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RP: 4th Fleet (NSN) [Mission 7.1] Exercise: Loud Party

Sigma

Inactive Member
Mar. 1, YE 36

It was the last fifteen minutes before the first wave dropped. Marines were rushing about getting their kit together.

Leon Santiago was already in armor, pulling as many shotgun shells as he could for his AS4GS and checking his communication frequencies. Since the two Marine Shaiks used essentially the same equipment and the same comm. frequencies, it would be a disaster for them to intercept and listen in to anything the other side was doing. While they were, in theory, not supposed to do that, both Shaiks knew that NCOs all over would be trying to cheat that way. With their own officers' unspoken permission. If this was supposed to be a true simulation of war, one would have to guard the frequencies without the two-faced promises of brother officers.

He checked the fleet engagement status to see whether 4th Marines would have to worry about 2nd Fleet's fighter screen.

----

4th Fleet had begun operations almost the moment they dropped into the system, like any other invasion fleet. They were led by the Battleship and Battlecruiser Divisions, with the majority of the fleet's heavies up front. 1st and 2nd Cruiser Divisions formed the flanks, protecting the Carrier Division in the middle.

Swarms of 4th Fleet fighters had moved ahead of the fleet to engage 2nd's own fighter screen. Admiral Ironside had adopted a very aggressive strategy, unlike the more cautious Valken. There was to be no fancy maneuvering yet. Just a tight, compact formation to break through to their objective, drop the Marines off and then break up the 2nd Fleet.

Their opposition had been scattered throughout the system. It was Admiral Corcyra's way of preparing his own fleet to handle a situation where they would caught off balance. The arrival of 4th Fleet was known but its exact time and location were a secret, known only to that fleet's officers. As a result, Corcyra had to post picket units at all the likely places and delaying forces in strategic locations behind them to act as delaying forces.

Ironside and Valken had known this. Part of the plan had been created by the Grand Admiral prior to his departure. He just left the rest of it up to Ironside to finish with her own command style. The Admiral had suggested the compact formation and the arrival of the fleet together so as to brush aside any pickets or counter-attacking forces. Ironside, however, had decided to come in above the system's lateral plane. As a result, her ships slashed downwards while the 2nd Fleet's ships had to decide whether or not to turn and fight or turn and hope they didn't get shot across the T.

Nepleslian warships were designed to have powerful forward firing arcs with their broadsides being slightly less so. The doctrine followed that a forward facing unit presented a smaller surface area upon which the enemy might hit, as opposed to a broadside which presented a lot of surface area.

Corcyra had pulled back, conceding the landing zone to 4th Fleet too easily. All 4th Fleet could claim were half a dozen destroyer pickets. Even the delaying force had been pulled back. Ironside had frowned. Corcyra was smart. He was saving his numerical strength to gather his fleet and then bring his huge force to bear on the 4th Fleet. If he destroyed 4th Fleet in orbit, it effectively signaled the end of the campaign. Without a fleet, ground forces were helpless against orbital bombardment.

----

So the 4th Fleet Marines looked to have a clear drop. The problems would come after the drop and Leon strongly suspected that the Death's Head and his own FMF were walking into a trap. But at least they pretty much knew it was a trap.

He watched the two medics in Phaedra's squad gear up, working in sync and correcting each other. Save for the medical cases they carried, both looked like regular combat Marines.

"Corporal Morris, draw a couple of those experimental ammunition cases for the platoon and check out how they work. All I know is that you punch in the quantity and type into the datajockey, the nano inside builds it then spits it out for you. Check and see how sturdy they are. If we can bring them along in the drop, I want them. Otherwise, we'll have to get the tankers to bring them in the second wave," Leon instructed Henry.

The dummy rounds they had were finite, after all, and if they were going to need to hold the drop zone, a supply of ammunition would be good.

"All right, listen up the rest of you. This is the first major op we've done. Some of you might remember Tange. This is that big." He paused. Leon wondered if he should stress the date and timing of these war games. He decided not to. The Marines ought to be smart enough to work out exactly why the war games were being held in the Nepleslia system and exactly why three of their fleets were in a single location despite the strategic requirements of the Navy.

