Trying her best to lay still so as not to pull any of her bandages or field-stitches loose, Ashora looks out of the battlefield. Three days and three firefights and who's even left? she wonders with more than a little disquiet. Still, there wasn't much doubt that the xenos had come out it worse than they had--but given what she'd heard about greenskin numbers she wasn't sure it was enough on balance. "That could have been a lot worse, but a lot of deaths might have been avoided if we'd just been issued an anti-armor gun," Malchior complains from his spot over by the turret. "Think we could get Command to lend us a lascannon? We'd be a holy terror with one of those beasts!"
The pair splits most of their attention between the xenos' hill-line and the radio-silent trench network to the north. Hopefully its just a damaged vox. If we get outflanked they'll roll right over us...not that there's anything we can do about it right now.
As Thud waits to get sewn back together Notch goes about his task of gathering the wounded. Carefully. The gathering the dead somewhat less carefully.
'phix nods her masked face at Leni "I will be a tool in your hands mistress." Celephix surveys the scene "What remains of the bunker is little more sterile than open ground, while the Chimera is damaged it should suffice as a little more clean area for you to work."
" Well, Doctor, if you say so."
"Also, did you get any info from HQ? Sure we've taken out some of their artillery but an update on how things are going would be nice especially since it hasnt even been a week yet - throne I havent even been here for a day. Anyways, just let me lay down for a bit and let his headache pass and I'll get to torching their bodies. Have any Flamers handy?" she asks.
Leni scratches her chin at that.
"Mhhh, I was hoping for something cooler, you're a tech whiz kid aren't you?
well we'll make do but a proper medical station in the back of doombringer would
help a lot in keeping us alive. We'll use that neat toy I got from the sister
and Aubray will actually watch over us while we perform there. We'll have to
clear some rubble tho."
He eye lashes start to shiney just a little at the last part, but she doesn't seem to notice herself.
Towards Monia:
"We're contacting HQ as soon as we have regrouped and actually have a report
to make. That means we have casualty figures and the trench is locked down as
tight as we can make it. Or the inofficial version is I'm pretty sure we're
getting sent somewhere as soon as we make that report because the trench to the
north might be lost, so we need to be ready first.
Our flame guys kind of exploded when a good plan missfired. Litteraly. We were
trying to clean the snow to see ork mines - and detonated them instead, creating
a neat little firestorm which I owe this cute little sunburn to. On half my
body. Anyway just take the promethium from the canisters in Doombringer and
ignite it with your las pistol like 'Phix did. Or you use your own trick thing,
your call.
First Aid Session:
[EDIT: Leni beat me by a few seconds]
+15 for sterile, miniature field hospital
+10 for quick-trained assistant
+10 taking your time, preparations
+10 RP bonus
But note the max +60 boni limitation!
Hows Cel doing?
Not bad for a first timer! A few neglectable errors but nothing to disturb Lenis workflow, while providing valuable help with the easy parts (applying bandages, sterilizing tools and wounds, fetching the necessary tools at the right time, ...)
Looking at the numbers you succeed (2 DoS) on Monia and barely on Thud'dr - or you take the reroll for a major success.
Thud'dr /Notch:
As you wander the trenches, you first find it difficult to even get to the southern trenches since the tunnel linking the trenches is all but collapsed. You have to climb to the street and then down to the second trench again. There you are greeted by a fearsome sight. Right on the other side of the tunnel ... is a deep and broad crater, filled with a gruesome mix of blood, gore and body parts. Clearly a few soldiers stationed here as the artillery shell landed between them...
Here's no one to rescue. As you walk deeper into the trench you notice that the bunker on the southern end does not look any better than that in the north. On your way towards it you pass several bodies that do not react to the guard way of checking for life signs: Stabbing the body with the rifle for a few times.
You also notice several bodies in between the trench lines, obviously hit as they were trying to run away. Only as you get to the bunker, you finally find survivors.
Inside the bunker are four blank-eye soldiers, shooting at you as you look into the bunker. To your luck their hands shake violently with fear and each and every shot misses you.
