Bring Them To Their Knees

[Syrenia Renkl]

"Frelling weather." Syrenia muttered between clenched teeth as she maneuvered the shuttle towards its destination. She and the two other Army lieutenants, Vallen and Dirum, were the recon team sent to Talaesa. Imperial shipment for the military had been stolen during a supply run heading to Commenor less than a week ago and it had been traced back to a group of pirates on the shrouded world. They used the natural dangerosity of the planet against any intruder.

The Empire wasn't going to let them get away with their last stunt. The trio of soldiers had been advised that a strike team was to land upon their signal, but only after they had found a way in and began to lay ground work.

"Hold on, landing's gonna be rough." The storm was still going on, and the small hike to that muddy hole was going to be even tougher, especially with the local fauna not having a good reputation. At least, they'll all be in a mood to clean the place from the pains in the rear, once they got there.

[Forse Dirum]

Forse was sitting on one of the benches inside the shuttle that served as a place to sit. Forse found a certain comfort while sitting inside the dropship. He had been there a thousand times before. Forse was smoking a smokeless cigarra as he sat hunched over on the bench. He had opted for the smokeless variety not only because he had come to realize not everyone wished to put up with the cigarra smoke, but also because it would allow him to smoke on mission without the worry of attracting enemy attention.

Forse was dressed in a tight, black bodysuit that would normally have armor plating over it. But Forse had opted for a lighter loadout, preferring to have a tactical harness wrapped over it, with a series of pouches and a small backpack situated at his lower back. He had a knife sheathe on his chest, which held his phrik combat knife. On his hip was his personally forged slugthrower with a suppressor attachment. It wouldn't be much good in a firefight against any pirates with any sort of armor, but if a subtle approach was required, it'd work wonders.

Slung over his back was a Verpine Sniper Rifle. The rifle took a while to procure from the guys in the weapons division, but Forse had paid a lot for the weapon out of his own pocket. When the going got tough, you could load any sort of metal in the thing and fire those, at the expense of the weapon, of course. It operated by using magnetic coils to launch cold projectiles, causing massive damage and bleeding upon impact. It was a nasty weapon, but a silent one.

The weapon in his hand was an Imperial Heavy Repeater, heavily modified by Forse himself. It was technically a slugthrower, but one that wrapped it's rounds in a plasma coating, similar to that of a Tuskan Raider. Forse had used a lighter wood frame to house the metal parts, and had used higher efficiency alloys to make the weapon lighter without sacrificing mobility due to it's weight. Forse was a professional, and while the E-11 had proven to be the work horse of the Imperial Army, he knew that an operation like this one needed special considerations.

"Hold on, landing's gonna be rough."

"That's fine. I was debating a high altitude jump anyway." Forse said with a grin, looking at Syrenia as she piloted.

Forse looked over at Spark.

"Excited yet, Lieutenant?" Forse said to her, emphasizing her new rank and smiling.

[Spark Vallen]

"You know it," Vallen replied with a determined smile.

Working as part of this trio was a good fit for Spark, who had been through training exercises with Renkl and on a training mission as a Stormtrooper with Dirum. She worked well with them both and understood how her skill set complemented theirs.

"Frakking pirates," she added. "But at least it gives us something to do, right, boss?"

[Syrenia Renkl]

In Syrenia's view, the one Vallen had called "boss" was Forse. To her they all were on the same level, but the male member of their trio was the one with the most extensive experience in the Imperial Army, so it made sense.

"All right. We're good to go. Let's go make some pirates cry." She grabbed her gear and weapons, ready to take down an armada of scum. "And better kill the local fauna before they think we're gourmet food too."

She let the two others leave the ship, before securing it. The damp and hot jungle made her cringe. She hated this type of landscapes, but she'd make do with them.

They had work to do.

[Forse Dirum]

Forse exited the shuttle and made a final weapons check before turning to his allies. He took a small, round reconnaissance droid. In this weather, they'd need a little something extra. The sensors they had would be mostly useless due to the rain. Forse sent the little thing flying into the sky, above the treetops.

Forse took a datapad from his pack and held it in front of everyone. A holographic display rose out of it, showing their current position as well as the estimated position of the pirate base. Between their landing zone and the target was a wide expanse of jungle, filled to burst with deadly fauna.

