The 14th Brigade, also known as the Space Tramps, were, allegedly, the HCS Galaxy Battlecruisers' most capable squad of marines. This fact was a great insult to Dominion soldiery and also a front to my professionalism for it was, on that fateful eve of Federation Day in 2104, my duty to oversee operations of that pathetic excuse for a space marine squad on the hostile planet of Dimentas. The twelve of us had spent that long muilti-million light year journey in the ship's hybernation chambers. We were, in the grand scheme of the Galaxy's day to day duties, of patrolling the Dominion space, the lowest common denominator. However, our jobs were not without perks as we were the only members of the one-thousand-and-sixty-nine strong crew, permitted to carry and wield weaponry on board the ship, situation permitting...
We had each at our disposal, one maser rifle, a Dominon-standard Gauz cannon, as many grenades as we could carry and one laser rifle. Our choice of vehicles was less becoming of the best Dominion hardware had to offer, with three vulture bikes for us to fight over - albeit with spider mine technology - and one siege tank which only one of us was qualified to operate and the vehicle required a crew of three.
Our briefing had followed our hazy, awakening out of hibernation. We were herded into the ship's briefing room. There we were greeted by four of the crew's members. Captain Vladimir Prusuk, Assignment Commander Jim Catak, Lieutenant Sarah Bradley and Secretary John Royce. Our assignment commander, a gruff, mustachioed veteran of 62 combat drops, had given us instructions in no uncertain terms. We were to be inserted into the planet's atsmophere with just enough food, water and oxygen to last us a week. Our life support suits were to be incorporated into Dominion-standard marine armour, along with jet packs and just enough fuel to be used only in emergency situations. When the dropship landed we were to gather as much information about the planet as possible via three probes which we would insert manually, as well as our own eyeballs and video technology. While we tried not to mention the Z-word, the main purpose of the mission was to locate any signs of a probable and rumoured Zerg infestation on this desolate Fringe World. Perfect conditions for a Zerg hatchery...
When we were 20000 kilometres abreast of the planet Dimentas, we were crammed into the back of cruiser's only functioning drop ship and jettisoned in to space on to a trajectory aimed at the hellish, stormy atmosphere of Dimentas. To the best of my often censored and rose-tinted knowledge, courtesy of my Assignment Commander, we would be tracked by the Galaxy until we entered the stormy blanket of clouds enclosing the entire surface of the planet. Then, contact would be severed with the mother ship and success of the mission would rest on the shoulders of us, aided by our state-of-the-art technology, our training and our wits.
I had little faith in any of these aids let alone the capabilities of 14th Brigade...