"I'm sorry."
Words were all she could do for the monk now, but what was happening round her didn't allow time for even many of them.
Allowing Stan to roll back, she stood and drew the pistol she'd being carrying almost since she'd been injured days before. A few steps later and the twin shapes of Milk and Hicks came into veiw, rolling about on the deck.
Stunned at the realisation that it wasn't a betrayal by the ORMO but from within, she hesitated, holding the sights firmly in position on Hick's bloodied face.
How could the American they'd taken in turn on them? In hindsight the signs had been there, his story seemed too much like an old movie to be truthful, but they'd all simply given him the benefit of the doubt.

Anneka
Aiming HP-35 at Hicks
Firing the moment she has a clear shot
HP-35 + 3 mags

Stunned, Jason stumbles across the deck. He drags his weapon behind him. "Stanislaw" he mutters as he heads to the fallen Pole. "First Bear now Stan."

He drops to his knees beside the dead man. "I'm sorry. If only I was faster."

Grabbing his shelter tarp, he wraps te fallen warrior in the shroud.

Jason Kasparov
in shock
(ooc comp issues, sorry)

Satisfied at the angle for the range, Dawid said, "firing!" and pulled the firing handle, correcting and firing again as needed.

82mm Vasilek (4/5 HE, 5 HE + 5 HEDP)
Firing 1 round, then self-spotting to correct.
This message was last edited by the player at 15:15, Tue 20 May 2008.

Griet saw Dawid begin to fire the mortar at the AGS position but kept firing regardless. She intended to try to keep the enemies' heads down until death rained in on them. She adjusted her aim slightly and continued to fire at the AGS position on full automatic.

Griet
PKMG 170/200
Full Auto

Mariusz yelled to Bayer over the heavy incoming fire, "Do you want me to go in and man the turret? I can put down suppresive fire better than I can snipe."

After getting Stoner from his medical duties, Tucker and him duck, dodge, & weave through the gunfire to finally make it up to Konrad and Mariusz at the damaged BTR.  Sliding in next to or near those two, Tucker finds himself what cover he can and looks around to see that they are within the ranks of the militiamen they came in with.  Turning to Konrad and saying, "You gotta be shittin' me!  Where the fuck is their C/O?  So much for being observers huh?"

Tucker
M-16A2 [27/30]/M-203 [HE]
Taking cover behind damaged BTR

Bayer, squatting with his back against the BTR hull, nods and yells a reply to Mariusz, "Ja! Go!" Tucker's words swirl through his mind. The last thing he wanted was for the team to get more involved in this war than was necessary. They were only in it to gain gear and make "friends".

Clicking his radio he calls up Anneka, "Starlight, Sunray. Attack has stalled. Send sitrep. Over." Then leaning over to Stoner and Tucker, he says quickly, "Keep low, but if you have a shot take it."

OOC - GM, could you give a brief description of the friendly militia near the BTR? Numbers, actions, and such?
This message was last edited by the player at 02:13, Wed 21 May 2008.

Tucker looks at Bayer and answers him, "OK boss!  What's the deal with this hunk a shit we're usin' as cover?  Any chance of gettin' her goin' again?"

Bayer glanced down at the wheels. Some wheeled APCs could run no problem on deflated tires, but he guessed this one must have took enough damage to warrant its abandonment. "Doubt it. You know how to try? If so, go ahead."

Mariusz nodded to Bayer in acknowledgement of his agreement and crawled in through the open rear door of the APC. He slitted his eyes against the smoke and coughed at the fumes but moved on in to assess if the turret and machinegun were viable as weapons. He decided that if they were, he'd get into the gunner's seat and look for targets.

Mariusz
G3 20/20
Inside the BTR
Inspecting the turret and getting into the gunner's seat if appropriate.

Dave watches Mariuz crawl into the trashed APC. He shakes his head and asks Tucker " We really want him in there? It's a big target, and it's been hit once."

Stoner
AK-74, 6 magazines
BG-15, 6 HE rounds, 1 Illum
Aid bag

The teenaged Mariusz, lacking the developmental cognitive maturity that enables most adults to envision the possible negative consequences of certain actions, makes a mad dash for the open side hatch of the disabled BTR. Miraculously, he makes it unscathed, diving head-first into the metal husk. The interior of the BTR stinks sickeningly of stale body odor, cordite, and hot oil but a quick one-over reveals nothing in the way of significant battle damage. Mariusz, chuffed at his alacrity and good fortune, begins to wiggle his way into the vehicle's HMG turret*.

