[Prologue] Hitting Home

The Roughest, the toughest, the Galactic Marines. Set in a world where peace is more prevalent than war, the Marines are here to ensure that the status quo does not get flipped around. taken from the best and brightest of every race in the United Galactic republic, the Marines will sacrifice everything to keep the peace they have fought for through generations.
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Kai
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[Prologue] Hitting Home

Post by Kai »

Niall Callaghan found himself, brown hair, blue eyes, thick accent and all, stuck in the barracks at the UGR marine base on one of the planets central to the republic, the planet Hetra. His unit was doing a few training exercises, so he was stuck hurrying up and waiting. From the window of his fourth-floor dormitory, he could see one of the UGR's ships docked at the nearby spaceport, a Drathonian built ship called the Virkas, it was in for some minor repairs and upgrades, and it was neat to see the gargantuan craft sitting on what looked from this distance to simply be scaffolding, but the Irishman knew to rather be specially built supports to handle the weight of the craft on a world with gravity, since in space it could be as big as it wanted to without having to worry about collapsing under its own weight.

Having finished their training duties for the day, Niall's squad had been released to a base liberty, which he figured he might as well take advantage of. Rather than his uniform, the Terran soldier had opted to wear some civilian clothing, consisting of a pair of khaki pants, a t-shirt with the logo of some obscure band from more than a thousand years ago (made for him by Cormac Flynn), with a civilian-patterned brown leather jacket over the top. He had spiked his short hair up as much as it would go, and the opposite end of his person was covered in a pair of simple sneakers. Last but not least, he had a leather belt slapped around his waist, from which was hung a small sidearm. He had yet to use it to protect himself, but figured it was better to be safe than sorry, even in this time of peace.

All set up, the young man made his way out of the barracks building and took a taxi out to the nearby town, closer to the spaceport dry docks, and went looking to see if he could find a decent pub somewhere near the shadow of the hulking spacecraft. This part of town, closer to the industrial areas, was naturally a bit rougher than the main drag, but Niall knew that you were a lot more likely to find a bar or pub with character in such an area. Getting out of the taxi and paying the bill, he began to make his way around, trying to judge from the multitude of flashing LED (And even one old school Neon) signs, which one might be the most appropriate to enjoy himself.

Cormac was spending his day in much the same way. He had been out and about for some time now after getting the go ahead from the techies in the lab, and as such had a head start on exploring. In that time he had already wandered around the town's main market district on an impromptu shopping spree for the purpose of finding a nice hat to wear. New cap in hand, or rather on head, he fancied a drink and followed his sixth sense as it lead him to a nice cluster of pubs and breweries.

After a brief pub crawl to find the best venue to pay homage to his ancestors, he decided on a cozy hole in the wall with a classy neon sign out front that read The Jolly Taxpayer. It didn't have the most savory selection of patrons, but it was decent enough for him while he was still solo flying. Nestled up to the bar with a heady pint, he absent mindedly watched the TVs as they played a selection of local news and sports recaps, while listening in on some of the neighboring conversations.

Inexplicably, Nial found himself drawn toward the odd duck on the row- the only bar that had a Neon sign as opposed to the much more common brightly lit LED sign favored by seedy establishments for its low cost, bright light, efficiency, and ease of procurement. The Irishman made his way over, stopping in front of the pub momentarily to gaze at what the sign said, laughing a bit at the name, before looking into the large window and nearly soiling his pants.

"Awww, Feck, how'n the hell do ah always seem tah run intah tha' sonnovabich" he muttered to himself, half jokingly and half serious, trying to decide whether it was worth it to be with a familiar face, especially whith how his last few encounters with his old hometown friend had gone. He stared just a bit langer than he should have and then walked into the building, the door hitting a small bell that jingled as he entered. He braced himself internally, knowing that Cormac had a sixth sense for whenever he showed up.

Perking up at the sound of the door opening, Cormac half turned to glance over. Pleasantly surprised by who happened in, he raised his glass and greeted his old friend, With a brief gesture he offered the open seat next to him, but remained acutely aware of how Niall seemed on the previous mission and decided he would leave it at a suggestion rather than his usual candid invitation. Whatever the decision was, he still waved down the bartender and ordered a fresh drink for himself, and a first drink for the younger Irishman.

