As the escape pod rocketed deep into the atmosphere it streaked across the sky, inside Vladimir fought to keep his lunch in as the airbrake engaged slowing their descent to a more manageable speed allowing the pod to impact into the ground without killing them all. They had impacted in a heavily wooded area near some of the rest of the pods, hopefully near enough that they could all form up and stage some sort of action against the enemy that no doubt would be pursuing soon enough.
Only part of Alpha squad was with Vladimir they were down by four marines and unfortunately they were in two different pods so forming up the squad would prove difficult. Unstrapping his harness quickly the Hapan climbed towards the rear hatch, he grabbed at the release and the rear hatch blew off its hinges giving him clearance to duck out of the pods and around the side. He took off his helmet, leaned over and puked. Rising slowly he spat the taste from his mouth and put his helmet back on, examining the HUD for clues of the situation.
In the immediate area there was a dozen pods, they had no maps of this planet so the scanners in their helmets and the few active scanners in the pods were forming a picture of their surroundings. As Vladimir started to get his bearings the rest of Alpha started to form up, beacons began popping up in the HUD and distress signals from various pods started coming in it was a horribly disorganized mess locally, and it seemed no officers had been amongst this group of survivors. Some of the operations officers were trying their best to bring some sanity to the mess but to little effect.
“Alpha time to get organized, we have approximately a platoon of men and women in our immediate area. The enemy will be coming soon enough, this forest will not keep them away forever. There is little doubt they will find a way to bring troops in here soon enough.” Vladimir instructed as he looked to one of his squad mates.
“Compile the distress signals and set priority based on proximity first, then rank of the officer commanding the survivors.”
Looking at his HUD again Vladimir identified and isolated the comm gear of all the marines in the immediate area, they had more than enough personnel locally to form a platoon but unfortunately most of them were crew from the ship and few of them would be armed, still it was better than nothing. He activated his comm. From his HUD it was clear that the officers that had been in these escape pods were dead, someone had to take command and knowing he could do it faster if now better than the rest he decided it must be him.
“This is Sergeant Kirov, I have isolated your comms to operate on the frequency shared by Alpha squad, I am taking command for now as we apparently have no higher ranking officers in the area. Share comms with any of the ship’s crew that are equipped with comm gear, encrypt their signal with the cypher we are currently utilizing.”
As the marines started to respond to his orders more and more signals joined the HUD, they didn’t have all the details that were available from the equipment the marines were wearing but that didn’t matter. As officers from the crew started to join the conversation they started to try to assert their influence on the informal platoon.
“Sergeant Kirov, this is Lieutenant Marksen, I am going to be assuming command as I am the highest ranking officer here.”
“All due respect sir but no, if we were in space I would be happy to defer to your experience but we are operating on my field now, if you disagree feel free to bring me up on charges when I get us out of this mess.” Vladimir stated firmly as signals from the rest of the marines came through indicating they were intent on following his orders.
Realizing he was going to lose the support of those amongst them that were armed the Lieutenant backed off quickly.
“I just might do that Sergeant but given the situation I defer command to you for the time being.”
Satisfied he had the attention of all those in the region Vladimir identified the pod nearest to the center of the group and marked it on his HUD transmitting the marker to everyone else in the platoon.
“Ok form up on the location I have marked on the HUD, double time, we have distress signals to respond to.”
Minutes later the informal platoon was formed up, they had done an inventory of their equipment and found a few extra side arms, he had approximately four squads of armed men and a naturally defensible position. He quickly formed four formal squads out of the marines and crew that were armed, Alpha of course, Bravo, Charlie and Delta.
“Delta Squad dig in here, we will establish this location as our base, Lieutenant Marksen and his crew will assist in establishing a medical triage center here. Bravo and Charlie we have formed a search grid, I am uploading it to your HUDs now, I want you to gather what survivors you can find and bring them back here. Bring along any gear that can be carried the Lieutenant and his people will keep an inventory of everything that we have recovered.” Vladimir ordered as he looked at the Lieutenant who had questioned his command who was glaring at him intensely. It didn’t matter to the Hapan man if the Lieutenant liked him or not, as long as he could keep them all alive, that is all that mattered.
“When an appropriate officer is found in good enough condition to take command I want to be informed immediately, they should take command of this platoon as soon as they are able. We have identified the signal of the General’s escape pod, they have activated a beacon and their signal indicates they are under assault from enemy drop ships. Alpha squad is going go directly there and provide assistance. Orders understood?”