It takes you quite a time to talk some reason into them again. The privates Jankins, Helverton, Morton und Ignis finally follows you to the northern part of the trench. They follow you blank eyed, a few times you have to stop as one of them collapse after passing another body of their former battle brothers.
Morton has a flamer attached to his back, but the weapon is damaged by shrapnel's and is in need of repair.
"Alright, well...I...yeah. Huh. Ok, lets not waste too much promethium, we could use it for...something...later on if we need to like keeping us warm if it gets too cold or, I don't know, an improvised mine Ashora could set off? Something like that. Anyways, if we could just pile up all the bodies I could make a giant bonfire instead."
And Monia will try to wrangle any other currently-unoccupied expendable meatbags guardsmen to help her and her totally-not-forgotten companion and start piling up any Orkoid bodies within the immediate vicinity.
Once done, she'll just take a canister of promethium, either from Doombringer or Mortons, and douse it over the corpses of the orks and will set it alight. She also makes sure to remove any bullets, stikk bombs, etc. so that the pile doesn't start randomly exploding and or firing bullets at us as it burns.
Imperial corpses, Monia will instead line them up, hands (if available) in the sign of the Aquila. If all their bedrolls are available she'll try to use them as body bags or something.
Simmins does as the medic orders with a Yes Ma'am and makes a round of what's left of their defensive line to see if he can find anything useful.
but he's a humble meathead and he can't really make heads or tails of the bloody and twisted hunks of metal that is the ground they're expected to hold.
While you don't find anything useful beyond the obvious, the 'obvious' part is actually quite a lot. Especially as you take a look into the crew compartment of Doombringer.
There, far in the back of the compartment, is a unordered heap of crates and boxes. You get a peng of shock as you turn around the crates that lies around like tossed-away toys, just to see the explosive-label on each and every one of them!
All in all you find the following stuff in the crew compartment of Doombringer:
A huge amount of entrenchment tools in various shape and size
Two boxes filled with anti-personal mines (6 each, total of 12)
Another box labeled 'EXPLOSIVE INSIDE' filled with 20(!) frag-grenades
A box with a full heavy stubber clip intended for the one on top of Doombringer but interchangeable with your own.
Simmins tells the other survivors of the goodies.
Ya know, if Doombringer had gone up we wouldn't have even known it the explosion would have been so large. And can I requisition the stubber clip for myself? Went through a lot of bullets back there.
Celephix and Leni build up the field, miniature hospital following the instructions on the encasing and then start to the triage of the wounded.
It takes quite some time - at least an hour of endless desinfecting, stitching, bandaging - and cuts deeply into the medical supplies of Leni. Without the additional stuff gained through 'unofficial' supply lines, she would have run out of bandages and painkillers by now.
But their success is undeniable. Thud'dr looks mostly human Ogryn again and his breathing is much slower now. He still is far from recovered but also miles away from the sad state he had been before the treatment.
Leni can't believe the amount of wounds the big one has taken - and still continued to club Orks into unconsciousness.
As Ashora takes watch, she notices (several times in fact!) seemingly dead Orks all over the battlefield, which are trying to get up again. The badly damaged Xenos are easy pray for her marksmanship, but every time the SNAP-CRAC of her high-powered Longlas echoes through the trench - everyone snaps to attention, fearing another incoming attack.
As Monia's treatment is finally over and she starts to collect the dead Xenos with the help of every hand she can recruit - she does not meet any further resistance. The heap of green bodies is remarkably high (due to the massive frame of the Orks) and the resulting fire causes a huge black cloud - everyone within 20m of the fire starts to caught violently as the smell of burning (Xeno-)flesh fills their lungs.
Night dawns before the last imperial casualty is secured.
You receive 2 Insanity points. The view of the crater were multiple of your fellow guardsman died a horrible death from a point-blank hit from a artillery shell is something, no one of you will forget any time soon...
Dragging the dead back, covering them in their own bedrolls and lining them up is a bloody and depressing thing to do in it's own and you all feel the weight of the situation sink in deeply.