Niall sighed, relieved that Cormac wasn't trying to make a scene for once. Granted, this was more like how the man had been back before either of them had joined the military. Easing up a bit, he decided that he should go and sit by his friend. It also didn't hurt when he noticed that Cormac had ordered two drinks, which, while Cormac was a heavy drinker, he nearly always only ordered one at a time, this meant that the second was likely for him.

Sidling down next to the somewhat older man, Niall made himself comfortable and patted the other on the back. "Oi mate, how yeh doin' tonigh? Ah knew ah migh find yeh in a place like this'un. Jes goes teh show yer a creature a habit ah guess" He picked up the pint that was placed in front of him, and raised it to his friend, with a quick "Thank yeh kindleh" to the man.

"Yup, cheers mate," Cormac responded as he tugged the front of his flat cap in greeting. "Told ya, first round's on me. And doing pretty well meself. Been crawling between pubs until recently, decided on settling in here. Good thing too, it seems. Otherwise we'd both be flying solo, and where's the fun in that? At least now we can wingman properly." Taking another pull on his drink, he sighed contentedly. As Niall observed, Cormac seemed more docile than usual, like he was decompressing and recharging.

"Passed by a couple of clubs with good selections, but figured I'd opt for relaxing with a drink first over the typical debauchery. Get a relaxed pace going for a change," Cormac mused. "How about you, mate? Doing well after your first field trip?"

"Bah, it aint no good havin' too much fun then gettin' in trouble, though ah bet yeh can get away wit' a bit more'n ah do." Niall followed this up with a swig from the glass, setting it down with a practiced care that came with having drank a pint or twenty before. Relaxing certainly didn't sound bad, with as wound up as they had been doing all these exercises one after the other. It almost made him wonder if they were expecting something, but he dismissed the thought. He'd heard somewhere that the best way to preserve peace was to always be ready for war, so it probably had something to do with that.

"Aye, clubs are nice an' all, but this place's got effing billiards and darts," Cormac agreed. He hadn't dealt with as many exercises as a standard grunt, but the lab had him going through his own share of pain; namely, continuing education and applied scientific theory. "Mate, I signed up to cast fireball and magic missile, and the labbies got me studying and experimenting. After the run in with the bearodiles they have been pretty anal about stress testing. Hell, they even insisted on keeping the suit in their possession, so all I got is the compact version. Great for some parlor tricks, but it has no where near as much gusto as the real deal."

"An ah se yer doin' a real good job a studyin', findin yerself tha best bar in town after much much studyin' ah'm sure," Niall joked, taking another drink. he took a moment to look up at the scores on the latest games, noting that Ireshire was actually doing fairly well in the Terra Fin leagues, but their scores likely wouldn't net them much on the galactic leage playoffs.

"Ya kiddin'? My capstone project back in Uni was fueled by seventy-five percent beer, and the other twenty-five percent I won't mention in polite company," Cormac chuckled as he downed the last of his pint, and waved for another. Setting down his empty glass, he leaned forward and rested his chin against his braced palm. "Seriously though, mate. I went to Uni to get a degree, so that I could join the MTek department, because I wanted to play around with magic. Now, majority of my time is spent doing boring science stuff. It's like becoming a cop and finding out the job is mostly paper work."

Niall gave a hearty chuckle at that, still nursing his first beer a bit, not wanting to get too drunk, considering he had maneuvers the next day. "Aye, but a' least yeh still get tha donuts a' the end a tha day, doncha?" he joked, as the bar suddenly shook.

"What in the-" Niall muttered, as the bar shook again, and the sounds of screaming and confusion started coming from outside, followed in a bit of a distance by the din of battle suddenly breaking out.

The movement immediately caught Cormac's attention as the vibrations traveled up his arm. Perking up, any evidence of his previous malaise was gone as he looked out the door with a hard stare. "Sounds like somebody's havin' a party an' didn't invite us," he said as he stood up from his stool and made his way to the door at a rather casual pace as he went to step outside. Looking around, he tried to get a better idea of what might be going on, and where.