As all the marines and a few of the crew nodded in acknowledgement Vladimir knew he had the buy in he needed.
“Move out then, inform me of any difficulties.”
The squads fanned out to perform their assigned tasks, delta remaining behind with what remained of the unarmed crew to dig in a defensive line as Charlie and Bravo moved from pod to pod rescuing survivors and gathering valuable equipment from those who no longer needed it the forest had so far kept the enemy back but that wouldn’t last forever. Vladimir and Alpha squad double timed it towards the beacon the General’s group had placed down. They came to the edge of the forest looking down into the valley below where enemy drop ships were landing most of them well back from the location of the General’s beacon but a few of them were converging on the General’s location and he could see an exchange of fire between them.
“Move it, the General and the survivors in that valley are going to be overwhelmed if we don’t get in there to extract them.” Vladimir ordered as he charged down into the valley using a gorge to cover their approach, they stopped by another escape pod finding all of its occupants already dead.
“Gather weapons and ammo quickly.”
The squad geared up the two members that had been part of the ship’s crew with the weapons and armor from the dead marines in the escape pod as Vladimir gathered tags from the dead. No soldier who lost his life on this rock would be considered MIA presumed dead if he had anything to say about it. Of course that was unlikely as there would be a lot of dead soldiers on the planet and on the crippled ship above them but he was going to do his absolute best so every family of these men and women would get closure.
The rest of the squad geared up the moved forward slowly, picking their approach carefully, they climbed up the side of the gorge and peeked over the edge at the drop ships. He spotted the General and the survivors of his pod, he could see they were still exchanging fire with enemies on the drop ship but he could also see enemies coming up from the valley below they were much more organized then those on the drop ships harrying the General and the survivors with him.
“Ok, time to extract the General, we will have to drive a wedge in the rear of the enemy’s’ formation, get the General and his people out, once we have him back to the camp he can establish a proper command.” Vladimir ordered as he climbed to the top of the ridge signalling the marines in his squad to follow. He brought his blaster carbine up, aimed down the sight as the rest of the squad did the same.
They closed in on the rear of one of the emptied enemy drop ships, the crew of this drop ship had been intelligent enough to face their hatch away from the General and his pod so they could unload their troops in relative safety. Vladimir signalled two of his marines and the two crew members of the ship to enter the drop ship and kill the crew silently, they may be able to commandeer this vessel to extract the General and his people. He moved up the side of the ship with the rest of the squad using it for cover as the marines inside the drop ship indicated they had cleared the interior and were trying to establish control over the vessel. Vladimir peered around the edge of the ship seeing the enemy focused on staying in cover between themselves and the General’s position, exchanging careful fire, apparently intent on capturing the General. He signaled for his own men to move in behind the enemy slowly, keeping to cover and the moment they were spotted by the enemy they all took cover and began firing on the backs of the enemy in front of them. They had the benefit of having the enemy so most of the enemy fell quickly and those that didn’t sought better cover to the left or right flank.
“General this is Sergeant Kirov with Alpha squad, we have commandeered an enemy drop ship we are here to extract you back to the treeline. We have established a base of operations in the forest the woods are too thick for the enemy to land in. If you would be so kind as to bring your people back to towards us we will cover your retreat.” Vladimir requested as he and his squad kept the fire on the enemy constant to keep them down. He popped a few smoke grenades off his belt and threw them beyond the General’s position between them and the enemy to cover the retreat.
[member="Hasjo Hallu"] [member="Jeela Tillian "][member="Pravis Sharman"] [member="Melakoth Tyrin "][member="Darth Ferus"] [member="Maleus"]
TL;DR - Gathered survivors in the thick woods they had crashed in establishing a defensive line and triage center for wounded. Formed an informal platoon of ships crew and marines established four squads of armed individuals. Ordered Delta to hold their defensive position, Ordered Charlie and Bravo to seek out more escape pods, gather survivors and equipment to return to their defensive position in the woods before the enemy could get organized for a push into the woods. Took Alpha squad to extract Jedi General Hallu back to their base. Commandeered New Order dropship for possible use to extract the General. Engaged New Order forces engaged in combat with General Hallu and his survivors giving them an route to retreat along.
(Sorry for the length of this, just kept getting more ideas
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