It was almost completely silent within the dropship as practically everyone quietly waited for the drop ship to disengage from the launch bay. The only reason why it wasn't completely quiet was because there was a member of the Wonick Domain aboard the ship called Drafy, swearing rather profusely under her breath about how she would turn all the Kials into scrap metal and use their broken bodies to rebuild her hometown. Hearing her extensive use of vugular language well talking about the arcotices she was going to commit upon the Kials once she got onto the surface, Gorden couldn't help but let out a sad little chuckle before grimacing. It was a ritual of sorts to not talk before they dropped onto the surface of whichever planet they were being sent to.
But no one said anything to her, after all, who could blame the poor girl she had just finished basic training and her first mission is to retake the ruins of her home planet's cities.Then before she could keep talking about how she was going to make them feel pain despite their robotic nature, the red light on the ceiling began to turn green as the dropship started to disengage from the Mellixin star carrier.
Gorden quickly made sure to double check his harness as there was a case a few months ago of a Squad leader who was so busy making sure everything for the operation was ready to go that he forgot to lock himself into his harnesses properly. It was meant to be a safe descent but because of a shot fired from a well hidden Lathin anti air gun which tore through the armor and blew a chunk out of the side of the dropship. The squad leader couldn't withstand the resulting G Force which due to the compromised Gravity field was suddenly able to turn the poor fellow into liquified soup. Ever since he had heard of that from Frederick he always made sure he was strapped in properly.
Just a few seconds after double checking his harness was locked into place and he was strapped in securely, the dropship launched out from the bottom of the carrier and began hurtling towards the surface of Planet Gathin. During this time even the Wonick was quiet. That was until we breached the smog filled atmosphere of Gathin and saw the horrors that had been engraved onto the poor planet's surface. Even though we had already been briefed on what was going on through our previous scanning of the planet it was horrific to see the actual imagery of it. We all just stared at the screens in front of us in shock. That was soon interrupted by a sob.
It was awful. Even when she was ignoring the ritual and swearing under her breath while we were still attached to the Carrier, or when she was silent on the way down to the surface with a hate filled expression on her face which was frankly rather unnerving for me as I had to sit facing her. All of that though was much better having to see her grief filled face and listen to her cries of despair, as she witnessed the images of what was left of her home.
That was the point our squad leader stepped in, he was sitting right next to hatch as that was just the sort of person he was, always having to be the first one into the fight. Yet somehow his voice managed to envelop the whole ship even though he was not speaking loudly.
"We are going to be reaching the drop zone in just a few more minutes, before starting to march north towards one of the Kials encampments. Start channeling all those negative emotions into efficiency so that way we can clear this world of those toasters faster and hopefully save more survivors. Okay? "
For such a large and intimidating man he sure knows what to say to comfort us and keep the squad functioning. Though that could just be attributed to the extensive training squad leaders have to go through to make sure that even if the atmosphere of the squad isn't harmonious, all of our attention will be spent on whatever task it is we have been assigned rather than turning on each other. After all, this isn't a movie it only takes one mistake to wipe out a squad.
"Thanks, sir." she manages to stutter out. Before wiping away her tears. "our make sure to wipe them out as efficiently as possible.'' After saying those words she lets out a sad smile and starts to just stare at the ground. At Least now she's channeling all that anger towards cleansing this planet of invaders instead of glaring at me like she's about to snap my neck.
It never ceases to amaze me how fast a Wonick can change their whole mindset and become focused on a different thing almost instantly. Sometimes I even envy their short attention span but not this time. Although their attention span can be very beneficial in certain situations such as combat operations as they are always focusing on one thing at a time and don't get sidetracked, making them a perfect cog in the machine. However, it's also very dangerous if this cog comes undone and falls out of the machine and that's just what has happened.
The Wonicks have conjured up a frenzy of rage and patriotism and have completely infested the rest of the crew with it.
Everyone is completely forgetting the importance of intel and they are all just charging into battle. Even if this is just a battle against a Searching Class civilization we should still be on the side of caution. I mean they have already taken over a planet in just a single short day.
Admittedly the planet Gathin is located within a very rural sector of the Federation and has objectively rather poor defenses. However, it is still something that a Searching Class civilization should not be able to conquer so fast. But the admiral would rather listen to the Wonicks than the actual advisors. Guess that's what happens if you left the strategic operations branch of the core worlds academy and all you've been able to do for the past few years is handle some minor cases of rebellion, poor guy must be desperate for a promotion or at least a relocation.
"Alright listen up, we're about two minutes away from the drop zone. There's been no last minute changes to our orders. We're still going to land then meet up with squad Jet and squad Quill before advancing North towards the enemy encampment. There's something blocking our radars from scanning their encampment properly so be careful as there will almost certainly be ambushes we have to deal with. Once we breach their defensive line remember to search for anything that looks techie and bring it to Gorden so he can disable it and then we can hand it to the engineers so that we get a reward for finding it, Got it?"
" Yes sir! '' Answers most of the squad with varying expressions on their faces, from sadness to seriousness to joy.
"We'll be counting on you for our holiday pay Gorden." Laughs out Jason who's sitting to my left eyeing me up with his dark blue eyes as though I'm some pile of cash.
" I do need a new toaster haha." laughs another new recruit to our squad whose name I've already forgotten, unfortunately.
"Haha all you have to do is smuggle some of them off this planet and bam you got yourself a toaster a cleaner and a dishwasher just like that." Chuckles Frederick earning himself a glare from Drafy. If he was sitting next to her I guarantee he would have gotten a hard punch on his shoulder as well.
Then before Frederick could crack another poorly made joke we landed at the drop