"Our little recon droid will be able to show us some of the local animals before we encounter them. It only has an effective range of a few hundred meters in weather like this, but that should give us a little bit of breathing room. Intel has it that the planet is filled with feral animals. Notable creatures are feral Banthas, Rycrits, and Acklays. The last one is my favorite." Forse says with a smile.

Forse pulls a magazine from his back and slams it home in his Heavy Repeater, pulling the slide back with an audible cocking noise.

"How should we play this? We can attempt to sneak through the jungle and plan a covert assault on the shield generator and Ion cannons, or we can make a ruckus in the jungle and try and draw out their forces, while one of us makes their way to the sparsely defended base and begins the sabotage with a lighter hostile presence."

Forse pauses.

"I'm open to suggestions." He says to them. He didn't want to overstep his boundaries. They were his equals, and he was more than happy to adopt a better strategy if they had one.

[Spark Vallen]

Spark pursed her lips and studied their environment. The pre-mission simulation had been good, but there was no replacing the live situation, she thought.

"Given my tech background, the diversion would allow me to get close and sabotage them. So far, there's not a system I can't hack," she said with a smirk.

It wasn't wholly true now that she understood her origins and "real life," but truth was a matter of perception she had learned long ago. And this was the truth that she was going with at the moment.

[Syrenia Renkl]

Syrenia was already studying the environment when her two fellow lieutenants spoke. Her cybernetic eye and ear came in handy to add to her trained observation skills. She listened to the offered suggestions, pondering on them for a moment.

"Forse and I can make a diversion in the jungle." She loaded the holo map on her datapad, to explain her addendum to the previously laid out plan by the two others. "If we go to this location, we're out of range of their canons, so they're forced to come at us themselves, giving us some kind of cover and clearing the way even more for Vallen to go sabotage."

[Forse Dirum]

"Sounds good. Our three targets are the Shield Generator, the Comm Relay, and the Ion Cannons. If you have to skip one of the targets, skip the shield generator. An orbital bombardment will crack that egg, but if the Ion Cannon stays intact, they'll have offensive capability against our capital ships." Forse says.

He looks into the forest, in the distance he sees a flock of winged reptiles fly into the air all at once.

"It looks like we've got something big coming our way, Syrenia. Let's go ahead and start on that distraction." Forse says. "Either a Bantha or an Acklay. I'm not sure I have a preference on what it turns out to be."

Forse raises his weapon to his shoulder.

"You guys ready?" Forse asks, looking down the sight of his weapon.

[Spark Vallen]

Spark nodded, taking Forse's input seriously as to how to prioritize her targets.

"See you on the flip side," she told them both.

As Forse and Syrenia took on the winged beasts, Spark crouched low and began scurrying her way through the jungle. The pack on her back was heavier from this position, but the mature woman simply drew on the strength she had and kept on at a steady pace.

This really is me! she thought, giving herself one moment for self-realization, before focusing entirely on her surroundings and her mission.

Spark had to duck and cover more than once as the pirates took note of the racket that Forse and Syrenia had created. Their heavy tred passed by her and Spark hurried on...

[Syrenia Renkl]

Syrenia listened with great attention to what Forse explained of the targets, even regarding Vallen's part. They had a sound plan. Sure thing, problems could always arise, but they were trained to be able to face everything. She had experienced that herself in a tragic way already, and it filled her with even more dedication to the task.

"See you on the other side." She said with a nod to the older woman. In the meantime the brief discussion had occured, the brunette Lieutenant had drawn her rifle at the ready, and checked on her two blasters and vibroblades. Better safe than sorry, she thought.

"Ready." She knew that Forse and her had work to do. "I'll take the Bantha over the Acklay personally, but we'll make do with what's up."

Of course, it turned out to be a bloody acklay, but for sure it created damn ruckus and was drawing a hell of attention. She rolled and dodge as she reached the backside of the beast, using her uncanny strength, offered by her replacement arm and leg, to climb up the thick skinned beast to have another vantage point to hurt and kill it, along with Forse's help from the ground.

