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*********Pre-adventure medical recap, see below for Demetria's report********

The infirmary aboard the base is small and well equipped, staffed with both enlisted personnel and medical officers. Men and women move about smartly and pay Adel & tedrick little mind as they groggily opened their eyes for the first time in days. Nearby, a doctor and nurse helps a wounded trooper through his daily physical training routine. Both of them have their arms tucked under the soldier's shoulders, on either side, as they assist him in walking down a straight line. The nurse looks up as our heroes stir, her hair a mess from the work, and says "Oh, Good.. they’re awake." she says.

Tedrick: "what happened?

Doctor: Ugh, listen the protocol is that the Imperial Guard has to make first contact with ya. I can’t and uh the lieutenant's here so.. sigh… let me go get him. Alright?

The Lieutenant comes in and places a pict recording device between the two of you. “Trooper Adel, Trooper Tedrick, nod if you can hear me and understand me.”

They nod.

Lieutenant: “I am required by orders to make initial contact with you after this major incident. You are in an infirmary, in flat top hill. “

Lieutenant: “Trooper Adel, are you aware that you have been wounded while in the line of duty?”

Adel: Yes, sir.

Lieutenant: “Trooper Tedrick, are you aware that you have been wounded while in the line of duty?”

Tedrick: Yes, sir.

Lieutenant: “I, uh, have a doctor here that can explain the medical situation.”

The doctor steps forward, reaching for a report attach to the foot of the hero's beds. "I'm doctor cannon, & the good news is- you’re both now in stable condition. Adel, you have suffered from third degree burns covering 50% of your body.”

Doctor: “However, some of your injury burned deeper than a full thickness of the skin, as your squad was incapable of immediately extricating you from the flames. Both of your natural eyes became detached and destroyed while in the fire, and you sustained extensive lung damage.“

Doctor: “The adeptus Mechanicus has since replaced these vital organs with cybernetics.”

Doctor: “Physically and cosmetically debilitating scars are the most common aftereffects of extensive burns, we have provided initial skin grafts, however you will continue to need new skin grafts for years to come to achieve articulation and acceptable cosmetic results.”

Doctor: “Realistically, the results are almost never as good as the patient’s pre-injury condition.”

Doctor: “You should avoid exposing the scars to sunlight. And Because full-thickness burns can destroy sweat glands, sebaceous glands, and hair follicles, it may be necessary to apply lanolin and other emollient creams and lotions to the scarred skin in order to prevent drying and cracking and to reduce itching.”

Doctor: “Do you have any questions for me concerning your medical health?”

Adel: No.

Doctor: “Tedrick, your most notable injuries include several severe lacerations across your abdomen.

Doctor: “Portions of your small & large intestines have been replaced with transplants. We are currently in the process of transitioning you back to an oral diet.”

Doctor: “You have also been provided a cybernetic eye to replace the eye you’ve lost.”

Doctor: “Your other injuries suffered during the torture are comparatively minor- you did suffer a concussion, you do have numerous lacerations around your left eye.”

Doctor: “now… the MRI results show you have some strained tendons in your arms and ankles and you have no broken bones. But you have some deep bruising in your left thigh and some torn ligaments in your left wrist.”

Doctor: “Do you have any questions for me concerning your medical health?”

Tedrick: No

The doctor steps out of the room & the Lieutenant comes forward again.

Lieutenant: “I’m required to inform you that the operation resulted in loss of life. Current information state that of the 10 members of your squad, we’ve lost 3. All remaining members sustained injuries and were treated and released with a clean bill of health.”

both: Who died?

Lieutenant: “Three troopers, Lane Teclim… Jesse, and Klemm. Any questions? Well I’m off, Good luck.”

Adel: this regiment will see the death of us all.

******************************

Demetria's after action report

As per orders, I am to offer a debriefing on the situation that had occurred. Something of a last stand, a do or die fight. I could just write the details of the fight, but I will instead start this report shortly before the mission had been undertaken, to ensure that all parties have a clear view of what had been done and why. The best place to start would be just before my demotion, at the…’mixer,’ I think it was called, with the Lo Rifles.

