The “Battle” of Brecourt II - Part 1 of 6

Posted on Mon May 15th, 2023 @ 1:34am by Captain David Tonelly [Reece] & Lieutenant Colonel Azhul Naxea & Captain Samuel Woolheater & Lieutenant Kurt "Berlin" Vogel
Edited on on Wed Jun 7th, 2023 @ 8:55am

Mission: MISSION 0 - History Speaks
Location: Brecourt II
Timeline: The Past
2052 words - 4.1 OF Standard Post Measure

[ON:]

Lieutenant Kurt Vogel shivered in the cockpit of the Valkyrie fighter. His body shook despite the flight suit and leather jacket he wore. He had long since transferred partial life support to his engines, so while he had plenty of oxygen, he would be cold until he transferred it back. His wing flew in tight formation as they escorted the drop ships carrying marines to the surface if Brecourt II.

Well…”close” was a relative term. His nearest wingman, Lieutenant JG Reginald Crabtree, callsign “Lobster”, was above and to his right about 10 kilometers away. To his left and below Kurt was Ensign Barbara Fox, Callsign “Double X”. Her craft was approximately 12 kilometers away. Almost to far to see via the eyeball, but almost in each others laps as far as the vastness of space was concerned.

Kurt flicked a switch to transmit on Wing internal communication. “All squadrons, this is Berlin, stay tight, we are about 30 mikes (minutes) out. Squadron Leaders, give me a comm check and PERSTAT (Personnel Status). Berlin out.”

The German flicked the switch off. He then flipped a different switch to communicate with the Marines.

“Mama Bear, this is Berlin, over.”

"Go ahead, Berlin," Naxea replied from the lead transport.

“Be advised: we are one hour to landing, break.” Kurt briefly cut the comm line so it couldn’t be triangulated as easily. He keyed the talk button again. “I have Blue Squadron on alert as CAS*, break.” Another brief cut off of comms. “The rest of my group shall be on standby to watch for bandits#.”

"Acknowledged," Naxea replied. "Good hunting."

Kurt’s headset came to life. “Blue 1 to Gold 1.”

“Send it.” Vogel replied.

“Sensors are non-operational. Suspect jamming, over.”

Kurt looked at his own screens. Sure enough, the sensor screen had faint lines running horizontally across it, a likely sign of jamming.

“Berlin to all birds: we have possible bogeys inbound. Sensors are useless. Go to visual scanning.” The German cut the line without waiting for a response.

“Berlin to Marine 6. Be advised ma’am: we have possible incoming. Green Squadron will escort you down, over.”

"Understood," Naxea replied as she sat in the transport. This was one thing she hated, was having to go into an area with transports instead of a transporter. Two dozen things could easily go wrong with such a deployment method.

David sat across from Naxea in the transport. He had heard the reports as they came in. "Though she was his superior officer, they both knew he had far more combat experience. Switching his suit's comm channel to a private one just between the two of them, he spoke. "How many combat drops have you been on, Boss?"

"Three. And I hated every one of them," Naxea replied. She thought back to her first combat mission against Orion Pirates that had commandeered a star cruise liner and taken hostages. That had been even more nerve wracking as it had been an EVA insertion.

David nodded as he listened. "May I make a suggestion, Ma'am?"

"Go ahead," she replied, tilting her head to the side slightly.

"Try not to think of the drop itself. Focus more on the various objectives you have to accomplish once boots are on the ground."

"Thanks for the tip," she replied with a slight grin.


A THOUSAND MILE FRONT


War is all hell.

The battle of Brecourt II would be no different. Brecourt, a Class-M world, very much Earth-like and heavily industrialized was, as one marine put it, “the largest weapons and ammo depot in the alpha quadrant”. Heavy weapons, arms and all of the assorted cast of the usual suspects came to Brecourt II. Captain Samuel Woolheater described the place as the “discount terrorists strip mall. When you want your war; but….you don’t want to pay a lot for it.”

“Fuckin’ cheapskates!” Sam said as he lay prone on the floor of a bombed-out munitions depot. He continued his assesment of the creeps, "Arms dealers digging for change in the couch cushions!” Every rotation at 2000 hours, there would be an opportunity to communicate with the field command of the sixty-second company. Sam had been sent forward, along with elements from the 62nd and the 33rd to scout and secure this urban nightmare before marines made their forward advances. As he waited for the chronometer to click “2000” hours, he used his enhanced SFMC tactical rangefinders to scan the area while he waited.

He was on the 12th floor of a 15-story building that, now, only had three sides to it. But he had the most advantageous view of the DZ (drop zone) that would be used to deploy a few hundred marines. Then there was the long avenue that led from the DZ to the area that was across the river from the one-thousand-mile front. An area that stretched from the upper plains, through hills and valleys, along this long central river and all the way down to the coast. All along the front, the battles raged on. And from high orbit, the Brecourt looked on at the mad labor below on the surface. If the intel was correct, tonight, the Brecort planned to abandon the front and then by orbital bombardment, wipe out everything along this front. If they succeeded in that, Federation and Starfleet forces would suffer severe casualties. And that could not be tolerated.

Sam saw movement. He switched from the rangefinder, which was great with all kinds of additional tech, but sucked in low light. He switched to his rifle scope and searched. He found the source of the movement. It was two females. They were digging through the rubble. Sam wached them from his prone, flat, perch and waited.