"Oi Niall, up for some sightseeing?" Cormac called over to his friend as he leaned back inside.

Niall got up, following Cormac toward the door, and when the other asked him if he was up for some 'sightseeing', he merely nodded, a hand going to the hidden holster around his waist, ensuring his sidearm was still there. As they went outside, the sounds became much louder, along with the shouting. The duo rounded the building, only to realize that not too terribly far in the distance, the supports holding up the ship in dry docks were on fire, some of them already beginning to collapse under the immense weight of the vessel.

Closer in, a firefight had broken out- a group of perpetrators had attempted to escape through the maze of city streets, but had only gotten so far before a combination of police and well-armed citizenry had cornered them. Aside from the firefight, however, everyone was running away from the flames and the threat of the ship falling over.

"Niall, how are ya for defense right now?" Cormac asked as they got closer. "I've got my ballistic weave outfit on, but if you just have standard civvies on then hold a safe distance and focus on support. How about ammo? How many mags do you have?"

"All ah got is whats on mah back" Niall answered simply, flapping open his leather jacket to reveal that that's all it was, however, he pulled out his sidearm and a couple of extra magazines. "Ah got 36 rounds fer the CPL pistol an' about fifteen fer mah thigh pistol, though tha' one's no good past 'bout ten meters."

"Sounds good, mate. Just play it safe. Don't need my drinking buddy taking the wrong kind of shot," Cormac added with a light joke. "Ah got two mags for my pistol, counting the loaded, and my compact MTek unit. Ah'm gonna need to be a bit closer, so counting on you to watch my back, aye?"

Approaching the fight, Cormac gauged what the best approach was that would give him the best chance of not getting shot in the head, and, if possible, help mitigate civilian crossfire. Peeking around the corner at the skirmish. The alleyway made it a choke point, and it was already crowded with police and gungho citizens.

"We should try and get those civilians to fall back. It'd gives us more room and get them out of harms way."

"Aye a fair plan, that," Niall agreed, making sure his pistol was ready to go. He checked the chemical cartridges that reacted to produce a laser blast to ensure that they were still properly contained, and that they didn't have any noticeable cracks, as Niall had re-used them quite a few times since new ones were expensive and hard to come by. Satisfied, he gave Cormac a hand signal to show that he was ready to go, and headed forward, putting himself behind the nearest piece of cover he could find.

"Make sure an' get 'em movin' quick, an keep 'em outta mah line o' fire!" Niall called, as he surveyed the firefight more completely. On their side, more or less surrounding a small building that seemed to be butted up against a larger one, was the group of police and vigilantes. The vigilantes were a ragtag group of Terrans, Drathonians, Chataans, and even a Moonie. It seemed that the police had the same idea as the two Marines did, as the brunette could tell they were attempting to get the citizenry to step back away farther.

On the other side, inside and behind some makeshift barricades around the small lean-to building, were the renegades, consisting entirely of Terrans, all of whom wore a white armband with a logo that looked a bit like a stylized version of the cracked planet Terra. They were fighting back, using assault rifles and submachine guns, which was doing a very good job at keeping their opponents, whom were more or less entirely armed with sidearms (The Moonie had gotten ahold of a shotgun somehow), at bay.

"Shoot ta thrill, mate!" Cormac confirmed as he pulled out his custom biker goggles and strapped them on. Rolling his shoulders, he gave an affirmative hand sign before rounding the corner, keeping his head low as he quickly advanced towards the firefight; checking the HUD feed in his goggles a couple times to see if it saw anything he didn't. Once he arrived at the defenses that the civvies were using, he did what he could to get their attention.

"Alrigh' civvies, ya've done good, but the marines are here now and this alley is gonna get toasty. Either get down or get back. We'll cover you," Cormac called out, split between his admiration for their taking action, and his annoyance at them taking up space. Looking back to confirm Niall had his back, he rounded his barrier and advanced some more.

Instead of listening to Cormac, however, the civilians simply made room for him. Through the continuous firefight, one of the renegades was hit in the arm, forcing the man to retreat. However, the vacancy he left was soon filled by another, whom came out from inside to take up the former's station, keeping everyone more or less behind their cover.