I start here, because this is the beginning of the chain that led us to see things through in the manner we did. That night, I was performing one of my last acts as Sergeant of the squad, though I did not know it at the time. A representative of the Munitorium spoke with me as requested that I look over the paperwork for the squad to make sure that we had been marked for the proper gear. Everything seemed fine, though I did put in a request that the gear we are assigned for missions is appropriate. Beyond that, there is not much to mention, and if you wish to know more, I respectfully request that you put in the paperwork with the Munitorium for a more detailed report on the interaction.

**************************
Briefing

Your Lieutenant begins his presentation with a brief prayer to the god-emperor and berates any stragglers who arrive late.

“Let us pray.” He starts, and motioning to Preacher Ermy.

Ermy:

“The Emperor is our guiding light, a beacon of hope for humanity in a galaxy of darkness.”

“As we serve him, he is our greatest servant”

“As we pray to him, His thoughts are only for us.”

“And in the dark when the shadows threaten, the emperor is with us, in spirit and in fact.”

Raising his head, the Lieutenant gazes around the room at every squad. “I’ve got bad news, and I’ve got good news.” He Pauses. “Good news is this isn’t a briefing concerning our next mission..” He again, Pauses. “Bad news is this brief concerns our relationship with the Lo Rifles.” You hear grunts of surprise around you.

“Command has found it too inconvenient to simply purge two regiments who cannot work together long enough to do the Emperor’s own work. So they have assigned us the job of fixing our own malfunction.”

“We’re passing out a flyer that describes our effort to allow our two regiments to become brothers in arms. Tonight we take the first step towards that goal with a Gambling night, you heard right gents.. Gambling with the Lo Rifles.”

“Our assignment is to report here tonight and spend some morale time with the lo rifles. Nomads, this will be a plum assignment, We are not expected to do much more than be civil. Don’t dissapoint me. Any questions?”

The Lieutenant stands searching for any last questions for what seems a minute too long. Satisfied, he grunts “Dismissed” before walking in the direction towards the officer’s quarters. Your platoon stands up and files out of the auditorium in an orderly fashion.

********************

Things were rather uneventful after that, up until the mixer. Those of us that were to attend had been ordered to be polite and avoid causing any issues. At first, there was only three of the squad that I recall having been present. Adel Teclim, the medic of the squad, Alek Tedric, the Storm Trooper that was assigned to us, and me. Our interaction with the Lo Rifles started somewhat…amicably, in the fact that we managed to choose an activity, some card game just to note what it was, though things quickly soured.

Adel’s sharp eyes noticed the fact that one of the Lo Rifles was attempting to play dishonorably by ‘stacking the deck’ as I was later told. He was called out on his actions, and he attempted to play it off. The game started off decently, with a bit of conversation and some comparing of our standard kits. Through the hand, the Lo Rifles had repeatedly made snide comments about our squad and our abilities, and we only managed a single hand before other problems came up. Once more, Adel noticed that something was off, and managed to pick out the fact that the Lo Rifles had mixed in at least one card from another deck to get the winning hand. They were called on it, and they insulted us once again before they accused us of cheating. I simply pointed out that we weren’t, nor did we have any reason to. In response, one of the Lo Rifles Threw himself over the table.

[section Excerpt from Trooper Serratt’s After-Action Report: “During that mixer that command threw together with.. those Lo Rifles.. I was given a small unit to recon the rail tunnels under Flattop; consisting of myself, two other Nomads and our unit’s Commissar Natalia. Still not sure why they sent the Commissar down in the tunnels with us. During our initial sweep of the northwest tunnels, we came across natives huddling inside a maintenance station, afraid we were Dominate soldiers. I let them know that we kicked their sorry asses out, and the Emperor was in charge now. They were relieved and we escorted them back to Flattop on our sweep back. On the southwest approach, something rather disturbing happened. We were assaulted by massive local predatory reptile that seemed to be controlled by the Kethaslu via vine connected to the animated corpse. A tube charge was enough to seal the breach and still the reanimated xeno. Medical Investigation teams were notified per Commander Directive A122b. Later I learned the priest we saved from the Dominate was attacked by an Infiltrator servant of the Kethaslu as well. Might I humbly suggest that day and night napalm strikes deep in these jungles might alleviate these troubles we’ve been having lately with the local flora.]

