Chronicles of a UED Marine
by Dale B. Olson Copyright 2004 by Dale B. Olson
Note: Blizzard owns the Starcraft Universe. I only tread upon it with my own characters.
Chapter One: On a Log
When you are the anvil, be patient. When you are the hammer, strike."
-- Arabian Proverb
Corporal, have you ever been through a VR Debrief?
No, this was my fourth drop and the others didn't have much combat.
Well, it goes pretty much like this: You drop this visor over your eyes and then we'll watch the mission as you describe it.
Like a vid?
Kinda. You'll watch it mostly from your perspective, but just tell me what you see and why you did what you did.
Sounds kinda strange.
Yeah, but you'll understand why we go through it this way. Here's the visor.
Nifty. I just put this on?
Yes. Go ahead. I'm starting the recordings.
Okay. Here goes.
VR DEBRIEF BEGIN
Location: BattleCruiser Expedition
Cpl. Richard "Bear" Hayes
2nd Platoon, 4th Marines, UED Command
Planet: 4N19
0912 Hours
I don't know if this was like it was, but I like telling it like it is.
It was like this.
It was a jungle planet again.
I hate jungle planets the most. Mainly, it's the mud. Cleaning that muck off of suit armor is worse than the dust and sand from a desert planet. We were supposed to recon a "suspected Zerg base near a vespene geyser." The geyser was in a small valley and Command thought we could drop in, mosey on throuh on recon, call in an airstrike and then mosey on back to our pickup point.
It always sounds better in the briefing room.
Our dropship left us in a small clearing that was mostly swamp. As we ran down the ramp, I saw at least two zerglings fading back into the treeline. The rest of the squad thought I was seeing things, but ever since the corporals got the last suit upgrades (including the new sight mods), Sarge didn't doubt it.
He ordered us up right after them, charging all the way. The rest of the squad spread out behind us as the point team hit the treeline. Oh, we found the zerglings. At least a dozen were waiting for us around some massive tree trunks. The first to get it was one of our Bats, Hankins -- he was right next to Sarge flamining away with his thrower. Sarge toasted one ling as Hankins pumped stream after stream into the swarm as it crested over them both.
Only Sarge's Firebat armor stopped them -- but Hankins was ripped apart limb by limb in a flaming fireball.
"Get me outta here!" Sarge screamed. He shot streams of flame all around him, wildly.
Johnson and Phillips ran to him to drag him away, only to be hit with the swarm. They managed to pull him free of the smoking bodies and drag him to a fallen tree trunk.
The rest of our squad were sniping the zerglings as they raced for cover. It wasn't pretty -- ling swarms never are -- and by the time the last ling fell dead a meter from my boots, we had lost Johnson. He was clawed down from behind as a medic and Phillips covered Sarge.
"Are they gone?" said a shaky voice behind me. I turned and saw Gates, the newbie. He was shaking so bad that his hands shook, even through the suit dampeners.
"Yeah," I said. "They're dead. For now." I reset my gauss generator on my rifle, fusing new rounds. C-14 "Impalers" have an almost infinite number of rounds -- provided you regenerate the gauss collector and keep the ammo loading into the projectile unit.
"What do you mean?" he said, looking around nervously.
I glanced over at who was left in the squad. They were reloading and scaning the dense
forest.
"Lings usually are the scouts. We're about 5 minutes away from being hit by a bigger force," I said. "Probably closer to 3," said Sarge, pushing away the medic. There was a hiss of escaping air from his suit as Sarge cycled the excess air from his flame system, recharging his fusion generator. "You guys form your line closer to that tree."
He pointed to a massive tree trunk that ran along the treeline. It looked like it was as tall as a bunker.
Phillips pulled Gates along with him. "Come on Marine," he said. "Let's get on top of that monster." The rest of the squad fell back, finding firing positions along the massive log. The tree was solid as rock and didn't even move with the weight of Marines on it. The sides were ridged, perfect foot- and handholds. I scrambled up the side, helping Gates along. The bark was as hard as rock -- I wondered what made it fall. There were pock marks in the sides of it, kinda like craters, so we all took up positions in them.
I scanned through my HUD readout. Besides Hankins and Johnson, we had lost only one other Marine. That left me, Phillips, Gates and Sanchez as riflemen, Sarge as the only Bat, and our medic, Swift.
Not a lot against a mixed Zerg swarm attack. Sarge quickly arranged the riflemen so our fields of fire overlapped. He sat at the center of the skirmish line along the tree and we waited.
