Semper Fi

by **Len Hyet** » Thu Aug 16, 2012 4:55 pm

Semper Fi

A Marine is a Marine. I set that policy two weeks ago - there's no such thing as a former Marine. You're a Marine, just in a different uniform and you're in a different phase of your life. But you'll always be a Marine because you went to Parris Island, San Diego or the hills of Quantico. There's no such thing as a former Marine.
-General James F. Amos, 35th Commandant of the Marine Corps

Gunnery Sergeant Benjamin Silva
USMC Forward Operating Base Delhi
1023 Hours, May 6th, 2012

Gunnery Sergeant Benjamin Silva's breath fogged the cold mountain air in front of him. At 2,343 feet (714 m) in the air on a mountainside, even in a desert country it was cold. As he jogged the Marine kept thanking god for his warm fatigues and jacket. He'd read that in World War Two, soldiers deployed to Italy by the allies had to fight through the mountains in summer gear, because some fuckwit hadn't bothered to check the weather, and simply assumed Italy would be nice and warm. Thankfully, logistics seemed to have gotten their act together since then, and such mistakes hadn't happened that Silva was aware of.

Behind him, the other nine men of his squad jogged to the same beat. They were making a lap of the base, just a nice morning warm up jog. They had been assigned to a roving patrol later that day, which meant there was an excellent chance of driving over an IED or getting shot at by the various insurgents. Ever since President Obama had announced the withdrawal of American troops, the Taliban had been getting bolder, as though encouraging the Americans to leave. Not that they needed encouragement. Neither Silva nor his squadmates could wait to get back home, see their wives and girlfriends, hug and kiss their kids and family, and have a nice cold beer without fear of being shot at while drinking it.

As the squad pulled up in front of their barracks they all dropped to the ground and began to rattle off pushups to an internal beat, that they somehow all had synchronized. Silva, thirty one years old, hardly felt the years as he did the exercise. Since joining the Corps at eighteen he had been in the best shape of his life, constantly, for the past thirteen years. He was a career NCO, with a degree in Engineering that he had never once used. To his way of mind that wasn't a bad thing. His dad had been a Marine. His mom had been an Army Nurse. His brother was the achiever of the family, owning a small but growing investment business in New York City. Silva had chosen at eighteen to follow his father's footsteps. He hadn't regretted it.

The squad finished their pushups and rolled over, executing with robotic precision fifty situps. That done, they stood quickly and went inside, to simultaneously cool off their muscles and warm up their extremities. They left on patrol in two hours, and each man wanted to go over his equipment one last time, or two or three last times, before shipping out. You never knew what you might wish you packed, and didn't, so most of the time the men took all the gear they could possibly see themselves needing, and then some. Ever since that nastiness down in Mogadishu in the eighties, anyone on patrol wore full body armor and carried Night Vision Goggles, or NVGs.

Silva grimaced as he walked into the barracks, the warmth hitting his tingling fingers and ears like a wet sledgehammer. He walked to his cot and started going over his equipment. M4 Carbine, check. M9 Beretta, check. Grenades, check. Reloads up the wazoo, check. Helmet, check. Full pack, check. He slid the first clip into his M4 and slapped the bottom, making sure the clip was firmly in. Silva repeated the process with his M9. Then he sat and quickly started a letter to his wife back home. She was twenty nine, and worked for a law firm. They had bumped into each other at a bar, and from there things quickly escalated. He was six foot one, with blonde hair, blue eyes, and high cheekbones to finish off his handsome face. She was five foot nine, red hair, green eyes, and a temper to match. She loved him, but hated what he did for a living. She kept on him to quit before it was too late, to do something with his degree. He didn't argue, couldn't argue. There was no way Silva could explain why he did what he did, but it was a part of him.

The two hours passed quickly. Silva stood, gave his equipment one more go over, and motioned his squad out. They moved as a group toward their twin Humvees. Corporal James Waters hopped on the Fifty Caliber of the first vehicle, Private Adam Yvengy jumped into the other. Silva grinned at the Private's eagerness and slid into shotgun on the first Humvee. The rest of the squad piled into the pair. Private First Class William "Billy" North climbed into the drivers seat, and they drove off the base. Silva studied the map again, even though he had committed it to memory earlier in the day. They were to do a thirty mile circuit, and repeat once. Then they drove back into the base, and went off on a different route for twenty four miles. They would do that once, then come back for good. The reason for the switch was to keep the Taliban from, hopefully, being able to set up an ambush along the route.

