baronsamedi | Aftermath Session XVI

The Battle of Caamas is over. Our side had one of the scientists killed, but past that no casualties. Lucky was critically hurt in the fight though, Namri, Cam and Gusto were hurt pretty badly, and Greegan about died, but that had nothing to do with the fight.

I should start from the beginning.

As it turned out we had a night and morning before the Derelicts arrived. Jek and Khayall, who are very intelligent, looked over the crater and determined the two most likely avenues of entry for them; entering any other way would be particularly difficult. They came up with the plan with Greegan to create homemade mines at both entrances, concentrating more at the Western Entrance. The others would be at the Eastern Entrance. Jek and Khayall also found where a rockslide could be used, with Ithorian bellows used to trigger it from several volunteers, including Sassawa.

We divided our forces for the split entrance. At the eastern entrance, which was very near the landing platform, we had Sigma lying in wait on his STAP and the clones waiting in the Sunrise. Behind where they were coming in were two Seraph-Class “Flash” speeders with some blasters, one piloted by several Ithorians I had not met, the other piloted by Kamu and Morrow and commanded by Jek. I was nearer the eastern entrance, on top of a communications tower I had fortified a bit north of the landing platform. It gave me a good view of the entire base. The western side had the Ithorians who would trigger the landslide hidden in foliage, but also Namri and Khayall with their BARC speeders, and Greegan with his Wheelbike. Sheela for her part was in the sky a ways away in her V-19 to provide air support.

The plan in general was this. When the enemy approached, the eastern theater would see some explosives to destroy the front of the first wave, then the Clones and Sigma would come from the front, Sigma on his STAP, and pincering would be Jek and the Flash Speeders from behind their forces. The western theater would see the initial explosives but on a larger scale than the eastern theater, designed to herd them to where a rockslide would further demoralize them, then Namri, Khayall and Greegan would arrive on their vehicles and I would snipe. Given I was at the opposite side, the range was a bit long for me but most would not, in theory, be able to even return fire. Ideally, the western theater would be cleaned up and they could move east.

That was the plan anyway.

We got into position that morning and saw their Sheathipede shuttle come back and attempt to land on the platform. Sheela flew in but found herself engaged by two Z-95 Headhunters. Sheela fired a missile that damaged the shuttle and discouraged it from landing its troops, and moved to engage the Headhunters in a dogfight. The actual force distributions that morning were intimidating. Both of the Derelicts' assault forces sides had about 30 soldiers, not counting the ones in the shuttle or the Headhunters, which brought their total deployment for 74. Clearly, they wanted this place. Gersham Debaal was the commander on the eastern theater, and Keiza Deza'an was in command on the west. Both sides were mostly ground forces, with some heavy support weapons, and both sides deployed 3 troops on STAPs and 3 snipers among the 30. Regrettably, my placement put me where I and Keiza were out of each others' ranges even with the sniper rifles, so that showdown never happed. Gershan was another story, but I am getting ahead of myself.

The initial charge on both sides hit Greegan’s mines. The western side lost about a third of their forces, the Eastern side about a sixth. On the east, they broke cover to move in, while the West was herded to the rockslide, which took out about another sixth, costing them half the forces on that side. At that point, the Speeders and Wheelbike broke cover, and moved in. I fired on the confused forces taking one merc out. Meanwhile the Clones charged the east, and met with heavy resistance. Cam was badly hurt immediately and ordered to withdraw by Tycho, and Lucky and Gusto were hit. As they moved in, Jek’s Flash Speeders flanked the enemy forces, taking out all three snipers on the east side before flying toward their rear.

The enemy STAPs split up. The three on the East moved to engage Sigma, while two from the West went after me, the third staying to engage the Speeders and Wheelbike. I wanted to assist Sigma but had to deal with my assailants first. I shot down one STAP driver, and Sigma’s STAP took a hit and he shot down one assailant. Meanwhile Lucky was hit again by enemy blaster fire and critically injured, and Gusto was further hurt. However, the Clones dispatched a withering array of fire into the mercs, dropping several. Gersham meanwhile used a rocket launcher to engage the Flash Speeders, hitting and damaging Jek’s.

Greegan was enthusiastic to say the least. His initial shot with his Wheelbike’s gun went poorly, but his second shot took down one of the mercs. Unfortunately, he was too eager to try out his Wheelbike’s ramming capacity. The soldier he charged leapt out of the way and Greegan collided his Wheelbike with a rock, badly damaging it and throwing poor Greegan from the seat. Greegan recovered pretty well, all things considered, and got into a gun battle with the evasive merc using the rock he had wrecked on as cover. Namri stayed to assist him, fighting with her electrostaff, while Khayall moved up on his BARC speeder to deal with the snipers.