"That didn't last too long," Gates whispered to me over the squad comm. "Do all battles go as quick as that?" "Nope. Some either last so long you have to stim to keep it going," I said. "Or they're over in a short burst -- but then this is only my fourth drop."
Gates was crouched in a crater to the right of mine. He swung his helmeted head back and forth, still shaking and jittery. Even though I knew how he felt, it was starting to get a bit annoying. He was attached to our unit on our last drop -- and that was a milk run. All we did then was watch as SCVs built a base. All the fighting then was somewhere else. We just bunked up and pulled duty watches for 3 days.
His nervous hide was going to get me killed.
"Look," I said. "Calm down. You're gonna make yourself sick if you keep shaking like that." "How do you do it, Bear?" he said, flipping the visor of his helmet up. "Aren't you scared?" I stared at his face -- he wasn't much older than I was. I flipped my visor up, too.
"Take some deep breaths and remember boot. Nothing can be as crazy as that," I lied.
Newbies get lied to a lot.
Sarge told us over the comm to can it. "The bastards should be here soon," he said. "Lock and load." Gates and I flipped our visors down. I could feel the hum of my C-14 as my gauss collector was generating rounds. I saw Sarge link to the ComSat and request a scan of the area to our front.
The swirling blue lights on the HUD showed our position, in a short skirmish line at the edge of our LZ clearing. Then I saw the red clusters of dots headed toward our position.
I could hear Sarge swearing and calling for artillery support, pickup, anything. There were about a 50 or 60 Zerg headed toward us and 60 to 5 ain't the best odds to fight over. I also made out some red blobs on the edge of the scan.
"We're right on the edge of their base. Come now!" I heard Sarge yell over the comm.
That's when I saw the swarm.
There are only a few other things I've seen in my life that scare me as bad as a mixed Zerg swarms. I've seen Boot Camp food worse than the muck we scrape off our armor. I once saw a Protoss Arbiter decloak a dozen cruisers over our position.
But this swarm was bad. It had Zerlings, Hydras, Mutalisks and even one of those dammed elephant looking things, an Ultralisk. "Take em out! Now! Stim up!" I heard Sarge yell over the comm.
I pushed the red stimpack toggle on my left arm panel. It was only my third stim ever -- they give you one in boot so you'll know what it feels like, and I stimmed on my first drop -- a recon that took out some Zerg drones.
Stimming is both scary and sweet. Imagine warm water running through your skin from your head to your feet. Then all your muscles stop hurting and feel like a supercharged fusion reactor. You can pull off more aimed bursts per minute while stimmed and not get tired -- although you can't stim too much or you'll collapse. Our line opened up and the lings took it first. They started falling the second we started firing, piling up like cord wood. I could see the blood flying as the Hydras stomped through the dead, preparing to fire.
Swift was running up and down the tree trunk, injecting chems into each of us, bringing us back from stim degeneration. It was like running a mile and then someone handing you more energy. They told us in Boot that you can take 3 stims before you'll die -- unless a medic injects chemical modifiers into your bloodstream through your medical suitport.
The Hydras and Mutas then started opening up. We took out 3 Hydras in quick order -- we just followed Sarge's flame streams. It wasn't pretty. I saw Phillips on my left take a Hydra spine in the helmet and he fell, his rifle clattering next to my feet. Sanchez shuffled over to take his spot, but he took about 4 spines in the back. Swift ran over and ported his suit -- only to watch a Mutalisk projectile tear his torso off Sanchez's legs.
Swift took only a bit of damage -- those Mutie animal projectiles bounce around, biting into everything. He ran over to me and Gates, the only riflemen left. I grabbed Phillips' rifle and started hosing down the Mutalisks above us. They caught wind of my double stream of slugs and homed in on my position. Swift alternated between Gates and me as we stimmed and blasted Mutie after Mutie out of the sky. Sarge kept slinging streams of fire into the rest of the swarm, keeping the last few lings and the Hydras at bay.
But only for a moment.
That was when the Ultralisk took that moment to charge our tree. It hit the trunk with its massive head -- causing Sarge to fall off the front and Swift, Gates and me off the back.
"Sarge!" Gates screamed over the comm. "Sarge!" Slow, agonizing seconds passed, and then all I saw was a massive fireball of a suit fusion generator degrading and the fuel cell igniting.
Gates had lost his C-14 in the fall and was looking around for it, helpless. I tossed him my extra and checked my HUD.
We were surrounded by a solid mass of red, moving dots, spreading around our position. I called to Gates and Swift. "Get ready for a Trio!" I yelled.