As he moved closer, Cormac could see that there were four heavily armed men outside, with three more positioned at windows, all fairly well protected and rather cognizant of the civilians whom were taking what amounted to potshots at them. the fire continued back and forth, with the narrow street (Or wide alley, depending on how you viewed it) lit up with the blast from Niall's laser pistol, which managed to melt one of the defender's rifles, causing him to toss the scorched weapon and duck behind cover.

"That's the way!" Cormac cheered at the incoming laser fire. "Alright, time to show off some of my cool tricks. Covering fire!"

Cupping his right hand, he focused energy on the compact MTek unit he had, generating a modest fire ball before pulling out his pistol. Looking around the dumpster he had set up behind, he threw the fire at the insurgents behind the barricade, banking on some degree of surprise.

"Moving up!" Cormac called back, hoping to not be shot in the ass as he ducked over to the wall and rushing towards the barricade. Firing a couple of shots from his pistol he tried to keep direct fire at him down as he formed another fireball.

Cormac's plan worked since, short of seeing a guy lugging around a flame thrower, it's typically uncommon to see flames being spewed in such quantity, unless you blow something up. Still, the sudden addition of two skilled fighters to the fray made a major impact, magic flames or no. The renegades ducked behind cover until they saw the flames stop, then poked up again to start firing, definitely focusing on the flame-spouting lunatic that was bumrushing them.

Again, Niall was able to snipe a machinegun out of one of the defender's hands, causing that person to duck down as the other had done, though the previous person the young marine had shot at was now back to the fight with his sidearm.

"Ah migh' hafta kill 'em if'n they stay so persistent" the young Irishman shouted to his counterpart, as he moved a bit closer by rushing to a different pile of debris, trailed by a hail of bullets that were just too far behind to quite catch up to him.

This. This is what Cormac had been waiting for. A real fight that he could test himself with. It wasn't a glorified game of tag like back at the lab, and while the beasts back in the jungle had been challenging it still wasn't a proper battle. These insurgents had guns and they meant business, and one wrong move and he wasn't going to have a redo. Flame-spouting lunatic was apt, as Cormac hurled another fireball with a devilish grin on his face.

Cormac's reckless charge was not without its drawbacks however, as a few of the bullets flying at him made contact. Thanks the his ballistic weave clothing he was saved from being swiss cheese, with the small rounds stopping completely and the larger rounds losing a degree of momentum; and, as bad of a wake up call as a bullet is, it did a good job of focusing the Irishman. Once he was within ten meters of the barricade he dove behind the last bit of cover he would have.

"I've met honeybees that stung worse than you guys!" Cormac jeered before he moved on to stage two of his plan. "If I'd had the actual unit I wouldn't have needed to get this close. Techies owe me a pint." Peeking around as little as he could to get a better view of the barricade, wishing for probably the first time that he had an Earth unit rather than Fire.

"Come on, this thing has to be able to do more than just toss fireballs, It's magic, right?" he said as he looked at his hand and started to really focus. Maybe if he concentrated enough energy he could make a fireball with some boom rather than sizzle.

Niall peeked out from behind his bit of cover long enough to see Cormac take a few hits, and shook his head, wincing a bit in imagined pain. Part of their training involved getting shot (which was Niall's least favorite part, but thankfully the republic had the technology to easily heal such a wound) but that didn't make it any less painful, especially if it hit somewhere important. Thankfully, Cormac was obviously still awake, but he probably wouldn't last too much longer.

Just as Niall was about to pull the trigger on a third well-aimed shot, the overhead roar of a flight of starfighters closing in made him (And just about everyone else) look skyward for just a moment. The Vigilante citizens all started cheering for a moment, then looked on in horror as they began to fire missiles at the supports holding the docked starship up. Niall's face fell as he realized that these weren't friendlies coming in to fly support.

From the small shack, a mild thud could be heard, and bits of concrete and a lot of dust billowed from the open door, as if some sort of demolition charge had gone off. It was then that Niall realized that they weren't holding out in that shack indefinitely, they were just using it as cover as they tried to get into the building next to it.