"*Cough* Well, Leni, theres you-*cough* your bonfire. Better radio it in so that HQ doesn't start panicking and decides to bombard us thinking our section is lost *cough-spit* But hey, at least we'll have a source of heat for a while." and doesn't think more on the implications of a giant bonfire and column of black smoke could have on the trenchline.
Leni smiles sadly at Monias description of the big pile of burning orks. "In just a moment.". After packing up whats left of her medikit but before pulling down the field hospital she moves over to Aubray and lifts her bridal style - or like a sleeping child. She carries her to the bonfire, the fire reflecting in Aubrays lifeless eyes. "We cleaned up for you, everything is in its place, just like you liked it." then she closes Aubrays eyes and gently lays her down next to the other dead. She stares at her for a few more moments before turning to the others and visibly straightening out.
"Everyone with me, we're making a breakfast circle around Ashoras watch position, so bring your favorite food." she cracks a weak grin at that and fishes a mangled ration bar out from somewhere in her uniform and leads the way.
After a minute of eating and drinking - or in her case forcing the shell shocked fools from the second trench to eat and drink - she starts talking about the plan.
"Okay guys n girls. This was a shitshow but we survived it and we have a duty to those who didnt to keep surviving. First up: Roll call. I need a count on how many of us are left. After that everyone who has a lasgun takes at least 2 mags from the dead. And I won't hear any discussion about this, they'd want us to keep fighting. Frag nades are distributed evenly, cept the Orgryn, he throws for 2 of us so count him as 2. Simmins that's your job. And yes take the clip while you're on it. 'Phix you take posession of the explosives - find out how to arm and place them. Spook, I need a pair of eyes on the second trench while everyone from there is with us here. Stay in or close to the tunnel so you can return on a moments notice if you spot anything.
And I need ideas how we secure the damn tunnel. They are big green retards but they seem to know enough to bypass the razorwire since it's weak there. I'll talk with command now."
She gets up and moves to the vox as soon as the roll call is done, switching to the command channel.
"This is Leni Tifnan, medic and acting officer of the remaining forces from both northern and southern trench of the southern approach reporting. The attack has been fought off and enemy artillery barage has ceased after an airstrike. The commissar was lost along with the southern squad chimera by direct artillery hit. We have 17 surviving but medical supplies and ammo for heavy weapons are getting low and the remaining chimera is crippled. Report over."
Your com-partner's voice is nearly shut out by the background sound of a vehicle engine on maximum.
"Acknowledged. Counter-push mustered and on the way - ETA to your position ... 10 to 12 hours. Be warned that the line is breached in multiple places. Immediately to your north is a two-position-breach, the south is 4h beyond regular report and it's status is unknown.
You are cleared for artillery support on short notice - Authorization Serenus 1st #89-A.
No known friendly forces are within 5 clicks of your position.
Your orders are to stay low, keep your eyes up, report enemy movement and call artillery strike on enemy formations until the counter push reach your position."
The Imperial Guard primer requires a careful check of Lasgun barrels after prolonged battles - especially if used on high power settings.
The primer advises to change a Lasgun barrel after going through 4-5 clips if possible and exchange parts are available.
One spare barrel is usually part of every Guardsman kit and can be changed with a Tech-Use +30 test (half an hour per test, repeatable).
Tech-Use +40 reveals the current status of a barrel.
Carefully sitting up, Ashora sends Malchior to retrieve their packs, along with some food and a few spare power cells for the lasguns. "Guys, I'm still getting nothing from the northern line. If they're gone then we're in it deep, the xenos might press deeper into allied territory or the might swing around and hit us from the side or rear."
Taking a steadying breath, she goes on. "Ten or twelve hours is a long time."
You were quite busy (and luckily so!) to shoot not-dead-yet-Orks. To the north are various of smoke plumes but you cannot make out actual movement.
From time to time you thought you saw some movement, but it usually only was some debris flopping over the ground in a breath of wind.
