OOC:

A-8 - Mobile Weaponry

The normal Stormtrooper loadout is usually sufficient to deal with most threats a squad would face, but occassionally, there’s situations where the standard rifles will not be enough. This is where mobile weaponry comes into play. With the simple addition of a few attachments to a rifle, a soldier can become far, far more dangerous.

A single 1200 word story describing the trooper using both of these weapons in a simulated combat environment.

Heliwer felt his shoulder jolt as he slammed himself up against the wall into cover, wincing in pain. Orange low powered training bolts shot past him and slapped another trainee in the helmet, sending them to the ground groaning in pain. A buzzing suddenly came over the helmets.

“Trooper Jastor, eliminated.”

Another burst of blaster fire, and another name was read off.

“Private Tuk, eliminated.”

A couple more names were declared as casualties, as those not quick enough or sharp enough were weeded out by the turret up ahead of the squad of stormtroopers.

Senior Sergeant Heliwer Garrarth had only recently returned to the Vast Empire active duty roster and had thrown himself into getting back up to speed to be able to be effective on the front lines again. This meant tossing himself back into training, and in particular obtaining specialities was high on that list. They symbolized a challenge for the old trooper and he wanted to push himself especially in front of some of the younger recruits. As such, he dived head first into the Mobile Weaponry course. Currently run by Sergeant Major Vaunt, it focused less on theory and more on practical use. Vaunt touched on the basics, how grenade launcher and shotgun attachments to rifles gave you flexibility in exchange for weight and altering the handling of the blaster, when to switch to what weapon, but it was seen as more of a formality. The real meat of the training was the simulated combat field that Heliwer and his classmates had to navigate through.

“How many didn’t get pasted by that gun?” He called out over the radio.

“I’m here,” The trooper next to him, Yune, answered. “I think Loran and Beltro made it too.”

“Only just!” Trooper Beltro swore and fired blindly over his barricade, only to get a burst of blaster fire in return. “Loran and I are pinned down here by that thing!”

Heliwer sighed. The simulation had him leading a 6-man squad assaulting a garrison headquarters in order to retrieve important information, with two armed with underslung rifle grenade launchers and two with underslung shotguns. The building itself was 2-storied with a basic wall and gate surrounding it, and supposedly lightly guarded from the pre-mission intel. Of course nothing ever was one-to-one with intel, something he knew from experience. After approaching the garrison carefully, they had quickly engaged the training droids manning the walls and blasted open the gate with grenades when a sentry turret deployed and started opening fire right through the opening, sending the squad into disarray and into the current situation.

“Keep their attention Beltro, I’ll take the turret!” Heliwer readied his E-11, thankful that he was one of the ones to have the grenade launcher modification on his blaster. “Yune, when I knock that turret out you grab Beltro and Loran and follow behind me!”

“Yes sir!” Yune stacked up behind the much larger trooper.

“You nuts? Those may be training rounds but those’re doing a number on my cover! I ain’t moving my ass-”

“Tuk had the other grenade launcher,” Heliwer interrupted the other trooper. “And unless you feel like making another stupid decision today by trying to jump into the line of fire to grab it, I’ve got the only thing that can deal with that turret. Now are you gonna sulk like a baby or are you gonna do as I’ve ordered.”

An unintelligible grumble came from Beltro’s direction, no doubt another complaint.

“Fine, fine!” Belto relented. “Just deal with it before me and Loran are next!”

“Yes, Senior Sergeant!” Loran spoke up in agreement, just barely able to be spotted behind Beltro and the barricade. With the last bit of confirmation, Heliwer loaded his grenade launcher attachment and inched near the corner of the wall.

“Ready… three… two… one…”

On cue, Beltro blind-fired his blaster over the top of the barricade again, once again drawing the interest of the turret as it fired at him. At that moment, Heliwer exhaled and swung out from behind the wall. He had precious few seconds to judge the arc of the grenade just right enough or get eliminated himself as the turret identified the new target. Gut instinct kicked in and at the last moment shifted the arc of fire just slightly higher before unleashing the grenade. He had no time to watch to see if it landed right as he dipped back into cover just barely dodging the turret swinging towards him and chipping out a loose piece of the wall’s corner. A fraction of a second later everyone heard the explosion and sound of destroyed machinery whirring down. Taking a sigh of relief, Heliwer once again poked his head out from behind cover and smiled.

“Turret down. Squad, move out on me.” He waved the troopers on to follow, taking point while the other three troopers followed close behind. All four had their heads on a swivel as they entered the compound, noting knocked out training droids from the earlier assault and the turret that had been thoroughly destroyed. With the small courtyard cleared, the squad now stacked up on the front door. He gestured to Loran, who with Beltro had the underslung shotgun on his E-11, to deal with the door ahead of them. Nodding, Loran racked a slug and fired into the lock, blowing it out. He then cut back into cover as Heliwer kicked the door open and leveled his rifle.

Inside a pair of training droids turned towards them and started to take aim just as the Senior Sergeant opened up and blasted both. He quickly checked his corners and led the remains of the squad into the building, swiftly clearing the ground floor rooms before heading up to the second floor by the stairs. Here on the second floor, Beltro and Loran both took point to check on the two rooms ahead.