Konrad, Tucker, and Stoner are relieved to catch a glimpse of the boy disappearing into the BTR. The incoming fire picks up in intensity for a few seconds as the IPAT defenders react to the sight of a target out in the open. About two dozen Sandomierz militia hug the earth, split unevenly on either side of the road (more men occupy the left or inland side). One man lies face up in the drainage ditch to the left, quite obviously dead. The group appears rather disheartened at the moment and only one or two of them even attempt to return fire, and that employing the equally hopeful and wasteful "spray-and-pray" method. The IPAT are in and around a building between road and river between 100 and 200 meters to the southwest.

Back on board the Krolowa, Dawid doesn't have time to spot the fall of his high, arcing shot at the roof of the corner** building. Just a meter or so to Dawid's right, the militiaman loader's head literally explodes and 12.7mm rounds impact all around them both, shredding the starboard sandbags and penetrating through to the steel-plate gunshield blessedly installed just hours before by the recently departed Snowy. David, spattered in a gritty-sticky mix of sand, bits of skull, blood, and brain matter ducks down almost into the open ammo hatch to avoid the incoming fire. Minh too is sprayed with sand and gore and she slides down the sandbagged wall to the deck below the gunwhale. The second militia loader cowers nearby. The far shore bunker has found the range and is hammering all around the Vasilek postion with heavy and accurate fire***.

Above, Griet continues to suppress the suspected enemy AGS position. She just notices the sudden silence of Clarence's port Dushka as the Vasilek barbette below her is steadily chewed apart by HMG rounds.

Several meters aft, Anneka steadies the sights of her Browing 9mm on the slowly moving form of Chopper. With considerable difficulty, he attempts to climb to his knees, but a well placed double-tap puts him down with bullet wounds to his left leg and lower back. Clarence, at the top of the ladder draws his own .45 and points it at the crumpled, bloody figure of the apparently mad Chopper below, lying on his left side, hands scrabbing over his belly.

Jason, shocked by what has just transpired stays with Switek on the bloody quarterdeck. His recent friend and leader dies without a word. True to his character, the fighting monk gave up his life for those of his comrades. Although his status as a Polish partisan leader working for a contestant in the scramble for the rulership of a foreign occupier makes the matter of jurisdiction a tangled mess, if the proper and legitimate authority could rightly be determined, he would certainly deserve its highest medal for bravery.

Actions?

* The BTR doesn't have a rear hatch but I gave Mariusz the benefit of the doubt. He will find the HMG turret operational. There are about 50 rounds of ready ammo for it. The vehicle may be able to run since it is growing increasingly likely that the crew bailed out primarily due to the shock of the blast caused by the IPAT IED.

**I wasn't entirely sure which buidling Dawid was aiming at- the corner building troubling both the BTR and the Krolowa, or the warehouse adjacent and a little futher upstream. Either way, he rolled a hit, although, since otherwise occupied, no one actually saw it.

***Since I forgot about the bunker in my last turn, I made sure Dawid and Minh were unharmed by the enemy HMG volley. I hope this coincides with everyone's idea of fairness.

Also, lest anyone think Milk received the benefit of favortism in the encounter with Chopper, check the die roller. His luck is legit.

Bayer is still squatting with his back to the BTR's hull. Glancing down to either side of him, he can see the damage was mostly taken by the wheels. He then looks at the state of the militia. He remembers his company commander's training... when his former CO drove into him the concept - any action is better than no action. Make a decision. Whether it is good or poor it will always be better than doing nothing.

"Tucker!" Bayer calls over the crack of gunfire. "I want to move this thing forward. I want to squeeze as many militia behind it as possible as moving cover. If we have to, shuttle back and forth. We stay here and people are going to get picked off one by one. We need to get these people moving... attack attack attack. Get close enough to assault the buildings and clear them out."

Making eye contact he asks, "Can you drive for me?"

After Tucker's reply, he calls into his radio again, "Tug, this is Sunray. Assault has bogged down. Send sitrep. I am not reading you. Over!"

Bayer
G36/HK69 (20 rounds/1HE)
Squatting behind BTR
Communicating

"No, not Minh too." As the volleys pound the mortar crew, Jason comes to his senses. Racing to her position, he stops short, as the bullets whiz ahead of him.

