Xenia: Damn this rain...
This tale of blood and thunder begins in the weeping Hadian countryside, not too far from the Legion's objective. The skies were almost as dark as night with how thickly the clouds covered the sky and rained upon the lands. Dirt roads, lengthy patches of trees, and communal farming sites were all soaked with heavenly water.
Gordon: Xenia, what's the hold up?
Xenia: Nothing, sir. Command gave us hope the rain would let up to manageable levels, but it's only been getting heavier as we walked. It's going to make scopes useless since they'll just fog up in this weather.
Xenia's blue eyes were tired yet ready, and her brown hair was neatly tied up under her helmet. The two were not alone, for Xenia was one in a troop of 32 legionaries quietly converging on a nearby town through the trees, including the bearded and hoarse-voiced Gordon.
Gordon: Scopes off then. We're just about to reach the town.
A nearby soldier chimed in.
Legionary: Sir, treeline ends just ahead. We should stop here.
Gordon gave the signal for everyone to stop, and the attack was prepared.
Gordon: Xenia, take Team 3 and hook around the left. Team 4 will hook around to the right. Teams 1 and 2 will spearhead the assault from the front.
Xenia: Understood, sir.
Aided by the cover of trees and their camouflaged cloaks, Xenia formed up with 7 others and traversed around to the left side of the communal town. With all teams in place, Teams 1 and 2 looked down the sights of their rifles at the unsuspecting Hadian troops ahead. Some of them were on guard, trying to keep themselves warm, while others hurriedly threw supplies into loading trucks.
Legionary: Center of Gravity, sir?
Gordon: The only one I can see is a possible escape through the rear of the village, but this rain is going to give them hell when they try to move the trucks. Defenses shouldn't be a problem. Team 4 will be able to cut off the rear in a timely fashion. Let's do the honors.
Three fingers in the air.
Two.
One.
A volley of rifle fire rung out from the trees like thunder, peppering the Hadian troops guarding the front. What little calmness the Hadians had erupted into chaos as they ducked behind sandbags and soaked village houses. The men packing the trucks did not stop. They only hurried their task.
Xenia: It's begun.
Legionary: We should go-
Xenia blocked the soldier with her arm, fiercely focusing her gaze on the road going through the village.
Xenia: No. Wait a little bit. We need to let them move the bulk of their reinforcements move to the front so we can pinch the loading trucks from the side. There's still Team 4's diversion too.
Legionary 2: Well they better hurry, damn it. Wait too long and those trucks will try to escape.
The firefight at the front raged on, with the legionaries hugging the trees for cover as bullets from the Hadians' return fire whizzed by their ears, chipping wood off of the soaked tree bark. Gordon carefully poked his rifle out from cover, popping off three shots through the window of one of the houses ahead and just barely missing a Hadian rifleman inside, who ducked behind cover.
Legionary: Sir, we're going to move over to the right to spread our fire!
Gordon: Go! Team 1, cover them!
As they moved, the godsend of a diversion from Team 4 finally manifested in the form of a thundering explosion on the side of the town. Smoke arose from the burning buildings ahead and rubble rained down from the sky, alerting the Hadians to their position.
Hadian: Move! Enemies trying to insert from the side!
Xenia: There it is. Now we can go!
A group of Hadian riflemen broke off from the front to defend the town from a side attack, only to find the site of the explosion empty. Not a single Legionary to be found. The dozen or so soldiers were perplexed, and confusion in battle lead them to paranoia. They looked around and around, but saw not a thing in the heavy, misty rain.
Hadian: What the hell?! Where are they?!
Legionary: Peek-a-boo!
Before setting off the charges, Team 4 moved further down the side of the town, as to approach whatever reinforcements that broke off from their rear. The Hadian riflemen realized this all too late as they drowned in gunfire and fell to the ground. With that, Xenia and her team were able to begin pinching in through the side of the village, meeting in with little resistance as most of the defense was now concentrated and spread out on the front.
Xenia: There they are! Stop them!
The team of 8 tucked themselves into alleyways between houses as the Hadians guarding the trucks fired on them, only to receive fire from behind as Team 4 made their way up the side of the town.
Legionary: Now that's some beautiful timing!
The Hadians were forced into a position where neither side was safe. Bullets struck them in the back from behind, and through their cheeks in the front. Many of them laid dead in the mud and rain in just a few seconds as the remaining cowards to fell back down the road. Both teams moved in and seized the trucks.
