Grunting at the sucker punch, Master Chief Byk glanced down at Brooks' hand, before rolling his eyes. "We're alive, for now, fearless leader." He took the co-pilot's seat, fumbling around under the seat for a second bottle he kept tucked there for emergencies, an all too regular occurrence considering Jayce was in command.
The Social Credit pulled back towards where the Repair ship was hovering, the long arms moving into position to lock onto the damaged Storm. An umbilical docking ring extending to mate with the main hatch, as Pasha pushed his way back along the length of the ship, flipping open the hatches as repair crews came aboard, ready to start the spot repairs that would, hopefully, get the Social Credit back into some kind of combat shape.
It was chaos. Sheer chaos. A dead ship and it seemed that every one was blundering about. To herself, she mused at the incompetence of these individuals and that the whole situation had gone FUBAR over the course of a few hours. Yet still, the call didn't come in for support. Her foot began to tap against the steel deck plates in annoyance. Alvarez and Brooks were probably treating this like game.
With a sigh, she turned to the tactical officer and spoke in a bored tone, "Prepare the marines and an exoskeleton for deployment," She then turned to the helmsman, "Bring us up beside the ship and lock the cargo bay to the derelict," Then to the engineering station, "Get us a few cutters. We need to hack our way into the ship."
With a chorus of "Da, Comrade Lieutenant Colonel!"s, the plan was set into motion, the large cruiser moving into position and deckhands scurrying about the ship.
"THE HULL HAS BEEN BREACHED AND THESCIENCEIS LEAKING OUT!"
Santorini just looked at the Doctor with considerable Surprise. The Doctor gave her a haughty stare back. The air crackled with tension. Finally she spoke.
Doctor, you are not going there.
The Doctor's change of expression would have been hilarious in other circumstances. Now, it was just expected. He spluttered for a moment, before bursting.
What the hell!? You heard Comrade Khan! Do you wish to have a bullet in your head!
She sighed.
I do not recommend you going there until the situation is under control. Well under control. But very well....
She signalled to the venerable doctor to proceed, then, after a few steps, she took out her standard issue pistol, and quietly punted the doctor on the head with it. He slumped to the floor, courtesy Coalition training in non lethal methods.
She returned to the bridge, and shrugged apologetically at Commissar Khan and Razin.
Looks like the Doctor ran into some trouble, and fell unconscious. I've put him in medical for now, shall we proceed?
Without waiting for a response, she moves to one of the communications controls, and began barking orders out to the various marine teams and their leaders aboard the Trotsky.
Commissar Santorini here, leaders report in, and keep in touch. I'm transmitting possible paths for your teams to take, stay together, and cover each other's backs. We're watching you from here.
It had been five minutes since he lost contact with his secondary team, three minutes since his team got caught in an ambush and one minute since he had started running. His secondary reported noises, shortly after all Steele heard was horrible screaming. His primary team had ran to secondaries last known position and got caught by a pack of animals that resembled giant wolves. Worse, these wolves had fangs the size of Daemons arm. His unit didn't stand a chance, the entire pack ripped them to pieces. The only reason Steele was alive was because one of the marines got the Wolves attention, allowing him to escape. He never even knew the mans name and yet the man didn't hesitate to sacrifice himself. Unfortunately, now wasn't the time to grieve or really do much except run like hell. His equipment was weighing him down, but he knew he'd rather not be defenseless. Suddenly, his TAC Comm came to life.
'This is Colonel Alvarez to all units, pull back, regroup at'¦ Nav point alpha.'
Steele was glad to hear the Colonels voice, however a roar just behind him ruined the mood. Instinctively, he dived to his right just as a Wolf lunged at him, barely missing him. Steele knew the others were nearby and he had to get a move on. He ran towards the Navpoint and tossed a Grenade. It landed near the wolf and three second later the wolf went from horrifying beast to a mist of red. He heard more roars in the distance and began running as fast as he could. He went for his TAC-Comms
The marine team was moving towards the Social Credit crash site. The marines, with Petko leading them, were keeping a close formation of four's with 2 scouts moving on ahead.