"We will be dropping 500 Marines every ten seconds for ten minutes. That is the first wave. We will be in that first drop. Our job is to secure the beach head perimeter. 2nd Marines aren't going to be in the landing zone but once they figure out where it is, they'll be heading for it. Simultaneously, shuttles will be ferrying heavy armor and more infantry down as the second wave. They'll be slower, having to burn through the thin planetary atmosphere. Third wave will be another infantry drop timed exactly when second wave hits. After that, we hold the line until the Field Marshall tends us where to punch a hole and break out. Be fully prepared for the landing zone to be surrounded before that break out. And remember, pray to God that Corcyra isn't smarter than Admiral Ironside. We lose the fleet in orbit, we lose the round. Squad leaders, check your chickies are ready for hatching and report in!"
 
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"Alright Cavaliers, finalize your loadouts and report in to me," said Phaedra over the comm. Clad in her Hostile, Phaedra took some exploratory steps and checked her weapon settings.
 
"Stones here, reporting good to go." Wulfe said on the squad frequency as he finished checking the Kegbuster for the Nth time. The weapon felt unfamiliar and clunky for the Marine, having been much more used to the HPAR and the AS4GS combo, but the Wargames were the best opportunity to try them in 'real' action as opposed to the simulations. Needless to say, he was looking forward for the exercise.

Satisfied, the P1C waited for the rest of his squad, his Helmet's monoeye panning left and right.
 
Aleksei listened to the briefing while he chewed on the end of his cigar. He found himself checking the rotating barrels of his AMP once again along with the drum mag of the weapon to ensure maximum combat effectiveness. Satisfied that the weapon was in working order, the P2C held out his hand and spit the chewed and tattered cigar into the armored palm before gently wedging it in between the waist area where the armored skirt connected to the rest of his armor. Replacing his helmet on his head, he booted the systems quickly and performed a check of the monoeyes. Once again satisfied with their performance, he stood carefully to avoid knocking any of his Hostile clad allies aside with the bulk of his own frame.

"Voronov, set." reported the marine while he gently lifted one foot and then the other, getting himself back in touch with his armor.
 
A quick slap on the back signaled that the last adjustments had been made. "The Most Brilliant Medic in the Universe and Bernie are ready!" Laura announced cheerfully. "Bernhard," muttered Greer over the comms. He was still trying to act like absolutely nothing was going on between the two of them even though it was almost common knowledge just how intimate the two were. He also didn't want to draw attention to his previous... break down.

So he just made his customary protestation at his fiancee's pet name for him and left it at that.

His Hostile was armed with a HPAR loaded with dummy rounds, like all the others. The dummy rounds would impact upon shielding or armor and the AI would calculate the amount of damage done by a live round. The shielding would then be reduced by the appropriate amount or the affected armor systems would be modified by the AI. The round itself would disintegrate, leaving black marks on the armor's surface if it impacted there. That would be to show others that hits had been made. In addition, he had a pair of smoke grenades. His job was to get close, treat and retrieve the wounded. Smoke helped to mask his position from visual targeting, giving him vital moments as his attackers switched to some other view mode.

In contrast, Laura's role was to cover him, provide support and then give advanced care. She was simply more technically proficient, though her bedside manner was terrible. Thus, Laura's VOID was equipped with energy weapons. She used the LPA and the VOID's laser gatlings without reserve. She also manipulated the VOID's shield drones to protect Bernhard or others in the squad. Her grenade launcher was armed with 10 HE and 10 Subspace Particle Burst rounds. Laura had one of the YELLOWs in the barrel.

Both medics had fully stocked medical kits, though neither of them expected to actually use anything. Simulated rounds meant simulated casualties, right? Bernhard glanced at Stan Brandt. He had heard some very disturbing stories about the man since he rejoined the Cavaliers. First, he had several friendly fire incidents under his belt and now Bernhard kept hearing about how he received fan mail from Nekos...

"And that's everyone important, Sergeant!" Laura continued, oblivious to Bernhard's interjection.

"Good enough for me, Volkov. Get your butts up to the launch tubes!" Santiago shouted.

---------------------------------

In the tradition of not really having tradition, 4th Marines decided that the Fleet Marine Force, being the senior Marine unit would launch first. After all, the geriatric veterans from that unit would need extra time to pack their walking sticks.

"Send the Marines!" Admiral Ironside ordered over the ship's speaker. And like that, Leon Santiago and Phaedra Volkov were shot out of the launch tubes. All around them, other Shaikas were spitting out Marines towards the landing zone. The rest of the FMF followed behind them, hurtling towards the low atmo planet where Funky City trainees often did low gravity training. While it was a skill rarely used by Marines, it was still essential. Movement was easier in Power Armor, thanks to thrusters, but it was still slightly different.

