Kuat - The Ending

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A scream pierced the air. A blade, twelve inches in length and solid black, punctured the man’s white armor and pierced his skin. A twist of the blade cut through most of the vital organs around the blade. With a force unthinkable, the blade sliced through flesh and bone to exit a different path than it had entered. The scream fell silent and the man slowly fell backwards. Hazel eyes raised from the body to meet the fearing stares of six more men dressed similarly to the first. The killer’s mouth curved into a sinister smirk as a rifle found its way into his hands. The butt fit nicely into his shoulder as he raised it, resting the stock on the top of his left wrist, as his hand held the blade. Eight rounds to a magazine, and only six targets. Six tugs on the trigger and high powered armor piecing slugs slammed into the men’s bodies at various points. All dropped to the ground, dead.

“Move up!” a voice called out to Aiden’s left. He turned his gaze from the seven men he had just single handedly killed to the source of the voice. It was his father, and commandant, Mike. Accompanying him was the entire 1st Battalion of the Sith Marines. Aiden turned around to see what was left of his squad. They had taken casualties during the shipyard battle and again when they had landed on the surface of Kuat to help the 3rd Battalion. Only four men were left in the squad: Grubber, Joker, Eagle, and Snake. Grubber was still fearful of dying and lagged behind the rest when it came to combat. It was getting annoying.

Mike dropped down into the trench next to Aiden. The rest of the battalion, or what was left of it after the shipyard battle and days of fighting it out with Imperial shocktroopers on the ground. Aiden turned around to greet him. In the passed few days, Aiden and Mike had become good friends, as they were technically father and son. Aiden hadn’t seen his father at all during his childhood, and Mike hadn’t seen his son since he was born. The two acted almost exactly the same and Aiden looked like Mike only younger and with less scars. “Aiden, I just got word from the Second. They’ve finished the job upstairs and are ready to support all five battalions on the ground.” Mike didn’t smile despite the good news. Aiden didn’t smile either, they had lost their smiles a long time ago.

“Good. There’s three more lines and then there’s a large hill. That hill is where most of the fuckers are gonna be but if we can’t get there then there’s no point.” Aiden pointed out towards their front, trying to show from a ground point of view what he was talking about. In the distance a hill that formed a sort of ridge protruded from the ground. White dots, obviously enemy soldiers, moved up and down the hill. Mike nodded and looked around for a couple of seconds. He turned back to Aiden, he had reached a decision.

“We’re gonna assault the final three trenches and see where we are from there.” Aiden nodded in agreement. Let’s end this fucking thing fast. Mike nodded and called out for all of the Marines around him to hear. “Marines! Out of the trenches, we’re not stopping until we reach that hill!” Every Marine in and around the trench cheered and yelled their agreement. Aiden looked at his father with a sinister smirk.

“Oorah!” With that, Aiden sheathed his combat knife and reached over the side of the trench. His arm held his wait as he kicked up and essentially rolled over the top of the trench. The roll turned into a summersault. Once his feet touched the ground, he jumped up at and started sprinting forward. The four men in his squad followed closely. The rest of the Marines followed, Mike sprinting up to try and catch up with Aiden.

The Imperials had tried to sneak a company of shocktroopers up to the Marine lines. Aiden saw them crawling in the grass as he ran by. He fired the last two shots in his clip, killing two more soldiers. The Marines had a field day, shooting the helpless shocktroopers as they tried to crawl away or act dead. The rear line decided to get off the ground and start running back towards their trench. Aiden only ran harder to try and catch them. He was gaining fast- he didn’t have any armor or equipment to hold him down.

They were ten feet from the trench when Aiden sprinted as hard as he could to catch up to one of the fleeing soldiers. As the soldier was about to jump inside the trench, Aiden leapt into the air, producing his combat knife once more. He slammed it into the soldier’s back before his entire body slammed into the man. The shocktrooper was propelled forward with Aiden’s knees and knife in is back. The man’s body slammed into the other side of the trench, his stomach hitting the corner and crack the ribs in his body despite the armor. Aiden bounced off of him to find himself in the middle of the trench, where he took a hold of the shocktrooper’s collar and threw him to the ground as the others looked on in horror at what they’d just seen.