Swift hooked her chem injectors to our suits. It was the last thing a medic did before a Trio. A Trio is two marines and a medic hooked straight to a medic's chem units. The marines then lock down their stimpacks and, well, all hell breaks loose. Command doesn't condone it, but after hearing vets talk about surviving entire swarms in them, I didn't hesitate.
Remember that warm water in the skin and the energy from the stims and chems? Imagine that every 5 seconds. It was like jumping from one bathtub full of ice water to another full of boiling water. And while your arms swing your rifle around, your brain really gets detached. It's kinda like punching autopilot -- your brain shoots while you almost watch.
Gates and I swung our C-14 in looping arcs around us, hitting both the ground, zerg and trees. The Hydras pretty much had us surrounded by then, a solid ring of red around our position on my HUD. Green spines began hitting both the tree trunk at my back and Swift's body.
"I don't know how much more I can take of this!" Swift yelled as I checked her stats on my HUD. She was down to about 32 armor integrity and was bleeding from at least a dozen wounds.
I could hear Gates screaming over the comm. Swift was moaning as spine after spine slammed into her armor.
That's when I saw the cloaked Wraith fighters on my HUD. Those babies opened up with their burst lasers and missles all around. I saw body after body fall in masses -- there must have been an entire wing of 12 in the skies above us.
Swift pulled the link on our Trio and our stimpacks deactivated. I grabbed her and shoved her in between me and the tree trunk.
The HUD only showed one more red dot -- the Ultralisk. It had taken the brunt of Sarge's fireball and was banging its tusks against the tree. "Target that bogey, gentlemen," a Wraith pilot said over the comm. The wing's comm melded with ours. I didn't waste the gift.
"Get us the hell out of here!" I screamed. "We still got 3 of us on the ground!" I didn't want to tangle with an Ultralisk by ourselves.
It was then that I saw the Wraiths make their strafing runs on the Ultra. I was glad I had 5 meters of tree trunk in between it and us -- I saw those laster bursts slicing through the trees like rain. The Ultralisk was screaming in loud, shrieking grunts.
Ever hear the sound of an egg being dropped on the floor? That's what an Ultra sounds like when slammed by lasers. It popped on the other side of that tree like a melon.
The comm crackled. "Do you gentlemen want to join us hitting that base?" I heard the wing commander call. "We could use some eyes on the ground." I glanced at Gates, whose face was ashen. His hands shook, badly. He shook his head, staring at the ground.
"I'll join you commander," I called. "Can you relay to our dropship to pick up the wounded?"
"On it's way," the pilot said. "Meet you at the base."
I turned to Swift. "You guys going to be all right?" I asked. She turned to look at Gates now curled up in the fetal position -- as much as the fetal position you can get in suit armor -- and nodded.
I slung my C-14 (after punching reset on the generator) and checked my suit status. Armor good, most of my health levels in the green. I met Swift's eyes with mine. "Take care of him. It's his first drop," I said.
She nodded again, then slumped down on the ground, exhausted.
I turned and started running towards the Zerg base. I'm not entirely sure why. I know that a mixture of emotions were running through my head: fear that staying put was more dangerous, anger at losing my squadmates and most of all, revenge. I wanted to kill this swarm more than any other ... maybe it was the after effects of the Trio. I still felt pumped up.
My HUD had the last position of the base from the ComSat scan. I linked again to the satellite and requested another scan, but on the opposite side of the base.
I saw the base more clearly now. The Vespene geyser had a Zerg extractor on it with more Zerg running from it to the Lair. The creep it sat on wasn't too spread out, but I saw a couple of sunken colonies. There weren't any air defenses ... thank God, or any Muties. The ComSat scan did show a couple of burrowed units around the Lair. Probably Hydras or lings.
I called to the cloaked squadron above me. "Can you guys take out the sunkens?" The comm crackled. "Roger." Their strafing runs took out the colonies in a splatter of blood and Zerg intestines. A few Hydras popped up to spit spines at the wraiths -- it was then that I saw the Overlord drifting towards me.
Giggling like a maniac, I toggled my stimpack again and opened up on the Overlord. It started to float away as my rounds started to impact, raining blood down onto my suit. I ran along under it, firing burst after burst into its belly, only keeping under it because of the stim. I finally saw it take a couple of Wraith missles and explode in a ball of fire and blood.
That's when I remembered I was standing underneath it. I ran as fast as I could, but a large chunk, of, well, meat fell on me. It pinned my rifle and right arm and right leg under it. It must have been at least a couple tons -- I couldn't move it even still stimmed up.