"Remember boys and girls, low gee doesn't mean zero gee. Shots will go farther, lose momentum slower. Be prepared for long distance gun fights! This isn't going to be the knife fights we had on SC-4. 2nd Marines have more guns and they know it. When we hit, start bunkering up fast!" Leon reminded the units as they entered the atmosphere.

Once down, the Marines quickly set to preparing their positions. The LZ was a trio of huge craters, each over a kilometer in diameter, though only about a meter and a half in depth. It made a natural perimeter but it wasn't going to be enough against whatever the 2nd Marines could throw.

"Engineers to the front, get moving!"

"Four-Oh-Twos, take the skies!"

"I want OP there and there! Ammunition caches every hundred meters! Get those nano fabs running!"

"Helipads there, there and there! The flyboys are on their way and are gonna whine if we don't have their LZ prepped!"

The craters were a bustle of movement. Even as the first simulated shells rained down.

Live fire was live fire, even if it wasn't actually aimed correctly. Real artillery munitions rained around the crater but simulated rounds landed. The live rounds shook with full force, jarring the Marines and interrupting some of their work. Simulated rounds exploded with smaller pops, letting the AI handle the damage assessment. But regardless, the rate of fire was light. At best, it was the amount of firepower that a platoon could put out. Not enough to really inconvenience the hundreds of Marines now preparing their fighting positions.

"Keep building! Squad leaders, choose two Marines and send them ahead as skirmishers! Not you, Hardman. You're the reserve!"

Above, AIR2s from a regiment in the 402nd Division soared at high speed, hunting for the attackers. VOIDs from the Undertakers were hastily setting up nano fabrication units and TEKs.

----------------------

"Rana, Reams, help me set up a triage station!" Laura shouted at the two. It was easy work but it needed multiple hands. They needed to place beacons for the triage drop pod. She tossed a pair of marker beacons to each and began pointing to where she wanted them to be stuck into the ground.

Bernhard scanned around, watching the fall of rounds to see if he was needed. Obviously there was a unit who had pre-sighted the position and were going to drop as much ordnance on them until the rest of 2nd Marines could arrive.

"Typhoon Wing inbound, mud puppies. Call out the bad guys and we'll smoke 'em."

"As if! No one fries bad guys better than the Green Beans! MORE SPEED, MORE THRUST BABY!"

Slower Corona gunships had deployed from shuttles in mid orbit while others started bringing down the heavy armor. All around them, the delta shaped green outlines of Green Squadron darted, daring anything to beat them at speed and precision. It was going to be an interesting contest between the Marines in AIRs, the Navy pilots in slow moving Coronas and their colleagues in the fast moving starfighters. For now, though, 4th Fleet had the ground and air.
 
Stan listened patiently to the briefing. He checked his AMP and other weapon systems less frequently than Aleksei and Wulfe, being more concerned with ensuring that he had, in fact, loaded dummy ammunition. He must have checked it at least fifteen times at this point, but that didn't stop him from looking yet again, as though some invisible gremlin might have taken the opportunity to switch it out with live ammo just to make his life more difficult.

Phaedra's request was met with a slightly stiff "Brandt is ready." He didn't feel as jittery as he did before. Perhaps he was getting used to things...

The transition from space to terra firma was an uneventful one, if turbulent. Things were far more chaotic at ground level, however, and Stan felt a little useless. Barring an order from a superior, the ID-SOL decided that the best thing to do was to help provide security for those who were currently going about their tasks. He began to look for a suitable location to keep an eye on things, though he also kept an ear out for any instructions.
 
Much like Stan, Aleksei's descent to the planet was uneventful though the sound of the radio chatter from squads confirming orders and the fly boys was a comforting buzz in the ID-SOL's ears. The planet's surface rushed the meet Aleksei as he felt the Aggressor frame hit the dirt. A quick glance through his monoeye suite showed infantry and engineers rushing about the LZ, prepping fighting positions and other necessary emplacements. The demo specialist could see there was nothing that needed to be blasted, though he was fairly certain that his squad had forgotten or just didn't care that he had attended the course and was rated to assist in any way that involved taking something down.

Glancing ahead, he saw the engineers maneuvering to the front to begin setting up and so he moved up to provide security for them. Thundering across the LZ, Aleksei squeezed past two engineers before taking a knee. "Providing security to engineers teams." spoke Aleksei as his shoulder mounted chainguns swiveled to and fro waiting for a target to appear.
 