Aiden retracted the knife and lifted his eyes to the shocktroopers who were confused as to where to look. The four men in Aiden’s squad had penetrated different parts of the trench. Screams of pain and agony filled the air from all directions. His eyes flashed as his body became a blur of movement. The shocktrooper closest to Aiden realized Aiden’s movements too late, just as the combat knife found it’s way in the middle of his face. Aiden pushed his body aside and slammed the knife into the next man’s chest. The man screamed and held out his arms as if to say ‘why me!?’ The next shocktrooper pulled out a small knife of his own, only half the size of Aiden’s and got into a position to fight. Aiden started to chuckle as Joker walked up behind the man and slit his throat with ease.

“Wow, for smart Imperials, these fuckers are really dumb,” Joker toyed with what the Imperial Remnant broadcast every morning, telling the Marines that they should join the Imperials because Imperials are ‘superior to all others.’ The Marines shoved the words right back into the Imperial’s mouths.

“Fucking right. We gotta keep moving, over the side.” Aiden rolled over the side just as he had done before and began running for the next trench. Joker followed closely with Eagle and Grubber close on his heels. Mike and the rest of the battalion jumped over the first trench and continued running. The next trench, as Aiden neared it, was filled with regular Stormtroopers. They looked out and cocked their heads at the approaching Marines. They had never seen such a mass of lightly armored infantry charging a battle line. Their confusion cost them dearly, for Aiden and his squad were in the trench tearing them apart before they realized they were actually under attack.

Aiden had reloaded his MR-1 fired all eight rounds within five seconds of reloading. The Stormtroopers panicked and didn’t put up much of a fight. The rest of the battalion jumped in and massacred the rest as they had done with the first trench. Aiden’s legs ached and his breath came in short, heavy gasps. When the battalion had bunkered down inside the trench, Aiden raised his head above the side to see the next trench at the base of the hill. The trench was filled with both shock and Stormtroopers. It was heavily guarded and the Marines wouldn’t be able to use it as cover from the hill because the hill overlooked the trench. He pressed his tongue to the back of his top-right k-nine tooth and sucked on it for a split second, making a suction noise with his mouth. Mike looked at him.

“What do you see?” Aiden looked down at Mike and shook his head.

“Next trench is completely full and has both regulars and shocktroopers in it. We can’t use it as cover once we take it because the hill overlooks it and the hill’s swarming with the fuckers.”

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“Then we take both with one assault. The Fifth just radioed in, they’ve taken the gardens and are on our left flank. They can assault the hill from the left side and we can take the front.” Mike showed Aiden what he meant by taking a stick and drawing in the mud floor of the trench. Aiden nodded in agreement.

“Tell the Second to put all the fire they can on the hill.”

“Already did.” As soon as Mike said this, a shrieking sound pierced the air followed by loud bangs and krumps. Aiden looked over the side to see the hill engulfed in flames. The men manning the trench at it’s base turned around to watch the show or ducked down. If the Marines were going to attack, now would be the best time. Without telling Mike, Aiden lifted himself over the side of the trench and sprinted toward the last trench. Joker, Eagle, and Snake followed. Grubber lagged behind with the rest of the battalion. Mike swore and got the battalion moving forward behind Aiden as he radioed to the 5th Battalion to tell them to start the assault on the left side of the hill.

The artillery barrage from the orbiting ships was still alive and kicking when Aiden stood at the edge of the enemy trench. A fragmentation grenade could be found in both of Aiden’s hands. He threw them both into the trench, one to the left about ten feet and on to the right about ten feet. As he jumped into the trench, the grenades exploded, causing mass havoc and confusion among the Imperial soldiers. Aiden twisted his body around, fully loaded MR-1 shouldered and ready. He pulled the trigger eight times, sending all eight rounds into the horrified soldiers. Joker jumped into the trench to the right of Aiden about twenty feet down. Two combat knives, one of them belonging to his buddy Senator, who was killed in the first day of arriving on the surface, flashed in his hands. The soldiers around him screamed as their bodies were ripped apart by the deadly blades.