I glanced at my HUD -- it was still working. I saw the Extractor go up in a poof of blood and guts, as well as the Lair dying a messy death. The Drones that were left were easy pickings for the Wraiths as they popped them like, well, bugs.
I could move my fingers on my right hand -- barely -- but couldn't pull my arm out from under that meat slab. I was glad my suit was still tight -- Zerg die messy and smelly. My stim wore off and the pain began. My HUD started flashing red warning lights as my med stats started to drop. It wasn't pretty and it felt like I had crushed my armor in on my right side. I was starting to panic, squirming around trying to get out from under that hunk of meat. I thought about punching my stimpack, but the pain was getting stronger.
"Hold on man!" I heard behind me. I felt hands pulling at my suitport. I felt the clicks of chems and felt the pain start to subside -- it was Swift. Gates was behind her, aiming a string of slugs into some straggler 'lings next to a nydus canal. The wraiths popped that a second later.
"I'm glad to see you guys," I stammered. "I thought ..." "Yeah, well, we thought you needed some help," Swift grinned at me and started to cut away hunks of the Overlord with a knife.
It took her a minute or so to get me free. My rifle wasn't damaged, but my suit arm was pretty much crushed. "You'll have to see a MedSurgeon for that," Swift said, wrapping some field suit sealer over the arm. The sealer kept the suit airtight for vaccum environments -- it made my HUD register green on the environmental readouts. I clipped my rifle to my left arm. Gates had shifted his rifle fire to the last Zerg building, a tall, pulsing Spire. It was obviously trying to pump out another Mutie. I glanced at Gates, his face still ashen but a different look on his face.
A look of baptized by fire. A veteran's look.
We both fed the Spire some heavy bursts. It fell and burst in a cloud of blood.
"I like it when they pop like that," a voice said over the comm.
"Sarge!" I heard Gates yell. We turned and saw Sarge limping towards us, suit armor in pieces -- gone, his blood-smeared body showing more than the armor. He held a knife in one had and a Hydra fang in the other.
"Is that a fashion statement?" I snickered. Swift ran over to him, probing his cuts and burns.
"Nope," he said, taking off what was left of his helmet. "More like a new battle uniform. Damn Ultra stepped on my suit and broke my generator off." "What did ... how ..." Gates stammered. Sarge snorted. "I'm a lucky bastard, didn't you know?"
It was then that the dropship sliced through the smoke to land next to us. "You guys need a ride?" the pilot called over the comm.
"'Bout time," I said. I nudged my HUD menu to the Wraith commander's freq. "You flyboys done yet?" I saw the lead Wraith decloak as it overflew our position. "Roger" he said. "Take care and thanks for the assist." Sarge watched as the Wraith streaked away, then recloaked. He turned to me.
"You sure pulled one off here," he said. "I saw you take out the Overlord." I shrugged. "I didn't get much. I knew I should have stayed in bed this morning."
Sarge snickered as we trooped up the dropship ramp. "Some guys are always trying to be funny."
END VR DEBRIEF
So, what did you think?
Nifty. But you didn't tell me I'd feel what I did during the mission. That was ... freaky.
Yes, it does help the PsyExaminers to read your emotions during the mission if you experience it again fully.
You should have warned me.
I'm sorry about that, but it's policy. I have couple of questions.
Shoot.
Why did you leave Swift and Gates?
I wanted to pay the Zergies back for killing my guys.
You weren't with those Marines very long.
Yeah, but they were Marines. Semper fi and all that. They deserved better than being Zerg food, so I wanted to get some back for them.
Allright. Did your suit upgrades work well?
Mostly. I wish I had Upgrade III though.
We're working on it. Did you have enough intel on this mission? Was it accurate?
Ha! Next time you guys send a recon, do it with some wraiths or ghosts. Don't send a mixed squad of Marines and Firebats!
What do you think we should send?
Send one of those science vessels -- or like I said, a cloaked Ghost or something. Don't waste good Marines on recon.
Waste?
Yeah. Let us team up with some Goliaths or tanks. Mixing units makes a better force, anyways.
Corporal, I have just one last question. Your unit lost half its men and only made it because of other units -- Damn straight. Mix us up.
As I was saying, you lost 4 men to mainly ground units. What is your ideal, ground scouting force -- uncloaked, that is.
Hmm. I'd say 4 riflemen, 2 Goliaths and 2 siege tanks. And a Medic and a SCV to fill in the holes. Not a fast recon, but one that could stand up to a force. If it was a smaller recon patrol, I'd say use only mechanized units -- but then I'm just a Corporal. Not an officer.
