Location: Planetside – Dunkirk Beach
Allies: Valkren Calderon,
Roona Osmari,
Kei Amadis,
Jessica Med-Beq,
Elijah King, Lupewaurreg, Jost Cal Dayne
Enemies: Kor Vexen,
Scipio Alta,
Tekkio, Thane Danson,
Sokar Azad
Position/Action: Engaging Sith forces at Dunkirk
Jost Cal Dayne’s perspective:
Jost waddle-ran, his breathes coming in and out raggedly. His cheeks puffed in and out with the effort of pushing oxygen through his, less than well maintained, cardio-respiratory system. He wanted to shout back at the Sergeant that he was running just as fast as he could, but even that was far too much effort for the Corellian.
Several paces ahead of them, Lupewauregg loped behind the advancing Ranger forces. Blaster fire continued to intensify as the advancing Sith forces made their way ever closer to the Rangers’ trench line.
To their left, about a hundred meters down the line a bright flash was followed by a large explosion as incoming artillery fire hit a section of trench.
The sudden screams of men and women dying in flames were drowned out by the noise of the impact, which was followed a split-second later by an intense wave of concussive force that knocked Jost on his back.
His whole body felt like it was on fire.
For a moment, Cal Dayne thought that he was dead.
Finally, it seemed, all the years of running away from trouble had caught up to him. He found it somewhat ironic that it had to happen here on the beach, the one fething time he tried to do the right thing. Or, more accurately, the one time he hadn’t been able to talk Waurr out of doing the right thing.
That was okay, though. After all, death was supposed to be a release from all his worldly cares and unhappiness…so why did it hurt so fething much?
“Oh feth me…” He moaned, rolling to his side. He wasn’t dead. Not yet, at least. Blinking rapidly, he struggled to clear the blurriness from his vision. The noise of the battle was gone also, replaced by a powerful ringing in his ears.
Slowly, or maybe not so slowly-he wasn’t sure, his vision cleared and he was treated to the sight of the aftermath. The artillery strike, it appeared, had collapsed an area of the trench line approximately fifty feet wide. Several flailing arms and legs could be seen sticking out of the ground-ostensibly belonging to
Ranger troopers who had suddenly found themselves buried underneath the ground.
As the seconds marched on, their collective flailing only continued to intensify. Why? He idly wondered in his sluggish state.
“They…they can’t breathe.” He answered himself. “They’re suffocating!”
Forcing himself up, Jost looked around. Where was Waurr? Had he been close enough to the blast to be buried too?
A moment later, the Corellian knew the answer was no. The giant Wookiee was still on his feet, something that didn’t surprise Jost in the least. He doubted there was a force in this galaxy that could put Waurr down for long. No, the Wookiee had almost made it to the site of the collapse, firing his bowcaster in unison with the rifles of those troopers who remained on their feet.
Their target, the advancing Sith vanguard, who were now only a few hundred meters away. With that entire section of trench out of commission, there was a hole through which the Sith infantry could push through. Jost didn’t know much about war, but even he could tell that was bad.
Rolling into his belly, he called out as loudly as he could. That Sergeant had to be around here somewhere. “We gotta get them outta the ground! Before they suffocate!”
From there, his roll became a crawl, and after a meter or two, he found himself on his feet. For the first time in his life, Jost Cal Dayne was running, truly running, into danger.
And he wasn’t the least bit afraid.
Upon reaching the first of the flailing appendages, the Corellian fell to his knees and began digging. He didn't have a trench shovel that many of the other troopers likely did as part of their kits, so he used his hands. Likely for him, the ground-freshly moved by the force of the blast-was loose and easy enough to claw away. It took him only a few seconds, following along the arm until he came to a shoulder, then a neck and finally a head.
The trooper, a young Twi’lek with red skin, took a deep breath. His hearing hadn’t yet come back, but Jost imagined he could hear it and he was certain that he could see the look of relief in the young soldier’s eyes.
Still, there was no time. Getting up, he moved to the next limb and the next, repeating the same set of steps each time. After uncovering his third trooper, he risked a glance upward. There, he found Waurr at the center of a firing line of about six troopers. In the time that he’d been working, they’d climbed through the ruined trench and now stood on the other side trying in vain to plug the hole. He could see that troopers from the intact trenches on either side of the collapse had also begun to climb out and moved to provide support.
Several of them had begun digging foxholes while others covered them. All the while, the Sith continued to march onward.
As Jost got to his fourth buried trooper, the Corellian began to notice that some of the limbs were slowing down, some had even stopped moving altogether. In his head, he knew that it was impossible to get to them all, but he forced himself to move faster than he ever thought possible.
With each trooper he was able to unearth, he found himself closer and closer to Waurr’s firing line. His hearing was getting better too, because he could hear his comrade’s furious and defiant growls and roars.
Another quick glance saw Waurr, now in hand to hand combat with a pair of Sith troopers who made it far enough in. A second glance, a moment later, saw those troopers laid to ruin and Waurr back to firing on the enemy with his bowcaster. A third glance, and now the entire firing line was being beset by enemies.