Eagle reached the edge of the trench just as the shocktroopers were raising their weapons to fire upon him. The grass underneath his boots was wet, and he accidently slipped which slid him down into the trench just as the troopers fired a volley. Eagle fired his MR-1 as fast as he could into his attackers. A simple mistake had saved his life. Aiden shook his head in amazement. As Eagle lifted himself up to continue the assault on the trench, a blaster bolt flew through the air and smacked into the side of his head. No sound exited Eagle’s lips; he just fell to his knees and then slumped over to the ground. Aiden felt pure rage bubbling up inside of him. He unleashed a relentless assault on the nearest shocktrooper he could find. The assault lasted until the rest of the battalion caught up with Aiden and cleared out the rest of the trench. Aiden lifted himself off of the trooper’s body, covered in blood, to find a battered battalion staring at him blankly.

Joker and Grubber walked up to Aiden and stood behind him as Mike got the battalion into motion to head up the hill. Aiden wasn’t going first this time. I’ve done my part, let them do theirs… He watched as Mike and about eight-hundred Marines due to being dwindled down from the shipyard and five days of fighting in trench warfare. Aiden looked at the hill. The hill itself sat on a raised platform, causing it to look like a natural pyramid. Just as Mike and the first platoon, Aiden recognized them from Charlie Company, blaster bolts exploded from all directions. “Shit…” Aiden whispered underneath his breath and started running up the hill. As he cleared the first platform part, he saw a scene of destruction to that he had never seen. The entire battalion of Marines were dug into craters left from the artillery barrage and the Imperials were right on top of them. If the Marines in the holes weren’t completely wiped out, then the Imperials were. Aiden ran in trying to find Mike’s hole, only to find him underneath a small ridge with a team of Marines who were taking out targets moving down a trial.

Aiden got to him and turned around to see if Joker and Grubber had followed. They were about ten feet away when an E-web opened up from the ridge above Aiden. The blaster bolts tore both Marines to shreds. Aiden looked away as the last of his squad was killed. His entire squad, all twelve men, had been killed to take this rock for a dying order. There’s no way he’d be staying with the Sith Armada after this. Wait... Where the hell is Snake?. Aiden began looking around the battlefield from his position looking for the last man in his squad.

Mike looked over at Aiden and knew what he was going through. Mike had lost numerous squads under his direct command before. It wasn’t anything they could help, they were one and the same. “Aiden, we’re taking a small team up this trail to flank a repeater section that’s got the Fifth pinned. I think the First can handle things here.” Aiden nodded and sighed. His took off his steel helmet for the first time since they’d come to Kuat. He ran a hand over his short, military cut hair and felt large beads of sweat come off of his head with his hand. The sweat went to his trousers as he wiped his hand on them and replaced the steel helmet atop his head. I’ll have to find Snake later.

After another group of Stormtroopers were cut down by the small five man team, Mike leapt up onto the trail and rolled into a crater as troopers turned to fire at him. As he drew all the fire, Aiden leapt up with the three other Marines and began picking off the assailants. Aiden’s last slug slammed into a stormtrooper right between the eyes. The entire head exploded in a mass of red mush.

Mike rolled out of the crater and the five Marines made their way as best they could towards the other side of the hill where the 5th Battalion was pinned. Aiden jumped down into a natural trench where a jutted ridge protruded upwards about five feet on his right and a steep, almost ninety degree part of the hill protruded on his left. He raised his MR-1 and slowly stalked through the trench. Mike jumped in behind but made his way to Aiden’s side. The other three Marines jumped in. One covered above the team while the other two covered the rear. They came to a bend in the trench, Aiden started moving out to peep it out.

Aiden moved out of the cover of the corner into a straight away that housed about twenty shocktroopers with E-Web heavy repeaters. Aiden emptied his clip into the crowd, killing seven shocktroopers before a few of them turned with rifles raised. Aiden dove back into the cover of the cover as blaster bolts slammed into the rocky wall on the team’s right. Dust and rocks flew outwards about two feet with every connecting bolt. Mike leaned out and emptied his own clip from his MR-1. Aiden got to his feet and took out his last fragmentation grenade. He pulled the pin and chucked it around the corner without looking. He didn’t need to look- he knew it would land somewhere in the trench and that’s all he wanted. The distinct BOOM of a close grenade explosion followed by screams of pain told the Marines is had hit the mark.