A stun grenade was thrown to try to end the situation without bloodshed on the Storm Trooper’s part, though it did not have the intended effect, as it only disabled a single Lo Rifle. Adel was forced to act in self-defense with a shot that, while I’m sure was painful and may still be something that the Lo Rifle is recovering from, was non-lethal. It was at this point that I noticed Remi joining in, attempting to jump on and tackle one of the Lo Rifles to keep him contained I think. Not the best choice, but still a noble attempt to prevent further bloodshed I suppose. I, on the other hand, simply used my Talon, a type of knife from our home world, to disable one of the Lo-Rifles with a deep cut to the leg, and missed a second swing against another one of the Lo Rifles. I cannot remember the exact action that dealt with the final Lo Rifle before an Officer made his presence known. I was ordered to go to his office, and Adel was ordered to patch up the Lo Rifles.

I will not offer up the details on that particular exchange, as once again, I am certain that the details are unnecessary. If it is deemed otherwise, I am certain that the Officer in question can and will provide a log for that particular event. With my demotion formally on paper, we were assigned a new Sergeant, and introductions were made before we were sent off.

In the field, our orders were to find a Severan Dominate training facility. We initially landed in a native camp, and after a short exchange, were offered the chance to duel our way out. I was chosen to step in the ceremonial ring with the natives. In the end I lost, as their ceremonial weapons were poisoned and I had declined the use of one. The Commissar stepped in and managed to put an end to the whole thing rather quickly, granting us leave of the village.

From there, we had a rather uneventful time scouting the surrounding area. We ran across a single patrol or two of the vine minions, but nothing spectacular. In our reconnaissance, we discovered a damaged communications tower, an old rail depot, and a bunker. None of the buildings had anything particularly useful in them, and aside from the bunker were uninhabited. The bunker took some time to get inside of, and once we did, we found nothing but the shredded remains of some Dominate soldiers. We opted to use the fortification as a place to rest for the night, and climbed on top of it. During the course of the night, a larger vine minion came out…specifically, the kind that looks like a giant bundle of roots with a mouth. We dealt with it without notable incident or injury, and moved on from the bunker to find the training facility.

**Radio Log**

Demetria: “Showstop Main, Showstop main, This is Showstop Actual, Radio check, Over.”

(a few seconds pass)

Demetria: “Showstop Main, Showstop main, This is Showstop Actual, Over.”

Operations: “Roger Actual, This is main, we have you Lema-Charlie”

Demetria: “Roger Main, all boots one “klick” east of suspected training camp, I pass- “T-Bird”, Any traffic for my station at this time?”

Operations: “Actual, Imagery picked up an increase in traffic throughout the enemy lines, known to be… enemy QRF. Intel has also picked up an increase of enemy distress radio calls. There is still no support assets for your location, how copy?”

Demetria: “Roger Main, Out.”

[section Excerpt from Sergeant Malhony After-Action Report: I stepped forward with a sigh and motioned for everyone to get closer. “Gather around boys and girls.” I broke off a nearby stick and began to draw into the ground. “I was hoping the circumstances wouldn’t come to this. This information is on a need to know basis and now… you all may need to know.” An odd shape of the continent your squads is currently standing on begins to become visible in the dirt. “A long time ago, this jungle was nothing but rocks and minerals. The imperium’s mining efforts on this world were interrupted when what the Ordos Xenos is calling a “Kethaslu” landed on planet and terraformed it into a large jungle.” I began to “X” out the imperium factories. “Information about the genocide of the imperiums miners on this would didn’t make its way through the warp storms until it was too late.”

