The Marines of Haumea
Posted on Wed Jun 18th, 2025 @ 2:15pm by Lieutenant Colonel Shaun Bradley
1,926 words; about a 10 minute read
Mission: Terrorpin
While the colony itself was currently in a state of evacuation and chaos, the Marine outpost Camp Vimy Ridge was getting more full. Marines pulled back from wherever they had been and were staging for deployments, with the Albatross dropships and Griffon gunships swinging around to move personnel where they needed to be. Corpsmen loaded onto one, stacked with their combat gear to deploy to evacuation centre three, helping to bolster Starfleet Medical in their needs, while also acting as additional fire support. Engineers had been sent to form trenches and walls, trying to funnel the creature further and further away. The scream of one dropship's engines filled the air as it pull away from the ground, the weight of the Chieftain tank briefly slowing it down before it pulled off and towards the town's defensive line.
In the back two Valkyrie fighters sat on the ground going over final ground checks by the crews. Their normal sleek forms were cut by two torpedoes under each wing, large and typically meant for ship combat. Stitches and Fallback were already scaling their craft, jumping into their seats and finding each of their TacO's waiting and ready. "How're we doing?" Captain C'Morr asked Second Lieutenant "Callback" Cairne as he descended into his own seat. Systems were already lit up, and he quickly flicked off the lockouts and let himself begin running through his system checks as the TacO talked to him.
"We just got confirmation from Haumea Ops and Marine Ops that the sensors are reporting back to the communications net, and our ordinance is locked in. Tall, dark, and spooky is still standing around basking in the energy bath, so looks like our flight path hasn't changed. Weather seems to be holding the the Colonel says we are clear for high speed pass." The facts and stats were rattled off rapid fire from the younger officer as he looked over his own screens and got information fed back. Stitches offered a thumbs up to the ground crew who were standing near by, and a ground controller returned the gesture. Flipping another switch, there was a brief hum and the cockpit slid closed. The sound of the system pressurizing filled the space, but C'Morr still pulled his helmet on and plugged into the air system. In the event of decompression the suit would keep him in one piece, and the air would switch to a tank in his seat.
One of the marshals rushed forward, the slopped nose of the fighter allowing the Marine Captain to follow him. Standing, the marshal raised is right hand in the air, and then outstretched his left holding one finger out. His right hand began to spin around. C'Morr punched a button with his thumb and held as he heard the whine of the primary engines coming online. The mixed use aerospike engines that acted as atmospheric and near atmospheric before impulse engines were effective first fired up. The system, which allowed for an afterburning system was key to the speed of the fighters near planets, and today would be their real strength. A second finger was raised and C'Morr brought the small ship's warp drive online, which in turn powered up they small ship's phasers, shields, and primed the impulse engines if they were needed. As all systems flipped to green across the Captain's instrument panel. He threw up a thumbs up and the marshal sprinted clear of the craft. "Control, Sierra One-One, we are complete on prep, waiting departure clearance, over."
A pause, before the reply came back from the Marine Aerospace Controller. //
"Sierra One-One, Control, confirmed. Airspace is clear for your departure, no friendlies in the area, you are clear for departure, over."\\
"Sierra One-One, affirmative Control, departing now, out." Once the bird was in the air they would be joined by their wingman and headed for the mountains to take the long way and, hopefully, avoid spooking the creature. Thumbing the atmospheric controls he used the powerful vertical maneuvering thrusters to push himself airborne, and gently forward before firing his engines and maneuvering away. Two orbits later and the second Valkyrie joined him before the pair angled away towards the pass they had identified.
The pair of fighters completed their final turn in the mountain pass, keeping as low as their terrain following system would safely let them get, the roar of their engines through the tight space filling the area around them before they finally kicked out over the foothills and forests. Both now fully pushed their throttles to the firewall and burned hard towards the target. As the two off white fighters skimmed across the tops of the trees, the looking form of the large monsterous beast grew larger and larger. Both began their careful low degree climb a few kilometers out, giving them space to work. The monster, for its credit, continued to bask in the radiation and energy it seemed to be feeding off of keeping it content for the moment.
Both TacO's, glued to their instruments read out readings and measurements as they approached, but neither pilot really heard them, just the key details bleeding through. Instead, they were focused on their own missions, and checked their Master Weapon Systems quick to ensure they were armed. Targeting computers pulled up firing solutions, and over the headsets Colonel Bradley read out orders pre-programmed by himself to make sure they could pull out if needed. But it wasn't necessary, for all the harassment the Marines had done earlier, the creature seemed completely unaware of the Marine presence at the exact moment. It let them work in piece. A green HUD market showed up for Stitches, and the ship's computer read out dutifully "SHOOT". The Captain pulled the trigger.
