Pepper Atoll, Brytene
Hlasyctere Aoife 'Brighteye' Lodbrok
Above them, the marine in the turret opened up with a short burst of .50 cal. The figure staggered, and then straightened. With a baffled curse, the gunner fired again, a longer stream, and suddenly there was a blinding flash and the armoured car flipped, crashing onto its side. Aoife's door was hard against the ground, but the gunner had been thrown clear from the Nihtgenga and so Aoife crawled out of the turret, sliding into the tall plants around the stricken car. Her head was spinning, but she could hear shouts and gunfire, as well as a strange electrical snapping noise.
She turned and reached through the turret for a shotgun, a durable semi-automatic TAS-HOGG racked by the central column, and hauled it out. Finding her feet, leaning against the side of car, she took a moment to collect herself. Peeking around the hood, she spotted the figure still stood in the roadway, advancing briskly with a raised rifle of some kind. She waited a moment as the man took a couple of steps closer, until he was practically side-on to her, and then sprang out, bringing the stock to her shoulder and squeezing the trigger. The weapon's recoil was partially absorbed, letting her unleash a barrage. Each blast staggered the dark figure, and as she got closer he was driven to his knees. With only two shells left of the eight-round magazine, she stopped barely three feet from him. She unleashed a round into his head and it snapped back, the man sprawling on the roadway. Amazingly, though his helmet was scored and his visor cracked, his head was still intact. She placed a boot on his right arm, reaching down to tug off his helmet. Upon doing so she ggasped, recoiling, just as the man's left arm snapped up to crack against her knee, sending her rolling into the mud. Scrambling, she held the shotgun tight across her chest and fired half-blind. The shot rolled her onto her right side, sending a spray of blood across the track. Aoife continued her roll after a moment's pause, letting the shotgun drop in the mud as she staggered to her feet. The headless corpse lay half-submerged in the mud, and she took a couple of steps backward before turning to limp towards the convoy, which was already beginning to maneuver around the wreckage of the lead car. Several corpses were scattered around the area, all the work of the one black-armoured man.
The driver of the next vehicle began to ask her a question as she climbed onto his running board, but she cut him off. "Just drive! Go!" she yelled over the storm, her voice frantic.
Across Pepper Atoll
Various sites
Manaagnwe Militia SAM sites
The first they knew of the events that had transpired far above them was when Carlossian attack craft roared overhead, missiles streaking down in a plume of condensation trail that hammered into their positions, crashing through the thin leaves overhead to bring explosive destruction to the little groups of ragtag fighters in their half-hidden nests.
Even from afar, the smoke plumes snaking up from the jungles and mountainside betrayed the eradication of several Militia fireteams. Elsewhere, however, the Militia were moving quite openly. St Joseph was crawling with activity, with armed militia at every main road and strolling the streets confidently, and whilst there had been ample bloodshed, most of the native civilians had survived, those that had not wisely fled at the first sign of violence.
En-route to Carloso
In the skies
Inyurstan HALE UAV
Directly ahead of it, and several thousand meters above it, however, a new contact emerged, closing fast...
In the waters off St Joseph
Pepper Atoll
Battlegroup Ebon
As the islands came into view, far on the horizon, at a distance of maybe nine miles seen from the very top of the tallest warship, a sonar contact did register, a particularly large one, but it was quite plainly organic in nature - other than that, nothing pressured them from the seas.