Martial Parole

[Fromikeable]

The dropship zoomed through space like a bullet the size of a bus, the engines causing the whole thing to rattle and shake as it zipped toward the station. It had left a little late as it was; the bombardment had started over a minute ago, and even though they'd blasted open the hangar doors, there was no telling how quick the Imperial troops would be to respond.

Imperial troops. Horst couldn't help but grin a little at that. War wasn't fun, but for once, it felt like a war he should be fighting.

"30 seconds kids." His thick accent was further distinguished by the speaker in his envirofilter, his armor leaving no skin bear. The plan and subsequent blasts to the hangar had assumed the worst, so every single trooper was prepared for zero-gravity, zero-atmosphere, zero-light fighting. That meant vacuum-ready armor, magnetized boots, and a combination of night-vision helmets and tracer rounds.

The usual spec ops gear, in other words.

"You." His gloved hand tapped against the arm of the woman at the back of the shuttle with him. His handler, the brass had called her. At least they had been honest, though he still had to call her a "Republic war observant" to the troops. His reinstatement had come with gobs of skepticism (which he could understand), but the constant lying was growing old.

Even still, the fear that no one would listen to a former alleged traitor was valid (even if that case was a giant heaping piece of sh-). So for now, he was simply "under review".

"Keep low. Stay out of fire. Hang on to these." He gestured to the pack of bombs strapped to her back. Sabotaging the reactor would be a lot harder to live through if they lost the explosives.

"10 seconds!" The dropship zoomed even closer toward the hangar, starting to slow the minimal amount.

[CaptainBonkers]

Sitting at the back of the dropship Kira couldn't help but to feel a little out of her element. Direct assaults like this weren't usually what she was called in to do but as many a mission before had proven, she was adaptable. She would adapt but that didn't mean she didn't feel a small doubt gnawing at the back of her head.

It didn't help that Kira wasn't particularly enthusiastic about her job at hand, keeping an eye on the leader of the Special Forces squad whom had been accused of treason earlier. Kira didn't know how she had landed this assignment but even if she didn't like it orders were orders and she was damned before she begun to ignore them without a better reason than 'I don't like them'. 

"30 Seconds kids." rang Major Stellar's voice through the passenger compartment. Kira perked up and quickly went through her armor's seals to make sure everything was in place and sealed. She had chosen the lightest possible model but it still left much to wish for in terms of mobility.

The Major tapped her arm and told her to stay out of fire and not to lose the explosives they'd handed her. She wasn't too keen on carrying so much explosives but wasn't going to complain. She'd spent enough time in the Army back in the day to know that the best way to annoy your comrades was to complain. And even though she wasn't here to make friends things would go much smoother if she at least tried to fit in on some level.

"You don't need to worry about me, Major." She replied, making sure that her pistol was easily accessible. "This ain't my first rodeo."

Kira couldn't tell through the Major's armor whether or not her reassurances had had any effect but at least there hadn't been any vocal sign of disbelief. Or maybe she just hadn't heard them over the engines roaring. And then she didn't have time to think about it any more as she braced for the entry. 
 

[Fromikeable]

“That’s great hon, but this ain’t no rodeo.” Giving her a huffed chuckle, Horst would turn toward the front of the dropship again. As if on cue, the ship began to shutter and jolt. Streaks of light could be seen flashing outside the doors as its flying became notably more erratic. The hangar’s door batteries had kicked in, and were trying to stop them, but it was too late.

With a mighty whoosh, there was suddenly sound again as the dropship entered the hangar, its atmosphere evidently still holding. The dropship’s doors opened before it even stopped, and almost instantaneously, the world shifted from the silent, dark calm of space to the vibrant, explosive excitement of a battlefield.

“MOVE IT.” The commandos were already doing as much, leaping down from the ship before it even stopped and opening fire. The world quickly devolved into chaos; where once there was politics and courts and people, now there was only the smell of burning air, shuffling of armor, and yells of men and women fighting for life itself.

It wasn’t much of a paradise, but it was Horst’s paradise.

Jumping off as soon as the ship stopped, Horst’s repeater was already whirring. Bolts began to fly from it like a swarm from a rotating nest, shooting death down upon some of the many Sith troopers in the hangar. Engineers that appeared as though they had been trying to patch the broken entrance fled, and as seconds passed, an alarm began to blare. Blast doors closed around the hangar entrance, sealing them in.

The only way out now was death or success. Whichever came first.

“Stick close! Bravo, light ‘em up!” The Major would motion toward the agent as the pilots of the dropship popped out of the cabin, adding to the assault.

