Star Wars The Clone Wars: 242nd Siege Battalion (Hero and I)

[Broomhandle45]

Opening Crawl

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The heavy thunder of the turbo-lasers was a familiar lullaby for the month that the 242nd had been on the planet. Every single force-forsaken world was a fortress, and the CIS had time to prepare for a siege. This was their training in a nutshell, what they had lived for. Even as they landed on the harsh desert planet proper, the ray shields were seen for kilometers around. There was truly only one way to cut through ray shields like that, with either infantry or constant bombardment. Since the ray shields covered everything, and the droids had every entrance covered...there was only one thing to do.

Clone Commander Ferrus had ordered bombardment, and for the entirety of their time on the planet, that is what they did. The shifting sands of Aargonar were made claim to a bridgework of trenches, firing lines, heavy emplacements that constantly roared out their fire, and from that came droids attempting to break their defenses. Morale was stable and holding, but starting to falter. The city had heavy anti-air defenses, getting supplies in was a taxing process. And so, they waited...Ferrus had calculated every shell, every volley to be a calculated move to strain the ray shield's generator.

But finally, it would be over soon. It had to be, they had to do this or there would be nothing to make of this sorry excuse for a planet that made Ferrus wonder what was so important about it. But it didn't matter, what mattered was that they had it in Republic hands again. And now it was time to do just that. Ferrus ordered his AT-TE to the front-lines, the formations would be finally moving. Siege warfare was a long game, nothing more and nothing less. He knew that he was right, and today he would prove it.

“All bombardment units,” Ferrus murmured through his commlink, now or never. “Adjust your firing angles to sixty degrees. I want squads loaded in, circle formation. We're going to crack this wide open, establish a foothold, do not...I repeat, do NOT let those clankers through.” For one, blissful moment that had seemed like an eternity, there was a deaf silence as the massive batteries of artillery adjusted their firing position. Boots on the ground moved and shifted, the roar of engines flaring to life, desperate for activity. “PAW Units, I want direct fire support, keep those boys clear.”

Copy that, Commander. Moving into position. A quick response hissed through, and he leaned back, fitting on his helmet. He would not let his men bleed without him, not now.

“Juggernauts, you move on the bombardment, full speed. Don't stop for anything.” he hissed. Then came the all clear from the artillery teams, firing angles set. Good. He was nervous, it was...strange to feel, in a good way. He took one even breath before he closed his eyes, and opened them, his nerves steeled.

“Fire.”

The sound was almost deafening as the Juggernauts roared off across the sands, the combined mass of fire slammed into the ray shield, and it flickered. That was all it took. The salvo a half-second after that slammed into the city properly, triggering a reaction of explosions that left the entire city open like a cracked egg. The PAW's let loose a hail of mass driver fire, their slugs tearing into the droids forming at the walls to stop the advance.

There was no hesitation in the drivers of their massive machines, they were the first wave that would be coming. They were brute forcing their way into the city...and that meant exactly what it sounded like it did. Thirteen A6 Juggernaut's punched through the walls of the city like paper.

 

[Hero]

Boomboomboomboomboomboomboomboom

The sound of shelling could be heard even from inside the heavy carapace of a Juggernaut. Then came the heavy laser artillery, the eerie wheezing noise, a rasp of oncoming death. The sound of engines that moved hundreds of tons of durasteel and weaponry was like a rancor's roar. The Juggernauts were massive, the earth quaked as the thirteen roared into life and surged toward the front of the battle lines. With ramps that opened from the front and the back, the machines would create a bridge through the walls, a place for Clones to use as entry points into the heavily fortified city, but more than that inside each and every Juggernaut shell aside from the crew were 300 clones, 300 brothers ready to unleash hate upon the waiting droid army.

There were no windows within the Juggernaut, just vibrant red running lights. As the machine burned across the desert sands and rushed to the wall as the ray shields fell the lights flicker down the row.

Alpha-87, Lt. Hero as he'd been nick named, stood so close to the front. One hand was raised, gripping tightly to a leather support strap that dangled from the ceiling. The other clutched tightly to his DC-15A rifle, it had a strap that was wrapped over his shoulder as well, but in that moment as his legs shifted for each new bump, stone and dune that was rolled under the massive tires of the Juggernaut. The lights alternated over the tops of their heads, illuminating the white armor each brother wore, making the painted Jaig eyes on Lt. Hero's helmet shimmer a dull orange.

