Death Korps of Krieg: Zipperheads

[Aaron]

Archos IV, a world on the fringes of the Gothic Sector, barely worth the interests or the time of the Imperium. Recently emerged from a long running civil war between factions that wished to join the Imperium and factions that worshipped fell gods, it is now host to a small Imperial garrison and an Adeptus Mechanicus research post. The planet is considered to be quiet and out of the way, a perfect place to station units broken in battle to allow them to reform.

Your regiment, the 223 Krieg Armoured is part of this garrison and your Recce Troop, the cream of the Regiment. The 223rd was all but wiped out during the defence of Naxos by Chaos forces and has been sent to Archos to rebuild. Fortunately your Recce Troop was spared the heavy personal casualties, unfortunately most of the Troops vehicles where destroyed. The ones you have now being cast offs and rebuilds from other units or hand me downs from the other Companies in the unit.

The garrison is a moderate size fort, with thick walls mounting a number of autocannons and a central rockcrete bunker, housing the Garrison CP. The units stationed there are housed in there own lines, demarcated by short portable fences with vehicles parked in neat lines along them. The infantry spend their time between 3 day shifts in the trench lines outside the fort and 3 days in their lines.

Recce is not heavily tasked, most of the time getting to lounge in their own lines, with the odd week long patrol through the nearby towns.

Rumours have been flying through the unit lines though of activity to come and finally making there way into Recce's small area. Having yet to receive a replacement Lt, the Colonel is expected to brief you late in the afternoon.

[Mikey]

Sgt. Markus von Hollendorf stopped halfway through his morning constitutional to look over the line containing his Hellhound, the Home Cookin'. Nothing official had yet been said about some real work for the recon team, but each tread in the line showed some signs of very recent activity. The Home Cookin' herself displayed a freshly cleaned-up paint scheme in standard Krieg grey-and-drab, as well as handprints by the hatch. Erich, von Hollendorf's driver, popped his head up and saluted. "Everything's stowed, filled, and 5-5-5, sergeant," the driver said, knowing better than to wait to be asked.

"Very good. Carry on," von Hollendorf replied without really paying attention. He puffed the remnant of his narrow, tough cigar and looked over the rest of the line. Pretty heavy recce team, he thought, eyeing the other vehicles: two Chimeras - staffed with grenadiers or the equivalent, no doubt - a recovery tread, and of all things a Leman Russ MBT. Good thing, too... one of the transports had an autocannon instead of a multilaser, so without the Russ they had little with which to combat enemy heavy armor, even if they were supremely capable of fighting off infantry.

Markus found he had unconsciously been patting the flank of the Home Cookin' as he'd been thinking. Ironic - he'd named the Hellhound as a personal penitence, a reminder of the terrible but necessary thing he'd had to do; but she had become his home as well as a compatriot. The panel under his hand hummed, and von Hollendorf was sure his armored colleague was impatient to dispense some burning justice.

[Aaron]

Draggin Darcy was largely silent, her driver and VoxOp putting the finishing touches on a large scantly clad woman on the side of the hull well it's commander Cpl Phrenz was busy stowing the last of the stubber ammo in a large box they had recently welded onto the back of the cupola. To anyone elses eyes Darcy likely resembled a nomads caravan, with all manner of boxes, bins and racks attached to any available surface on the vehicle but to Phrenz she was a thing of beauty. A recent replacement for the Atlas he had lost on Naxos, she had been repainted, blessed and quickly modified with the benefit of all Phrenz's experience.

An oddity amongst the Regiment, Phrenz had spent almost his entire 15 year career in Atlas's. Where most troopers rotated through the different companies, positions and vehicles in the unit, he had managed to stay as an Atlas crewman the entire time. Spying Sgt. Hollendorf next to his Hellhound, he gave him a cheery wave before dropping down his hatch and calling his crew in through the sponson hatches. Slipping his crew headset over onto his head, he plugs it into the intercom system and instructs his driver, Silon to crank her over.

The air is filled with the chugging sound of a powerful multi-fuel turning over and then a throaty roar as it catches, the smell of exhaust fills the lines and a cloud of bluish smoke obscures Darcy for a moment.