Thank you, Corporal.
by Dale B. Olson Copyright 2004 by Dale B. Olson
Note: Blizzard owns the Starcraft Universe. I only tread upon it with my own characters.
Chapter One: On a Log
When you are the anvil, be patient. When you are the hammer, strike."
-- Arabian Proverb
Corporal, have you ever been through a VR Debrief?
No, this was my fourth drop and the others didn't have much combat.
Well, it goes pretty much like this: You drop this visor over your eyes and then we'll watch the mission as you describe it.
Like a vid?
Kinda. You'll watch it mostly from your perspective, but just tell me what you see and why you did what you did.
Sounds kinda strange.
Yeah, but you'll understand why we go through it this way. Here's the visor.
Nifty. I just put this on?
Yes. Go ahead. I'm starting the recordings.
Okay. Here goes.
VR DEBRIEF BEGIN
Location: BattleCruiser Expedition
Cpl. Richard "Bear" Hayes
2nd Platoon, 4th Marines, UED Command
Planet: 4N19
0912 Hours
I don't know if this was like it was, but I like telling it like it is.
It was like this.
It was a jungle planet again.
I hate jungle planets the most. Mainly, it's the mud. Cleaning that muck off of suit armor is worse than the dust and sand from a desert planet. We were supposed to recon a "suspected Zerg base near a vespene geyser." The geyser was in a small valley and Command thought we could drop in, mosey on throuh on recon, call in an airstrike and then mosey on back to our pickup point.
It always sounds better in the briefing room.
Our dropship left us in a small clearing that was mostly swamp. As we ran down the ramp, I saw at least two zerglings fading back into the treeline. The rest of the squad thought I was seeing things, but ever since the corporals got the last suit upgrades (including the new sight mods), Sarge didn't doubt it.
He ordered us up right after them, charging all the way. The rest of the squad spread out behind us as the point team hit the treeline. Oh, we found the zerglings. At least a dozen were waiting for us around some massive tree trunks. The first to get it was one of our Bats, Hankins -- he was right next to Sarge flamining away with his thrower. Sarge toasted one ling as Hankins pumped stream after stream into the swarm as it crested over them both.
Only Sarge's Firebat armor stopped them -- but Hankins was ripped apart limb by limb in a flaming fireball.
"Get me outta here!" Sarge screamed. He shot streams of flame all around him, wildly.
Johnson and Phillips ran to him to drag him away, only to be hit with the swarm. They managed to pull him free of the smoking bodies and drag him to a fallen tree trunk.
The rest of our squad were sniping the zerglings as they raced for cover. It wasn't pretty -- ling swarms never are -- and by the time the last ling fell dead a meter from my boots, we had lost Johnson. He was clawed down from behind as a medic and Phillips covered Sarge.
"Are they gone?" said a shaky voice behind me. I turned and saw Gates, the newbie. He was shaking so bad that his hands shook, even through the suit dampeners.
"Yeah," I said. "They're dead. For now." I reset my gauss generator on my rifle, fusing new rounds. C-14 "Impalers" have an almost infinite number of rounds -- provided you regenerate the gauss collector and keep the ammo loading into the projectile unit.
"What do you mean?" he said, looking around nervously.
I glanced over at who was left in the squad. They were reloading and scaning the dense
forest.
"Lings usually are the scouts. We're about 5 minutes away from being hit by a bigger force," I said. "Probably closer to 3," said Sarge, pushing away the medic. There was a hiss of escaping air from his suit as Sarge cycled the excess air from his flame system, recharging his fusion generator. "You guys form your line closer to that tree."
He pointed to a massive tree trunk that ran along the treeline. It looked like it was as tall as a bunker.
Phillips pulled Gates along with him. "Come on Marine," he said. "Let's get on top of that monster." The rest of the squad fell back, finding firing positions along the massive log. The tree was solid as rock and didn't even move with the weight of Marines on it. The sides were ridged, perfect foot- and handholds. I scrambled up the side, helping Gates along. The bark was as hard as rock -- I wondered what made it fall. There were pock marks in the sides of it, kinda like craters, so we all took up positions in them.
I scanned through my HUD readout. Besides Hankins and Johnson, we had lost only one other Marine. That left me, Phillips, Gates and Sanchez as riflemen, Sarge as the only Bat, and our medic, Swift.
Not a lot against a mixed Zerg swarm attack. Sarge quickly arranged the riflemen so our fields of fire overlapped. He sat at the center of the skirmish line along the tree and we waited.