"What in the world was that?" Cormac asked as the situation seemed to escalate further. "Well, here goes nothing." He poked around cover and chucked his fireball at the barricade, huffing slightly as it functioned identically to his other fireballs. Rolling his eyes, he raised his pistol and began firing from his new position. Whatever they were up to in that shack, he would still need to get past the barricade to do anything about it.

Cormac's fire wasn't met with much aside from the wall and some other cover, because in the distraction, the defenders had taken to running into the shack and starting to make their way out of dodge. One of the men, however, wasn't so lucky, taking a laser blast to the calf, which brought him down quite quickly, and, being the last one, found himself without anyone to help him escape.

Niall moved forward, now that they were no longer being peppered with random gunfire, moving past the now stunned citizenry who were watching in awe as the rogue fighters took to trying and finishing the job that had been started by the renegades on foot. the brown-haired man lunged forth, settling in next to Cormac and smacking him in the shoulder

"Ya bloody fookin' idiot, nearly got yerself killed!" he scolded, pointing at their now mostly vanished quarry. "They weren't tryin ta fight us off, jus' tryin ta make time ta get in there. Obviously they got some way o' escapin'. Use yer fancy glasses ta tap into them cop comms an tell 'em to go around tha buildin' we'll take this side."

Cormac winced as Niall hit his shoulder. "Well excuse the hell out of me," he said as he turned to face down his friend, his face stern and unapologetic. He looked like he had his own share of words, but relented for the time being. Lifting a hand to his goggles, he adjusted his communications frequency to that of the local law enforcement channel.

"This is Tech Specialist Flynn with the UGR marines, the bandits blew their way into the neighboring building. I recommend cutting around and setting up a perimeter on the next street over. Another marine and I'll pursue from this end. Over," Cormac said in an oddly measured tone as he made his way towards the shack. His communication over, he checked his mag and slapped it back into place.

"For the record, Niall, every bullet I took was a bullet that didn't risk one of the civilians," he said at last before checking the entry.

Ignoring Cormac's comment, Niall held out a hand to help the Noncon soldier up, before heading carefully toward the little shack, keeping low under cover. He crouched down, trying to see if he could make his way close without getting himself into any trouble- When a gunshot rang out, sounding to have come from something small-caliber, like a handgun. Though Niall couldn't see, it was the man he had injured earlier, whom had propped himself up inside the shack just enough that he could fire at anyone trying to come in the door.

"Cripes, Ah'm too close" he muttered, realizing that he couldn't move without making himself a target and acutely aware that he was incredibly vulnerable without the high-tech body armor he wore into combat.

Overhead, the trio of fighters continued to fire at the supports holding the Drathonian-made ship up, the beefy supports finally taking enough damage that they began to creak, while the ship started to lean threateningly.

When the shot fired, Cormac pressed himself against the wall near the door. "Ya alright, mate?" Cormac called back. Inching towards the entrance he peeked carefully around the corner to get a view of what he could expect going in. Luckily, it seemed his buddies had left him behind, likely going through the improvised doorway they had made. Prepping a fireball, he looked back to Niall and counted down from three on his free hand. Once he finished the count he lobbed the fireball inside, and a second later rounded the corner himself as he closed the distance with the injured man in order to deliver a solid kick to his temple.

With the oncoming fireball, the man instinctively raised his hands to protect his face, instead getting pretty nasty burns on his arms and torso, and setting his outfit ablaze just long enough for him to not notice Cormac coming in to finish him off. Cormac's kick connected, but not as solidly as he had hoped with the man's arms in the way, still, it was more than enough to incapacitate the man, knocking him unconscious and tossing him aside a bit, where he laid still on the floor, sizzling a bit.

"Ya got 'em good?" Niall asked, peeking in the doorway and looking past his comrade to see what was going on further in, and his eyes widened. In front of them, in the middle of the large warehouse, was a medium-sized troop transport, one that was decently aggressive as well, armed with a pair of rotating cannon, mounted on stubby wings that sat to either side of the craft. He could see the side of it, the rear hatch open and people piling in.

"Aww sheeit, we gotta hurry, Cormac!" he yelled, moving through the shed and getting a closer look, noticing a few piles of crates here and there around the warehouse. Just in time for a shot to come from behind one of them.