"Right, shut her down driver." Phrenz commands, satisfied that she'll be good for when the Colonel shows up.

Unplugging his headset, he slides out through the cupola and heads over to have a chat with the Sgt. he spotted earlier.

"Any sign of her crew?" He asks, jerking a thumb at the lone Russ.

[Mikey]

"Phrenz, right?" von Hollendorf asked flatly, pausing a moment before extending his hand. "No, I haven't seen anyone about her. Chances are we'l need her well-crewed, too."

[Aaron]

"Right," Phrenz pauses to wipe the dirt from his hand before giving von Hollendorf's a brief but firm squeeze. 'With any luck we'll get to sit around here a little longer, never objected to a good milk run."

[Mikey]

Markus laughed brokenly, though his face didn't show any humor. "Milk runs have a tendency to become on-ramps to Glory Road."

[Tyyr]

Johan walked back towards the recce troop's staging area after a good breakfast in the mess tent. He carefully cradled a cup of recaf and the morning's dispatches. The 223rd's refit had been going acceptably well, especially for the recce troop. They hadn't had to spend much time on the line and it had been for the best. The equipment they'd been issued to make up for losses had been sub standard at best. The extra time they'd had in garrison had largely been spent just getting their equipment in order. Even having spent all his favors securing Nancy, in his estimation the best Chimera in the replacement pool, it had taken a tremendous amount of work to get it to the point where he'd willingly drive it into combat. Their forays through the local villages had given them a lot of time to road test the gear in less stressful conditions.

Turning a corner around the medical tent he spotted the muster area of the recce troop. The other vehicles were showing their own degrees of readiness. Everyone had heard the rumors and to Johan they just right, like something was going to come of them. As such he'd pushed his own crew to get Nancy in fighting trim as quickly as possible. Walking down the lines of vehicles he turned in alongside his Chimera, patting her nose with a fist full of dispatches as he walked towards the rear. He paused to wipe a bit of mud off the nose-art his driver had painted on and immediately regretted it. The mud had been the only thing keeping the raven haired temptress fit for public consumption. Perched on her cartoonish nuclear bomb she was an odd bit of gallows humor mixed with titillation. Sighing Johan continued on back. He'd have to speak to Albia again about her drawings and once again she'd either get out water soluble paints to make her decent or just forget to get to it. It was almost a game between them really, Johan rather liked having Nancy splashed across the nose of the Chimera but regs demanded that in a mixed gender regiment things be at least kept semi-decent so they had their little discipline sessions for show and so he could claim to have told her to be covered up.

Walking around behind his track Johan paused as his dismount squad caught his eye. Sergeant Jedia had them lined up with their full kit laid out in front of them. She was going over it with a fine tooth comb, barking out reprimands and orders for more attention when needed. He'd ordered her to get the dismounts up to speed for a real deployment and she'd complied. Not that it required any abnormal action on her part. Jedia kept her squad in high gear at all times. Getting her squad ready for a combat deployment really only consisted of making sure their kit was beside the entrance to their tents instead of their foot lockers. Pausing in front of a trooper in fatigues just a bit too crisp and unfaded Jedia looked it over for several minutes without comment. Finally popping off a simple "Good work," before moving onto the next trooper. The grenadier in question grinned a moment before staggering as grenadier next to him elbowed him in the stomach and doubled him over. Johan shook his head, the spic and span trooper would be Zek, the dismount's replacement. Naxos hadn't been too bad to them personel wise. Zek was the only replacement the dismounts needed to be back up to full strength. He was replacing Private Hayes, who'd died on Naxos, taking an autocannon round to the chest will do that to a man. Hayes wasn't particularly liked or disliked, he largely just was. He'd been in the dismount squad for over three years but had never made any real friends or enemies. The squad morned his loss as a competant grenadier but not much else. Johan figured that would make life easier for Zek as he wasn't replacing a seasoned trooper. He was still a fung (Frakking New Guy) but he wasn't taking over for a beloved member of the squad. With any luck he'd learn the ropes without getting himself or someone else killed. Jedia had gripped about dealing with what she refered to as a "nugget" but Johan was sure she'd get him in condition to do something useful quickly enough.

