I've never been good at naming stuff, but this is a comic/illustrated novel I'm working on.
Plot
Far future. Humanity truly was alone among the stars, and as the sole dominant lifeform of the galaxy, it had begun cannibalizing itself. Sole standing superpower had crumbled into pieces thousands of years ago, centuries of knowledge and technical progress lost. Common-place items become unknown artifacts of the old as entire sectors of the galaxy are cut off from each other. archaeology and military industrial complex began molding together. Sole rulers of vacuum are now nothing but scattered shadows, fighting amongst themselves, and the horrors their thousand-year-old reign had spawned.
Hundreds of thousands are drifting across space in seemingly eternal cryosleep, as desperate wars between religious fundamentalist groups, radical movements, pathetic attempts at reconstruction of great human state and megacorporations for rare, terraformed heaven-class worlds go on for seemingly, forever. Industrial moons, meant to be only inhabited by the thousands in the days of the old are now hosting millions in cramped underground bunkers. Only now, planet-side combat is seeing it's rebirth due to exclusively space-based warfare doctrines being developed. Any rebellion used to simply get starved via planetary blockades. Global literacy rates drop to ~30%. The present is bleak.
Yet there is still profit to be made. Colossal swaths of space legions desert, resorting to raiding and banditry as the primary strategy for survival. Others are not so foolish, forming massive mercenary companies, training planet-based armies. Main character is one of them, a simple soldier, each atom of his body is loyal to the company, he is ready to perform any order, no matter what. The mercenaries saved him from a hungry death in poverty on a barely-habitable planet, taught him how to read, fight and write. He is sent to defend a jungle world from a "small scale pirate raid." along with few thousands of his comrades.
Planetfall
They didn't know what was coming. In hours, all contact with the space fleet is lost, as ground objectives rapidly fall one after another. Instead of disorganized gangs armed with homemade guns and armored civilian trucks, they are faced against a fully organized force, armed with artillery, tanks and mechs. For hours, they desperately defend the last standing city. Entire neighborhoods are leveled, retreating brigades are ambushed and wiped out. Last stand at a factory results in a massacre, with only few evacuating on endoatmospheric aircraft, heading towards the LZ, yet their escape is cut short. Few survivors from the carriers are forced to go underground, scavenging power armor of their dead comrades, collecting whatever survivors of the PMC that are still around.
Whatever reconnisance reports coming in mention the invading force, instead of conducting clean-up and garrisoning the planet like in case of a proper hostile takeover, begin rapidly destroying any kind of infrastructure present. Planetary government falls, yet there is no sign of any reinforcements, evacuation or at the very least, fire support from space, not from the PMC nor the state the planet belongs to. Help is not coming. Strangely, their own power armor tells them that they are deceased, and are talking to fellow "deceased" troopers.
Aerial forward operating base which had seen thousands of battles is now burning down, turned into scrap, laying flat on the ground. Morale is rapidly declining, the mission was almost perfectly timed to come just before the replacement of neural inhibitors, making the user numb to fear, pain and almost any emotions. Brutal guerrila combat ensues. Neither side is taking prisoners.
After a couple of days of licking their wounds to the best of their abilities and collecting every last survivor in one place, the PMC remnant heads towards the last standing base codenamed "Echo" of the planetary garrison. Instead of a fighting army to reinforce, they see drunk rabble which themselves had seemingly turned into savages. Single road leading to "Echo" is filled with mutilated corpses on spikes, deserting soldiers are hung off trees. Multiple brigades of the government forces surrender immediately, believing that the last nail in their coffin had already arrived, a weakened fighting force with an arsenal of multiple salvaged tanks and converted civilian vehicles. They will fight another day.
"Echo" itself is in shambles, full of civilian refugees and barely standing soldiers, it is truly a miracle the base still stands. Higher-ups are nowhere to be seen, yet thankfully, the colonels in charge are not hostile to the idea of becoming a single, united army in the face of invaders. If their words are to be trusted, the generals have all welded themselves into a room, formulating a plan for counteroffensive. Their voices can still be heard, albeit MC does not believe a single word coming out of the officer's mouths, forcing an engineer at gunpoint to open the planning room up.
To their horror, they find out that the generals have all committed suicide, leaving a recording of their meeting to play out on full volume. They are truly alone, yet not for long.