While Phaedra had been shot out of a launch tube before, there was something about being dropped into low gee that made everything seem sluggish; to her it seemed more like gliding through the air instead of hurtling hundreds of feet in a matter of minutes.

Landing heavily in her Hostile, Phaedra rose to her feet and checked her HUD to gain her bearings. She held her HPAR in one armored hand as she surveyed the horizon.

"Stones, Brandt," said Phaedra over the comm. "Advance as skirmishers. Remain watchful and report enemy movement. Move out!"

"Cavaliers! Look alive! The rest of you get into firing positions at the crater's edge!" she said, pointing at the "front" of the crater where the fortifications were being constructed.
 
Max enjoyed the "ride down" to the planet. Orbital drops gave him a hell of an adrenaline rush. It was a great feeling and part of the reason he joined the Marines, to get to do cool shit like get shot out of spaceships. Most would think that he was nuts, and maybe he was a little, but that's what made him such a great Marine.

As Max touched down on the planet with a heavy thud, he readied his HPAR and remembered his training. Around him he could see the rest of his squad on his HUD as well as the others that were supporting them. When Phaedra's orders came he was already instinctively moving to take up a position around their landing zone.

"Taking defensive position!!" responded Carter, acknowledging that he had heard the orders. He moved his armor up to the marines forward position and began to look for targets that might try to counter-attack them.
 
Eric was ready for the drop as he casually adjusted his welders torch. A few more button presses and it seared to life and died just as fast. His job was simple. Reinforce the perimeter and hold the landing zone. He was ready when they dropped and he quickly went about his task.

The engineers ahead of him had grabbed the prefab units and were busy setting up a small bunkered position in a smaller crater when he arrived. His torch flared to life, "Welding, watch the edges!" His visor polarized as the bright plasma hit the edges of the prefab unit. He was quickly done with his rush job and the three engineers quickly started throwing up walls and other cover to the left and right of the position. Marines already were manning the emplacements as the trio started another hasty emplacement.
 
"Corporal Morris, draw a couple of those experimental ammunition cases for the platoon and check out how they work. All I know is that you punch in the quantity and type into the datajockey, the nano inside builds it then spits it out for you. Check and see how sturdy they are. If we can bring them along in the drop, I want them. Otherwise, we'll have to get the tankers to bring them in the second wave," Leon instructed Henry.
Though he was the 4th Fleet's lead Marine Engineer in all but name, Henry was there to figure out how to make shit work, and how to break shit with it. "Yes sir, inspecting now!" he replied snappily as he got to work on examining the device. In this case, it made bullets and ammunition. "They seem fragile when working, but it's tolerant to a few bumps when it's not operating." He made his analysis of the device as he listened to its inner workings, observed the way it worked, the way it printed bullets. A Nepleslian's wet dream come true - but it seemed to have a distinct wobble to it. It didn't like having to move around while doing its thing - but it did deactivate quickly for rapid transportation. "Extra ammunition's always a boon. We can use them in the second wave to restock defence while the reinforcements go."

"Speaking of defence, away I go. Sir."

Chukkata-clack! THUNK- FWOOOOOOOOOO...

And then silence before the sounds of rushing wind as he penetrated atmosphere. The sound of the new launch tubes was still ringing in Henry's ears as he went planetside, it was a welcome sound as mortars pounded down all around him to simulate a real battle, in addition to dummy rounds aimed closer to him. Nepleslian doctrine considered the live fire incorporation into exercises to make mistakes carry heftier consequences, and to get that lovely battlefield ambience that's difficult to emulate in a training scenario as large as this one.

Henry had hit the ground a little later than his colleagues despite being one of the leaders of the charge. Such was the drawback of being Santiago's analysis man, but he found his niche immediately, watching the prefabs get built. "Morris here. Apologies for the delay, just tool analysis for our second wave," he said as a picture of the ammo fabricators appeared. "Phaedra," he radioed his immediate superior, "I'm going to have a monoeye drone do overwatch duty," he pulled the violin-case off of his back, set it down and gave it a firm boot in just the right place to open the lid and let the drone free. Feeling fatherly, he gave it a scritch beneath the 'chin' before setting it loose to watch the perimeter on passive sensors. "Whereabouts do you need me?"
 