It was quiet, as they trudged through the snowy deck of what looked like living quarters. None of them expecting a noise to erupt from dark corner. Before they realized what was happening, a large creature, all fangs, claws, teeth, spikes and spines'¦ with a few razor sharp barbs thrown in for good measure, burst around the corner tearing into the marines.
'Fire, FIRE!' Petko desperately ordered. As the Marines scrambled to comply hurling bullets into the armoured beast.
"Keep firing marines kill it" Petko yelled above the din of weapons fire.
The creature possessed a completely different idea over who was going to die. It tore through the ranks of marines, rending, slicing, goring and gouging till there was no one standing but it and the Coalition Officer.
Petko was well trained, Coalition training taught one all important thing, if you are going to get torn apart by a rabid, frothing, killer-death-beast'¦ run the hell away! Seeing he had little choice, Dimitriov dived through a small opening in the floor, sliding through much, slush and snow, he felt the beast clawing at the opening behind him... as he elbowed his way through the vents, leaving it behind.
He grabbed his TAC as he ran, locating the emergency beacon as he sprinted, hearing Steele's saying something'¦
" Dimitrov here Comrade Steele I am coming to rally point alpha my marines are dead. How are yours?" Dimitrov waited for a response while running'¦ hoping that if Steele's marines were still alive, then maybe they could do something about bubba-come-ugly chasing him down.
Stacy checked her watch, and pulled her Tac-Comms radio out of her jacket pocket.
"Bravo Team, this is Winters. Move towards Nav point alpha's position, dropping by at Dimitrov and/or Steele if you can find them"
The Marine team spoke words of acknowledgement, not at all dissuaded by the previous fates of almost all of the Marine teams before them.
Stacy raised her rifle once more and proceeded down one of the darkened corridors facing towards the Trotsky's position, a distant yet distinct sound of movement rattling the derelict hallways.
"Uh oh..." she muttered, checking her rifle.
A pack of wolf-like creatures rounded the corner, each with a distinct fiery-red fur, contrasting the cold atmosphere and snowy environment of the decks. They all boasted rather elegant twin-tails, though each one differed in size, they all seemed equally pissed off.
Without much more hesitation, Stacy opened fire, aiming mainly for head and torso shots. It didn't matter much where she hit, as the shots were high enough calibre to tear through a flesh target at the range.
Three of the beasts fell, another stumbled to the ground mortally injured, but a couple were close enough to pound, their breath a vile black puff of what seemed to be smoke.
Her attempt to draw her side-arm was a failure, hope following the gun as it fumbled out of her fingers and across the ice. Then it hit her, the force of one of the creatures took her off her feet, slamming her backwards into the wall.
The wolves rounded on the spot, coming back to finish her off, it's pounce however was interrupted when a few 10mm rounds penetrated it's skull, putting it down for good. The last, smaller wolf whimpered and backed off, turning to run back down the corridor.
"Oh, not so tough now, are you ese?" Alvarez chuckled, turning to the downed Winters, "Now we are even, si?"
"Thank you, Sir" Stacy groaned, straightening her self against the wall.
Her coat was stained with her own blood, a nasty looking piece of shrapnel extending from the wall through her left shoulder.
"It's not that bad, is it?" she asked, feeling around the wound with her right hand.
Yuveraj Khan was normally a calm and sedate man, he liked the quiet contemplation of strategy. He enjoyed the fear that the men displayed whenever his ire was aroused. And he reveled in days where nothing went wrong.
It was not one of those days.
The news that Doctor XiaoBei was in the infirmary was not particularly thrilling to him. Especially considering he agreed that the doctor was needed over on the alien derelict.
He rubbed his brow, kneading the tribal tattoo that was traditional in his particular sect of the Coalition.
'Sir the Trotsky appears to be closing on the alien ship'¦' one of the men reported.
'Broch, endeavouring to steal the glory,' Khan said, his lip curling in disgust. His hand reaching out to scoop up the growler phone. 'Kerimov to Trotsky, patch me through to Trotsky-Actual'¦'
He waited for a moment, as she answered.