“Well?” Heliwer whispered.

“This one’s the main room where the intel should be.” Loran gestured to his door. Beltro gave his a cursory glance and walked over to where Loran was.

“Alright, let’s go do this then.” Beltro cracked his neck and positioned himself at the door. “Then I can peel out of this armor and into the shower.”

“Hold on,” Heliwer held his hand up. “I need one of you on that other door. Double breach with me and Yune at the same time, clear the smaller room as we work on the larger room, come in through the other side and flank them.”

“Hey, I’ve almost been blasted by you once before.” Beltro snorted. “I got it this time.”

Before the Senior Sergeant could argue, Beltro stood right in front of the door to the main room and shot at the lock. Unlike Loran, he hadn’t fully destroyed the lock, which meant when he went to kick the door open it stayed shut. Also unlike Loran he wasn’t in cover, meaning that when a blaster bolt came through the hole he made, it hit him right in the gut and sent him toppling over.

“Trooper Beltro, eliminated.” Sergeant Major Vaune’s voice crackled over the radio. Now they were down to half the number of troopers, and Beltro’s blaster was now up for grabs. Without wasting any more time, Heliwer looked at Loran and Yune.

“Other side, breach and clear it now!”

The two didn’t wait for more confirmation and simply nodded in response. Loran set up correctly so he was behind cover and cleanly blasted the lock off with his shotgun attachment. Yune, the only one of the three that just had a basic E-11, flipped around the corner and with Loran lit up the smaller room and started to move inside. The noise hopefully distracted the droids inside the main room enough for Heliwer to make a grab for Beltro’s blaster, or at least he hoped so. Hope would have to do, as he couldn’t afford to wait much longer.

“Clear!” Loran radioed. “Preparing to breach into the other room now!”

Heliwer carefully set his rifle on the ground next to him and breathed out slowly. He’d need to get this right, or else he’d be eliminated, or worse the whole squad. He waited until he heard the sound of Loran and Yune breaching before he dived for Beltro’s blaster. A few shots came at him through the hole in his door before it turned towards the other team breaching. He didn’t waste any more time, racking a new slug in the blaster and destroying the lock with a second blast. Without a second thought, he tossed the blaster to one side and rushed to grab his blaster and load a new grenade in.

“Grenade on the way! Stay clear!”

“Affirm!”

“Understood!”

The door slammed open by virtue of his shoulder, still aching from being rocked into the wall earlier and now firmly in pain, but pain could wait until after. For now, there was a group of training droids that had tipped over desks to form a makeshift defensive position. Unfortunately for them, it could not protect them from a well aimed grenade.

“On way!” Heliwer yelled as he fired, sending the grenade into the midst of the training droids. The explosion sent them tumbling into the walls and over the tables, and shocked the other droids towards the new threat. At the same time, Yune and Loran rushed in and fired with their blasters, finally clearing the last room. With the last of the droids collapsing to the ground, Heliwer took one more look around the room and sighed heavily.

“Good job, squad.” He smiled under his helmet. “Now let's find that info.”

It didn’t take them long to find it, a holopad securely locked in a drawer that was promptly unlocked by Loran’s shotgun attachment. It was decided that Yune would hold on to it for safe keeping as Heliwer also picked up Beltro’s shotgun equipped blaster and walked out with it and the two remaining members of the squad. Sergeant Major Vaune was waiting for them just outside the destroyed gate with the eliminated members of the squad.

“Well done, Senior Sergeant.” Vaune clapped his hands and took the holopad from Yune. “You three did well for yourselves on the course. I’ll have your final evaluations ready soon, but I believe that will be a pass for all of you.”

“Wait wait wait,” Beltro piped up, very annoyed. “Yune didn’t even use one of the modified guns!”

“No, but she saw how they are properly supposed to be done.” Vaune gestured to Heliwer. “She even had someone properly use both in the same exercise. She’ll still have to go through the exercise using whichever one she wants to use of course, but unless she completely screws the nerf and doesn’t follow directions from her squad leader like you, then she’ll be fine.”

Handing Beltro’s blaster back to him, Heliwer set his own blaster to safe and handed it off to Vaune. “Well, if you don’t mind, I think I’ll get a drink.”

“Sure you don’t want to watch these three redo the course? I have a feeling you’d get a kick out of seeing them get pasted from a more comfortable seat.”

Heliwer chuckled and shook his head. “More comfortable is at the bar. Besides, as much fun as it would be, I got work to do. No rest for the wicked.”

The two sergeants exchanged a salute and Heliwer headed away from the course, the barking of Sergeant Major Vaune slowly drifting out of earshot. There was a drink with his name on it, and had little time to relax before his next venture.

OOC:

1951 WC according to Google Docs.

First time writing in a long time, decided to warm up with a bit of training. Was advised by Slasher to go ahead and just post in Neutral Story net, been probably over a decade since I last did anything with VE so trying to get back int othe swing of things.