“Ordos Xenos hoped there was only one Kethaslu on this planet, however this new information eludes to an existence of a “Mate”

I stood up “now back to the mission on hand, let’s get this camp destroyed and back home. Any questions?” ]

At this point, we could see that the outside of the facility was completely covered with vines, and the Sergeant ordered the squad to stop. “Demetria, raise operations on that horn.” he said pointing at the vox unit on Kal’s back.

**Radio Log**
Demetria: “Showstop Main, Showstop Main, This is Showstop Actual, Over.”

Operations: “Roger Actual, This is main, pass your identification”

Demetria: “Roger Main, I pass- “T-Bird.”

Operations: “Actual, Be advised, we are currently under attack. You are to fall back to primary evacuation at flat top hill, secondary evac site will be located 3 miles southeast of flat top hill, how copy?”

Demetria: “Roger Main, Good copy, Out.”


The sergeant rather quickly ordered a retreat, without so much as considering checking the inside of the building to see if it had just been some form of camouflage, though Serratt, our resident demolitions…’expert’ said that there could be something inside that could be of use. The Sergeant ordered him to head in alone, and without back up. Instead of allowing one of squad to go in alone, I started to walk after Serratt, leading to a problem in and of itself. The Sergeant started to shout after me on it, and when I made my intent known that I refused to allow Serratt to go in on his own, the Sergeant started to attempt to order me to retreat once again, prompting to Commissar to begin citing articles from the Primer. In response, I pointed out the Sergeant’s dereliction of duty, the fact that he was ignoring orders from higher up on his mission for no reason other than cowardice, as there was no external evidence, other than a coating of vines, if anything had happened. This lead to an exchange between myself and the Sergeant, culminating in the Sergeant’s apparent willingness to assault me…something that the Commissar put an end to rather quickly. It was at this time that Serratt returned with a vehicle, and we made our way to Flat Top Hill once again.

Once there, our squad only had a short while to make ready with the defenses, while the Sergeant opted to go inside the base. Ermy, a priest that recently joined with our squad, noticed some survivors, or at least we thought that they were. It was hard to tell, and given the way that the vine creatures worked, I was hesitant to attempt to offer them sanctuary, though in the end there was a compromise. And by ‘compromise,’ I mean ‘held at the business end of a flamer until we were sure that they were human.’ Amongst the group was a member of the Dominate, or rather, former member as he declared himself. It was at that point that I opted to walk with the survivors, and took the chance to speak with the Dominate soldier. I took the opportunity to question him about the location of the major Dominate bases in the area (information that I have yet to submit due to my current condition in the med-bay, and the sensitive nature), which he happily parted with in exchange for protection.

I would have questioned him further, but it was at this point that the vine minions started their attack. I was unable to make it back to the squad in time to join the fight, though they managed to hold their own. At some point, the Sergeant had made his way out once again. Once our extraction had arrived, we opted to place the survivors in the vehicle. While they were being loaded on, I took some time to speak with the pilot to see about getting some form of air assets to attempt to offer some cover if we were to stay at the primary extraction zone and wait for the next available one. Once I was informed that the possibility of air support was…well, impossible, I attempted to recommend moving to the secondary extraction to the Sergeant, as attempting to hold in this particular area would most likely end poorly, given lack of manpower and how many angles of attack we were open to, but he refused to move. Until a flying vine minion came in and crushed the extraction vehicle against the landing pad.

I would like to take this opportunity to present a question to whoever is reading this report. Have you ever been caught in an explosion? Not the kind you get from a grenade, of course, I mean a full blown vehicle explosion. It is not particularly pleasant, and it leads to quite a bit of shrapnel getting flung your way.