Turning and stepping up into the Chimera Johan ducked and scooted in. Unlike most Chimera's Nancy was a scout version with her turret pushed to the rear. It forced most of the dismounts to sit to the left of the vehicle but Johan prefered it to the standard version. Walking between the turret basket and the troop seats he moved into the forward compartment where the vox/auspex station was directly behind the driver and in front of the troops on the right. Sitting at the station working the dials and switches of the vox furiously was the other fung in his command, his new Vox and Auspex operator corporal Veyda Dart. Unlike Zek she was replacing someone who would be missed. The krak missile that had killed their Chimera had hit on the right side. The warhead had spent itself on the right engine but it imparted enough energy on the shrapnel to send it careening into the crew compartment. That alone probably would have killed Corporal Ortin, he'd been shotgunned with pieces of engine and was reduced to a bloody mess Albia claimed. The clencher though was the gallons of superheated oil and fuel that had sprayed into the crew compartment. Thankfully Albia could just climb out her own hatch like he and Jax could. Ortin wasn't so lucky. At the vox/auspex station he didn't have a hatch. His wounds chewed him up too badly to drag himself out and the burning fuel had made it so no one else could get in to pull him out. Albia had tried, and her left hand and arm had the scars to prove it. Thankfully they'd all been clear by the time the fire got to the autocannon and bolter ammo. The Chimera had been a wreck though. They'd spent the last week of that campaign on foot with the dismounts.

Veyda seemed to be falling into her position quite well. She was good on the auspex but left something to be desired in her vox discipline. She more than made up for it though in her ability to fix a balky piece of kit though. Nancy's gear hadn't been in the best condition when they'd gotten her, the vox and auspex being in particularly bad shape, but with a lot of work and remarkably little help from the regiments tech priests she'd gotten them both running remarkably well. Remarkably enough to have the chief techpriest pay him a visit and demand he keep Veyda's hand out of things they didn't belong in.

"Sergeant Holst!" She said, popping up out of her seat when she saw him. "I didn't realize you were aboard sir!"

Johan sighed, "Sit down and keep the sirs to yourself Veyda, I'm not an officer."

"Yes sir... yes sergeant," she replied. Veyda was perfectly suited to armored crew service, at only one point six meters and change she could walk around the interior of the Chimera fully erect and not smack her head on anything. She was also, as Albia had described her, a reedy little runt who's uniform hung on her like it was on a hanger. Her dirty blond hair was stuffed up in her helmet and her freckled mousy face looked at him earnestly for direction.

"What were you listening too?" Johan asked.

Veyda was suddenly very concerned, fidgeting like a juvie caught with their hand in the cookie jar. "Oh, nothing sir, just tuning it in."

"Veyda, you're the vox operator on a recon track. I expect you to snoop," Johan said as he took a sip of his recaf. "Spill it."

"Well sergeant," Veyda said as she visibly relaxed, "not much. The usual chatter and that's about it."

Johan turned and tossed the dispatches atop his own kit which he kept stowed between the turret basket and the right hull. "And the civvie channels?"

"The civvies sir?"

"Sergeant," Johan chided. "Yes, the civvies, if we're going to be moving out there's an even chance that it has something to do with the civvies. Always keep one ear on the civvie channels if they're running. You'd be amazed what they let drop sometimes."

"Like their babies on their heads," Albia said from the entrance to the driver's compartment on the left of Veyda's seat.

"So you're a native?" Johan asked. "Get your paint and put some clothes on Nancy," he said.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah," Albia drawled as she poked her head back into her compartment. A moment later she crawled back out with a small rucksack. In a way she was the exact opposite of Veyda, taller, nearly one point eight meters, and with a bit more meat on her bones with curly brown hair that refused to stay in place.

"On the double, before the colonel sees it. Or at least put some mud back on her."

Albia bent over and squeezed between Johan and Veyda, "Well why did you go and knock the mud off in the first place?"

"Now private," Johan snapped.