At dawn, a single cargo ship appears out of nowhere, breaking the atmosphere with a highly-accurate hyperjump, piloted by a group of arms traders which had connections to multiple corrupt figureheads, wishing to purchase equipment from the stockpiles, absolutely oblivious to the chaos which had happened down below. After a short interrogation it is found out that the planet surface, to any outside observers seems perfectly intact and peaceful and the orbit is almost completely blockaded by unmarked, unknown spaceships. Luck had not completely turned away from them. In exchange for remaining endoatmospheric jets, the army is once again supplied with ammo and food.
The pieces of the puzzle come together. Seemingly, the PMC had sold any and all information regarding the planetary defences to the pirates, for a bigger payday, which in turn have been extensively supplied by an unknown, third party which is only concerned with making sure nothing gets off-world.
Unfinished part ahead
Multiple groups of soldiers and PMC attempt evacuation off-world, destroyed in the atmosphere by the orbiting fleet.
Remnants of planetary government are held hostage, forced to broadcast the official surrender message across the planet by the PMC remnant to hopefully, bring civilians to such levels of desperation that they're ready to pick up arms and join the planetary defence force. PMC is elevated to "selfless heroes defending the innocents which have been betrayed the same way by their government", assume control of the planet.
Captured bandits and pirates are sold off as slaves in exchange for equipment, multiple planetary production plants are restored to semi-functionality.
MC refuses to lead the defence force, earns a status of a legendary trooper.
Aerial forward operating base is restored, conducts multiple mass-scale terror bombings across the planet during it's last 72-hour flight, brought down via a high-precision orbital strike once and for all.
Massive assault happens in order to stabilize a nuclear plant in a middle of a meltdown.
Government officials are killed by third party.
Through some kind of machinations, it is later found out that the invasion was a distraction aimed at the planetary secret police which would be too busy surviving behind enemy lines to wonder what is happening.
The planet itself holds a device, perhaps a superweapon of unknown strength and might.
Pirate gangs, realizing that there is no escape begin fighting amongst themselves for resources, their equipment rapidly deteriorates due to misuse.
There are sightings of black endoatmospheric craft and highly advanced squads of soldiers seemingly searching for something.
A single SOS signal gets out, leading a mutiny within the PMC which was just about to leave the system. Multiple legions desert, joining up with their comrades to defeat the invasion.
PMC itself collapses, higher-ups are either found, killed or flee.
The government is alerted, sending a major force towards the planet to glass it.
A race for the weapon begins.
Please post feedback and tell me, what could be worked on, improved, whether it's "all edge and no point" or not etc. Thanks in advance!
Plot
Far future. Humanity truly was alone among the stars, and as the sole dominant lifeform of the galaxy, it had begun cannibalizing itself. Sole standing superpower had crumbled into pieces thousands of years ago, centuries of knowledge and technical progress lost. Common-place items become unknown artifacts of the old as entire sectors of the galaxy are cut off from each other. archaeology and military industrial complex began molding together. Sole rulers of vacuum are now nothing but scattered shadows, fighting amongst themselves, and the horrors their thousand-year-old reign had spawned.
Hundreds of thousands are drifting across space in seemingly eternal cryosleep, as desperate wars between religious fundamentalist groups, radical movements, pathetic attempts at reconstruction of great human state and megacorporations for rare, terraformed heaven-class worlds go on for seemingly, forever. Industrial moons, meant to be only inhabited by the thousands in the days of the old are now hosting millions in cramped underground bunkers. Only now, planet-side combat is seeing it's rebirth due to exclusively space-based warfare doctrines being developed. Any rebellion used to simply get starved via planetary blockades. Global literacy rates drop to ~30%. The present is bleak.
Yet there is still profit to be made. Colossal swaths of space legions desert, resorting to raiding and banditry as the primary strategy for survival. Others are not so foolish, forming massive mercenary companies, training planet-based armies. Main character is one of them, a simple soldier, each atom of his body is loyal to the company, he is ready to perform any order, no matter what. The mercenaries saved him from a hungry death in poverty on a barely-habitable planet, taught him how to read, fight and write. He is sent to defend a jungle world from a "small scale pirate raid." along with few thousands of his comrades.
Planetfall
They didn't know what was coming. In hours, all contact with the space fleet is lost, as ground objectives rapidly fall one after another. Instead of disorganized gangs armed with homemade guns and armored civilian trucks, they are faced against a fully organized force, armed with artillery, tanks and mechs. For hours, they desperately defend the last standing city. Entire neighborhoods are leveled, retreating brigades are ambushed and wiped out. Last stand at a factory results in a massacre, with only few evacuating on endoatmospheric aircraft, heading towards the LZ, yet their escape is cut short. Few survivors from the carriers are forced to go underground, scavenging power armor of their dead comrades, collecting whatever survivors of the PMC that are still around.
