War, What is it good for? Absolutely Nothing! (Invasion of The Silken Asteroids) [Crusade + Horde]

[HK-36]

[member="Siobhan Kerrigan"]
"Good work, Sio, I guess I will have to actually pay you something after the battle now."
Yeah, her wages were not something they discussed, anyway, he would look over the opening as their dropships opened fire, filling the hole with barrages of blasters to knock out any opposition that was left.
Vong and Horde troops screamed as they were sucked out into space through the sudden hole in the hull, one Vong hitting the transparisteel cover of their dropship's cockpit, leaving a bit of a splatter as he tumbled off of it.
"Eww!"
The pilot exclaimed as he brought the dropship inside the ship through the hull.

"Put a helmet on, Sio, there will not be too much air in there with a hole that big."
He quipped to her, passing her one of the spare brain-buckets.

Opening a transmission to the dropships , he began to give out orders.
"Seal your suits, be prepared to fight in the void, we are following the rappelling procedures for this, I do not want to lose any of you into the void. Have the magnetic soles of your shoes activated, no gas barrage on this one, it would just suck it all out onto us anyway."
His commands were answered by a chores of affirmation,
"Yessir."

The dropships would turn about, landing on the surface of the ship, broken and void of life, void of resistance as the Horde's troops were sucked out by sudden incursion.
The ramps would open and the troops would step out, their guns and thick armor at the ready, strong metal cabled trailing behind them, keeping them attached to the dropships in case they would fly off for some reason.

The air rushed past them, sucked out into space but they stood fast, strong and tall.

Finally the air would stop and there would be only quiet. Like silence, but not really silence, just that still sort of quiet, like the sound of a page being turned in a book, or a pause in the walk in the woods. Anyway, they quickly moved out the durasteel covers to secure the landing zone, switching their cables to attach themselves to heavy covers instead.

HK made a transmission to the Moross Navy once more, [member="Amorella Mae"], [member="Kassandra Distorith"],
"My flanking team is aboard the ship, we have made a doorway in the hull. We have met no resistance, well we did, but you could probably see them floating by you any chance now. We are heading for the bridge, over."

 

[HK-36]

//I hope you guys don't mind me double-posting, I found it easier in this case to split the post in two//
[member="Siara Vorru"], [member="Vascious Relens"], [member="Crystal"],
Meanwhile in the Flagship's Hangars

Vascious would be disappointed to see that there were no Greycloaks this time around in the boarding party Iron Company sent to help them, HK took all of them with him and an image of them led by the droid cutting their way straight to the bridge with all of the Horde's resistance sucked out into space could come to mind.

However!
The Mandalorian did had the help of heavy assault troops to help him in catching up with the droid, racing towards the bridge of the ship to see who first could take [member="Supreme Overlord Dredge"] in chains.

"Formation!"
One of the mercenary captains called out as they began to shift around, the landing zone secured, they were ready to advance. The Iron Knights, clad in heavy defense powered armor, although no shields, took the point, forming something along the lines of a phalanx with the rest of the Company's troops, who wore normal, lighter version of the powered armor, supporting their charge from behind.

"Forward!"
"Charge!"
"Push the Vong back!"
Orders were called out by the Captains as the mercenaries began to move, the heavy troops acting as sort of mobile cover, their heavy bolters clunking out explosive projectiles that could even shatter crab armor upon impact. Those MK 1 bolters were pretty much an anti-vehicle weapon they decided to use against infantry, each shot spraying a shock wave and rain of shrapnel upon impact.
"Troops, load buckshot!"
Order was called out as the lighter soldiers behind the Knights changed out their ammunition into buckshot, their job was to take care of any troops that would get close enough to their advancing lines that bolters would stop being effective. They had in their hands the MK 2 bolters, better at shorter range and lighter than the previous, devastating version of the weapon.