Turning back to the turret basket Johan shimmied in the small access way and got in it. The access door was right below his loader's seat and he had to worm his way under the seat, under the autocannon, and over a dozen stacked ammo and ration boxes before he could stand up and hoist himself into his seat. "How's it looking Jax?" Johan waited for an answer as he started to run a few quick checks on his own station, making sure his responsibilities on the Chimera were in order. "I said how's it looking?" Johan turned towards his loader and saw the man leaning back in his seat, crew helmet pushed down low over his eyes. In aggravation Johan grabbed a spanner he kept tucked in beside his targetting cogitator for clearing autocannon jams and reached across the small turret to smack Jax across the back of his head with it.

"Hey, wha!?" Jax sputtered as his forehead rebounded off his own targetter.

"It's not even oh eight hundred!" Johan snapped. "Wake the frak up private! By the bloody throne are you just now waking up or taking a nap before the sun's even over the garrison wall?"

"The later sergeant," Jax muttered as he pushed his helmet back and sat up.

Johan jammed the spanner back in position and checked his auxiliary auspex feed. He could believe that Jax was already taking a nap, that was his loader's response to any lull in activity. Baring a carefully worded order that prevented him from sleeping he'd find any excuse he could to nod off. Long stretches of inactivity in the garrison meant Johan hadn't been as on top of Jax as he usually was to stay awake and without an immediate threat to his ass Jax had decided to catch a few winks. "We're trying to get ready to move out Jax, if your shit's already done find something to do. Hell, get a frakking hose and wash Nancy if you have to."

"Aye sergeant," Jax said. "What'd ya ask when you came in?"

"How are we?"

"Doing good," Jax said as he straightened up. His frequent napping never seemed to impair his functioning too much. "I finally got that jam worked out in the autocannon. It should eject the brass just fine now. Just finished putting the stubber back together again a few minutes ago. Hunter-killer passed all it's checks. All the targeters and repeaters look to be going good. Full loads of ammo and consumables."

"The tanks?"

"Topped off before dawn sir, running on the APU right now."

"Good," Johan replied. He reached up and popped the hatch on the turret's roof then pulled himself up. Beside him Jax did the same. He stood in his seat and took a look around. For the most part the camp looked like it had every morning for months, only someone intimately familiar with it would notice the buzz of activity just beneath the surface. Below them Albia was splattering a handful of dirt across Nancy's nose-art.

"Awww," Jax said as he caught sight of Albia's work.

"It wouldn't be so throne damned bad if she didn't make Nancy look just like the sergeant," Johan grumbled.

"Nancy's got black hair, the sarge has red," Jax said helpfully.

"Yeah," Johan sighed. He pulled himself up out of the hatch and scrambled down the side of his Chimera, he might as well see if he could chat anyone up for any info they might have.

[Mikey]

"Some of the grunts seem to be getting ready," von Holledorf commented to Phrenz as they watched the Nuclear Nancy's attached squad fall out. As Markus ground the stub of his cigar under his boot, he startled to see an enginseer emerge from under the cowl of the Leman Russ and wave off an approaching team of Krieg assistants.

"Too far gone for field repairs," came the tech-priest's metallic words through the wind. "It will have to be towed to a rear encampment, stripped, and re-consecrated."

"Well, so much for having a tank along," said von Holledorf. "It'd probably just slow us down, anyway. Here's hoping we don't run into any heavies." He began to approach the commander of the troop carrier when his attention was drawn away by a shout from Samson, his gunner.

"Sergeant!" came the call from the direction of the HQ tent. Samson was exiting the tent and approaching quickly, all nervous energy and noise - the opposite of the laconic and dogged Erich. "I was just signing out our small-arms loads when I got word that we're getting-" The gunner was interrupted by the chugging of a small flatbed carrying a trio of hunter-killer missiles, along with the associated cradles and firing mechanisms, coming around to the line from the flakboard garages. "- one of those," finished Samson.

Von Holledorf turned back to the commander of the Chimera, stepping down from his roof hatch, and waved. "Looks like you're a step ahead of us," markus said ironically, and began to roll up his sleeves. Turning back to Samson, he barked, "Well, are we going to stand here and admire it, or are we going to install it?! Break out the tool kit, and let's go!"