"That didn't last too long," Gates whispered to me over the squad comm. "Do all battles go as quick as that?" "Nope. Some either last so long you have to stim to keep it going," I said. "Or they're over in a short burst -- but then this is only my fourth drop."
Gates was crouched in a crater to the right of mine. He swung his helmeted head back and forth, still shaking and jittery. Even though I knew how he felt, it was starting to get a bit annoying. He was attached to our unit on our last drop -- and that was a milk run. All we did then was watch as SCVs built a base. All the fighting then was somewhere else. We just bunked up and pulled duty watches for 3 days.
His nervous hide was going to get me killed.
"Look," I said. "Calm down. You're gonna make yourself sick if you keep shaking like that." "How do you do it, Bear?" he said, flipping the visor of his helmet up. "Aren't you scared?" I stared at his face -- he wasn't much older than I was. I flipped my visor up, too.
"Take some deep breaths and remember boot. Nothing can be as crazy as that," I lied.
Newbies get lied to a lot.
Sarge told us over the comm to can it. "The bastards should be here soon," he said. "Lock and load." Gates and I flipped our visors down. I could feel the hum of my C-14 as my gauss collector was generating rounds. I saw Sarge link to the ComSat and request a scan of the area to our front.
The swirling blue lights on the HUD showed our position, in a short skirmish line at the edge of our LZ clearing. Then I saw the red clusters of dots headed toward our position.
I could hear Sarge swearing and calling for artillery support, pickup, anything. There were about a 50 or 60 Zerg headed toward us and 60 to 5 ain't the best odds to fight over. I also made out some red blobs on the edge of the scan.
"We're right on the edge of their base. Come now!" I heard Sarge yell over the comm.
That's when I saw the swarm.
There are only a few other things I've seen in my life that scare me as bad as a mixed Zerg swarms. I've seen Boot Camp food worse than the muck we scrape off our armor. I once saw a Protoss Arbiter decloak a dozen cruisers over our position.
But this swarm was bad. It had Zerlings, Hydras, Mutalisks and even one of those dammed elephant looking things, an Ultralisk. "Take em out! Now! Stim up!" I heard Sarge yell over the comm.
I pushed the red stimpack toggle on my left arm panel. It was only my third stim ever -- they give you one in boot so you'll know what it feels like, and I stimmed on my first drop -- a recon that took out some Zerg drones.
Stimming is both scary and sweet. Imagine warm water running through your skin from your head to your feet. Then all your muscles stop hurting and feel like a supercharged fusion reactor. You can pull off more aimed bursts per minute while stimmed and not get tired -- although you can't stim too much or you'll collapse. Our line opened up and the lings took it first. They started falling the second we started firing, piling up like cord wood. I could see the blood flying as the Hydras stomped through the dead, preparing to fire.
Swift was running up and down the tree trunk, injecting chems into each of us, bringing us back from stim degeneration. It was like running a mile and then someone handing you more energy. They told us in Boot that you can take 3 stims before you'll die -- unless a medic injects chemical modifiers into your bloodstream through your medical suitport.
The Hydras and Mutas then started opening up. We took out 3 Hydras in quick order -- we just followed Sarge's flame streams. It wasn't pretty. I saw Phillips on my left take a Hydra spine in the helmet and he fell, his rifle clattering next to my feet. Sanchez shuffled over to take his spot, but he took about 4 spines in the back. Swift ran over and ported his suit -- only to watch a Mutalisk projectile tear his torso off Sanchez's legs.
Swift took only a bit of damage -- those Mutie animal projectiles bounce around, biting into everything. He ran over to me and Gates, the only riflemen left. I grabbed Phillips' rifle and started hosing down the Mutalisks above us. They caught wind of my double stream of slugs and homed in on my position. Swift alternated between Gates and me as we stimmed and blasted Mutie after Mutie out of the sky. Sarge kept slinging streams of fire into the rest of the swarm, keeping the last few lings and the Hydras at bay.
But only for a moment.
That was when the Ultralisk took that moment to charge our tree. It hit the trunk with its massive head -- causing Sarge to fall off the front and Swift, Gates and me off the back.
"Sarge!" Gates screamed over the comm. "Sarge!" Slow, agonizing seconds passed, and then all I saw was a massive fireball of a suit fusion generator degrading and the fuel cell igniting.
Gates had lost his C-14 in the fall and was looking around for it, helpless. I tossed him my extra and checked my HUD.
We were surrounded by a solid mass of red, moving dots, spreading around our position. I called to Gates and Swift. "Get ready for a Trio!" I yelled.