END FIRST INSTALLMENT

by **Len Hyet** » Fri Aug 17, 2012 3:28 pm

OOC Thread

Semper Fi
Chapter Two

The Marines I have seen around the world have the cleanest bodies, the filthiest minds, the highest morale, and the lowest morals of any group of animals I have ever seen. Thank God for the United States Marine Corps!
-Eleanor Roosevelt, First Lady of the United States, 1945

Gunnery Sergeant Benjamin Silva
USMC Forward Operating Base Delhi
1253 Hours, May 6th, 2012

Silva stared out the windshield of the Humvee praying that nothing went wrong. It was on patrols that the majority of American soldiers were killed, not in grand firefights with the Taliban. They were called terrorists, not soldiers, for a reason. They would bomb a truck, fill the air with AK-47 fire, and run like the devil himself was after them. It wasted a lot of ammo, and got more than a few Taliban killed, but it worked. American soldiers died without so much as seeing a single Taliban Insurgent.

He shrugged and kept going. One of the men in the back leaned forward and tapped Silva's shoulder. He turned and looked back. The Lance Corporal who had tapped Silva had to shout to be heard over the roar of the Humvee.

"Sergeant! Gunner says clouds are forming, in his words, weird as fuck!"

Silva looked up and out the windshield. Clouds were forming, and it looked like a storm. He leaned back.

"The hell is he talking about! Just a storm!"
"Negative Sarge! Behind us!"

The Gunnery Sergeant twisted fully around, and looked out the back window. Clouds were indeed forming, but unlike the ones to the front of the vehicle, they were Red. Startlingly so. Silva frowned. Odd, but not dangerous that he could see. He twisted back to the Lance Corporal. Jenkins was his name.

"Tell him I see them, and agree, but to keep his eyes on the ground!"
"Yes sir!" The Lance Corporal sat back, and relayed the instructions to the Corporal on the Heavy Gun.

Silva resumed looking out the front. As he did so a flicker of motion on the lonely road caught his eye. Off to the left. He took a better look. Squinted. It was roughly round in shape, and behind a sand dune. Silva was about to go back to the road when the round shape moved, straightening up, revealing itself to be the back of a man, who clutched an RPG-7 in his hands.

"RPG!" Silva screamed, and pulled the driver's head down with his own as they ducked inside the car. There was a flash, and the warhead slammed into the second Humvee. It detonated on the passenger side door, and sent a gout of flame out the gunner's hatch. The Private on the .50 opened up on the now running form, and cut the Taliban fighter down. Behind them the second Humvee burned. Silva jumped out of the Humvee, and motioned his men to stay tight. More of the bastards might be around. The Gunnery Sergeant started to run to the burning Humvee, but threw himself to the ground instead as the sound of multiple AK-47s firing split the air around them. Bullets hissed past Silva's head as he and the squad Medic finished their mad dash to the burning Humvee. The air was filled with the scent of burning flesh, and hot metal. The acrid smoke filled the air, attracting anybody who cared to see it.

The Medic, a Corporal by the name of Clint Young wrenched open the door, and ducked back as a gout of flame and smoke spilled out the opening. Clint and Silva both tried their best to get into the burning vehicle, but it was no use. The squad demo-man's C4 had caught fire, and spilled out into the Humvee. C4 doesn't explode when it get's hot, but it burns fiercely. The pair ran back to their Humvee, and ducked under it's cover. The AK fire seemed to be coming only from one side, opposite that which the man with the RPG had come from. Silva chanced a glance up, and the bright red storm clouds were now right on top of them. He dismissed them and started to return fire. His M4 had barely spat two rounds before a rumbling shook him to the core.

The Taliban fire slackened, as did his squad's, as a great roar filled their ears. It was louder than any Jet the Americans had, and deeper than any drum on earth. In the distance Silva could see black clad forms running away, their AK-47s forgotten as they ran from the storm. Furious with them for costing the lives of five of his squadmates, Silva took aim and fired a three round burst into the back of one of the fleeing terrorists, but stopped immediately after as the ground began to shake. A bolt of searing gold light burst from the clouds, and before anyone could call out a warning, it struck the ground. The light was conical in shape, surrounding the now shorthanded Squad and their Humvee. It pulsed once, and Silva's vision pulsed with it, before going dark.