"Private 3rd Class, A6013. Ready for combat." - came a formal voice with a salute. All his gear has been in place and he couldn't be any more prepared than he was, truly. Without much more said, the clone had simply set to doing his job to the best of his ability.

The systems of his armor were quickly and efficiently booted, and soon the marine newbie was ready for his drop. A lond cracking, metallic sound roared outside, but A6013 merely stared ahead, at his screen. With a trembling vibration and a few dramatic moments, the power armroed clone was launched away into the atmosphere. Merely a moment passed before the sudden burst of air grinding against his little shell threatened to make A6013 nervous. Ha. No. The clone proceeded to calmly go through the landing safety measures.

"Landing at point [insert meridian values here] in exactly 17.7 seconds. Requesting clear landing, ready for immediate combat." - and he truly was. Quickly loading his weapon, the suit moved to join the formation infront of him.
 
"Roger that, Sergeant!" Wulfe replied, his Hostile still smoking from the extreme temperatures of atmospheric reentry. The monoeye on the helmet of his armor swiveled left and right as he got his bearings, using the armor's HUD to get an idea of how the friendly forces were deployed.

The marine hefted the clunky Kegbuster and used his thrusters to propel him towards the area of enemy activity in long 'jumps'. His first jump was botched at first, but his armor's Savtech had already calibrated the thrusters to behave in a more manageable and familiar manner afterwards as he jumped again. He knew he couldn't possibly face the elements from the 2nd Marines in a stand-up fight, so his plan was to merely harass them, safely falling back until he joined back with his unit at the defensive point.
 
Sensor data began coming in. Anyone who tuned their sensors to pick up anything five kilometers out would pick up the readings. Hundreds of red blips were converging on the fewer blue ones. Just as more and more blue dots arrived in the center, even more red ones appeared at the edges.

One battery was coming from the east, another from the west while a third from the north. Three thousand Marines from 2AF against the ... Leon checked his count, eight hundred seventy two Marines from 4AASP.

More rounds started dropping on them. A heavier fire as the gap between explosions decreased. Leon shouted to his Marines what to do next. "If we're in range of their guns, they're in range of ours! VOIDs, Aggressors, stop popping off rounds! Morris, you keep doing your shit!"

---------------------------

Wulfe and Stan advanced outwards, into the live fire zones. Live fire war games were the only way Nepleslia trained its big units. Best way to expose the greenies to big booms without killing most of them. Plasma shells exploded around the pair as they scuttled forwards, keeping low.

One kilometer from the LZ, their Savtechs picked up signs of fighting. Then it started tagging friendlies in the air and hostiles on the ground. Using their zoom, the two Marines could see that a trio of 4th Marine AIR2s were harassing a squad of Hostiles and Aggressors. For the moment, the 2nd Marines seemed entirely focused on the AIR2s, probably because those armors were blasting their Noisemakers to throw off the land-bound PA targeting locks.

---------------------------

Even though dozens of Marines, like Wulfe and Stan, were out interdicting, 2nd Marines approached quickly. Soon, they were a kilometer and a half from the LZ perimeter.

"Get to the firing line!" Laura ordered all of the Marines around her. She physically shoved that newbie, Asics, or whatever his name was towards the position Bernhard had taken up at the lip. The Most Brilliant Medic in the Universe had more important things to do than simply shooting her inferiors. She had set up the drop triage to save their inferior hides!

Bernhard barely noticed as Asics, Rana and Alex Reams took up positions around him. "Start shooting. Controlled burst," he said simply before tapping out single coin rounds from his HPAR at a quick rate.

-----------------------------

Practice HPAR rounds started biting into the dirt and nano-constructed emplacements around Eric, Max and Aleksei, kicking up dirt and throwing it in the faces. Nothing had hit them for now and the prefab bunkers were undamaged save for some scratches. But the fire was accurate and heavy.

Each prefab bunker could house up to four Marines in armor. They were simple concrete, nano-reinforced bunkers with firing slits inside. Easily constructed, easily taken down and recycled afterwards but tough to kill with anything short of AM warheads. If a practice round tagged as an AM warhead struck, the Marines inside would all be locked up in their armor as "casualties" but the bunker itself would continue to be there for subsequent use. It was a bit unfair but this was a war game and wars were never fair. The only disadvantage to a bunker was that you could only use handheld weapons in the firing slits. Anything else was blocked by the bunker itself.