Swift hooked her chem injectors to our suits. It was the last thing a medic did before a Trio. A Trio is two marines and a medic hooked straight to a medic's chem units. The marines then lock down their stimpacks and, well, all hell breaks loose. Command doesn't condone it, but after hearing vets talk about surviving entire swarms in them, I didn't hesitate.
Remember that warm water in the skin and the energy from the stims and chems? Imagine that every 5 seconds. It was like jumping from one bathtub full of ice water to another full of boiling water. And while your arms swing your rifle around, your brain really gets detached. It's kinda like punching autopilot -- your brain shoots while you almost watch.
Gates and I swung our C-14 in looping arcs around us, hitting both the ground, zerg and trees. The Hydras pretty much had us surrounded by then, a solid ring of red around our position on my HUD. Green spines began hitting both the tree trunk at my back and Swift's body.
"I don't know how much more I can take of this!" Swift yelled as I checked her stats on my HUD. She was down to about 32 armor integrity and was bleeding from at least a dozen wounds.
I could hear Gates screaming over the comm. Swift was moaning as spine after spine slammed into her armor.
That's when I saw the cloaked Wraith fighters on my HUD. Those babies opened up with their burst lasers and missles all around. I saw body after body fall in masses -- there must have been an entire wing of 12 in the skies above us.
Swift pulled the link on our Trio and our stimpacks deactivated. I grabbed her and shoved her in between me and the tree trunk.
The HUD only showed one more red dot -- the Ultralisk. It had taken the brunt of Sarge's fireball and was banging its tusks against the tree. "Target that bogey, gentlemen," a Wraith pilot said over the comm. The wing's comm melded with ours. I didn't waste the gift.
"Get us the hell out of here!" I screamed. "We still got 3 of us on the ground!" I didn't want to tangle with an Ultralisk by ourselves.
It was then that I saw the Wraiths make their strafing runs on the Ultra. I was glad I had 5 meters of tree trunk in between it and us -- I saw those laster bursts slicing through the trees like rain. The Ultralisk was screaming in loud, shrieking grunts.
Ever hear the sound of an egg being dropped on the floor? That's what an Ultra sounds like when slammed by lasers. It popped on the other side of that tree like a melon.
The comm crackled. "Do you gentlemen want to join us hitting that base?" I heard the wing commander call. "We could use some eyes on the ground." I glanced at Gates, whose face was ashen. His hands shook, badly. He shook his head, staring at the ground.
"I'll join you commander," I called. "Can you relay to our dropship to pick up the wounded?"
"On it's way," the pilot said. "Meet you at the base."
I turned to Swift. "You guys going to be all right?" I asked. She turned to look at Gates now curled up in the fetal position -- as much as the fetal position you can get in suit armor -- and nodded.
I slung my C-14 (after punching reset on the generator) and checked my suit status. Armor good, most of my health levels in the green. I met Swift's eyes with mine. "Take care of him. It's his first drop," I said.
She nodded again, then slumped down on the ground, exhausted.
I turned and started running towards the Zerg base. I'm not entirely sure why. I know that a mixture of emotions were running through my head: fear that staying put was more dangerous, anger at losing my squadmates and most of all, revenge. I wanted to kill this swarm more than any other ... maybe it was the after effects of the Trio. I still felt pumped up.
My HUD had the last position of the base from the ComSat scan. I linked again to the satellite and requested another scan, but on the opposite side of the base.
I saw the base more clearly now. The Vespene geyser had a Zerg extractor on it with more Zerg running from it to the Lair. The creep it sat on wasn't too spread out, but I saw a couple of sunken colonies. There weren't any air defenses ... thank God, or any Muties. The ComSat scan did show a couple of burrowed units around the Lair. Probably Hydras or lings.
I called to the cloaked squadron above me. "Can you guys take out the sunkens?" The comm crackled. "Roger." Their strafing runs took out the colonies in a splatter of blood and Zerg intestines. A few Hydras popped up to spit spines at the wraiths -- it was then that I saw the Overlord drifting towards me.
Giggling like a maniac, I toggled my stimpack again and opened up on the Overlord. It started to float away as my rounds started to impact, raining blood down onto my suit. I ran along under it, firing burst after burst into its belly, only keeping under it because of the stim. I finally saw it take a couple of Wraith missles and explode in a ball of fire and blood.
That's when I remembered I was standing underneath it. I ran as fast as I could, but a large chunk, of, well, meat fell on me. It pinned my rifle and right arm and right leg under it. It must have been at least a couple tons -- I couldn't move it even still stimmed up.