Xenia: That took a little too long, don't you think?
One of the troops from Team 4 chuckled as they shut the engines of the trucks off.
Legionary: We went as fast as we could without being detected. I just hope 1 and 2 will be alright.
Xenia: They're the ones equipped for a long firefight, they should be worried about us instead. Either way, we'll both drop off half of our team here and get them behind. That leaves 8 to secure the trucks and 8 to assist in the frontal assault.
Legionary: Let's do it then!
Xenia, of course, opted to move up and join the fighting ahead. Teams 1 and 2 were slowly gaining more ground as Xenia and the other legionaries came in from behind, ducking outside of the windows of houses where the Hadians took cover. Now dangerously close to the enemy, Xenia could hear the frantic commands of the Hadians, their yells for more ammo, and even the cartridges falling onto the wooden floors as they returned fire.
Xenia took a grenade from her belt, signaling the other legionaries to line up along the windows and prep theirs as well.
Three fingers in the air.
Two fingers.
One.
The pins were pulled and the grenades thrown in synchronously, like a choreographed dance.
Hadian: Sh*t! Grenades!-
The Legionaries covered their heads and smoke and bone fragments ejected from the windows, then proceeded to infiltrate the first house.
Gordon: Looks like they're moving in now! Concentrate fire on the other houses! Don't let them escape!
It was quick inside of that house. You storm in, you check your corners, you shoot anyone wearing a uniform that isn't yours. Xenia did this as she approached the stairs, quickly popping out of cover to nail a Hadian engineer in his chest. He tumbled down the stairs, unresponsive and bleeding. Now she could see the features of humanity in her enemy, their dirty skin, the color of their eyes, the length of their hair.
Legionary: Clear!
Xenia: Up the stairs!
Their soaked boots left wet prints as they cautiously stormed up the stairs, checking the rooms for any remaining soldiers. Xenia slowly approached the closed door to the master bedroom, halting in her tracks and signaling the men behind her to be quiet. She removed her fist from the air and wrapped her hand around the grip of her rifle. A shadow beyond the door revealed itself from what little ambient light could be seen from underneath.
A deep breath.
A single shot through the door.
With that, she could hear someone plop down on the ground. The team stormed in to find a young Hadian soldier on the ground, his eyes rolling back into his head as the red stain on the chest of his uniform grew larger.
Legionary: Kid can't be older than 16, man...
Xenia: If it has a gun, it's an enemy. End of story. Is that it?
Legionary 2: Yeah, the house is clear.
Xenia: Let's meet up with the other teams. The rest of the Hadians probably fell back to the granary down the road.
The gunfire outside was brought to a halt. It seemed the assault was successful. The teams met out in the middle of the street and the unforgiving rain after the houses were cleared. Annoyingly, it seemed the rain was starting to get in everyone's boots.
Gordon: Are those trucks secured?
Xenia: Yes, sir! We left 8 to secure them!
Gordon: Good! The remainder of the enemy fell back towards the granary! We should-
Legionary: The hell is that?!
The soldier pointed everyone's eyes to a curious plume of black smoke in the distance, rising up towards the storming heavens.
Legionary 2: Hey, that's the direction of the granary!
Legionary 3: Those psychos are trying to burn it down?!
Xenia: Sir!
Gordon: Move it out, go! Stop them immediately!
All of them stormed down the street with great haste, their collective footsteps sounding like the thunder of a cavalry unit. They had finally met up with the troops assigned to the trucks up the road.
Legionary: Trucks are unloaded and secured, sir!
Gordon: Fall in and move up! We've got to stop them from burning down the granary!
But then came the bullets, striking Gordon in his leg and killing several legion troops. The sudden hail of gunfire came from Hadian reinforcements coming down the road, using the sandbags and buildings for cover. The constant snap and whistle of bullets split the legion troops onto opposite sides of the road, leaving the dead and wounded right in the middle. As they returned fire, the sound of Gordon screaming in pain felt more like a baby crying in the distance to Xenia.
Legionary: God damn it! What do we do?! We've got to rescue Gordon!
Xenia: Leave him!
Legionary 2: What did you just say?!
Xenia: We cannot rescue any of them under this amount of fire! We need to keep them busy from the front and systematically pinch them from the side! Divert 8 troops on each side and shoot them from the alleyways before they get the same idea!
Legionary 3: You heartless little-
Legionary 2: Ahh! Damn it! Do it! The fire won't stop until we do!