The squad collectively blinked, then blinked again from shock. Their Humvee, and themselves, were now located on a grassy knoll. To the east, their left, a forest loomed perhaps a hundred meters away. To the west, the squad's right, there was more of the grassy plain. Nobody bothered to turn around and inspect the north, for in their shock they noted not only that they were no longer in Kansas, as the saying went, but that they were watching a battle unfold in front of them. One hundred and fifty meters out, two groups were busy slaughtering eachother. One group appeared to be made up of humans, with soldiers in the rear defending the party, and a great mass of old folk and children fleeing the battle. The other group, clearly the aggressors, appeared to also be human... but weirdly so. For starters they were tall, extremely so. Easily eight feet on average. The shortest no less than seven foot eight inches. They were also bulkier than any human, even in full combat armor. And they were clad head to toe in some green paint or skin tight dress.

The Squad Medic blinked. "Are they using... swords?" He asked uncertainly. Silva shook his head to clear it, and took another look. It appeared to have escaped him at first, being focused more on the combatants than their weapons, but they were indeed using swords, spears, and the occasional large ax. A small squad of five Greenies, as Silva mentally began to call them, peeled off from the main battle and started to jog toward the group of five humans. Silva held up his hand and made the signal for the squad to harden up. Shaking off their shock, their Military training took over. The squad took up a V shaped firing position, with the tip facing the approaching Greenies. The wings were composed of two men each, with Silva at point. They stood their ground, the squad Humvee silent in the rear, and waited to find out just who the hell was approaching them.

by **Len Hyet** » Sun Aug 26, 2012 9:16 am

Semper Fi
Chapter Three

Come on, you sons of bitches! Do you want to live forever?
-GySgt. Daniel J. "Dan" Daly, USMC near Lucy-`le-Bocage as he led the 5th Marines' attack into Belleau Wood, 6 June 1918

Gunnery Sergeant Benjamin Silva
Unknown Position
1310 Hours, May 6th, 2012

Silva stood his ground as the five Greenies came at his position. His squad behind him shifted nervously, uncertain as to just what was going to happen. The Gunnery Sergeant slowly raised his M4 to firing position. When the Greenies were a mere ten yards away, he called out.

"Alright, that's far enough! Who are you?" He called out, sounding firmer and more sure of himself than he actually was.

The Greenies came to a stop. One of them hefted a wicked looking sword over it's shoulder. It was easily five feet long, and made of dark iron. It had a jagged, serrated blade, which protruded at seemingly random points. The back of the blade was rough and unfinished. It was clearly a poorly made weapon, but none the less deadly for it. Red blood dripped from the tip, down the rudimentary blood channel, and to the hilt of the blade. The Greenie that held the blade had slightly more armor than the rest of the Greenies, with shoulder guards and a breastplate instead of just a breastplate. It's face twisted into a sneer and it charged Silva's Marines, the rest of it's troops coming with it, howling war cries.

And just like that the Greenies went from unknown to hostiles. Silva shot first, a single round that hit dead center of the Greenie's forhead with a wet smacking sound to accompany the loud retort of the M4. The other four opened fire a half heartbeat later, cutting down the five Greenies with military precision. Across the way, fifty Greenies peeled off of the main battle, and charged Silva and the Marines. The Gunnery Sergeant made a snap decision.

"Everybody into the Humvee! Waters! Kill those Motherfuckers! Somebody police his brass! Move!"

They piled in, and the Humvee charged the approaching Greenies. Waters opened up with the Fifty Caliber Machine Gun attached to the top of the Humvee. The enormous rounds punched holes through the approaching wave of Greenies. The M2 Machine Gun, Browning .50 Caliber Machine Gun, is a weapon of deadly precision and killing power. It is a heavy machine gun designed towards the end of World War I by John Browning. The Gun is very similar in design to Browning's earlier M1919 Browning machine gun, which was chambered for the .30-06 cartridge. The M2 uses the much larger and much more powerful .50 BMG cartridge, which was developed alongside and takes its name from the gun itself (BMG standing for Browning Machine Gun). A .50 BMG round is capable of producing between 10,000 and 15,000 foot pounds (between 14 and 18 kilojoules), depending on its powder and bullet type, as well as the gun it was fired from. It can go through multiple concrete walls, and has been used often as an Anti-Aircraft round.

In other words, the Greenskins were hit. Hard. Waters was recognized as one of the best Gunners in the Platoon, and as such knew the key to killing massed enemy forces is not to simply hold down the trigger. It's to fire two or three round bursts, each of which kills two or three of the enemy. Before the Humvee even came within fifty yards of the Greenies, Waters had killed twenty four of them. The rest had slowed their charge dramatically, not wanting to be anywhere near this killing machine. By the time the Humvee smashed into the first Greenie, rolling right over it, there was a mere fifteen of the original fifty left. They broke and ran, screaming in their own harsh language.