“Aye, no kiddin’,” Cormac agreed as he pressed himself against a wall and peeked into the makeshift hangar. With the kind of hardware they were packing, it would be a hard sell to believe these were fringe element terrorists. They hard struck hard and fast, crippling a UGR cruiser, and were exfilling just as quick. If they hadn’t shot him a few times, he might have been impressed by their coordination. “Seriously though, who the Hell are these tossers?” he asked as he popped out his magazine and checked his ammo, before popping it back in place. “Think the boys in blue have had time ta flank? Otherwise this is gonna be on the rough side.”

With a few words muttered under his breath, Cormac tightened his grip on his pistol before looking over to his buddy. “I’ll launch a ball out, hopefully that will cause them to duck back long enough for us to beat feet to some forward cover of our own. Erin go bragh, mate.” Bracing his hand off to the side he formed another fire ball and waited for Niall to confirm that he was set as well. With a silent countdown, he chose a break in the oncoming fire to launch his shot. Waiting a beat or two longer he rounded the corner.
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Mr. Blackbird Lore
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Re: [Prologue] Hitting Home

Post by Mr. Blackbird Lore »

As Cormac's fireball hurtled into the enemy presence, which was making a superbly organized fighting retreat, it was accompanied by the trademark plasma salvo of a Papa from the flank assigned to the cops. The energy storm struck down dozens of unsuspecting armed men and women and ruined countless parcels in the collateral. By the time a counteroffensive was made, at least half a dozen were dead or injured and the gunner had trained the heavy assault weapon on the transport itself.

The gunner was a startling sight. Basic marine body armor shielded her broad torso and thick legs, but her exposed skull and arms revealed a rich tan. She wielded the weapon designed for a tripod and two-man team by herself, left trigger finger locked tight. Pale hazel eyes were lit by an imposing inner fire, and the right side of her face was dominated by a burn scar that resembled an arcing comet or lethal comma. Half her eyebrow and the hairline above her temple on that side were casualties lost to the corrupt flesh. Another wild series of scarring had mottled and disfigured her left shoulder into a twisted mass of poorly healed tissue and muscle that seemed not to affect her aim in the slightest.

Before the gunner could deal significant damage to the vessel, she suffered two shots. One was caught on the body armor and would merely leave a bruise, while the other bit into the exposed mound of her right trapezius. She stumbled, spun slightly, and fell. Empowered by the sudden success, gunfire in her direction amplified tenfold. The grinder was shot to hell, forcing a hasty retreat to cover. Or, it should have. Instead, she rose to her feet and drew a sidearm with practiced precision and returned fire while briskly crouch-running to cover.

A soft click indicated to members of the police channel a new arrival. Most likely couldn't hear it over the din of the gunfight. None could miss the steady female voice that came across the line, however. "All units, requesting a plasma shitstorm to recover the heavy ordnance. Repeat, all units cover fire immediately." If it was the woman who had just been shot, there was no distress in her voice. Just the cold certainty typically reserved for androids and psychopaths.
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Kai
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Re: [Prologue] Hitting Home

Post by Kai »

With the sudden influx of policemen, and the surprise entrance of the heavy gunner from the main entrance to the warehouse, the transport's gunners were forced to shift their attention from the small makeshift back entrance to the now suddenly heavily populated front. The policemen tried to give the heavy gunner the covering fire she wanted, but a hail of heavy plasma bolts from the turrets began to rain down on their position, something that even the sturdiest of Terrans couldn't survive without the heaviest of shields or body armor. As it was, the cover they had of crates and concrete barricades piled up near the entrance wasn't going to cut it for long.

The remaining enemies were forced to beat feet into the transport, or take what cover they could behind and between nearby crates of their own. The vast majority of the fire found its way toward the front entrance, but there were still a couple of enemies for Niall and Cormac to deal with. On top of that, a steady rumbling sound as well as the slow shaking of the ground made it apparent that the rogue starfighters were having an effect on the drydocks, causing the Drathonian warship (Which could barely be seen out the main entrance of the warehouse) to list even more, threatening to come down on the facilities and nearby residences and businesses to its side.

