The “Battle” of Brecourt II - Part 5 of 6

Posted on Mon May 15th, 2023 @ 5:40am by Lieutenant Colonel Azhul Naxea & Captain Samuel Woolheater & Captain David Tonelly [Reece]
Edited on on Fri May 26th, 2023 @ 11:21am

Mission: MISSION 0 - History Speaks
Location: Brecourt II
Timeline: The Past
2623 words - 5.2 OF Standard Post Measure

[ON:]

=== CONTINUED FROM PART FOUR ===

MEANWHILE - HIGH ABOVE IN ORBIT

The Intrepid-class ship USS ATLANTA put herself in between the Brecourt frigate and the fighter wing in an attempt to cover the fighter's asses from the frigate's firing solution. Atlanta opened up with volleys of torpedos and phaser fire that did heavy damage to the Brecourt frigate. Becaused of this, the frigate turned and had to delay it's orbital attack on the surface to deal with Starfleet.

On the bridge of the Atlanta the tactical officer called out, "I think that got their attention Captain. She's coming about. She'll have a firing solution on us in moments!"

Below the two capital ships, several fighters noticed the melee in orbit.

"Holy shit! The big girl is getting in front of the shots!" came a pilot, forgetting his comm was open.

"Green 3 to any fighters: we cant let her take the heat for us, we need to do what we can to assist. I need two pilots."

He let it hang in the air for a moment, until the reply came back.

"This is Dagger: Im in."

"Carrot here: me too"

"Falcon, this is Green 3." the Marine pilot said as she keyed the comm to talk to Vogel.

"This is Falcon, go Soupcan."

The female pilot continued. "Atlanta is taking fire meant for us. Request permission to take Dagger and Carrot to assist."

"Granted," Vogel replied. "Godspeed."


USS ATLANTA - BRIDGE

"Bring us about! Bring us closer to the Brecourt! Make Atlanta a bigger threat! Phasers! Make your shots count! Photon torpedos, full spread" came the commands from the Captain. And after a tense moment, "Fire!"

This time, swinging around and offering up the dorsal side of the ship, she fired hellfire and a volley that made the Brecourt shield grid drop 30%. Even so, Atlanta was leaving a trail of drive plasma from open wounds on her ventral side. But the Brecourt had other problems. Atlanta came about and brought her nose straight on towards the frigate. Offering as narrow a profile as she could get. Her forward phasers tore through seven fighters as they were like gnats. Straight on she closed the distance. Phaser firing, red hot, pouding and boring a hole until the Brecourt shields collapsed. Ther maneuver was to ckear the field. Follow in under Atlanta's wake for she was like a scythe....reaping the harvest and the war that had been sown.

The three fighters buzzed past the Atlanta, firing wildly at the Brecourt carrier. Soupcan called out on her open mike.

"Follow me in, stay tight. Lets at least give the old girl a fighting chance."

The fighters went in at full speed, trying to give the enemy as hard a time as possible firing upon them. They fired their small complement of torpedoes, which impacted the enemy vessel amidships. She reeled, but did not burn.

And she returned fire. Carrot was hit, her crippled fighter cartwheeling in space. The remaining two fighters received hits, and, inside their cockpits, sparks flew and warning lights flashed.

"Shit. One more! If we gotta go, we will take them with us!" Soupcan cried out into the comm.

The two remaining fighters wheeled upon the carrier, going straight into its maw. They fired their phasers on rotary mode, laying down a steady stream of phaser fire that impacted the shields and made them glow green and angry. Dagger received another hit, mortal, as it turned out. His fighter split in two and he had to eject.

Soupcan carried on. Down, down she flew, into the heart and teeth of the Brecourt's fire, defiant and angry. Multiple impacts around her as her fighter heaved and shook, but still she did not turn off. She fired until her phasers glowed red hot, her torpedoes streaming forth to vent her fury upon the foe.

Her ammunition spent, Soupcan tried to turn away, but the fighter would not respond. A glance at the panel revealed why: her stablizers were shot through, and the attitude controls were gone. She was on a straight course at nearly half the speed of light towards the enemy.

"Fuck you assholes." She said.

The fighter impacted the Brecourt carrier at .5C. The enemy shields, already battered, couldnt hold the ship back. It bashed through them like they were wet paper. The fighter impacted near the rear quarter of the enemy carrier, going through eight decks. The piees of what was once a starfleet fighter turned to shrapnel as they cut further, smaller swathes of destruction through the hull, like ant tunnels.