These rolls are for 2 hours. After such a long time watching ... nothing but wastelands your eyes start to hurt and you see movements were none is and it gets hard to stay focused (see below -> you count as fatigued after such a day)
"Acknowledged. Counter push 10 to 12 hours, multiple breaches. short notice
artillery support authorization Serenus first #89-A, no friendlies close, report
enemy movement and call artillery strikes. Southern approach orders confirmed
and out."
First things first: Leni writes down the Authorization code at the vox, then
returns unless the vox comes alive with new infos.
While walking back to the group she takes a quick detour - she changes the mag
in her Lasgun and hooks the old one into Doombringers generator since it won't
be used to move the chimera for a while. She fishes out a replacement from her
backpack and adds it to her armor webbings
She returns to the group to report. Since some might be away she also taps her
vox bead.
"Okay, looks like we're pretty much alone out here for now. The counter push
we heard about is ready and should reach us in 10 to 12 hours but we better
consider everything around us as hostile territory now since we have multiple
breaches to the north. Our orders are to stay low and order artillery fire on
enemies - we actually have authorization now so it should be a lot quicker this
time. I left the code at the vox so you have it if anything happens to me. Spook
that'll be your job if it comes to that.
We'll set up at the road and stick together so we can watch both trenches
without splitting up too much. Watch groups of 3, switching out after 4 hours to
stay fresh. Ashora you're up first an get to pick your 2 helpers. A 2nd Group
re-sets the fortifications. 'Phix you lead that one with the mining, pick 2 more
people to redo the razor-wire and maybe fix these trenches some.
Anyone who's not with them helps me prepare for those artillery calls - we know
the coordinates their artillery used to have now but we can't take that long
again to find the coordinates. We have plenty of land marks around here with all
those burnt out vehicles so if we know their coordinates we can use them as base
to find an enemies coordinates that is close-ish."
Lenis group starts out by looking for a map or range/coordinate finder in
Doombringer and if they don't find anything there they'll request coordinates of
the northern and southern bunker of the southern approach - then triangulate the
points on the battlefield from there
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"Well, I'll have to do it from on the top of the road in that case. Tunnel collapsed when the Trukks went boom...or just naturally fell apart...hard to...tell...with orks...*sharp inhale* But, aye, aye Ma'am, if anything, at least the Trukks up there will give me some cover. What'd Command have to say?" she says as she eats her more-nutritious-than-edible-or-tasty Imperial Guard rations.
You find a basic map showing the locations and coordinates of the imperial defensives in your vicinity (including your own).
The map has a resolution of 1km and shows your position and 2 positions each to your north and south.
There is also a small map-tool you know can be used to read out more precise location off the map - but none of you is trained on the use of it .
You can try around with the thing to get used to it.
Taking range values to the landmark is easy, transferring them into coordinated according to your base coordinates takes a basic Intelligence (+0) test.
You probably are not very happy with Lenis last order. Grouping at the street, using Xeno machinery as cover instead of staying near the familiar, badly damaged Chimera - which machine spirit distantly cries for repairs - sits ill with your believes and training.
Your quite confident that you can - at least - bring the chimeras turret back on-line given a few hours of uninterrupted working with the help of your servitor...
Thud and Notch sit quietly. Thud beause he's recovering, Notch because he's trying to bleach his memory. Leny had to use what was basically an improvised flesh hook to get the stitching through Thud's near bullet proof skin so he sat there with a pained, sullen look.
Notch speaks up regarding the tunnel. Maam, that tunnel's done for. with all those mines and grenades and shells going off the structure collapsed. Nobody's getting through there.
Emperor preserve us but somehow I got through that barrage unscatched so I'm good wherever ma'am. Simms says to the medic in charge. Uh, Phix.. tech lady... ma'am. Could you help me use some of those entrenchment tools to rig up a mobile tripod? If I can get a central high spot to operate out of then I could provide cover from 12 to 6 in a direction without havin' to rebrace.
Ashora nods at Leni's orders. "K. I'll take Malchior and...her." the sniper points at one of the soldiers from the southern trench who looks more alert than the others. Giving her a light kick on the boot she says, "You can finish eating that on watch, we're going to go climb into one of those xeno trucks if it's safe. Nice armored place to keep watch in every direction. What's your name, Trooper?"