Both torpedoes under his wings unlatched from their pylons and the fighter rolled hard left and dove back for the trees before he would pull back. Torpedo one, loaded with it's payload pulled twelve G's and banked upwards, travelling on a trajectory above the creature. Torpedo two instead burned hard for four seconds and then deployed a pair of aerowings to glide it towards the creature on a lazy path. As the first torpedo finished it's eight second burn it exploded into a cloud of shrapnel and discarded it's payload to coast even higher. The communications buoyed coasted higher and higher, before reaching its destination and deploying its anti-gravity thrusters to hold it in place. The second torpedo finally deployed as well, a large spike free falling from the body before it's motor fired and drove it into the ground. Pairing to the now hovering communications probe the seismic reader began pulling data, giving a roughly hundred and fifty square kilometer area to pull readings from.
From the second fighter it's two torpedoes fired, immediately arcing upwards and spreading out. Like the first torpedo of the lead fighter these burned hard for eight seconds before slowing to a lighter burn for another few seconds before also disintegrating in a cloud of shrapnel. The two contained units here coasted higher still, nearly five kilometers up before deploying their anti-gravity thrusters and linking to the communications probe. These two were high fidelity sensor probes, meant to give battlefield intelligence in real time for advancing Marines. Today their wide spectrum of overlapping sensors were feeding data back to Marine Command about the creature in question, pulling as much data as they could, then feeding it back to the Starfleet Ops and Science teams.
Two Eagle scout cars roared across the ground, their airless tires kicking up a cloud of dust and gravel as they weaved through the forest. Inside the car had been fitted with equipment to monitor the various pieces of equipment. While they would be able to follow the beast with aerial equipment and the new sensors, physically following it would allow the team present to be able to get better data for the comfortable scientists in their bunker. As the cars pulled up a safe distance away from where the creature had stopped the collection of Marines got out, and began setting up the gear they'd been asked.
Could Starfleet be doing this role? Sure, Colonel Bradley had said. But there were a lot that still saw the Marines as the brutes of Starfleet, the hammer to which everything was a nail. In an effort to reduce that stereotype, the Colonel had volunteered them to take up the mantel of being the ones who would dive into danger to support where needed. And right now, the collection of NCMs who were piled about putting up mobile sensor systems were excited to be doing anything but standing around waiting for something to happen. A few moments later, with the additional systems in place hooked up to their cars, the settled in to watch.
Shaun had only been back a few minutes and was already diving through a series of reports in the central holotable as it fed him data from the various aggregations. Many of Starfleet were accustomed to the more calm callouts of their starship bridges, with people waiting politely for their turn. Instead around him various callouts were happening at the same time, sections relaying information to one another as quickly as it came in, and feeding data to its needed spot. Shaun had his ears perked up for specifics, but otherwise focused on his own work. Speaking into his headset, he called to one particular section he was watching. "Albatross Victor One-One-Eight, Spectre, there appears to be some kind of issue near the town square, something is holding up evacuations of one of the apartment complexes, can you get eyes on that for me?"
//"Spectre, One-One-Eight, it looks like there is a family struggling with another family, looks like a pregnant mother. Likely just slow to move, should we deploy Corpsmen?"\\ came back the steely response. Shaun frowned, and nodded to himself.
"Yeah One-One-Eight, get some boots on the ground, help how you can. Spectre out." He looked up out the large windows as the fighters returned from their mission, settling down and beginning the rearming process. Captain C'Morr had been selected for the Doomsday scenario, if it became necessary to slag the creature. He watched as the two high yield photon torpedoes were plugged onto pylons, and just as quickly as he landed, him and his wingman were gone. It wasn't an option that the Colonel wanted to entertain - especially as Corporal Lia Issacs had just reported back that the creature was definitely storing the energy. But if necessary they had enough juice in their own generators to draw the creature away from the Bray institute and the colony and hit it with the full force of the powerful torpedoes. At their set yield one was strong enough to crack a mountain. He seriously doubted the lizard could take one, but the second was to be sure.
Tracing the fighters' path away, he nodded slowly, before returning his attention to the room once more. If the needed to be deployed, that was a one way trip, with a third possible torpedo if needed. His badge chirped and he ignored it a second as data for another team came through, and he called out to send another bird to take a pass. The Captain needed him, but she'd have to wait a minute longer.
He was sure she'd understand.
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