Meanwhile Sheela dogfought the two Headhunters. She was a better pilot than either, so they tried to split off to force her to pursue one. She fired a missile at one and pursued the other. The one she pursued went down pretty fast. I took down the other STAP driver on me, and gunned down one of Sigma’s remaining assailants even as he took out the other. While Gersham made things difficult on the Flash pilots, hitting both speeders with his heavy artillery, Jek rained down fire on the Derelict forces, mowing them down with the speeder's blaster cannon. One of the pilots of the other Flash speeder was killed in this exchange, which is saddening.

Meanwhile despite Lucky and Gusto pulling back, the Clones devastated the remaining mercs. The mercs' numbers were simply not enough for the Clone's training and talents. Between them and Jek's flanking maneuver, the mercs were crushed. Gersham called for a retreat but I, having seen Sigma was okay and one of the Ithorians fall, took aim and shot him down where he stood. He died as the Clones annihilated the last of the mercs.

Meanwhile the shuttle moved to deal with Khayall along with the STAP still on the west side. Namri saw this and used the force to grab the shuttle. She was hit by a sniper at that point and was staggered by the injury but held on, hurling the shuttle to the ground and taking out the STAP in the process. The shuttle was destroyed along with most of its crew. Even as Greegan was having his running battle with a merc, Khayall rode over the crater ridge and found himself facing a sniper. Taking advantage of terrain, he attempted to move in where the other snipers would have poor line of sight. He drew his sonic blaster but it malfunctioned. The sniper he faced, since Khayall was almost point blank, dropped his rifle and drew a blaster. Khayall did a hard shove that did not injure him…but did knock him into the way of a the blast coming from Keiza’s gun. This caused Keiza's shot to miss Khayall.

Then of course, the STAP coming up on Khayall had a shuttle dropped on it, and a second STAP flew in…Sigma’s. He shot down the other sniper and narrowly missed Keiza, who fled as Khayall took out the sniper in front of him with his sonic blaster.

Meanwhile Namri was badly hurt and still facing several foes. As Greegan took his enemy down, she drew her lightsaber, and it was pretty much over at that point. She cleaned house with some help from Greegan. One remaining soldier and I apparently serendipitously took aim at each other, he with his rocket launcher and I with my rifle. We both hit. He went down and a rocket, being smaller than a planet, failed to seriously hurt me. I gave the order to liquidate their forces when I saw the lightsaber come out. I may have overstepped my bounds.

At the shuttle, Keiza declined an order from Khayall to surrender and he hit and injured her. She kept moving though, but outrunning a STAP, much less one piloted by a cheerfully psychotic Battle Droid, is a fool's game. Sigma took her down as she fled. Meanwhile, the few survivors emerged from the remains of the shuttle, and were dealt with by Khayall and Sigma. Sheela shot down the second Z-95 and emerged from the battle in same shape she was going in, minus a couple of missiles. She gets herself into some tight spots on the ground, but she is one hell of a pilot.

It was over. All 74 of their forces were lost. We lost an Ithorian, and Kamu and Morrow, as well as survivors on the other Flash Speeder, had been hurt. Lucky was critically injured but managed to pull through. Namri, Gusto, and Cam also survived. I was kinda staggered by the rocket, but it was not a planet, so it was not too bad. We won, and it was not even pyrrhic. That is kind of nice.

Jek was nice enough to radio Dantalian and make arrangements for them to pick up their dead. Dantalian was remarkably civil, though Jek did not push things.

I spent a quiet evening with Aya after that, when she was not tending to the injured. I confess I was not really prepared for what happened when I emerged from the Sunrise the next day.

You see, I stepped out of the Sunrise and noticed Greegan, Sigma and Jek looking at the nose art on the Sunrise. It would seem someone, by someone I mean Sigma, had changed the skin color of the Twi’lek on the nose art to match Elili. I calmly walked back into the Sunrise and got my heavy pistol, returned and asked Jek who had painted it. Sigma cheerfully volunteered that he had under orders from Greegan. I was about to calmly ask Greegan to put his affairs in order when Elili came out. She was…surprised…by it, and looked, to me, more than a little uncomfortable. After all, the lady on the front was in heels, had her butt sort of as the center of the picture, and was turned so she was smiling seductively over her shoulder with her chest pushed out just enough for her breasts to be visible. I, uh, notice these things. Elili rather pleadingly asked me to go back inside. I went in to see if Aya had any spare spaces in the infirmary for when I shot Greegan. At his point I was only planning to wound him.

Jek, being Jek, apparently had a heart to heart with everyone about the picture. I can but assume he chastised Greegan for changing it without asking Elili. I assume this so I won’t throttle him later. Elili approached me and told me she was okay with it. She was embarrassed by it, but it made her feel like she really belonged to the crew now. I explained that it seemed to be sexualizing her and I felt she was being violated by it, but she disagreed. For now I honor her words, but this will not be forgotten.

The sad part of the whole thing is Sigma seemed so proud.