Vascious could start to hear a familiar tune rise up from the lines of mercenary troops, slugs ricocheting off of their armor here or there, or impacting it with a thud as one of the Knights staggered back but ultimately kept going, their armor still holding, the battle has only begun after all! The energy shields they had built into their armor flashed from time to time, catching the blaster bolts thrown by enemy, diffusing them safely. Either way, the troops started to sing, a song that HK often went into battle, it made them miss the presence of their commander among them bit less,

"Kote!"
One of the Captains began as the chorus of Iron Company voices responded to him,
"Kandosii sa ka'rta, Vode an! Abregada a'den mhi, Vode an."
The song continued, just with the bit "We, the wrath of Coruscant," changed to "We, the wrath of Abregado," because, well most of them spend their time on the planet almost every day, that was where their headquarters were, and they weren't exactly Mandalorians.
Either way, the song would continue in the background through chorus of soldiers as their warcries have been added to it in between.

"For Abregado-Rae!"
One of the troops called out,
"For Fondor-"
"And Eriadu!"
"For Corellia, my home, yee-haw"
"For Sullust, to protect my son!"
They weren't all from just one planet, HK went about the Protectorate territory to recruit new recruits into his little band, as much as he tried to avoid it, they did took casualties in battles, and he needed to replenish those numbers, often in sorrow.
"For my brothers and sisters!"
"To keep my father and our arm safe!"
"For my daughter!"
Their motivations rang out through the hangar mixed with rage of bolters and rotary cannons, their heavy line marched fearless through the cover of gas, supported by the Moross troops, they were all in this together.
And it would show who the soldiers of Iron Company were, people, just normal people who wanted to protect their homes. They knew that Galaxy can be harsh, especially in Outer Rim trapped between Fringe and Horde, the memory of Eriadu being attacked fresh in their minds. They left their families of their own will and went through the training, served so long now, just to keep their families, their homes safe. Many of them have been in service since the Bando Gora Campaign, original threat that has pushed them to take up arms in defense of their loved ones.
"For the Iron Knight!"
Somebody called out, voices echoed,
"For the Baron!"
Moross wasn't the only one with devotion to their leaders here, although they didn't considered him a god, he was their Iron Protector.

 

[Crystal]

Apparently a few of her companions were even more eager than she was. She wasn't about to get trampled in order to go out and kill things. That just made no sense at all. So, she hung back and waited until Aesir Kalee, Siara and the numerous troops had exited via the ramp. While she had a few moments, she secured her mask and ensured that it was functional. Then reached to the small of her back for the lightsaber hilt that rested there.

Walking down the ramp and grinning behind her mask, she ignited her magenta blade with it's snap hiss. Her patience had been well worth it. The Sith Princess had not even christened her blade with the filthy blood of the vong, and already she was drinking in the deaths around her. But she could stand it no more. Crystal jumped off the ramp, aided by the Force propelling her forward and she thrusted her blade into one of many attackers. And thus it began. One became another, and another and another, as she sliced her way toward Aesir Kalee. She licked her lips, practically tasting the blood.

She'd drawn attention to herself though, as blaster fire was heading in her direction. The hum of her lightsaber was all that she could hear as it swiftly deflected the shots back to their shooters. A whirl of hostilities all around her. She loved it. It had been entirely too long since she'd had ANY action. The Sith Master continued forward, raising her left hand as she walked. The Sith Princess seemingly conjured fire and began to encircle the Vong. Yes, gather them like insects. THEN BURN THEM.

 

[Siobhan Kerrigan]

Aboard Horde flagship, moving from the opened up hull
[member="HK-36"]

"I chuck asteroids and crush a bridge tower and only now you think about paying me?" the former Exarch spoke with mock indignation. Siobhan would have already been wearing a helmet, given the fact that she was wearing a full set of beskar'gam. Regardless along with the Iron Company soldiers and HK she rappelled through into the opening she had created in the hull of the command ship, a strong metal cable trailing behind her as they traversed the emptiness of space.