Leni ponders Notches statement for a moment
"Hrm. actually I think that'll be to our advantage Notch. I don't give a damn
about the second trench but letting them walk through all the razor wire without
shooting them to pieces - and letting them have the road as full cover until
they can charge over it - seems suicidal to me. I'm thinking we fortify on this
side and use the road as nice highground to shoot at them from an elevated
position - we just need to rig up some positions so we don't lose cover up there.
Having the tunnel collapsed actually saves us the trouble of securing and
watching it. We fall back into the trench if they bring in artillery or other
heavy shrapnell weapons again."
She smiles at Simmins but her eyes stay stern. "Good to hear, but I haven't
seen you hand out the frag grenades yet so start with the job you already have.
After that set up somewhere around here so you can be ready on short notice and
get some rest, I need everyone at their best so resting is literally an
important job. I managed to get my hands on a deck of cards if the off-duty
group gets bored. I'll let you borrow it but you're not allowed to die until you
return it" she winks at the last part.
She starts fiddling with the map and the tool while sitting around with the
group - on the side of the trench close to the collapsed tunnel entrance. "
Alright now if I was a fat man with a fetish for stale paper and ink dipped
feathers how would I make this thing work?" she looks at it from every
direction, checking for buttons, switches and displays before simply placing it
down on the map. "Okay so this is suppoed to work together somehow, so I just
need to find the right side yo put onto the paper and there should be numbers on
it so we can actually find out those damn coordinates that decide whether we go
boom or the greenskins do." she moves it around the map for a bit, randomly
placing each side down at some point just in case it randomly starts to make
sense. After a bit her eyes drift from the device to the map and an idea begins
to stir. She pokes at the map multiple times and laughs. "Damn I'm stupid. I
actually have a point of reference and I don't even have to ask the boys from
artillery" she's actually pointing at the hill the greenskin artillery used
to reside on - and for which she knows the coordinates. She places the tool
there and looks if anything on the instrument indicates coordinates close to the
ones she gave to the artillery command
She actually gets the hang of it pretty quickly and shows the others who are off duty - before joining in a game of cards
Upon hearing an apparent order to relax Thud immediately passes out. Being able to sleep anywhere is a Guard survival skill, but the Ogryn doesn't even try to settle down. He literally passes out on the spot. Notch goes to help Simmons gather grenades before passing out himself next to his charge.
Simmins does as the medic says and gathers and redistributes frag grenades.
Finished eating, Monia packs her stuff up and moves to set up near the street/tunnel and makes herself as comfortable as possible before she has to get up there and watch for anything going on at the southern trench.
vs Int 34 for 1 DoS.
"Yeah, but, see here, the coordinates are only in relation to our current location. If you want command to fire effectively, you need to relay them with regards to their location so since we know we're [insert distance here] klicks northwest of the spaceport, you just modify the numbers a bit...like so...and we should have a working set of numbers to send to command when we want the Orks shelled."
The map tool has a square part that - after some trials - fit perfectly on the squared map. A button on the side projects an enhanced view of the square field below the tool with a cross in the middle and a row of numbers below. The cross (and thus the numbers) can be moved up and around by two little wheels at the side of the tool.
Using the map itself reveals another set of coordinates ... But comparing it to the set the artillery has used, those from the map are shorter.
After some thinking, number crunching and the help of Monia you figure out, that the more numbers the more accurate the set of coordinates. Using the map tool you finally are able to reconstruct the artillery coordinates, by taking the basic grid coordinates from the map and appending the coordinates shown by the nav-tool. Using the map, the tool and the known distances to some of the landmarks, you are able to retrieve a set of coordinates for those position and note them down.
Simmins carries the large crate full of grenades into the midst of the guardsmen, handing out the fist-sized deathbringers. One fore each, Thud'dr receives two and two are left afterwards. From the salvaging of the dead, everyone receives another one and a spare clip each. There is a huge heap of sorted-out charge packs that are salvaged from the dead that are damaged and Celephix advices to not use them until in dire need, since they may dizzle out any time. Everyone can take two of those as well.
