Asteroid Blues

Lieutenant Farouk Abadi gazed out one of the portside windows of the dropship, taking in the sweeping expanse of the asteroid below and the vacant void of space beyond. This was his first command in Human Edge, having spent most of his career safeguarding shipping closer to Bourak with his fellow Sekban. The yawning emptiness of space all looks the same wherever you are in the Sphere, but somehow Farouk knew in his gut he wasn’t where he belonged. There was a wife and three children back home, probably enjoying the evening meal by now. Only a few months ago, Farouk was transferred along with many others to a Joint Security Task Force. They had been dubbed Jamiel Aldarayib, the ‘Tax Collectors’, after some commander thought himself clever playing on the old idiom about death and taxes. They were being sent to protect Haqqislam assets in the Human Edge and would rendezvous with other smaller Nomad and mercenary factions who knew the territory better than those into command. Within a week of coming to the Astreus system, all hell seemed to have broken loose at Novvy Bangkok and the JSTF responded.
‘We’re coming around to the drop zone lieutenant, less than five minutes.’ The sound of the pilot’s voice in in his ear took Farouk from his thoughts. Now was not the time to have his attentions lightyears away, now was the time to push his emotions aside and get to the task at hand. ‘Acknowledged. Bring us to the primary drop point, then circle the rest around.’
‘Aye sir.’ Farouk turned to the belly of the ship and the troopers under his command; most of whom were doing last minute checks on gear and weapons and talking amongst themselves in the soft green glow of the overhead lights. ‘Listen up…’ His voice a practiced bark, immediately voices lowered and eyes went to Farouk. ‘Command has some reservations about Ariadnan guns watching our flank when those same guns can so easily be trained on our fleet. Intelligence reports suspect Shasvastii agents have made a foothold in the Xaraks Battery Field. These things dig in deep and spread like the plague, and they have a nasty tendency to pass for human when need be.’ A few muttered curses and grim jibes came from the unit, all of them knew stories of the Shasvastii.
‘We’ve picked up a signal transmitting remotely within the drop site and our people can’t seem to jam it or crack it; Command wants whatever it is secured and the area swept for hostiles.’ A pair of yellow lights on either side of the dropship’s hatch began blinking; primary drop point in sixty seconds. The unit, almost in unison, each reached a hand upward to grip one of the several rings fastened to the ceiling of the dropship to steady themselves against the swift descent of the craft. As few troopers began quiet prayers to Allah, lieutenant Abadi stood first at the dropship’s hatch and switched on his comms to the rest of the unit.
‘Jamiel Aldarayib! Make them pay their due!’

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Aleph takes the initiative and chooses to go first, Haqqislam chooses the right side of the board pictured and deploys second. I pull Experimental Drug as my classified.

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As the dropship pulled away with the high-pitched whine and wash of thrusters, Farouk scanned the area for contacts as the rest of their primary unit fanned out. The area looked to be an abandoned cargo cache, most likely a Submondo smuggling station, set along a barren slab of the asteroid near the Battery Fields. Farouk tapped at his comms link, ‘Keep your eyes up, we don’t know – ‘ The comms suddenly became a wash of static, fading chatter from a dozen different comms, old screeching bit code, and reruns of Mayanet streams. Lieutenant Abadi tried to adjust his comms link, but proximity to the target seemed to be playing hell with the signal. One of his team’s Nasmats kept pace behind him as he took up position on the right flank and tried to coordinate their efforts. Then he saw it, sudden fluid and predatory motion from a corner up ahead. ‘Contact!’

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Aleph Turn 1 – A core fireteam of Yadu, Shakti, and a Rudras make a push for the center objective thanks to this season’s Forward Deployment for medium infantry. His Danavas hacker prone crawls along a gantry toward one of the antennae; while Andromeda (who failed her Infiltration roll) stalks her way up the right flank of the board. Last action she comes around a corner to fire at my Sekban lieutenant from an angle giving him no cover and long range with an SMG (only -3 instead of -6 for the Regolith Plains special rule). Lieutenant Farouk tries to fire back and ends up getting two shock rounds in the chest for his trouble.

Haqqislam Turn 1 – Loss of Lieutenant! Both of my Yuan Yuans decide to walk on the table edge inches away from Andromeda and behind a box, Booty rolls are a light shotgun and E/M close combat weapon. First Yuan Yuan comes around the corner with the shotgun and blasts Andromeda as she shoots back with an SMG, Andromeda misses but makes her armor saves. Second Yuan Yuan comes around the corner and tries his chain rifle, Andromeda returns fire with a nanopulser and kills both pirates while shrugging the attack. My Sekban haris land one at a time, walking in on the edge of the board I deployed from (should have not bothered and just put them on the board from the beginning) and are in a position to threaten Andromeda next turn. Leila Sharif comes up from a prone position to take a few shots at a Yadu with rocket launcher, which gets he killed by the entire fireteam at once. I finally admit I need a minute to collect myself and drop every other unit I have in Supression. This breaks my core link…bad decisions continue.