"Oi, mate, looks like this'n is gonna be real bad!" Niall Callaghan called out to Cormac, thankful for the distraction caused at the other interest. He took advantage of it to make another well-aimed shot with his 2911, frying a plasma rifle out of the hands of an unsuspecting adversary
"If we can stop this 'ere transport, at leas' we'll 'ave someone to blame fer this whole mess.."
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Straken
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Re: [Prologue] Hitting Home

Post by Straken »

The older Irishman was making himself small in the corner of the cover he was using. His unit was getting worn out, and he along with it. The small portable unit he worn was not particularly meant for this kind of use, and the wear was beginning to show. His fire balls were becoming less stable, and they were taking longer to form. Soon enough he wasn't going to be able to contribute much. Biting his lip, he ran through several different options, but they either would be too little too late, or just plain crazy.

"Alright" Cormac called out to Niall, "I got an idea! Neither you, nor the specs back at lab are likely to approve."

As he spoke he shed his jacket and began to undo the clasps that held his portable MTek unit to his chest and arm. With the power supply sitting in his hand, he pulled out a small screw driver that he kept in a side pocket for maintenance purposes, only this time he wasn't going to be doing maintenance per se. With a hand still on the trigger, he fluctuated the power output as he removed the protective shell around power source. "And Swanepole said I never paid attention," he mused as he did what he could to try and short circuit a system he only vaguely understood; in theory it should be easier that way. Only real trick would be making sure it didn't meltdown while he was still holding it, but with a bit of Irish luck it would create a grenade with a blast respectable enough to mix things up a bit.

Working diligently, he could hear the sound of a gun heavier than most anything else he had heard in person began to sing, and Cormac could only hope that it was on their side. Sure enough, a rather casual voice came over the comm channel requesting covering fire. "Well, here goes nothing," he said to himself as he quickly clasped the unit to itself, trying to make it as compact as possible. Once it began to smoke and whine Cormac made his call. "This will either be awesome! Or it will do jack shit. Here's hoping for awesome!"

Pushing away from the wall, he swung hard and lobbed the expensive piece of experimental technology at the terrorists. "God it had better blow up, because otherwise I am screwed."
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Kai
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Re: [Prologue] Hitting Home

Post by Kai »

Much to Cormac's joy, the jury-rigged bomb did indeed explode; but much to his chagrin it exploded before it even got very far. The blast was, however, rather impressive, and the resulting fireball sent shrapnel everywhere, peppering everything in the warehouse with at least some tiny bits of metal or plastic or whatever the MTEK unit was made out of. Cormac, naturally, got the worst of it, his arm and side getting a bunch of shrapnel, and the sleeve of his outfit being burnt to a crisp, along with any exposed skin, and quite a bit of the man's hair. His opposite side, somehow, escaped all damage, giving him an impromptu two-face cosplay, not that anyone but he, Niall, and a few other 20th century film nerds would understand.

Niall had done his best to duck behind the crate he had been using for cover, and managed to avoid getting singed, but a stray bit of shrapnel splintered a portion of the crate sending small, uncomfortable slivers of wood everywhere, including a few that made their way into the back of the man's neck, the rest thankfully being deflected by his leather jacket and sturdy pants. "OI, YA DUMBASS ALMOS' GOT US KILLED!" He yelled over the ringing in his (and everyone else's for that matter) ears.

Those farther from the blast were of course less affected, including everyone at the main entrance. but those near the dropship had not avoided the brunt of the blast, even if none of them had been killed, a few were quite wounded and nearly all were disoriented. Even the gunship itself had stopped firing, those in control of the guns momentarily blinded by the blast.
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Mr. Blackbird Lore
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Re: [Prologue] Hitting Home

Post by Mr. Blackbird Lore »

The explosion was jarring, rattling her drums and bones, but otherwise had no effect. It wasn't the cover she'd been expecting, but the veteran wasn't one to look a gift horse in the mouth either. She sprinted out from cover to her discarded heavy weapon. Hefting it was hell on her fresh wound, but she'd been through worse by the looks of her.