The Humvee rolled up the Greenies' left flank, with the .50 chattering it's song of death, and the squad's M4's barking along as their muzzles pointed out the windows. A shiver ran through the Greenie flank, then the center as the Humvee sped around. More and more dropped dead, the .50 exacting a heavy toll. Another shiver ran through the flank, but this time the Greenies stopped their advance. They began to run, away from both their foes, and the squad Humvee. Slowly at first, but faster soon, and more and more of them ran. It but moments, the Greenies had fled.

by **Len Hyet** » Fri Jan 04, 2013 6:47 am

Semper Fi
Chapter Four

I come in peace, I didn't bring artillery. But I am pleading with you with tears in my eyes: If you fuck with me, I'll kill you all.
-Marine General James Mattis, to Iraqi tribal leaders

Gunnery Sergeant Benjamin Silva
Unknown Position
1325 Hours, May 6th, 2012

Silva breathed heavily. He'd nearly emptied his clip on the damn Greenies, and wasn't all too happy about it. From what he saw there didn't appear to be a damn lot of guns in the area, which meant a damn shortage of bullets. He quietly spoke to his men.

"Police all your brass. I don't know what the hell is going on but we might need it."

Muttering their agreement and acknowledgement, the Marines scrambled around the Humvee, picking up the brass cases for the 5.56mm NATO rounds chambered by their M4 Carbines, as well as the much larger casings for the .50 caliber M2 Machine Gun. It took several minutes for them to find every casing, and even then a few were still missing, what with them having been going at around forty miles per hour and shooting out the windows it wasn't all that unexpected.

Silva's attention was caught by Waters chambering a new round in the M2 and calling down to him.

"Hey Gunny! Those guys the Greenies were fighting are coming this way!" Mentally kicking himself for forgetting about them in the post battle rush, the Gunnery Sergeant placed his M4 in the bed of the Humvee, despite Lance Corporal Jenkins asking him just what in the hell he thought he was doing. Silva stepped out of the Humvee, hoping that leaving his primary weapon would be taken as a sign of good faith. Of course, one of his hands was on the butt of the M9 strapped to his thigh. No sense in being too friendly.

The delegation approaching him were of an obviously different species than the Greenies that had attacked them. They were all tall and willowy. Most carried thin swords with bows and quivers of arrows slung over their backs. Equally, most were covered in an odd greenish blood, which it didn't take a genius to figure out had come from the Greenies. Underneath all of it however, especially the women, were gorgeous. Silva's thoughts stopped there. Three of the seven were women. All three carried weapons which looked like they had seen hard use. Their quivers were empty, and they were covered in blood and gore. One of them had a silken bandage wrapped around her left arm. So clearly, they had been knee deep in the fighting.

Suddenly and acutely aware he was staring, Silva cleared his throat and coughed, trying to regain some semblance of control. His men sniggered, although each of them were just as transfixed by the women fighters. One of the men from the group had armor that looked more ornate than all the others, with gold, silver, and what looked like platinum coating it in intricate designs. Silva was no metalsmith or Jeweler, but such a thing looked extremely expensive. Following that logic, Silva faced him, taking careful note of the aristocratic look in his face, along with the apparent disdain on his features.

The tall man removed his helmet, to show beyond all doubt he was not, in fact, human. He had pointed ears and his eyes had an exotic slant to them, despite his apparently Caucasian features. One of the men, PFC Billy from the sound of it, swore softly.

"Holy shit Sarge! They're elves!" Silva spun and leveled a frightening glare at Billy, who immediately shut his mouth, along with the rest of the squad. Silva turned back, and spoke strongly, despite his internal turmoil. He wasn't entirely sure what the protocols were for being teleported thousands of miles, engaging in conflict with, and establishing diplomatic relations with, two entirely different species. So he just followed the established protocols for meeting tribal leaders in Afghanistan.

First, he bowed from the waist, then straightening up he saluted.

"My name is Gunnery Sergeant Benjamin Silva, of the United States Marine Corps. It is a pleasure to meet you." The tall elf spoke, and his voice was light and lilting, with an accent Silva just couldn't quite place.
"How have you come by such weapons?!" The elf asked, and his voice clearly held a note of danger.

Well that was unexpected. After all they had just saved the bastard from being ripped apart. Silva's eyes hardened, and he was about to retort, when the one of the other elves spoke up. It was the woman with the bandage on her arm.

"Lord Greenleaf! How dare you! These men just saved us, and you treat them like criminals!" She was clearly gorgeous, and from her tone she also appeared to be this Lord Greenleaf's superior. His next action confirmed it.