Covering their movement, Xenia peeked her rifle over the corner of the ruined house, securing a masked Hadian in her sights and sending a round through his head right as he haw her.
Duck.
Reload.
She popped out again, firing another shot at an engineer just before he could toss of a grenade.
Hadian: Get back! Get ba-
The explosion from the grenade swallowed up 6 of the Hadians and shrouded them in a mist of blood and smoke.
Legionary: Up ahead! Enemy cannon coming down the road!
A small infantry gun rolled down the road, shielding it's two operators with its iron fins. The operators wore balaclavas for their faces, and gloves to protect their hands from hot shell casings.
Hadian: Loading!
The chamber was slid open, allowing for a 37mm round to be loaded in. The operative closed the chamber as the other adjusted the cannon.
Hadian 2: Set!
Hadian: Fire!
The first round blew up behind the team on the other side of the road, showing them in dust and debris. Their ears rang and popped from the explosion, but they were lucky not to be killed.
Legionary: Screw this! She's right! Hook around and take the bastards out! Go!
The chamber lever was pulled, sending the cartridge flying out from the smokey chamber.
Hadian: Loading!
Hadian 2: Adjusting!
Xenia: Damn! We need to move!
Hadian 2: Set!
Hadian: Fire!
*BOOM*That round was just lucky enough to kill two of the maneuvering legionaries, robbing them of their legs and lives. Xenia bit her lip as she ran between the houses, up the side of the road.
Xenia: Damn it! They've split us! You guys keep going and shoot them from the sides! I'll get up in one of the houses!
Legionary: Who the hell put you in charge?!
Xenia: Just do it!
Xenia ran off, slinging her rifle on her back as she climbed into one of the broken windows of the houses.
Legionary 2: I hate that cunt, but she's the only one with a plan right now! Keep moving!
Xenia rushed up the stairs of the house, making it up to the 3rd floor. The master bedroom provided just enough cover and openings for her to shoot through, giving her a perfect line of sight on the street. As soon as she cracked open a window, the chill of the rain and the crack of gunfire caressed her senses.
Xenia: Beautiful. It should be fine to use the scope in here.
She reattached the scope to her rifle and set her sights upon the masked operators of the 37mm infantry gun.
Deep breath.
Fire.
The loader was shot through his head, splitting it wide open in a red, gory mess. The other operator freaked, but was shot in the back as he tried to run by Xenia's follow up shot.
Xenia: Damn, he's still moving.
Through her scope, she could see the operator struggle to crawl to cover. His struggle was put to and end by a second shot to the back of the head.
Xenia: Alright, Xenia...Alright...from this position, I can support the pinch on the right side.
The Hadians anticipated they would divert from the main road and apply a pinch strategy. They diverted some of their own troops to meet them on the sides and halt their advance, resulting in firefights on both sides that seemed to go nowhere. At least until Xenia chimed in.
Xenia: Ah, what a shame. You're kind of handsome. Sorry, man.
One shot went through a rifleman's neck, sealing him to a fate of bleeding out in the mud.
Xenia: Next one...
In a beautiful stroke of marksmanship, Xenia shot one of the Hadians through their shoulder, and the bullet passed through to strike another one through the cheek. Both of them fell over wounded, unable to keep fighting. With her support, the Hadian troops halting the advance on the right were forced to fall back for more cover, allowing the legionaries to push onwards.
Xenia: Alright, time for the left side.
The legion troops on the left took whatever cover they could, behind ruined buildings and between the rows of muddied farms and crops. Every time one of them would pop up, a bullet would force them back into cover, effectively pinning them down.
Legionary: Damn it! Toss some grenades!
Pull the pin.
Throw like hell.
The booms of their grenades eased up the Hadian fire, killing 2 of them. All of a sudden, the Hadian riflemen started to drop to the ground, one by one. Xenia's rounds were being delivered with such precision and speed, they too were forced to fall back.
Legionary: Hey, she did it! Move up while they're retreating! You two, commandeer their infantry gun and hit those sandbag positions!
Use a pinch to get out of a pinch. With the advance finally moving up, Xenia ran out of the house to link up with the advancing troops, now closing in on the granary. The rain was on their side, as it made maintaining a fire hot enough to consume the entire building much more difficult than the Hadians had time for.
Legionary: Xenia! We're moving up!
Xenia: I see that! I'll give you cover fire!
Topic: Excerpts from Op's Writing Trove (Read 22162 times)