"You and you," Corporal Talbain in his Aggressor came up behind the trio and pointed to Max and Aleksei, "Get inside and start firing." "You," he pointed to Epic Sequence, "make more."
 
The iron will and guts were what kept him focused on his objective and doing his best to ignore the shelling as Wulfe moved through the Live Fire Zone. There was nothing he could do if he got hit, and if he did die he wouldn't feel anything anyway, he had been trained to lose that fear but he had really put his 'reigns' over it after his first mission; It was just another case of doing it first, then getting the courage to do it after he did it. The marine came to a halt once he saw the group from the 2nd Marines.

He tried to recall the principles of harassment and skirmish from his training once his Savtech picked up the fight. It was not hard.

He and Brandt had the initiative from that, but once the enemy consolidated they would outgun both of them; Keeping themselves safe was paramount over doing damage to the enemy. "I'm going to fire BLUE at them, then you rip them a new one." Wulfe said to his partner, using a crater for cover as he moved to insert a magazine of imaginary BLUE rounds. Whether the EMP load of these rounds was dumbed down or the same he didn't know, but it would sure suck for the other armors to have their electronics fried.

"Once they start targeting us, we hightail out of here and let the AIR's do more damage then go at them again." he said, almost adding a 'And try not to hit our guys. Or me', but put that aside. He got up on the lip of the crater and aimed his launcher at the group of armors, looking back to check the backblast area, even though he knew Stan was armored, then squeezed the launcher's trigger, aiming at one of the 2nd fleet's Aggressors. As soon as the first missile was in the air, Wulfe was already firing the second, then the third, emptying the magazine.
 
Stan eagerly set off with Wulfe, feeling oddly proud for being selected for interdiction duties. As far as he was concerned, not a single 2nd Marine PA was going to get anywhere near his comrades. The trip might have been dull if not for the constant bombardment. Like Wulfe Stan tried to shrug off the near impacts of the incoming rounds. It wouldn't do for him - or anyone else for that matter - to get shaken up by something that pretty much everyone was going to encounter at some point. The ID-SOL came to a stop next to his partner, Savtech having pinged the combatants at roughly the same time as the Nepleslian's own. He studied the situation quietly and calmly, trying to size up what they were up against.

Luckily, Wulfe already had a plan - and a solid one. "I'm up for that," said Stan steadily. "If it makes you feel better, I'll go in front of you so you don't have to worry about any accidents." His tone was light and airy. The time for talk came to an end, however, when Wulfe put his plan into action. Clambering up the slope - mindful of the backblast as he did so - Stan hefted his AMP into a ready position, took aim, and fired, spraying the 2nd Marine Hostiles and Aggressors with it. He briefly considered letting loose a salvo of dummy ARROWs, but decided instead to lock on to his targets with his own Aggressor's Monoeye, releasing a few bursts with the powered armour's chainguns just to make sure that the duo definitely got the 2nd Marines' attention.
 
The thing about commandeering a drone is that while it had a relative amount of autonomy to second guess and make decisions based on what was around it, a modicum of finer control from an operator could make a single drone last longer and become even more effective. Henry was using the drone to mark targets of interest for the other soldiers, particularly the ones closest to the Stan and Stones fire team.

The way the drone was flying was following the contours of the hills, acting more like a rabbit than just a clay pigeon for the 2nd Marines to go skeet shooting with, able to duck behind the hillside and avoid incoming fire. Seeing that contact had been made, there was no use in keeping the Monoeye on the Drone passive mode. They knew where the marines were, and they were probably looking at him with their own monoeyes right now.

Targets lit up on the radar for those within range of things like mortars. Of course, the ones that Henry had bought with him were training rounds - able to simulate the effect of an antimatter blast but not kill those caught in it. For training purposes of course. Only the truly stupid or highly unfortunate died in these exercises. Even then, if the head was intact, you still had a soldier to piece back together - hopefully sobered by their experience.

"Alright I've got targets here, here and here," the positions started lighting up on his fellow soldier's HUDS, over an encrypted line to all of them. Little red reticle appeared where the Monoeye had spotted them. "Big group of Aggressors spotted!" he said as his drone fed a priority report to him. "I'll pin them down." He was still kneeling down not far from where he'd landed - still in the middle of them all. The mock-mortars whirred to life and armed themselves, triangulating, accounting for distance, angle of attack, gravity, flight time, lead on target, possibility of interception - just to name a few.

Several sets of conditions were played out by his combat computer. It seemed favourable. Henry fired one.
 