[Forse Dirum]

Forse pulled the trigger on his Imperia Heavy Repeater. A loud staccato of fire greeted Forse, in the same way slugthrower repeaters of ancient times had. Forse kept the weapon braced to his shoulder as he opened fire on the Acklay.

Syrenia was already on top of the Acklay a moment after it arrived. Forse began firing his weapon at the different joints of the Acklay's legs, causing it to stumble as it attempted to take a bite out of the soldier on it's back.

The Acklay swiped an injured claw at Forse, who leapt backwards to avoid the swipe. The Acklay wasn't smart enough to multi-task. With it's injured legs, it wouldn't be too long before the Acklay was defeated.

Forse continued firing at the Acklay, making sure to distract the beast long enough for Syrenia to capitalize on her position.

[Spark Vallen]

Blaster in hand, set to kill, Vallen crept forward to the clearing and surveyed the camp. Intel had been solid and everything was just where she expected to be and where they'd drilled for.

Thank the gods.

Seeing no further pirates guarding the camp from this vantage point, she skulked the perimeter further to ensure that she took out any who had remained back. Quick and deadly blasterfire ended their lives and only then did Spark come out of hiding to get to work.

Let's shut the rest of them up, she thought.

The security expert sliced into the comm relay with ease; they were using beyond cheap software. It was out-dated too. It made her sniff with derision. Spark introduced a virus into the system so not only was the system down, it also had no hope of coming back up.

Then, needing to work quickly, she went for the ion cannon to make sure it was down...

[Syrenia Renkl]

The Acklay tried to shake Syrenia off his back a few times, but she eventually managed to land the final blow against him, thanks to Forse's help from the ground. Once it was over, she leaped back to the jungle soil.

"Company's coming." She stated as she heard a bunch of people coming by. "All on foot, I think. That's weird." She got her rifle at the ready and went to take position to get a good angle. That just felt weird that everything would go so smoothly.

She might be young but she damn well knew that life wasn't easy.

[Forse Dirum]

"Probably just a scouting party. They wouldn't send the bulk of their fighting force towards us because we killed an Acklay. We'll need to fight off the scouting party. Then they'll probably send reinforcements." Forse says, loading a new magazine into his repeater.

Forse looked out into the jungle.

"We'll need to keep them occupied long enough so they can radio for reinforcements." Forse says, putting a thermal monocular to his eye. Through the trees, he sees several armed assailants.

"I've got some thermal tape with me. We're going to start a forest fire." Forse says to Syrenia.

Forse hooks his repeater to his tactical harness for the moment so that it hangs on a hook alongside his right leg. He takes a rock from the ground and a spool of thermal tape. Forse makes his way to a nearby tree.

Even in the soaking rain, the thermal tape would have the necessary kick that the soaked wood would need to ignite. Forse quickly adds more thermal tape around the rock, and begins wrapping it around the tree trunk.

"This'll get rid of any fauna that wish to give us a hard time, and it'll obscure our forms to the enemy. Maybe they'll think there's already a landing force on this planet. The ship should be fine. If not, we'll hitch a ride back with some of the ground forces that come in to clean up." Forse says.

Forse activates the thermal tape, and before long the tree begins to smolder and burn despite the rain.

Forse turns back towards the approaching enemy, hunkering down in some shrubbery. When the first pirate enters his sight, Forse opens fire, sending the man to his back.

"Maybe miss a few shots, Syrenia. Let's scare them enough to radio for backup." Forse says, firing off another volley of suppressive fire.

[Spark Vallen]

Hunched down for cover, Spark watched the movement of the remaining pirates who'd startled her into hiding. She'd just barely made it out of sight!

Dren. Okay, Vallen. You're almost there. Get the ion cannon out of commission or this was all for nothing.

While Forse and Syrenia were doing great at dragging most of the pirates off-base, there were still enough of them that she needed a second diversion to get her from point A to point B now. Spark pulled a grenade off her bandoleer, stood, and hurled it as hard and far as she could in the opposite direction that she needed to go.

Kabaaam!

At the shout and then mad rush in that direction, Spark flung another grenade, and then used the chaos to race toward the mechanical components that made the ion cannon operational. She slid through the dirt, landing hard on her knees as she tore open the plating and planted an explosive. Taking a chance, she set it with an exceptionally short timer, and then ran.