I glanced at my HUD -- it was still working. I saw the Extractor go up in a poof of blood and guts, as well as the Lair dying a messy death. The Drones that were left were easy pickings for the Wraiths as they popped them like, well, bugs.
I could move my fingers on my right hand -- barely -- but couldn't pull my arm out from under that meat slab. I was glad my suit was still tight -- Zerg die messy and smelly. My stim wore off and the pain began. My HUD started flashing red warning lights as my med stats started to drop. It wasn't pretty and it felt like I had crushed my armor in on my right side. I was starting to panic, squirming around trying to get out from under that hunk of meat. I thought about punching my stimpack, but the pain was getting stronger.
"Hold on man!" I heard behind me. I felt hands pulling at my suitport. I felt the clicks of chems and felt the pain start to subside -- it was Swift. Gates was behind her, aiming a string of slugs into some straggler 'lings next to a nydus canal. The wraiths popped that a second later.
"I'm glad to see you guys," I stammered. "I thought ..." "Yeah, well, we thought you needed some help," Swift grinned at me and started to cut away hunks of the Overlord with a knife.
It took her a minute or so to get me free. My rifle wasn't damaged, but my suit arm was pretty much crushed. "You'll have to see a MedSurgeon for that," Swift said, wrapping some field suit sealer over the arm. The sealer kept the suit airtight for vaccum environments -- it made my HUD register green on the environmental readouts. I clipped my rifle to my left arm. Gates had shifted his rifle fire to the last Zerg building, a tall, pulsing Spire. It was obviously trying to pump out another Mutie. I glanced at Gates, his face still ashen but a different look on his face.
A look of baptized by fire. A veteran's look.
We both fed the Spire some heavy bursts. It fell and burst in a cloud of blood.
"I like it when they pop like that," a voice said over the comm.
"Sarge!" I heard Gates yell. We turned and saw Sarge limping towards us, suit armor in pieces -- gone, his blood-smeared body showing more than the armor. He held a knife in one had and a Hydra fang in the other.
"Is that a fashion statement?" I snickered. Swift ran over to him, probing his cuts and burns.
"Nope," he said, taking off what was left of his helmet. "More like a new battle uniform. Damn Ultra stepped on my suit and broke my generator off." "What did ... how ..." Gates stammered. Sarge snorted. "I'm a lucky bastard, didn't you know?"
It was then that the dropship sliced through the smoke to land next to us. "You guys need a ride?" the pilot called over the comm.
"'Bout time," I said. I nudged my HUD menu to the Wraith commander's freq. "You flyboys done yet?" I saw the lead Wraith decloak as it overflew our position. "Roger" he said. "Take care and thanks for the assist." Sarge watched as the Wraith streaked away, then recloaked. He turned to me.
"You sure pulled one off here," he said. "I saw you take out the Overlord." I shrugged. "I didn't get much. I knew I should have stayed in bed this morning."
Sarge snickered as we trooped up the dropship ramp. "Some guys are always trying to be funny."
END VR DEBRIEF
So, what did you think?
Nifty. But you didn't tell me I'd feel what I did during the mission. That was ... freaky.
Yes, it does help the PsyExaminers to read your emotions during the mission if you experience it again fully.
You should have warned me.
I'm sorry about that, but it's policy. I have couple of questions.
Shoot.
Why did you leave Swift and Gates?
I wanted to pay the Zergies back for killing my guys.
You weren't with those Marines very long.
Yeah, but they were Marines. Semper fi and all that. They deserved better than being Zerg food, so I wanted to get some back for them.
Allright. Did your suit upgrades work well?
Mostly. I wish I had Upgrade III though.
We're working on it. Did you have enough intel on this mission? Was it accurate?
Ha! Next time you guys send a recon, do it with some wraiths or ghosts. Don't send a mixed squad of Marines and Firebats!
What do you think we should send?
Send one of those science vessels -- or like I said, a cloaked Ghost or something. Don't waste good Marines on recon.
Waste?
Yeah. Let us team up with some Goliaths or tanks. Mixing units makes a better force, anyways.
Corporal, I have just one last question. Your unit lost half its men and only made it because of other units -- Damn straight. Mix us up.
As I was saying, you lost 4 men to mainly ground units. What is your ideal, ground scouting force -- uncloaked, that is.
Hmm. I'd say 4 riflemen, 2 Goliaths and 2 siege tanks. And a Medic and a SCV to fill in the holes. Not a fast recon, but one that could stand up to a force. If it was a smaller recon patrol, I'd say use only mechanized units -- but then I'm just a Corporal. Not an officer.
Thank you, Corporal.