The air was sucked out into space the void, what Horde opposition they might have faced found itself equally inexorably pulled out and was soon left floating aimlessly in space. To be spaced was not a pleasant way to die, but if that would be their fate then Siobhan would feel no pity for them, and so silence descended upon their landing zone. Siobhan did not like silence, but then somehow she was doubtful that this was the prelude to some big Horde ambush. They might have been as brutal as the Bando Gora would have been on Aurum, but this battle had been terribly one-sided. Reavers would make you bleed for every inch of ground you got. On the flip side she had gotten the chance to finally just let loose and unleash her powers so she could not complain too much.

"Seems all the birds have flown out," she quipped to HK as they advanced, the Iron Company soldiers setting up defensive positions to secure the landing zone before they moved on towards the bridge. Her boots touched the floor and she grounded herself in the Force, stabilising herself amidst the onrush of air and bodies that were taking a dive into space. The sounds of battle, grenades being thunked out of bolters, heavy repeaters and rotary cannons fashioning a barrage of laser fire, explosions resonating across the hangar echoed so strongly they could dimly be heard even here. Along with the battle cries of the Iron Company soldiers and their motivational calls. Personally Siobhan found that shouting out like that during a battle just distracted. It was a bit hard to focus on the chaos of battle when you were at the same time joining a chorus. However, she could sense the affection the soldiers felt for their commander.

She doubted that Butcher Kerrigan had been particularly popular or loved by her own troops. Not after Roche, the Harbingers operation, Gehenna. A veteran who had fought on Gehenna had tried to frag her during a Firemane operation on Myrkr after all. But equally she did not care much about what they thought - hard choices had to be made, victory in war required sacrifice, often of others, and she felt no remorse for that. As the old saying went, it was better to be feared than loved if you cannot have both. Of course, that sounded terribly like rationalisations, but then she excelled at that. In her time, she had conquered most of Omega's territory, in the age when it had been one of the superpowers in the Galaxy. Even been Exarch for a time, second only to Tegaea. Of course, whether she had been a good one was highly debatable, but she had a strong opinion on where her place in the Protectorate's history was. Sometimes she missed the pomp and circumstance that had come with the title, the omnipresence of her name, the adulation, whether feigned or real did not matter - hence why it pleased her so to be celebrated like she was on Dahomey, the world she and Tegaea had liberated in the early days of the Pyre.

She cast those thoughts out of the metaphorical door, letting them be sucked into the void like the floating Vong. Thoughts like this made her feel old. A door had the insolence of denying them passage at the end of the corridor. A brutal shove through the Force blasted it apart and corrected this problem. Perhaps there would still be some Vong to kill somewhere on this ship, on the way to the bridge.

 

[Onrai]

Still here in space was Circe. Rolling her eyes at the carnage, she considered her options - one of which was to simply spam more of the Horde's droids and constructs. Another, however, was to simply use any ships under her command to continue firing upon the Moross ships in the area.

She was tired of this. The Moross had invaded the Horde without provocation. Was it some sort of fantastic and nonsensical tape track replaying in their minds over and over again that it was their right to the planet through some divine interventionary force? Was it just sheer stupidity or madness? Circe had no idea about any of these daft Moross, and she hardly cared now - the Silken Asteroids were an important location for clandestine monitoring stations or something like that. They had to have some sort of importance for the invasion...

But no. They were just large hunks of rock. The detritus of a failed planet or calcified star. Whatever it once was, it now had little value aside from being converted to raw materials, a good option considering that doing such would clean the area up splendidly. And as such, she smiled.

"There are more hostiles here. Let us end this the only way we can."

 

[Ereza]

OOC - This invasion had an end date of last Sunday and was ruled on by an RPJ in Moross's favor. As agreed upon by both factions, the Invasion is officially done. [member="Tamara"] or [member="Sarge Potteiger"] please close/archive this thread.