Stan and Wulfe's scattered fire certainly got the 2nd Marines' attention as mock explosions and hits registered on them. But none of them went down. Two of the Hostiles turned to advance on them while an Aggressor armed with an AOP started lobbing rounds at them. The explosion of a "HE" round took off their shields as HPAR dummy rounds streaked around them. There was no cover. In the air, the AIR2s danced and jigged, popping off UMD rounds at the rest of the squad in an attempt to stop them firing at the landing zone.

"Stones, what's your status?" Talbain growled over the radio.

-----------------------------

Bernhard received the targeting data from Henry. "You and you," he pointed at Asics and Rana, "take this one out." On their HUDs, the nearest Aggressor was tagged about 450m away. "You," he pointed to Alex Reams, "this one." A Hostile on Alex's HUD lit up. Bernhard stood up to fire at another Hostile.

Behind him, he heard the loud CHOONK of a mortar firing.

"Firing on your target," Laura told Henry, firing off a mortar round as well.

Henry's round sailed through the low atmosphere and landed first, hitting right in the middle of a group of Aggressors and Hostiles from 2nd Marines. Laura's round landed right after his. Between the two "explosions," all five 2nd Marine PAs locked up and "died" in the plasma inferno. Their computers had decided that they couldn't survive the impact of two fusion rounds right next to them.

Nonetheless, more of the "enemy" were advancing, firing as they came. At the lip of the craters, 4th Marines who stood up to fire were being gunned down. Their armors would lock up and they'd roll down, like rag dolls, into the bottom of the craters.

------------------------------

"Phaedra, start shooting at them. Talbain, position the squad. We need to hold on. Next wave of troops are inbound," Chief Santiago ordered the Cavalier NCOs.

Above them, 4th Fleet air assets roared outwards, shooting and being shot at by their targets on the ground. In the sims, if the flyers were knocked out, the craft AI would switch on the auto pilot and take it back to the ship. If it was an atmospheric flyer like the Corona, the gunship would simply land somewhere else, having "crashed" farther away.

They seemed to be doing alright until the 4th Marines saw jets diving on them. 2nd AF had placed at least some of its starfighters on the planet just to intercept the invasion. Dogfights ensued as the fighters fired digitally at each other. Real missiles might actually do critical damage so they were limited to firing lasers at each other that simply said whether they were hit or not.

In orbit, more fighter squadrons were scrambled to cover the landing zone since shuttles carrying the Shaik's tanks were launching.
 
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"Keep firing Cavaliers!" barked Phaedra. She had positioned herself near one of the forward bunkers, firing her HPAR in controlled bursts at the oncoming enemies. She smirked to herself as the NCOs under her command did their jobs and directed the efforts of the squad, all without having to be given orders to do so. Like a well-oiled machine, the Cavaliers rained down (dummy) punishment on the opposition. Spotting a particularly compact cluster of oncoming Hostiles, Phaedra fired one of the dummy grenades from her underslung grenade launcher at them.
 
Just as the HE shell exploded, Wulfe realized the mistake he had made: putting all the eggs in one basket. Since he and Brandt were in the same place it only took one lucky hit with another shell to put both of them out of commission. Not only that, they had already overstayed their welcome there, so it was time to get out. "We're gonna draw those guys away from the LZ! I'm gonna bail out then cover you, but take cover someone else or they're gonna get both of us in one hit" Wulfe spoke, already inserting a magazine of imaginary RED rounds and throwing the spent one of BLUEs away.

He looked over the lip of the crater once and then turned around, seeing that the enemy had already brought more numbers to fight the two of them. The marine took off in his Hostile, thrusters screaming, and activated the Noisemaker to throw off any locks as he boosted away in a hapzard pattern. Instead of going away, the marine circled the squad, keeping himself tangent to them so that he and Brandt could hit them from two different directions if they pulled that off right.

"This is Stones. Brandt and I have engaged an enemy squad and we're drawing them away from the LZ." He said, taking cover in another crater a couple hundred meters away from his last position. Wulfe said right before landing, raising a small cloud of dust and a small avalanche of dirt as he hit a little bit off the crater; The finesse of a Hostile was the same of a Rhino in a porcelain store. Once he slid down the rest, the marine raised the Kegbuster again, aiming it at the one of the Hostiles that had moved to engage Brandt and him and then fired the weapon, dishing out some RED payback on the other marine.
 
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