"I apologize milady, I was merely attempting to ascertain..." He was cut off by the lady in a furious torrent of words in another language, one that complimented their accents perfectly. For almost three full minutes the woman berated Lord Greenleaf. When she finally stopped, he turned to the humans, and with fires burning in his eyes spoke with no discernible emotion in his tone.

"Will you share our fires. Gunnery Sergeant Benjamin Silva." While his tone was totally neutral, his eyes spoke of a hatred that would burn forever.

Silva's eyes burned no less fiercely as he graciously accepted.

by **Len Hyet** » Sun Jan 06, 2013 4:29 pm

Semper Fi
Chapter Five

Marines I see as two breeds, Rottweilers or Dobermans, because Marines come in two varieties, big and mean, or skinny and mean. They're aggressive on the attack and tenacious on defense. They've got really short hair and they always go for the throat.
-Rear Admiral "Jay" R. Stark, USN; 10 November 1995

Gunnery Sergeant Benjamin Silva
Elves' Camp
1813 Hours, May 6th, 2012

The small squad of Marines sat in a semicircle around a fire. Their Humvee was parked just behind them, and they talked in low tones. They had made it to the Elves' encampment just a short hour ago. They had been scouting ahead for the main column, which served two purposes. Firstly, it made sure they wouldn't run into any ugly surprises, and secondly it distanced them from the unwarranted hostility of this Lord Greenleaf character. Nasty son of a bitch. He hadn't stopped glaring at them until they were out of sight, and Silva was certain that as soon as they were out of hearing range the elf had started advocating either sending them far, far away, or killing them and stealing their weapons.

As such, the Marines were seated several meters away from the rest of the Elves' fires, but none of them complained. They all had sensed the hostility that seemed to radiate from Lord Greenleaf, and none of them wanted to be anywhere near it. Of course, the men were fascinated with the Elf women, to the point where Silva knew that a camp further away was a good idea. He trusted his men not to lose their heads, but the idea that they might unintentionally cause some gaff was in the fore of Silva's mind.

Jenkins was the first to see their visitor.

"Elf, ten o clock." The Marines collectively spun, unconsciously reaching for their weapons, not one of which was out of reach. Silva barked an order, and they all immediately retracted their hands, looking abashed.

He stood, and faced their guest. It was the elf who had berated Lord Greenleaf earlier. Her arm was still bandaged, but she apparently had cleaned up, for while she still wore armor it was no longer bloody, and the filth of combat did not cling to her skin.

She spoke first, in a language Silva didn't understand. He paused, unsure, but before he could speak she started in English.

"My apologies. That is the traditional greeting of my people." Silva nodded in understanding.
"Of course. Might I ask, why are you here?" The Elf's lips curled upward in a smile.
"So different from our humans, yet clearly much the same." Now Silva was confused.
"Your humans?" He asked.
"Yes. Not far from here. We are going to them actually, in hopes of joining forces. The bearded folk are already there."

Silva looked at the elf inquisitively.

"Bearded folk?"
"The proper name is Dwarves." She responded. "They and the Humans are our allies in our fight."
"Against those things we saw today?" He asked. The Elf nodded, in a clipped, birdlike manner.
"Yes, among others. Those were, Orcs is the human word. We call them-"

What followed next was a series of sounds far too complex for Silva to even consider repeating, much less memorizing.

"Others?"
"Goblins, Ogres, Trolls, and a flight of twelve dragons." The Elf spoke matter of factly.
"Dragons?!" Silva exclaimed. The Elf looked at him quizzically.
"Yes, Dragons. I hope that is the right word, um.. big? Winged lizards? Breath weapons?"
"No no, I understand what they are, but for the love of Christ."

The Elf looked confused.

"Christ?" She asked. Silva looked at her, dumbfounded.
"You know, Jesus Christ? The son of god?"
"Which god?" She asked. "Was he recently birthed?"
"Which... the god! The only god!"

The Elf wrinkled her nose, confused.

"But there are so many gods. Our pantheon consists of thirteen major deities, fifteen sub deities, thirty six demigods, some argue thirty seven, along with thirteen devils, each the ruler of a specific temptation, and their demon servants number in the millions, at all levels of power from tiny Midges to great Demons from the fires of hell."

Silva's jaw hung open. He frantically tried to piece together his thoughts, and ended with a simple question.

"Where are we?" He asked slowly.
"Daen." The Elf answered simply. "In the nation of Elvesguard, the province of Alandur. Where else?"

Semper Fi

Semper Fi

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