Luckily, depending on how you wish to view it, I was the only one that was still close enough to be affected by the blast. Both my shield and armor managed to absorb and deflect most of the shrapnel that flew about, though I still ended up with quite a bit embedded in me. Adel saw to getting most of it out, and patching me up. After the display by the vine minion, the Sergeant thought it appropriate to move toward the secondary extraction point, so we all gathered in the vehicle once again. The way there was punctuated by an ambush, though it consisted mostly of the standard humanoid vine creatures, there was one of the larger ones, similar to what we encountered at the barracks. They were dealt with in a swift manner, and there was very little injury done to our squad, other than my getting assaulted while I covered the squad’s return to the vehicle. Nothing of note happened during the rest of the trip toward the secondary extraction. Once we were picked up and started to extract, we were informed of the impending exterminatus to deal with the vine creatures and their master.

From our vantage point during extraction, we managed to spot the master of the vine creatures. Instead of completing our extraction, we contacted command as our course was shifted, making our way closer. While we knew the master’s location, we could not convince command to shift from an exterminatus to a focused assault on the location. We were successful in being granted a chance to take down the creature ourselves and spare the planet its grim fate.

This is the part that everyone is the most curious about, I take it? To know just how a group that many refer to as primitive savages and barbarians did with one squad that which took the power of the atom to accomplish? The answer boils down to one simple word, and one reason. Courage, and the fact that those of us from Avitohol refused to see the planet lost for a reason not entirely unlike how ours had been. However, I doubt that anyone is interested in the why, only the how.

We landed near the outskirts of the location that we saw the master residing in, a native village surrounded by what would best be described as an overgrown killing field. We attempted to operate with stealth on the way in, though it was not working in our favor. Where some of us were able to watch our step, others were not. I make no attempt to appear as if I was perfect in this regard, as everyone present had some issues on the way in, it merely varied with who was unable to. This lead to our quiet approach becoming an all-out assault, charging our way through all that were presented before us. There were no injuries for our squad on the approach, though there were some close calls.

Once we reached the edge of the town, we were contacted by what I can only assume was Inquisitor Haries as I have no proof of who made the call. All I know is that while the Sergeant once again refused to answer the Vox on his own, once it was handed over, he ended up dragging Kal off so that he could hold his conversation in private. Once he had returned, we were ordered to wait before commencing our final push toward the target location. It didn’t take long before a VTOL touched down, and out stepped Inquisitor Haries and his retinue. We were given some better equipment on loan for the mission before we started in. The extra items were as follows:

Ermy: 1 Heavy Flamer, 1 Refractor Field, 1 Inquisitorial Acolyte for support

Serrat: 1 Melta Bomb, 1 Refractor Field, 1 Inquisitorial Acolyte for support

Adel: 1 Sniper Rifle, 1 Refractor Field, 1 Inquisitorial Acolyte for support

Natalia: 1 Refractor Field

Myself: 1 Eviscerator, 1 Refractor Field, 1 Inquisitorial Acolyte for support

Once we were equipped, we made our way in. The initial push made it seem as if we had a very real probability of being overrun, but with the possibility of stealth off the table, we bared our teeth and set to work. Our squad fought with a ferocity that would rival that of a wounded predator that had been backed into a corner, and we smashed through the lines before the master had a chance to order its minions to form a counter attack.

At this point, we were face to face with the master of the vine minions, and we set to work as quickly as we could. Ermy instantly readied his heavy flamer and unleashed a torrent of fire at the creature while the rest of us attempted to find a good position to assault from. I personally chose to take cover next to a building and waited for the creature as it approached Ermy. Aside from mentioning that Brother Ermy repeatedly fired off his heavy flamer, I cannot speak too much for what the others were doing during this time, as the fight was…taxing, to put it gently. I do know that when the creature advanced enough, Serratt attempted to get in close to it, by taking a path across some rooftops, I think it was. That approach had been unsuccessful, and lead to the building that he was running across being taken out from under him. I should note that the Sergeant was still with us for this, and he attempted to charge in himself, though fear seemed to take over at the last moment, and he ran away. At this point, I ended up charging in. To restate, in case it is thought that the previous statement was incorrectly recorded, I took the loaned Eviscerator in both hands, and charged at the creature. I don’t think it expected to be assaulted in close quarters, as there wasn’t much of an attempt to prevent my attack from hitting, though the blade of the Eviscerator dug deep .