Ashora chooses a young, tiny woman - barely older than a girl - with a sad and fearful expression in her eyes. As the squad's sniper points at her, her eyes goes wide and her hands starts to tremble. "Pri... Private Petri ... ma'am. In... Into a Xeno vehicle?"
The three of you make it to the burned-out vehicles up the street. From up close, the area looks like a scrapyard that was bombarded for some hours. Multiple craters from the anti-armor mines, blasted metal plates and the big heap of scrap-metal that was a former Ork vehicle. The front Trukk is so bad blasted, that it is unusable for more than basic cover. The second one is better suited for an elevated watch position. The gun of the turret is blasted of, but the turret itself remains and offers a good position. As you carefully enter the charred remains, Petri yelps and starts shooting her Lasgun on something inside the vehicle. As you whirls around to see what's happening, you notice a disturbing sight. The jumpy joung Privtae is shooting a - obviously already dead - Gretchin that seems to be hard-wired into the vehicle itself. Various tubes and cables run through the body of the small greenskin and disappear into the wall of vehicle - immediately under the former turret.
Mhh damn complicated. I'd be realy tempted to send them 0 0 0 as coordinates to see what happens - if we didn't need them so much. Let's start with the relaxing part tho. I'll take 2nd watch since I have to report to command around then anyway. So I'd say a bit of card gaming sounds good before the napping starts" she rumages around her pokets before pulling out a deck of cards and starts shuffling
Combead: "I'll take 2nd watch, make sure to wake me for every change tho everyone. Command expects a lifesign every 4 hours or write us off as dead and we can't have that"
Ashora is startled by Petri's burst of fire, and grabs the girl's shoulder. [b]"Easy Petri, easy! It's already dead. I admit though, that's pretty f&~#ing horrible. Kinda looks like a servitor but don't tell the Engineseer I said that."
Waving to the rest of the squad to indicate that everything's okay, Ashora hauls herself up into the truck bed. Malchior helps Petri up, then starts picking through some of the detritus for something worth noticing, while the sniper climbs into the turret itself for the 360-degree view.
"Sure, cards sounds nice..." And Monia ponders a second on whether she should mention any potential mind reading but just mentally shrugs and doesn't bring it up unless someone else does.
"So...I know you guys just got here three days before I did but...has it been this bad the whole time?" she absentmindedly asks as cards are being passed out." Haven't really been able to chat with anyone who's spent actually time out here before actually getting here."
"Na. The first few of them just tried to charge straight at us on foot so
that went well enough with Ashoras precision shooting. The second night was
horrible tho. Goddamn purple motherf!*$ers just popped up out of nowhere. Like
they f#**ing teleported into the trench and threw some f%~&ing foul smelling
bullshit into the bunker. Took some heroic head bashing from Thud to keep them
from hacking us to pieces. They left mines all over the place and I think they
also tried to nuke the chimeras but you'll have to ask Phix or Ashora about
that. Anyway the guys in the south got hit worse, so the commisar tried to join
up with us up here. That went pretty badly because more of the purple
motherf*%~ers were hiding in the tunnel - and some mines nuked our flamers, that
almost got us killed" she points at her new skin parts.
"We managed to rescue a lot of them in the end, but most were no longer in
fighting condition so they got pulled off the frontline - including our
sergant and our first commisar. That's how we got stuck with the uber psycho
that exploded earlier."
She stops shuffling and stops there "Actually what are we playing? I heard
most of the guardsmen out here play poker, not my favorite game tho."
When his name is mentioned Thud twitches in his sleep, but doesn't actually wake up.
"I...uh...I don't really know many card games most of my dealing with cards came through tarot reading training and practice which isn't really my-" and she stops as she hears the lasgun shot, and tries to bolt to her feet, using her staff as support.
"Lasgun shots?"she says looking around and then roughly in Ashoras direction then asks over the teams combead "Confirm las fire rapport?"