Whatever reconnisance reports coming in mention the invading force, instead of conducting clean-up and garrisoning the planet like in case of a proper hostile takeover, begin rapidly destroying any kind of infrastructure present. Planetary government falls, yet there is no sign of any reinforcements, evacuation or at the very least, fire support from space, not from the PMC nor the state the planet belongs to. Help is not coming. Strangely, their own power armor tells them that they are deceased, and are talking to fellow "deceased" troopers.
Aerial forward operating base which had seen thousands of battles is now burning down, turned into scrap, laying flat on the ground. Morale is rapidly declining, the mission was almost perfectly timed to come just before the replacement of neural inhibitors, making the user numb to fear, pain and almost any emotions. Brutal guerrila combat ensues. Neither side is taking prisoners.
After a couple of days of licking their wounds to the best of their abilities and collecting every last survivor in one place, the PMC remnant heads towards the last standing base codenamed "Echo" of the planetary garrison. Instead of a fighting army to reinforce, they see drunk rabble which themselves had seemingly turned into savages. Single road leading to "Echo" is filled with mutilated corpses on spikes, deserting soldiers are hung off trees. Multiple brigades of the government forces surrender immediately, believing that the last nail in their coffin had already arrived, a weakened fighting force with an arsenal of multiple salvaged tanks and converted civilian vehicles. They will fight another day.
"Echo" itself is in shambles, full of civilian refugees and barely standing soldiers, it is truly a miracle the base still stands. Higher-ups are nowhere to be seen, yet thankfully, the colonels in charge are not hostile to the idea of becoming a single, united army in the face of invaders. If their words are to be trusted, the generals have all welded themselves into a room, formulating a plan for counteroffensive. Their voices can still be heard, albeit MC does not believe a single word coming out of the officer's mouths, forcing an engineer at gunpoint to open the planning room up.
To their horror, they find out that the generals have all committed suicide, leaving a recording of their meeting to play out on full volume. They are truly alone, yet not for long.
At dawn, a single cargo ship appears out of nowhere, breaking the atmosphere with a highly-accurate hyperjump, piloted by a group of arms traders which had connections to multiple corrupt figureheads, wishing to purchase equipment from the stockpiles, absolutely oblivious to the chaos which had happened down below. After a short interrogation it is found out that the planet surface, to any outside observers seems perfectly intact and peaceful and the orbit is almost completely blockaded by unmarked, unknown spaceships. Luck had not completely turned away from them. In exchange for remaining endoatmospheric jets, the army is once again supplied with ammo and food.
The pieces of the puzzle come together. Seemingly, the PMC had sold any and all information regarding the planetary defences to the pirates, for a bigger payday, which in turn have been extensively supplied by an unknown, third party which is only concerned with making sure nothing gets off-world.
Unfinished part ahead
Multiple groups of soldiers and PMC attempt evacuation off-world, destroyed in the atmosphere by the orbiting fleet.
Remnants of planetary government are held hostage, forced to broadcast the official surrender message across the planet by the PMC remnant to hopefully, bring civilians to such levels of desperation that they're ready to pick up arms and join the planetary defence force. PMC is elevated to "selfless heroes defending the innocents which have been betrayed the same way by their government", assume control of the planet.
Captured bandits and pirates are sold off as slaves in exchange for equipment, multiple planetary production plants are restored to semi-functionality.
MC refuses to lead the defence force, earns a status of a legendary trooper.
Aerial forward operating base is restored, conducts multiple mass-scale terror bombings across the planet during it's last 72-hour flight, brought down via a high-precision orbital strike once and for all.
Massive assault happens in order to stabilize a nuclear plant in a middle of a meltdown.
Government officials are killed by third party.
Through some kind of machinations, it is later found out that the invasion was a distraction aimed at the planetary secret police which would be too busy surviving behind enemy lines to wonder what is happening.
The planet itself holds a device, perhaps a superweapon of unknown strength and might.
Pirate gangs, realizing that there is no escape begin fighting amongst themselves for resources, their equipment rapidly deteriorates due to misuse.
There are sightings of black endoatmospheric craft and highly advanced squads of soldiers seemingly searching for something.
A single SOS signal gets out, leading a mutiny within the PMC which was just about to leave the system. Multiple legions desert, joining up with their comrades to defeat the invasion.
PMC itself collapses, higher-ups are either found, killed or flee.
The government is alerted, sending a major force towards the planet to glass it.
A race for the weapon begins.
Please post feedback and tell me, what could be worked on, improved, whether it's "all edge and no point" or not etc. Thanks in advance!