The Carrier heaved, and fires could be seen streaming out of the gaping holes to her rear, her atmosphere feeding their flickering tongues despite the void of space trying to snuff them.

Atlanta pulled up hard as her ventral photon torpedo tubes opened up a volley of fire. Six torpedos exited from two torpedo tubes and cut through the hull. The Brecourt frigate rolled over to port and started her death descent to the surface.

A cheer went up on the bridge of Atlanta. The captain squealched it promptly. "I appreciate the intent. But there is nothing here to cheer about. We did out job. Lieutenant?" the Captain addressed herself to the COMM station, "Signal the fighters to disengage and return to Implacable."

"Aye Captain" and he went to work. "Damage report!" the XO called.

"Port nacelle is damaged and ventring drive plasma. Wwe have hull breaches on decks threve and eleven. Casualty reports still coming in. Twenty-four crew missing. ODN conduits to primary and secondary systems....havily damaged. Maybe a few shots left. We have four torpedos left in the armory."

The Captain took the news calmly.

"Captain? I....I...can't raise Implacable ma'am. No reply. I think that's the ship dead ahead."

Looking out the main viewscreen which was filled with static and derez lines, the smoldering hulk of the Oswego-class carrier was terrible to see. She glowed red from all of the fires internally. No lights anywhere were on her.

"Life signs?" the Captain asked.

The Science officer shook his head, "None. In fact Captain, we are the only capital ship left of th task force."

The captain was stunned a moment and there was an awkward silence on the bridge. Only broken by the smoldering SCI II station. The captain broke the silence, "Send to all fighters.... mop it up and return to Atlanta. XO? We're going to need room for the pilots. Will you see to it?"

"Aye!" he said and was off.


DERELICT BUILDING - ENTRANCE TO THE UNDERGROUND SHELTER

"The lifesigns on the tricorder say that they went in there. As far as the scan can reach, it's nothing but a rat's nest maze" the marine said to Woolheater. Sam asked him, "You sure they went down there?"

"Affirmative" was the reply. "Indeterminate lifesigns. Sometimes sisxty, sometimes ten...more than the three you saw captain."

".....Sssshit!...." Sam said exhausted.

"What's there to debate about?" another asked stepping in front of Gami. "It's clearly a trap."

Sam said, "Yeah. I know. But what if it's not? I don't know very many war torn civillians that go out into an active fire zone just for shits and giggles."

"I say we cut our losses. We got our asses kicked out here! Fuck the civvies. They shouldn't even be here" another marine said.

David's demeanor darkened at hearing those words. In a flash, he had grabbed the Marine in question by the front of his tactical gear, lifted him several inches off the ground and slammed him into the nearby wall. "What the fuck did you just say?!" It was clear that the MXO was extremely angry. "Did you just say, 'fuck the civies'?!" He then turned and tossed the man he was holding across the room.

"You call yourself a Marine?!" He strode over and kicked the Marine in the gut...hard. "You're a fucking disgrace to the uniform!" He reach down and grabbed the back collar of the man's uniform, jerking his up on to his knees. "If we weren't in the shit right now, I'd toss your ass in the brig, once I broke your legs! Get on your damn feet!" He hauled the coughing Marine back up to his feet. "Mister Man'darr, take control of this bag of shit until we get out of this hell hole. The Colonel will deal tlwith him later."

"Aye, Sir." Though he despised cowardice, he was against the XO's method of dealing with the Marine. He took the man and took his weapons, and then handing him to a corporal. "Corporal, stay back and watch this Marine."

"Aye, Sir," came the Corporal's reply.

At that minute, Naxea's voice came over the unit specific comm. "Momma Bear to Baby Bear. What is your status?"

Lieutenant Pierre DuBois’ sweat stung his eyes as it combined with the dirt of his forehead to create a crusty paste as it flowed down. The French-Canadian wiped it from his eye as he swore.

“Tabernac! War sucks.” He muttered.

Upon hearing the Colonel's voice Woolheater raised his closed fist to gather their attention and quiet the noise and talking he said in a loud voice so that the company would hear, "XO, Colonel is on the line." Sam immediately responded to her call with a calm, clear, unharried voice.