Ashoras voice comes over the combead. "Stand down, no contact, no contact! Dead greenskin in the vehicle, just making sure. Some of the little ones are wired into the truck, looks pretty permanent."
A ripple of relief runs through the soldiers, as Ashora's call makes it through the vox.
A sheepish, low voice follows the quick, loud call of the team's sniper "Sorry, my bad. Thought it had moved ...". Petri then gladly takes the hand of Malchior to get up the Trukks bed. A tiny squeal escapes her, as she nearly falls on a green, bloody limb on the ground. With a disgusted look she shaves it away with her lasgun, before settling down and forcefully looks into the opposite direction.
Malchior pushes around debris with his lasgun, but only finds lots of weird shaped metal and cables that obviously had fallen off the weird vehicle.
As most of the group starts to pack their things and walk towards the street to set up the new position, Celephix her servitor as well as Ren'Shaw and his operator colleague trail behind.
The tech-priestess stays unmoving, her gaze wandering between the group walking towards the ruined Xeno vehicles up at the street and the badly damaged shape of Doombringer and the two boxes full of explosives.
Surprisingly, Ren'Shaw also sits unmoving on top of Doombringers turret making no signs of following the group at the moment.
In the group of soldiers, the one surviving guy from the second trench seems in bad shape. His eyes seems hunted, his completely body hunched forward like he is preparing for impending pain. As Leni tells her story, he flinches every time the word "Commissar" comes up and looks around - haunted..
In fact, most of the newcomers does follow her stories with a fearful expression - especially the part about the commando raid ... Orks appearing out of nowhere throwing explosives around. That's clearly not what they expected after basic training on their first assignment...
At the first shot both Notch and Thud bolt upright, weapons in hand. Then Ashora gives the all clear and they settle back down. Better safe than sorry. he grumbles.
Wriggling in a vain effort to find a comfortable spot in the metal turret, Ashora makes idle conversation with Petri, though the sniper's eyes never stop their roving. She asks about the other girl's home on Serenus, why made her join up, and hoo-boy did the weather here suck or what? While not exactly a consummate charmer, Ashora hopes to calm her comrade-in-arms and steady her nerves.
"Yo, what's taking so long? You guys wanna marry that stupid bunker that gets used for target practice?"
Leni watches over Thudd and Monia - but right now they both just received first aid so the only thing to do for them is to rest up. She'll check on them regularily on her shift and apply salves and meds from the medpack as required and remind them to keep resting and concentrate on getting better unless shit realy hits the fan.
She takes 3. shift to rest herself
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'Phix takes a moment to process... Doombringer, flamer, mines, fortifications. Priority?
Flamer - low priority, mines - not enough to properly seed though battlefield, doombringer - [color=blue]Is in pain[/color]
With due respect, the most efficient use of time would be in bringing Doombringer's turret back online?" 'phix states.
If you don't like poker, what do you like ma'am? Simmins says to the medic as he sits on an overturned crate with his stubber sitting beside him Tech lady ma'am, maybe it wouldn't take so long to help me rig up a tripod too? One I can move around and plant someplace?
The greenskins have been hitting all over the place, so maybe they'll leave this spot alone and be happy with overrunning other places. Of course if they do that we'll be surrounded and they'd just swamp us from every direction Simmins shrugs.
"Getting Doombringer back up or at least ready to shoot them to shit sounds realy good if you want to do that instead of resting but take care of the mines first. We dont need the whole Trench mined anymore since our orders are to lay low, not to hold the line. We just need a perimeter around us so they don't murder the crap out of us. Pretty much everyone died only after they got into melee, so having them go splat before they reach us sounds realy good.
Or show someone else the techie stuff and have them do the mining"
To the others: "I'd go with blitz. Nice easy rules so no one has to think too hard"
"Copy that, no hostiles." she replies over the combead."Funny thing, ever since I've sworn my soul to the Emperor, my hearings better MILES better. Talk about fringe benefits but hey..." she states absentmindedly at the rest crew. The. Snaps her fingers before remembering what she was going to say.