As Aiden reloaded his MR-1 and got into position to run out again to fire the new clip off at the remaining shocktroopers, a thermal detonator rolled into view and stopped right in front of Aiden. Aiden looked down at it and had thoughts to kick it. Before he could, Mike had pushed him to the ground and laid his body over the detonator. The explosion tore all of Mike’s limps apart and created a gaping hole in his midsection. A piece of shrapnel escaped Mike’s barrier and sliced up Aiden’s face from the left side of his chin over part of the left side of his lips, up his cheek and over his eye, finally stopping at the forehead. Aiden covered his face with both hands and screamed in pain, arching his back and pushing with his feet to get away from the corner. The Marine closest to Aiden knelt down and tried to calm him down while the other two ran to the corner and finished off the shocktroopers there. Five minutes later the first elements of the 5th Battalion ran over the top and into the trench.

Aiden calmed down and spoke to the Marine who knelt over him quietly. “Grab my helmet, you got it? Take off the helmet cover.” The Marine did as Aiden asked and held the helmet, now solid olive drab without the camouflage cover, and the helmet cover in the other hand. “Drop the helmet and wrap the cover around the cut.” The Marine nodded and got to work, lifting Aiden’s head and wrapping the helmet cover around Aiden’s wound. The Marine tied it in the back as a finishing touch. Aiden opened his right eye with difficulty and looked around, half blind. He’d regain the use of his left eye once he got in a bacta bath. The Marine helped him up and Aiden finally got a good look at the Marine- it was Snake. Aiden didn’t mention that he hadn’t realized it was him, just nodded and turned around.

What was left of Mike’s body lay smoldering from the thermal detonator explosion. Aiden sighed and shook his head. “He took a fucking ‘nade for me.” Aiden’s voice trailed off. Snake placed a hand on Aiden’s shoulder and looked at the smoldering corpse. Aiden turned around and started walking away, he would take command of the Marines and leave the Sith behind. He had to for their very survival. They would change their name- they’d still be Marines, and always will be, but they would go by a name no one but them knew.

BATTLE OVERVIEW

1st Battalion: After helping the 3rd Battalion with the Plain Battles, the 1st Battalion made an assault on what they called “Bloody Nose Ridge.” The total casualty list numbers 243 killed and 355 wounded. The 1st Battalion is credited with killing over 2,000 enemy soldiers, not counting the thousands on the shipyard that were killed when they destroyed it.

2nd Battalion: The battalion was able to capture six Imperial-class Star Destroyers but had to destroy twenty or so. The battalion’s casualty list numbers 160 killed, 467 wounded. The battalion is credited with over 5,000 enemy soldiers killed.

3rd Battalion: The battalion had a tough assignment from the start- assaulting and holding most of the plains against entrenched enemies. They did so with courage and valor, but took heavy losses by the battles end. The casualty list numbers 423 killed, 430 wounded. Many of the wounded continued on to fight throughout the battle, knowing that the battalion would cease to exist if they didn’t. The battalion is credited with over 3,000 enemy soldiers killed.

4th Battalion: The battalion was finally able to capture the rest of the casino with minimum casualties. The battalion lost 90 killed, and 200 wounded. They’re credited with just under 1,000 enemy soldiers killed and another 2,000 captured, they were the only battalion to take prisoners during the battle.

5th Battalion: After taking the ground at the Gardens of Tralala, the battalion helped the 1st Battalion assault Bloody Nose Ridge. By the battle’s end, the 5th Battalion had lost 211 killed, 340 wounded. They’re credited with over 2,500 enemy soldiers killed.

6th Battalion: The battalion held firm at the Nebula Orchid. Despite heavy enemy assaults they held the ground and came away victorious. The battalion lost 534 killed, 90 wounded. The strange incline in killed over wounded is due to that every Marine who was wounded in the Orchid continued to fight, most didn’t make it to see the battle’s end. The battalion is credited with over 6,000 enemy soldiers killed.

Kuat: The Imperial Remnant, beaten and tired, was forced to surrender to the Sith Armada, of which three Infantry Regiments and three Droid Regiments came in after the Marines. The Marines left the planet and headed back to Yaga Minor where they had replacements and an extra battalion waiting. Kuat was now in Sith hands.

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