=A= Mama bear this is baby bear, I copy. SITREP we are at coordinates....Union and Baker...approximately three hundred meters from your last comm point at your six. The Brecourt are pulling out and air support is mopping up the last resistance this side of the river. We have traced two civillians carrying a wounded third to this locale. Tricorder reads between twenty to sixty lifeforms, Human, Brecourt, Essian, Madean...civillians caught in the wrong place at the wrong time. They are sheltering in the undercroft of the building. Looks like a basement with a lot of dark, narrow passageways and blind corners. Interference from debris, and heavy weapons in the area difficult to get a positive transporter lock. We have twenty-eight marine survivors. Six from the 33rd. XO is here ma'am. =A=

Sam pointed to his earpiece while looking at David to see if he wanted to talk to the Colonel while he listened for the Colonel's orders.

David nodded, then reached for the comm unit, putting it to his ear. "Mama Bear, Rip Van Winkle here. Like Baby Bear stated, there are an indeterminate number of civilians nearby. I'm sure they are scared out of their wits, and should have protection. What are your orders?"

"Go in but stay alert and watch your corners," Naxea came back as phaser fire could be heard starting in the background. "We're dealing with a straggling group of Brecourt soldiers up here. Momma Bear, out."

--------

Pierre DuBois ran towards a building, pushing his back to the wall hard enough to force breath from his lungs, as he was quite desperate not to get shot. He happened to be the second man there, as a female Marine Private was in front of him.

Pierre put his left fingers to his right palm in a 'T' formation: the signal to stack at the door to begin room clearing. Pierre absent-mindedly noticed that Woolheater had come up as the fourth man in the stack. Beginning from the rear, the Marines, weapons at the high ready, slapped the man to their front on the shoulder, to signal they were set. The female Marine gave the door a brief turn of the handle, found it locked, and gave the door a firm kick with her boot before rushing through the doorway.

She was immediately shot, and fell forward, temporarily blocking the door. Pierre pushed past her to enter the room, found the target straight ahead, shot him twice, watched him crumple, and continued into the room, turning left to quickly find a corner and no hostiles. The French-Canadian Marine stood in that corner and watched two doors, one to his left and one to his front. When he heard the other three Marines enter the room and assume positions, he suddenly realized that the call ‘One up’ was not going to come from the number one man, as she was wounded. Pierre quickly gathered himself.

“Two up!” he called.

“Three up!” came a Marine’s response.

Woolheater’s added response completed the cycle. Pierre went to the wounded female Marine. She was bleeding profusely from her stomach.

“Tabernac. Slug thrower.” DuBois stated. He poked his head outside the doorway. “Corpsman!”

A Marine with a red attachment to his sleeve ran up, and Pierre pointed to the wounded Marine. “Slug.” The Corpsman began to work on her, starting with a hypo.

DuBois’ stoic actions to a wounded colleague might seem cold, but the Marine was wounded in what was called ‘the fatal funnel’, a single point of entry where Marines can bunch up and become easy targets. It was where hesitation can get more Marines killed or wounded. Training and doctrine dictate that the correct course of action was to first finish the immediate fight before checking on the wounded. So, Pierre might not like it, but he would have to push past his wounded Marine to get inside and take out the enemy. If that meant you stepped on your friend, that was too bad.

DuBois turned to Woolheater. “What say you sir? Door number one, or number two?” He pointed to the two doors before them, leading to other rooms.

Sam's sniper rifle was securely strapped to the back of his armor. The length the TR-116 was simply too long for short range encountrs as they now faced. e carried a standard issue phaser rifle. They had been going deeper and deeper into this labynthian maze and Woolheater was keeping score. Say what you want about the Brecourt, but they were as calculating as any Romulan and ruthless in their logic. Sam quickly glanced as the combat tricorder on the forearm of his body armor.

There was something very odd about this buildings undercroft. Every structure had a purpose, a reason. The floors above them had been damaged but these lower floors seemed mostly undamaged. Sam checked his six before answering DuBois. "Something's not right. What the hell is this place? And why so much damn resistance? We have found nothing. So what the hell is so damn important that they are throwing so much at us? We're taking heavy losses. And we can't afford to keep that shit up. I still have the rest of the platoon on the scope. Tricorder says two Brecourt lifesigns and a third fading. Thirty more meters. Listen up....we're changing our tactics. No more murder holes and no more fatal funnels. These walls...they're some kind of concrete. We're making our own doorways. I'm setting my weapon to wide-angle beam and DuBois and I will take point. I'll fire first, disintegrate the wall. DuBois, you pour fire into the hole. And we cut our way straight along this line to the target. You two..." here Woolheater ordered the other two marines, "...cover our six and watch the corners like the Colonel said. Stay. Frosty!"


=== END PART FIVE ===

[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