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The sudden unmistakable staccato of SMG fire and Lieutenant Abadi’s vitals suddenly flatlined on Farrah’s display. She switched her view to RX-1, one of her two Nasmats, and confirmed her fears. Moments later, three more flatlines and Farrah realized the mission was on the brink of complete failure from the onset. Switching on the direct comms feed to each of her Nasmats, she prayed to Allah that there was a way to save the rest of her unit while hopefully salvaging the mission. ‘Regroup! Lieutenant Abadi is down! I repeat, Abadi is down! Regroup!’ Farrah’s voice blared over the comms and from the small audio units of her linked drones.

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Aleph Turn 2 – The landing pad midfield overlooks the tech-coffin and has my two Djanbazan holed up in Suppression behind a box, watching each other’s backs. Rudras tries twice to lob a mine right beside the pair, succeeds on the second try. A camo marker slips up the ladder behind, but I don’t react so as not to set off the mine. Dart reveals in a perfect spot to be right between firing arcs of the two Djanbazan, the HMG takes an SMG to the chest but only goes unconscious. Other changes face and pulls his pistol to react to the second attack, puts a wound on Dart as she misses with her bow but goes down to the mine while the second makes his save. Danavas hacker activates the antenna and a Sophotect comes out of hiding to grab the other antenna, my Ghulam NCO suppresses her twice and puts her down before she can.

Haqqislam Turn 2 – Doctor in the backfield is in charge now, goes prone and proceeds to do a much damage control as possible. But first, bloody revenge for Lieutenant Abadi! Forming up a haris link, his fellow Sekban hunt down Andromeda on the right flank and put her down with a boarding shotgun. The AP rifle tries for a shot downrange at a Yadu and gets killed for his trouble. Core link of Ghulam reforms, one of which reveals as a Hafza who puts two shots with a light shotgun into Dart and laying the Aristeia! star low. Nasmat RX-1 makes a mad scramble for the landing pad, and through the now Lieutenant Doctor Farrah gets both Djanbazan back up and into the fight.

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‘Say again!’ Farrah cursed once more under her breath; the unit had finally found some sense of order and a comms frequency that seemed at least a little less chaotic, but now she was trying to run the whole damn show while trying to pry shrapnel from one of the Djanbazan overwatch team. ‘Contacts are not Shasvastii! I repeat, NOT Shasvastii!’ Farrah peered out over the edge of the wall she knelt down behind for a moment, then back to the missing vitals of her dead comrades on her display. ‘I don’t care who the hell they are, make them pay their due!’

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Aleph Turn 3 – Yadu and Rudras team daisy chain along the center line to try and activate and capture the remaining antenna while holding the tech-coffin. The NCO Ghulam tries twice to lob grenades at the Rudras, knocking it out but gets herself shot. Samekh moves up to support the fireteam, mostly a lot of maneuvering to keep coherency while holding both objectives. I do little to ARO, either for lack of visibility or trying to save my forces for one last big push.

Haqqislam Turn 3 – Use a command token to fold in a Sekban to Comabt Group 1, an my last to reform my core team to include my two Djanbazan and two Hafza (having forgot that I needed Leila to play fifth for that maneuver). HMG goes to the edge of the landing platform and drops five shots into the Samekh, and misses spectacularly while getting a missile to hit him and his buddy dropping both again. Fireteam broken again, the heavy rocket wielding Hafza puts the Samekh down while RX-1 sighs and revives his Djanbazan buddies once more. HMG guns down the Yadu scoring the tech-coffin then leans out and tries to gun down a Yadu directly below with a pistol, but no good. Counting orders and current victory points, I move a FO Hafza into the middle and halfway around the landing platform. HMG Djanbazan jumps down off the platform in the hopes of surviving ARO and contesting the tech-coffin, he doesn’t. Last order, FO Hafza has to full sprint to get in base contact with the objective and survive an ARO from the last Yadu. Takes the hit and rolls a 19, game ends on a complete swing.

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The sound of heavy caliber HMG rounds punctuated the thunderous blooms and missile explosions, Farrah was doing her best to keep her people in the fight. She watches through RX-1’s feed as the particularly stubborn Djanbazan she’d already had to patch up twice pulled his sidearm and vaulted over the edge of the landing platform. A moment later his vitals were spiking once again. Suddenly the familiar high-pitched whine of thrusters came from above, and the entire area was flooded in blinding light from above. ‘STAND DOWN. I REPEAT, STAND DOWN.’ The voice boomed over the battlefield from the comms units of a trio of Qapu Khalqi dropships, one of which was descending onto the landing pad while the other two circled; weapons no doubt trained on those below. Farrah suddenly heard the same voice in her comms. ‘Jamiel Aldarayib, collect the prize and gather our dead and wounded. There’s been one hell of a mistake here, and you can be sure O-12 and the OSSSS will be both be questioned by High Command. For now, just get your people out of there.’ Farrah blinked and tried to make sense of what all just happened, her acknowledgment to the order a confused mutter. High Command corroborated all intel on Combined Army with O-12 liaisons; how could an OSSSS strike team be sent with orders to shoot on sight into the same operation as her unit and neither side knew? Was their intel really so off the mark, or had the intelligence service been compromised in some way? As her remaining comrades filed toward the dropship, her gaze went to the bodies of the fallen and settled on Lieutenant Abadi. All thoughts of alien insurgencies and clandestine schemes fell away; her only concerns were of a wife and three children lightyears from Novvy Bangkok, and of a father that would never return to them.

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