"Minh, Dawid, are you ok?" he yells from behind the bulkhead.

Hunkered down behind the sandbagged protection (the RPK-74 left resting on its bipod on the wall), Quyen calls back, "No Jason. No I'm not." Then glacing at her body to inspect if any of the blood is hers or Dawids calls again, "No. I'm scared. I almost died. Its not safe here." Despite he admittance to fear, he voice sounds otherwise, more of a matter-of-fact tone. Relieved that she and Dawid aren't injured she says to him, "This is intense."

Yelling back over her shoulder, "Jason, better not come up here. Its pretty bad. Why aren't the gunners hitting that position? We need help."

Without exposing herself the slightest, she looks upwards and listens. If it seems the volley is done for now against the mortar she prepares to get back up and into the fight.

Quyen
RPK-74 close by
Behind Mortar sandbags
Forced to take cover/getting ready to shoot again
This message was last edited by the player at 15:46, Thu 22 May 2008.

Stoner watches the stalled attacker half hearted return fire and shakes his head in disgust. "Hey", he yells at Konrad & Tucker over the incoming fire. "Wasn't there supposed to be a green beanie leading this clusterfuck? Send a girl scout to do a man's job."

He leans out from behind cover and fires a HE grenade at the IPAT members clustered around the building. Then he rolls back behind the cover and reloads his weapon.

Dave
AK-74, 6 loaded
BG-15, 6 HE, 1 Illum
Firing  HE round

Shaking his head he calls back, "Ja. He may be stuck with another platoon. Or maybe he is dead. We do this... and maybe we can get through this in one piece... and with a higher degree of respect with the Sando commandant."

Dawid lay in the hold on the body of one of the ORMO loaders, cursing his stupidity. The other helped him up.

He knew that that bunker could be waiting to catch them off guard. He'd thought of putting a shell into it just in case, and decided against it. Now he was away from the Vasilek, and didn't even have his Tantal/BG-15.

Standing up he yelled out the hatch, "Jason, I'm fine... but pinned down! Someone use a grenade or rocket on that damned bunker!"

There wasn't much he could do for Minh or anyone down here.

Stechkin (21/21)
[OOC: For the sake of clarity, the ORMO who was in the hold handing up ammo is okay, but the other guy dramatically fell into the hold after being shot.]
[Private to Cap'n Rae: It's all good, for some reason I was thinking the fire came from the warehouse but was wrong. Thanks for knowing what I meant! Hey, we took our eyes off the bunker. Dawid could have blasted it, but didn't, so that's the way it goes.]
This message was last edited by the player at 19:16, Fri 23 May 2008.

Griet began to realise that she was about the only one still firing on the boat. The HMG was chewing up the forward position but if she switched from suppressing the AGS she risked that opening up. She frowned and kept raining lead onto the AGS position, she yelled, "More fire! More fire!"

Griet
PKMG 150/200
Suppressive bursts on the AGS position

Mariusz smiled to himself. A really big gun ready to shoot with. He scanned the enemy positions for a good first target. He looked particularly for machineguns or other support weapons to recieve the first of his largess.

Mariusz
KPV 50/50
Searching for targets

[Private to Cap'n Rae: I'm figuring at least this much delay before Mariusz can start shooting. Let me know what he spots, I'm looking forward to shooting the BFG but I don't want it to be unrealistic after getting away with the rear door gaff, stupid Russians, all APCs have back doors it's common sense, grumble ...]

"Don't move!" Jason yells. Sprinting across the deck he runs for the DUSHKA, ready to fire upon the bunker. Staying low, his helmet strapped tight to his head, he throws himself at the weapon, praying he won't die and save his friends, before he is cut down.

Jason Kasparov
Kevlar armor and helmet
Racing to the Dushka

As Clarence keeps his .45 trained on Chopper from the top of the stairs, he can't fail to notice the sound of the enemy's incoming HMG fire striking just forward. With his own HMG silent, the amount of suppressive fire that the Krolowa is able to produce is cut by nearly a third. The maths are quite clear.

"Major, you got this crazy son-of-a-bitch?"

If Soleblume responds to the affirmative, Clarence will return to the port Dushka and engage the far bunker in an attempt to silence its fire.