"Oh! So yeah, they really sent in Kommandos on your second night stay? Throne its indeed a blessing youre all still here then...is that how the last Throne-Bound here got taken out? I did feel some form of psychic resonance in the area upon arrival and Ive been....ehh...curious about it. Hopefully we can get this hive back and exterminate the orks soon..."
"Super hearing sounds cool, just don't sleep close to the latrine then" Leni grins
"Well, I don't know if 'sent in' is the right term. Pretty sure Orks just do
whatever the f&+* they feel like and it somehow turns into an effective strategy
more often than not. F++$ing lunatics. But yeah they were here and having a
party.
Some big motherf##~er and his gang were hiding out in the tunnel - not that we
knew that - which the commissar tried to cross. You know you'd think they'd
notice them being in there with the preysense googles at night but no, they just
blundered in there and the commissar got shot in a bad way. Honestly I want to
think that the commissar was in a hurry to save the wounded in the south, he
seemed like a good guy compared to the a!+&+%~ that came with you. Not that it
stopped him from shooting the stormtrooper tho. Anyway their psyker guy commed
us while protecting the commissar because his orgryns didn't like the darkness
in the tunnel and ran away so we hurried - right into one of the mines. When we
had our shit back together we almost got stampeded by the running orgrynns. And
only THEN we could take care of the problem in the tunnel. By the time we got
there he had done something warpy to it and was pretty much dead, but he managed
to protect the commissar from taking any more hits."
The dawn moves into the night fast paced and the preparations are not even closely completed as the sun disappears and a pitch black darkness settles over you all.
It's hard to stay awake in the darkness and silence that makes the night - time is progressing as if someone engaged the slow-motion mode and without your night goggles you would probably become lost while standing still.
Leni makes her round, taking care of the badly wounded, stopping from time to time to play some cards.
The low, nearly whispered idle talking dies away quickly - as most fall asleep or do not dare to continue talking, as every movement, activity and spoken word seems to echo far. During the early evening, Celephix could be seen working eagerly all over the place. Together with Leni she works out a basic minefield and sets them carefully around their position, before disappearing into Doombringer's innards together with its operators. The clank-clonk-frzzz of the repairs sounding like a full division of mad monkeys hitting with metal bars on empty tanks. They quickly close the top hatch, to keep most of the sound within.
After the first shift, Celephix is fairly certain that the main turret is operational, although its targeting matrix and rotation motors will require additional work and lots of hours of work. The engine itself is operational but the motion system will require a complete overhaul or weeks if not months of personal work.
You feel the anger of the machine spirits turn into firm resolution - eager to deliver pain to those that crippled the vehicle in such a hateful way.
A soothing wind of acknowledgment replaces the agonizing aurora of pain coming from the tank and you are able to relax a bit.
The first shift of the night is over.
As the shift ends, Ashora carefully crawls out of the xeno turret and climbs down. "Completely quiet shift, just how I like it," she murmurs, then quiets as her voice seems far too loud in the eerie stillness. Tiredly trudging towards the trenches, she and Malchior and Petri set up their sleeping gear in a little leeward spot out of the wind, and after a quick check that the new watchers don't need anything all of them are quickly asleep.
Simmins takes some time after cards and before the night watch begins to rig up a crude, but portable, Three-Stick-Tripod, from appropriate pieces of scrap metal combined with artificial fiber rope and military grade adhesive. He tests it by setting up and slamming his stubber onto it a few times to make sure it can take the weight. With ammo being scarce he doesn't test to see if the crude brace would take the recoil of the stubber, but it was better than nothing.
Phix, ma'am, if you have time then making it sos I can swivel this would be grand too, but yeah, I figure getting the tank up and running again takes priority.
Having taken, well, no damage at all, Simmins takes over from Ashora for the next shift of the night after a far too short rest. Too bad we don't get reinforced in the night. I'd love to hear that sound. Maybe have a fleet of Lemaan Russes rumble up. Like to see what the greenskin trukks would do against *that*. he comments as he takes over.