“19:58” read the chronometer. There were three men that arrived and had climbed to the roof of a building 1km away. There was a wall on the roof that allowed them some cover. They had something…..a rocket launcher. Not a phase cannon, this was a pure kinetic weapon. One was a spotter, probably a scout. He was the one with the glasses and hadn’t yet spotted Woolheater. One was setting up the weapon and one was a carrying a heavy phaser weapon. Their equipment was not new. Likely, it was stolen or traded in what was left on the eastern side of Brecourt II’s weapons trade.

“19:59” Sam would be getting a call soon. He waited to see what the CO wanted him to do.

“20:00” Woolheater activated his body armor's laryngophone (throat mic) and then put the earpiece in his right ear and listened. The channel opened and he identified himself as was the protocol. “Baby Bear to Mama Bear. Do you copy?”

"Go ahead, Baby Bear," Naxea replied, unable to stop herself from grinning at Woolheater's callsign.

Sam recognized the Colonel's voice - and he thought he could detect a grin in her tone - the transponder indicated they were in the green for a secure communication. As he spoke, he watched through the scope the three men setting up a rocket launcher and a few kinetic weapons and now a photon grenade. He said, "Heeeyyy there boss; it's that time of the day and here's the SITREP. I've been at location x-ray delta for nine hours. The party opposite has been drawing down all day. They don't seem to be in too much of a hurry. We have heavy emplacements left on objective "B" for Baker. Although, I expect we're going to be disappointed that they took all their toys with them. There are four batteries left, crewed by six bad guys. At my ten o'clock I have a welcoming committee of three corpses setting up some party poppers to greet you all when you land. And I have two female civvies in the flak area digging through rubble for something they want awful bad. Something isn't right. I'm more concerned about the civvies than I am the emplaced batteries or the three guys setting up your non-surprise. Thirty-three is bringing up our six and comm chatter indicates that they aren't finding too much opposition. Except for these assets left on this side of the river, everyting west of this position has been abandoned. Requesting instructions and ETA."

David listened closely to everything that was said...and closer to everything that wasn't. He didn't like the idea of a couple civilians in the middle of a contested combat zone. They should have been long gone by now. That, or hunkered down so hard it would take a laser scalpel to bring them back topside. Whomever they were, and whatever they were doing was very troublesome.

He waited to see what the Colonel decided to do.

Naxea thought for a moment of the scenario. "Relay the enemy coordinates who are setting up an ambush to the fighter group to hit them and keep an eye on those civilians. "If they take any hostile action towards any Marines, they are no longer civilians.

——-Space——-

Lieutenant Kurt Vogel keyed his comm, but this time to switch to private channel.

“Reaper, this is Berlin. You know there are easier ways to keep up your flight hours.” The German said with droll.

"Perhaps easier but none as stimulating Berlin, you just keep your eyes peeled for any brick walls." Gary replied in a perfect dead pan.

Imik sat listening to the chatter, she noted how the other fighters were keeping station. "Coco to Berlin, your section is out of formation. I suggest you close up and reform, Coco out!"

Kurt looked at his sensors, remembered they were jammed. He turned the team channel. “Falcon 1 to all Falcons: bring it in until you have visual sight of your wingman. Relay when you are set. Falcon Leader out.”


=== MAP POSITION - X-RAY DELTA ===

"Copy" Sam said in response to his orders from Colonel Azhul. He keyed into his COMM unit the fighter group and made the call,

=A= This is position x-ray delta to Falcon One. Do you copy Falcon One? =A=

The response came back jagged, but readable. "This is Falcon One. Send traffic."

=A= We've got three hostiles setting up an ambush on these coordinates X-R-D. I am authorized to request you hit these targets at your earliest convienience. I am ready to paint them if you need an assist? =A=

A short delay before Kurt's voice came back. "Roger. Be advised: we have detected sensor jamming. We will have to do any gun runs via LIDAR and/or RADAR, break."

A small delay as Kurt keyed off the comm briefly.

"Pollack** Strongly advised. I have your position as Foxtrot-Lima-Gulf-Tango one-one-three-niner, two-zero-six-zero. Confirm, over."

Once Kurt got the confirmation that those were indeed the approximate coordinates of the caller, he continued.

"Blue squadron will be assigned to this fire mission. Blue One will be in contact shortly. Falcon Out."

The comm turned off.

Samuel turned his attention and his scope to the two female civilians. "...shit!" Sam said. They were gone. He scanned the area with his scope and then he went to his rangefinder and looked through them for life signs as the unit scanned the area. He cursed under his breath, "...where the hell..."

The close air support (CAS) was waiting for Sam to act. He had to decide what to do. If he civvies were in an active combat zone, as dumb as that was, and he knowingly continued with the air strike it could cause problems.

THERE!

He spotted them. Two females were carrying something. He couldn't see what it was. And the sensors on the rangefinder were not helpful. Sam looked back at the three setting up the rocket launcher and then back at the two civillians, very slowly, laboring to move something that was either heavy or needed specially great care in handling. But what was it??!!

=== END PART ONE

[OFF:]


Legend:
*Close Air Support - Fires provided by aircraft to support ground forces
#Bandits - Enemy aircraft
**Pollack - Fighter slang: to paint a target with infrared lasers to aid in detection for targeting. Term comes from the noted painter Jackson Pollack
##Gulf Romeo - Brevity code: Gun Run
***Alpha Fox - Brevity code: Anti-fighter
###BDA - Battle Damage Assessment
****Alpha Charlie - Atmospheric Combat