Clarence Milk
H&K SOCOM .45 cal pistol, 12/12
Covering the wounded Chopper; ready to return to his battle station

How did she get here, Anneka wondered? Aiming a smoking pistol directly at the head of somebody she'd considered a comrade, if not actual friend, until just a minute or two before. How was it that a medical officer originally from Israel had just shot an American sailor twice while on a tugboat in the middle of Poland?

Had the world gone completely mad?

Why was it that she was now faced with firing several more shots into the wounded man in an effort to prevent further bloodshed? Wasn't she supposed to be trying to say everyones lives? Had her morals and sense of right and wrong truely been twisted so far by the horrors of a world encompassing nuclear war?

It must be so, she thought as the trigger was smoothly squeezed once more.
Considered a reasonably good shot amongst her peers, it was next to impossible to miss Hicks head as he lay badly wounded upon the deck. Anneka felt no remorse as the lead and steel slug tore through skin, muscle and bone to pulverise the brain tissue within .

Hicks had chosen his path, probably long ago. Chances were he'd been working for Tarnobrzeg for a very long time, the Russian patrol boat just a plant to get him aboard. If they hadn't been so focused on the troubles with Corporal Yassie at the time, then they just might have been more cautious with taking him along, but now was not the time for "what ifs".

Wiping a drop of gore from her face where it had splattered, she answered Milks query emotionlessly.
"Yes, Sergeant Major. I've got him."

Anneka
Shooting Hicks
HP-35 (10) + 3 mags
[Private to GM: Assumed Hicks has been abandonned and death is too good for him.  ;)]

Bones lobs a 40mm HE grenade towards the IPAT held building, ducking behind the relative safety of the APC's metal hindquarters before seeing it impact. The satisying CRUMP of its detonation, followed by a brief respite from incoming fire indicates that, at the very least, it has given the enemy defenders pause to think.

From the cramped confines of the BTR's turret, Mariusz peers through the gunner's tiny optic, searching for a target. He spies a persistent muzzle flash- probably an enemy GPMP- and cranks the turret traverse handle to bring the KPV to bear. Taking his time, he centers the weapon's cross-hairs on the flash and pulls the trigger. The target is blotted out by turret gun's huge starburst firing signature but when he releases the trigger, the enemy position is wreathed in smoke and dust and the muzzle flash has ceased.

As the ground team's innitiative seems to be paying dividends, Konrad senses a subtle shift in the mood over their little patch of battlefied. He assesses that this is an auspicious moment to rally the militia and mount an assault.*

Jason, having witnessed up-close the plight of his friends, backtracks, climbing the starboard stairs to the companionway and rushing, hunched over, past Griet, to the port side Dushka**. Milk, looking down the port steps with his back to the gun, swings around nervously and points his pistol at Kasparov. Seeing the aviator swing the Dushka upstream, he relaxes and, after a brief pause, holsters his pistol, relieved that the betrayal did not include others besides Chopper. Grabbing his AK, he slings it and moves forward, behind Kasparov and past Griet, to man the other PKM on the forward companionway.

Anneka keeps her sights on Chopper. He's still curled up in the fetal position; his hands have stopped moving and are both held against his abdomen. Awkwardly, he starts to crane his neck to look up and back but Anneka acts first, sending another 9mm slug into his upper back. He squirms for another couple of seconds and then his limbs go limp. A grenade rolls out from where he'd been clutching it against his belly. Anneka ducks behind the sandbags as it detonates with a bang. When she looks back over the parapet, Chopper is splayed grotesquely out against the port gunwhale, a slick of smeared and splattered blood radiating out from his shredded body. His last trick has been spoiled.

Dawid and Minh continue to shelter in place as the enemy HMG chews away at the Vasilek, tearing up sandbags and punching dents into the gunshield. Errant rounds impact all around, clanging off the hull, ricochetting off of the superstructure; one even hits the upraised barrel of the Vasilek.

Actions?

OOC: *Konrad passed a leadership skill check so at least several of the Sando militia will join in on an attack.

**Jason and Milk will both be able to fire next round.
This message was last edited by the GM at 22:15, Sat 24 May 2008.

Grasping the Dushka's trigger, Jason begins firing at the troublesome bunker, his eyes focused, using all the previous expierence he had developed firing the little darling.

"Minh, stay down! Dawid, you too. I'll clear this bunker." 


Jason Kasparov
Port Dushka
firing at the bunker