[CaptainBonkers]

What did I do to deserve this? Kira didn't know on whose toes she had stepped on to get this assignment but if she made it through this clusterfrak alive and even remotely intact, she was going to make it her personal mission to find said person and shove something large and rectangular up a crevice best left unmentioned. But that was a worry for another time. Right now the only thing that mattered was getting the job done.

Kira stuck to cover and followed after the SpecOps, keeping her blaster trained at the most likely direction of enemy response. If this was how rest of the army was concluding operations, charging headlong into action, then no wonder the Imps were still making gains. She had had trouble believing the plan during briefing and she still couldn't believe it even though it was already in motion.

A squad of Imp soldiers charged through one of the doors (bulkheads?) leading out of the hangar, well armed but not quite ready from the looks of it. Their movement lacked certain determination Kira usually associated with Imperial assaults. Then again they were probably still reeling from the shock of being hit by such a audacious and harebrained assault. As questionable as she found the plan, Kira had to admit that at least it was really surprising approach. No way the Imps could have expected someone to basically crash into the hangar and shoot up the place.

"Bucketheads at two!" she shouted and sent a quick burst of blaster fire at their direction, hitting one of the Imps in the chest and grazing another's arm. The first went down screaming but the second kept going though his aim seemed to have gone to hell.

[Fromikeable]

“Repeaters on the right!”

“Detonator out!”

“Frakkin’ sons of-”

“I need a medic!”

“-flank on the right, give ‘im covering fire!”

The battle was nothing but a rushed blur of shapes and sounds. Blaster bolts whizzed, voices screamed, yelled, hollered, and roared. Pain was a universal constant, as was that basic, instinctual fear of death. True fight or flight fueled every trooper and every special operative as the latter pushed the former back. The Imperials, despite their defensive, clearly hadn’t been prepared. None of them had been in defensive positions, and a good few didn’t even have their main firearms, using pistols and whatever they could find lying around.

Even as reinforcements arrived, Horst’s gruff voice was on top of things. “Charlie, make that two-thirty!” The charging troopers were greeted with a heavy hail of gunfire, dropping half of them to the floor as the other half scrambled not to wind up the same.

Even still, they were moving too slowly. The alarm was already ringing, and time was scarce. “Push it! We’re there in 3 minutes, ladies!” Despite the horror of the situation before them, he chuckled. “No offense, Agent.” Indeed, the Imperials seemed to wane, their lines dropping back quicker and quicker. Within the next minute, there were only two types of troopers in the room; the dead or the running. The squads moved up, shooting as they ran until their opponents were clear of the bulkheads. Save for one, every blast door was shut and jammed.

Panting lightly, Horst’s voice crackled on the comms again. “Sitrep?”

“Alpha’s charred but good, Major.”

“Tribiza’s down, Sandusky took a few to the arm, sir.”

Reloading his repeater, Horst grunted. “They breathin’?”

“Tribiza’s iffy. Sandusky’s fine.”

“Then give Sandusky a damn gun and put ‘em both on the ship. Charlie, you okay?”

“Yessir.”

“Prep the ship, guard the hangar. Anybody tries to come through those blastdoors, you blow ‘em to hell.” Looking at Kira, he gave waved his thumb at her, asking quietly if she was okay (thumbs up being “yes”, thumbs down being “no”).

“Alpha, the rest of Bravo, let’s move.” He waved toward the still-open blastdoor, and the assigned soldiers began to run through. He quickly followed, Kira in tow.

“Prep those explosives, Agent. We’ve got 4 minutes to plant ‘em.” He snorted again. “Assumin’ the Imps’re as slow as Command thinks they are.” He was clearly a little skeptical, but then again, it was his job to be so.

[CaptainBonkers]

No casualties so far, which was a surprise. She had expected more but then again this wasn't over yet. The job wasn't done just because the imps were retreating. They still had to set the charges and get out of here which gave the enemy time to regroup and come at them with renewed vigor. Quick actions were required to get this over with some semblance of grace.

The major waved his thumb, an inquiring to her condition. After taking a quick look around her Kira showed thumbs up. Only one imperial soldier had gotten close to her; a mechanic that had managed to sneak up to her behind a pile of crates. It hadn't ended up well for the imp. He had gotten one good swing at her with a hydro spanner before being brought down with a quick punch to the larynx followed by two shots to the chest. With no armor, the mechanic had died almost instantly.

As ordered Kira got to preparing the charges. Demolitions and explosives weren't exactly her specialty but as long as no one asked her to make the charges and then told he where to place them she was good to go. 

"All set for placement, Major." she said once the charges were ready to be set.