[section Excerpt from Trooper Serratt’s After-Action Report: “Yeah, next thing I know the whole **** warehouse I was running across collapsed when that big bastard dropped a particularly large tendril on it. I come to and pick myself up out of the wreck and checked the (Melta) charge, still good. I’m getting ready for a second attempt to get this close to the xeno when I hear Romeo’s voice in my head. He told me to leave it and run, he would take care of the rest. I didn’t hesitate to prime the charge and high-tailed it out of there. The **** charge began floating up towards the towering xeno and detonated on its north side. **** near blew a quarter of the thing off, it was beautiful. Hey, what do I gotta do to get a few of those as standard kit?”]


If you were not aware, fighting such a large creature in close combat is not the smartest thing to do, but I needed to ensure that enough time was bought, either for someone to check to see if Serratt was still alive, or for him to make some sort of miraculous recovery and use the melta charge he had been given. Given the strength of the attack, the creature seemed to consider me to be a bit more of a threat, and decided to focus some effort on dealing with me. I can proudly state that through a combination of my own skill and the equipment that had been loaned to me, I was able to continue to engage the creature in close combat, though it seemed to have its attention split between myself and another target. While I continued to assault it, my senses were suddenly greeted with a large explosion that melted away much of the creature’s body.

Again, the creature attempted to take a few more swings at me, though it seemed that having its attention split was affecting accuracy. I cannot confirm what who else it was attacking at this point, as most of my view was blocked by the hulking creature and the building I was fighting it next to. I did, however, decided to return the favor of swinging at it more than once in return. It did manage to keep me from making purchase with my blade a few times, though parrying the Eviscerator did cost it the use of a few tendrils every time it tried to parry the blade.

Given my status in the medical bay, I cannot claim that I continued to engage the creature in combat until it was defeated. In fact, I cannot claim to know how it was defeated at all, though I did attempt to keep myself as the focus of its ire for as long as possible. It could have potentially lasted longer, though in attempting to dodge through the mass of its tendrils, I ended up running in to the Inquisitorial acolyte that had been assigned to me, giving it enough time to strike at the both of us. The acolyte took the brunt of a blow that sent both of us tumbling away, and I’m rather certain that he had been killed instantly by it, though there was no time to mourn his sacrifice.

Instead, I charged back in to continue fighting the creature. I was able to take a few more of the tendrils from it, and lash out at it with my own attacks a few more times, though in the end it proved to be far ahead of my skill, and struck me once again, with more force that I can ever hope to accurately describe, though the pain, the pain I can give some idea on by posing a simple question. Have you ever been lit on fire? If you have not, speak with Adel, though be careful with how you ask him about it, and he may be able to tell you. Personally, I can only think that the pain that shot through my chest was on par with it, although it was only momentary before I lost consciousness.

[interview with Storm trooper Alekander Tedric:

Concealed Interviewer: So Operative Tedric, you were the one that killed the female plant xeno?

Tedric: Yes.

CI: How did you do it?

Tedric: I shot a promethium fuel tank and it caught the xeno in the explosion.

CI: How did you know there was a fuel tank in the area?

Tedric: It was one of my comrades.

CI: So you killed one of your comrades to kill the xeno?

Tedric: My comrade had already fallen to the xeno along with a few others.

CI: So you were the last one standing?

Tedric: No, there was a few more.

CI: Did any retreat or fall back from the fight?.

Tedric: Not that I recall in the heat of the moment sir.

CI: So you had no other options to kill the xeno?

Tedric: No.

CI: That's all the questions I have, do you wish add anything?

Tedric: No sir.]

For the fight, that is all I can share, as the next time I started to regain momentary consciousness at the site, I was being pulled toward a waiting VTOL by Kal. After that, the next time I awoke, I was in the bed that I currently write this report from. If you wish for further details on the fight, please request a report from another member of the squad.

- Acting Corporal Demetria

Edited May 12, 2014 by William232