[Tyyr]

"Yes, well you never know when some frak-head is going to bring along a tank and royally shit all over your carefully laid plans," Johan said as he walked across the Chimera's boarding ramp to the other side. "It pays to be prepared."

[Aaron]

"What in the name of the Emperor's balls am I going to do with a hunter-killer?" Phrenz comments to no one in particular, headed back to his track. His crew is already bolting it onto the large A-frame on the back of their Atlas, there being no where else to mount it on the crowded hull.

As they and the rest of the Troop's crews finish mounting them, a Centaur makes it's way into the troop lines, a multimelta jutting out of the forward port and a trailer chock full of stores attached to the back. The driver brings the little vehicle to a halt in front of the line of armoured vehicles and two officers step down from the back. The first you recognize instantly as the Colonel, the other is unknown to you but he wears the rank of Lieutenant on the epaulets of his greatcoat.

The Colonel triggers his microbead and summons you to the Centaur for a briefing.

[Mikey]

Von Holledorf quickly fastened his vest and buttoned up his sleeves while barking, "Alright, finish it up... and check the couples in the fire control this time, Sam!" Once he had smoothed out his clothes and replaced his helmet, he made his way over to where the Centaur had parked. He came to rigid attention, offering a smart salute and clicking his bootheels together in a formal, but archaic, way. It was an obsolete mannerism; but even though his fortune was mostly gone, even though he would most likely never even see Krieg again, Markus was still the second to the Graf Vertsreich and he would acquit himself as such.

Von Holledorf kept the salute up until the colonel and the strange lieutenant began to dismount. "Sergeant Markus von Holledorf, sir," he announced.

[Tyyr]

Sergeant Holst watched the Chimera roll up with interest. A new lieutenant was always a rough experience. Some of them were actually smart Johan watched the Centaur roll up with interest. A new lieutenant was always a rough experience. Some of them were actually smart enough to know they didn't know shit and listen to their sergeants. Some thought they knew it all and wouldn't listen no matter what and required a little special attention to get them straightened out. A rare few had already been molded by another sergeant into something resembling a passable officer. He was intensely interested to find out where this new one would fall.

Jedia had noticed the Centuar as well and it was easy for Johan to get her attention. He set his coffee down on one of the troop benches just inside his Chimera as she jogged over. When she arrived he took the lead to report in. They both came to attention in front of the officers and saluted but without the heel clicking formality of their counterpart. "Sergeant Holst and Sergeant Nahorn reporting sir," he announced first gesturing at himself and then at Jedia.

[Aaron]

The Colonel returns the Sgt's salutes with a crisp one of his own and nods a greeting as the Atlas crew joins them. Motioning to the Lt. at his side, he comments; "Lt. Ghorman, your new Troop Commander."

"Now, to your tasking." He pulls a map slate out of his pocket and zooms out from the garrison, you can see the runes for the fort, the Ad Mech post and the landing field as he does so. As he zooms out further you can see a scattering of markers for local villages and ruins. He finally stops and the the scale on the side indicates several hundred km's. He points to a red contact rune, near the edge of the screen.

"Last night, the landing field control tower received a report from an orbital drone. It registered a meteor shower entering the atmosphere and setting down at this point. I don't have to remind you that it's the same method used by the Enemy to land on Naxos. It may be a landing force, it may just be a meteor but we need to check it out anyways. The Lt. has been briefed and will answer any questions you might have. Good luck and good hunting."

The Colonel hands the slate off to Ghorman, returns your salutes and leaves the compound.

[Aaron]

The Lt. removes his cap, runs his hands through his hair and replaces it while looking at each of the unit in turn.

"I want this to go quick and by the numbers, its a two day drive to the objective, if we push it, a day and a half. I don't know what we'll find but I want you all on your toes."

"We'll proceed in a single column, Nuclear Nancy up front, the Hellhound second, my Centaur, Gurtrud and then the Atlas. Comments, questions, concerns?"

[Mikey]

"Sir?" Markus responded, still unsure of what to make of the new lieutenant. "Do we have any idea of enemy disposition between here and the target?"