Another familiar figure also stood out among the increasingly savage melee, it was Rarr. Where in the hell’s had he come from? It didn’t matter, because he was ducking underneath a bayonet strike and driving what looked like a vibro-blade into the neck of one of the Sith troopers. Then he was pushing the muzzle of his side arm through the armored plates of another and firing. The unarmed Lorrdian was like a dancer, dealing death with each eloquent move of his body.
Still, it didn’t seem to be enough. At that moment, nothing seemed to be enough. Jost had just uncovered his sixth trooper when he sensed a shadow standing over him. He didn’t even need to look up to know that it wasn’t friendly.
Throwing his flabby arms in the air, Jost did the first thing he could think of and shouted. “Please don’t hurt me, I surrender! I surrender!”
When his eyes met the object of his fear, it only confirmed what he’d suspected. Several of the Sith infantry forces had made it through the Rangers’ lines. The trooper in front of him wore what seemed like faintly crimson armor, with insignia painted on it that Jost couldn’t read. What really drew the Corellian's attention was the nasty looking rifle the trooper held on him, finger held over the trigger.
There was the briefest of moments, like one of those split-seconds that still somehow feel like an eternity, where Jost’s eyes met that of the Sith trooper. Years of playing Sabaac had taught the Corellian how to read people and he knew, he just
knew, in that instant that the Sith was going to kill him.
In the breath-span of what happened next, one might have been able to describe Jost’s hand movement as if it were like lightening. The only exception to that was the fact that lightening could be seen and his hand moved so fast it seemed to teleport from one place to another. Then came flash of light as a bolt of super-heated energy seared into the space between the Sith’s chest plate and his helmet.
A split second after that came the sound of Jost’s trusty DL-44, lovingly called “Bette”, as it ended the Sith’s life right in front of the Corellian’s eyes.
***
Beltran’s perspective:
The first few moments of trench warfare had seemed utter chaos to the Lorrdian mercenary, turned soldier. Above him, weapons fire rained over the trench. The soldiers on the firing line fired back, dishing as much punishment out at the enemy as they were bringing in. He waited a few seconds for orders, but realized that waiting would quickly be the death of him.
Moving down the trench line, Beltran switched his particle rifle over to its projectile mode. The Sith were closing, and judging by the sound of fire, were likely well within range of the weapons projectiles. As he moved left, he made it approximately thirty or so paces before a young Ranger, a human, fell from his place on the firing line-a burning hole in the place where his chest had been.
Beltran was no stranger to death, but there was such a chaotic randomness to this kind of combat that the whole thing struck the assassin as wasteful. Still, he wasted no time climbing up to take the trooper’s place on the line.
There next to a man and a woman he had never met before in his life, the Lorrdian joined in the fight of his life. His rifle spat out projectiles as fast as it could, the sheer number of incoming enemies making up for the loss of accuracy.
When the weapon had spat out its last slug, Beltran didn’t bother to reload. He just switched back to the power cell and began to fire on the weapon’s beam setting. He did his best to fire as fast as he could, ensuring that each blast was a kill-or least a wounding shot-in order to make up for the drop in rate of fire.
He focused his mind, honed to a sharp edge of concentration. He had never before been a part of something like this, and in truth it thrilled him. His momentary previous ruminations on the wastefulness of war quickly became forgotten as he revelled in the death he dealt.
When the artillery strike came, decimating the section of trench immediately adjacent to his. He didn’t even think as he climbed out of the trench. His natural appetite for death mixed instinctively with what he’d learned about basic strategy and tactics while in basic training. He knew they needed to plug the hole, and he leapt-literally-at the chance to meet his enemy face to face.
As he scrambled up the ruins of the collapsed trench, he found that he wasn’t far from the first trooper to have his idea. Several, nearly a dozen and more poured in from the rear where Rangers continued to advance from the forest, and from each side of the intact trench line.
That didn’t surprise him much, if Colonel Calderon and the other Raiders were any indication and the training Beltran had received was the standard, then the Antarian Rangers were every bit as capable a force as existed in this galaxy.
What did surprise him was the nearly three meter tall Wookiee who stood in the middle of it all, firing off his bowcaster and roaring at the Sith as if daring them to face him. In truth, the Lorrdian didn’t really know how many of the Wookiee’s blasts actually hit the enemy, as he seemed more interested in shooting than actually hitting anything he shot at. But the profile Waurr presented was certainly intimidating.
Then, all of a sudden, Beltran was in the thick of it. He fired his rifle, lancing an approaching Sith through the chest with another beam before dropping it. He then ducked under another attack, a thrust with a bayoneted rifle. Pulling his blade as part of the same movement he came up and buryed it inside his attacker’s neck. Leaving the blade embedded in the dead being, he then side-stepped around another Sith who flew through the air quickly pursued by a Wookiee battle roar.
Drawing his side-arm, the Lorrdian came up behind yet another Sith. With his free hand he grabbed the trooper, spun him around and forced the muzzle of his pistol between the bottom of his helmet and the top of his chest-piece. His green eyes met the Sith’s hazel for the briefest of instances as he pulled the trigger again and again and again.
[SIZE=11pt]If death could be considered an art form, then Beltran would distinguish himself this day as a master artist.[/SIZE]
