1510 hours November 1 2552 Military Calendar
Scorpia
UNSC Rushmore FFG 2122
Sergeant first class David Silva cursed his luck as he ran into the armory the alarms going off with the Battlestar Hestia broken in half and a desperate evacuation underway the squid lieutenant Bradon Rigs had sent first squad in the Rushmores three pelicans to assist in the evacuation.
Opening his locker and donning his BDUs ensuring the ballistic armor is situated right he looked around doing a quick head count. The Rushmore had exactly forty marines and ODSTs aboard and a quarter of them were deployed.
He grabbed his personal MA5B assault rifle insuring the safety was off and slapped his first magazine loaded with red tipped armor piercing 7.62x51mm rounds in behind the trigger watching as the display reset to show a bright 32 shouldering it he checked his MD6 magnum the squat 12.7mm gleaming as he pulled the slide back to check the chamber.
In the center of the armory was a lone crate containing a dozen of the Jackal gauntlet shield generators. They had been issued in dozens to the UNSC ships and a few of the Battlestars after their marines were given some training on how to properly use them.
Looking around most of his men were choosing the tried and true MA5Bs M7 smgs or M90 shotguns but the newbie fresh faced recruit that had arrived a few days before finding themselves here hefted his heavy Stanton Gauss sniper rifle.
Before the boy could check his capacitor banks, Silva slapped the back of his helmet "are you trying to punch a hole in the ship fuckface? Use the brain the corps issued you for something other than holding your helmet in place." Silva snatches the gauss rifle from the private hands "what is the velocity of this weapons projectile grubb?."
"Fif…fifteen thousand meters per second sar…sargent" the kid stammered out
"Good stupid." David said slamming the weapon back into the kids locker " that will puncture the hull of the ship you dumbass." David picks up a BR55 "Use this instead maybe you wont blow the entire fucking ship to space."
The kid nodded slowly after the scolding and started loading magazines for the DMR into his vest seeing the other thirty marines finishing their last prep.
When the announcement comes over the ship "Cylon boarding party in the hangar, Marines respond."
Silva speaks up
"OK ladies keep your eyes downrange, fingers on your triggers and we all go home in one piece. AM I RIGHT MARINES?!"
The twenty nine voices answer in unison "SIR AYE AYE SIR!"
"Damn right I am." Silva grins. "Now let's move like we have a purpose."
The marines formed up and began running towards the ship's hangar bay. Passing naval personnel running in the other direction. It's not long before they here the heavy BLAM BLAM BLAM of a MD6 and they slow to a more tactical pace as a unfamiliar low pitched
thththththththththththththth
Peeking around the corner David saw a few naval personnel huddled behind improvised barricades as the sleek humanoid cylons steadily walked toward them firing from their wrist mounted machine guns.
A pair of pistol armed naval personnel peeked and fired several times at one of the machines, the heavy 12.7 rounds denting and then penetrating the head of the lead robot causing it to fall. Before both of them could take cover again one of them was almost cut in half by the return fire.
Moving forward while the machines were focused on the naval personnel a few of the marines with the gauntlet shield generators activated them with a hiss. Other marines formed up behind them and they opened fire. The lighter 5.23mm caseless rounds from the smgs bounced harmlessly off the cylons tough metal body while the heavier 9.5s and 7.62s knocked them back and dented their armor as rounds penetrated and bounced around inside their mechanical bodies.
The six cylons down the marines checked on the naval personnel, four dead and one wounded. They pushed onward towards the hangar passing more dead naval personnel and a few more destroyed cylons. A few not so destroyed had their heads destroyed by 8 gauge magnums as marines with shotguns finished them off.
With help from the bridge and the security cameras they moved in as squads quickly gunning down the cylons. The few times they had time to fire on the marines their scanners watched in bafflement as the shields stopped their bullets.
As they cleared the hanger the last centurion was gunned down from behind as it rounded the corner after talking to the bridge who had watched the three heavy raiders land and counted the twenty four robots board they compared numbers and evened out seventeen had been gunned down by marines and they had encountered seven that had been downed by naval personnel.
Looking around the recaptured hanger Sargent Silva keyed his radio "the boarders have been dealt with lieutenant."
On the bridge of the Rushmore Lieutenant John Geary breathed a sigh of relief as he turned his attention back to the maelstrom outside his ship. The Rushmore had started heading away from the fighting to concentrate on the boarding party but that was done. "Turn us around Petty Officer Young."
The man nodded and as he directed the ship to turn around he said "Yes Sir"
John looked over the local battlespace and it wasn't going well while he had been focused on the boarding party the Hestia had take several more direct nuclear hits and had broken into several large pieces as he watched the Colossus and Hyena fired their MACs killing a Basestar and a Cylon Berserk.
"Ensign Jane Foster ready the Focus cannons" he ordered the weapons officer "we need to target more of the Colonial ships the cylons are using if we can do that then our side's missiles can hammer them."
"Yes sir, I will prioritize the Firestars since they are designed to shoot down incoming ordnance" she began tapping into the control system for the cannons targeting computer.
The Rushmore came roaring in its engines at the redline as the MAC fired, claiming the port landing bay of a cylon Battlestar named Osirus. A moment later the twin cannons fired their focused plasma at two Firestars and set them ablaze. The six remaining Archer pods locked onto a nearby Berserk and Manticore and fired as well the thirty missiles pushing themselves avoiding the few flack shells the Berserk threw out. As they slammed into the pair of ships the heavy high explosive warheads made short work of them as the berserk sheared in half and the manticore drifted dead in space.
Foster looked up at Geary "sir that was the last of our missiles and we are down to three shells for the MAC."
"We will just have to make them count Foster." john said grimly
Looking over the local area again John saw the corvettes Demios and nightfall using their coilguns and missiles to beat off a basestar closing in on a heavily damaged Virgon heavy cruiser. Everywhere he looked UNSC and Colonial forces were being pushed back they were hurting the cylons but it wasn't enough.
As the Rushmore made towards a cluster of Firestars and Besarks the Colonial carrier Aethon issued an emergency alert zooming the frigates sensors in that direction he saw the corvette Crossbow firing its autocannon and ramparts in every direction as over a dozen firestars pounded it from every direction as it screened the carrier. As John watched the corvette disappeared in a nuclear fireball that also claimed eight of the attacking frigates and setting another adrift as the engines were sheared off.
UNSC Crossbow FSS 192 was destroyed taking its entire seventy five man crew with her.