After a brief spinup, the papa was chirruping again and spitting plasma all over the transport. She walked it calmly toward cover, diving down abruptly as the battery went dry. She sat beside a cop who watched with awe as she cradled the heavy weapon in her lap, belly up to expose its now empty battery port. She slammed a fresh one in and rose to a crouch, ready to strike again.

"If you've got another one of those, now's the time to use it," suggested that cool voice.
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Straken
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Re: [Prologue] Hitting Home

Post by Straken »

Mahp. Mahp. Mahp. Mahp. Cormac was making a nonsensical sound as he tried to clear the ringing from his ears. His plan had worked for the most part, and while it could have definitely gone better, he would wager that it went off approximately seventy-five percent as planned. Through the muffled haze that felt like being buried in hot cotton, he could make out a rebuke from Niall. Blinking slowly, he braced his back against the cool metal of the dumpster he had hidden behind and refocused.

"Yeah, but we ain't killed, eh?" Cormac responded, sounding about as off as he felt. "So did we win?"

Thinking that he would look down the alley and survey his destruction, he was surprised at the state of his arm. For one, there were a couple of small flames that needed attention as they burned away at the cloth and leather of his jacket, but as he swat at the flames a sharp pain swat back, rousing him from the rest of his stupor. Inspecting himself, it became clear that he could have just as easily lost his arm, but still there were dozens of bleeding cuts on his arm; shrapnel wounds, ranging in size from long razor thin slices, to small deep punctures. He almost laughed at the sight, certain in a rather morbid sense of how close he had come to joining his ancestors, and certain of the Hell he would have to pay when he got back to the Lab. He did end up laughing though, as the woman who had requested cover was suggested he do it again.

"Got a few million creds to spare? Because that was an expensive fucking grenade," Cormac said back, before switching his attention back to Niall. "I'm tapped, mate. Just got my sidearm, a knife, and what feels like one hell of a hangover."
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Kai
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Re: [Prologue] Hitting Home

Post by Kai »

The short amount of time that it took for Cormac to regain himself, and the heavily armed woman to re-arm herself, was plenty for the Terrorists to gt their bearings back- the heavy turrets on the dropship now beginning to aim for multiple targets as the craft began to rise, engines whining as they spooled up to get ready to go. There were still a few Terrorists on the ground, but the pilot of the craft decided it was time to go. One of the turrets pointed toward the back of the warehouse, near where Cormac and Niall were hiding, blasting at everything indiscriminately, while the other seemed to have followed the woman and was specifically targeting her cover, eating away at it so that she would soon have nothing to hide behind.

"Well, we're in a righ' pickle then, ain' we?" Niall yelled as random barriers and crates began blowing to bits under the heavy anti-personnel fire coming from the craft. "Ain' much Ah kin do agains' tha' thing, wha' wit juss a pistol an' all!"
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Mr. Blackbird Lore
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Re: [Prologue] Hitting Home

Post by Mr. Blackbird Lore »

The marine sighed. It was time for more dumb heroics. Not like the enemy had left her much of a choice: it was either sit here and get chewed up by plasma or go out there and return fire at the risk of getting chewed up by plasma. She turned to the man who occupied what little cover remained. "Listen. I need you to sprint to cover that way," she pointed in the direction from which she had come. "You can't stay here: you'll die. I'm going to cover you. Now GO!" The vet paused only a moment to make sure he was going before she swung out of cover and squeezed the trigger. A papa wasn't the easiest gun to manage in the first place, so striking a moving target while moving was going to be difficult. Nevertheless, her target was clear: the mounted guns of the transport vessel.

Over the comlink, she informed the others of, "Suppressive fire. Sure could use some extra guns."
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Straken
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Re: [Prologue] Hitting Home

Post by Straken »

"Oh, I got an extra gun for ya," Cormac grumbled as he pulled out his pistol and checked its clip, his words sounding somewhat slurred as his chin rested against his chest. "Niall! Don't take unnecessary risks, alright? I'm the resident reckless Irishman."

With his pistol gripped awkwardly in his still good off hand, he reached across his body and began to blind fire out from around the metal dumpster. Wincing visibly he tried to keep his hand as close as he could to cover, after all, he already had a messed up arm and didn't want to take a high caliber round to his other.
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