'Lieutenant Colonel Broch,' his voice dropped, and hardened as he spoke. 'I have not given the order for your ship to approach the alien vessel. Nor will I you contemptuous cow, you will pull your ship back to a supporting position and hold your men in reserve, or I will come over to your ship personally and do what Medvedov failed to do, which was end your sorry existence'¦'
Razin cleared his throat, 'Commissar Khan'¦'
Khan snarled at him, still holding the receiver, 'I know your aims, and your continued disrespect for the Commissariat, but you were removed once from the inner circle of power, and I assure you, cross me again and history shall repeat itself.'
As BAAL hovered in the Hanger Bay of the strange ship it started to systematically scan the area, attempting to establish a 'floor plan' for remaining ground forces, he did not notice a strange creature on the ceiling in, it resembled the Bats of ancient Sol, except the fangs were much longer and sharper, it could easily bite into the armour of the Storm Chassis and likely remove hull panels, it had armour padding, leathery so it would be resistant to weapons fire. When it was directly over BAAL's hovering storm it dropped down, flipping itself in midair and dug it's talons deep into the Armour of the ship.
BAAL immediately took action, transmitting the telemetry of what was happening to Khan's console directly as BAAL was under the dominion of the Commissariat.
'Hostile Lifeform-Meatbag Detected, requesting release of Modified Anti-Corsair Meatbag Protocals until hostile is silenced" BAAL reported in his normal cold voice, twisting the storm violently in the bay, attempting to shake the 'Bat' off it's hull, the top turrets swung around, ready to try to kill or stun depending on Khan's answer.
"No I am not BLOODY alright!" Doctor XiaoBei cursed as he tenderly fingered the welt on the back of his head from where Santorini had whacked him with her gun.
His head swam from the blow, and though he had been unconscious, a rather significant dose of something noxious from the Coalition doctor Igor, and he was upright, albeit very irked.
The Commissariat had a rather annoying habit of continually getting in the way, especially when it came to obstructing things that actually needed to get done. They had to be right, even when they were very badly wrong.
"Just give me the pain killers, and let me have a cigarette," XiaoBei demanded getting to his feet a little shakily.
The doctor, who was already smoking, shrugged and offered one to the scientist.
Sufficiently placated by nicotine, he grabbed a TAC and put a call into the bridge.
Naturally that meant being stuck on hold.
For quite a while.
He gave up, marching down through the ship towards the docking port that would connect to the repair ship currently servicing all the damaged ships of the Flotilla. Working his way through it, he ducked through another hatch and onto the Social Credit.
"Mister Brooks," he said, placing a smile on his face as he took an expressive drag on his cigarette. "You're going to take me across to the alien derelict at once. Consider this an order from the Science Directorate."
"He's doing what?" Khan asked... as another call came in through the busy bridge.
"What... anti-cor...huh?" Khan rubbed his brow. "Right, yes... do what you have to do... just... don't damage the alien ship further..."
He turned, "give the Social Credit clearance to return to the derelict, and instruct Mister Brooks that if anything happens to Doctor XiaoBei, I am going to personally use his *ahem* to decorate my Christmas tree!"
![[Image: socialcredit.png]](http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad103/cplydon/socialcredit.png)
![[Image: 5438_s.png]](http://signavatar.com/5438_s.png)
![[Image: broch.png]](http://i856.photobucket.com/albums/ab127/arcboundfiend/broch.png)
![[Image: Tyrael.gif]](http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20070319171309/diablo/images/a/a5/Tyrael.gif)
![[Image: joeyn.png]](http://img199.imageshack.us/img199/8428/joeyn.png)
![[Image: botev.png]](http://img337.imageshack.us/img337/5263/botev.png)
![[Image: userbarbulgaria.png]](http://img35.imageshack.us/img35/4886/userbarbulgaria.png)
![[Image: dimitrovifamily.png]](http://img413.imageshack.us/img413/1393/dimitrovifamily.png)
![[Image: stacyse2.png]](http://img202.imageshack.us/img202/6225/stacyse2.png)
![[Image: razin1.png]](http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad103/cplydon/razin1.png)
![[Image: Coalition-sig.png]](http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad103/cplydon/Coalition-sig.png)
![[Image: BAAL.png]](http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad103/cplydon/BAAL.png)
![[Image: xiaobei-1.png]](http://i926.photobucket.com/albums/ad103/cplydon/xiaobei-1.png)