Thirty-two seconds, that's all it took for the Juggernauts to go from start to wall. Ten...

"Brace for impact!" Lt. Hero shouted into the com-link in his helmet. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five. "Blasters ready, droid poppers out the door." Again he commanded. Four. Three. "For the Republic!"

CRUNCH

Durasteel collided with cold stone wall, it crumbled like paper under the weight of the siege engine. The red running lights over head stopped alternating and shinned solid and quickly flicked t green as the bay door on the Juggernaut opened up. There was no silence, immediately the world errupted in a hail of blaser fire, explosions and the battle cries of brothers. 13 Juggernauts pounded into the wall, 300 brothers each, the inner sanctum of the city began to flood with dirty white and dark orange plasteel armor, shouts and the familiar BWONG of EMP grenades popping off.

"GO GO GO!" Lt. Hero shouted. "GORAG SQUAD, on Captain Lucky, we have our mission!"

 

[Broomhandle45]

In one hot second of action, the world was a blur of dust and blaster fire. The tide of white and orange filled the streets as squad leaders barked orders over the hail of blaster bolts and the hiss of the EMP. The Anti-Air had to go, the other squads would secure and maintain a perimiter, secondary reinforcements would be en-route within the hour, hopefully sooner as they now had thirteen very effective doors into the city. B1 Droids came in numbers that Lucky didn't need to think about, and he didn't. The ground assault was coming heavy, but there were so many vantage points, so many clankers above them. The buildings were slammed together like a honeycomb, before they could do anything, they had to establish a vantage point. Thankfully they had all the tools they needed to reach out and touch someone.

"We're going in," Lucky ordered, his DC-17's coming out in a smooth twirl. "Boomer, you stay in the back. We're going to need you to reach out and touch a few droids. Put a breaching charge in, the rest of you," Lucky said, glancing back at them. "We clear fast and we clear clean, I want every corner looked at. Copy?"

"Copy," Smoke grunted, rifle shouldered and low. He was smoke for a reason, and the grenade launcher underneath his DC-15A was a good enough testament to that.

"On it," Stitches assured, the squad medic. The only one with the DC-15S, his back heavy with his kit. Didn't mean much, but he always liked the thing better. He was always good at running, to and from danger. Took him a while to get used to the normal ones not being able to always keep up, but they learned eventually.

 

[Hero]

The area was swamped with smoke and blaster fire. It was streaked with red and green bolts zipping through the air faster than a man could blink. Thankfully the pilots of the Juggernauts were laying down covering fire with the anti-personnel cannons and launching rockets directly ahead to clear a path. The explosions made the air smell like hot ash and molten metal.

"Copy Capt." Boomer said with a nod as his order were made clear. He carried the heaviest burden, not only was his pack weighed down but with the munitions he had stacked up he was a walking bomb. It wasn't something even a clone got used to. But some one had to carry the detonite and rockets. Troopers were charging out of the Juggernaut around Gorog Squad. CT-5309 pushed toward the front.

"Sir, permission to enter first sir! I've been itching to smoke a few clankers for all the trouble they've given us this past month." He said, Skid was what they called him. It was an apt name as well considering the amount of trouble he always seemed to steer into. The type of clone to charge first and think second, thankfully that was exactly the kind of man Gorog squad needed.

"Granted, you sweep right, I'll go left and the rest of the team will follow in behind us." Lt. Hero said intent on that formation now. The Juggernaut rocked heavily, tank fire had blown a few chunks of wall down over the top of them. "Boomer, I suggest you reach out now and make our path to that building clear!"

"Copy!" He said pulling the RPS-6 from it's clamp on his back and jumping from the Juggernaut onto the sand coated pavement below. There were a lot of things in the way, but he lined up a shot with the droid tank, just below the swivel of the cannon barrel, right at the joint. The familiar rush of the rocket rang in his ears as it fired and struck true, the tank slammed into the ground, the lip blowing right off as it set fire and erupted with bursts of blown ordinance.

"Move it troopers!" Hero commanded waving the squad on as he charged down the ramp now. With the team it was time to clear space so Boomer could blow the wall and the fun could really get started.

 

[Broomhandle45]

Lucky was off the ramp in record time, which he always was. He lead by example, his twin blaster pistols putting down B1's in a shower of sparks and metal limbs. They had to sprint to cover, which the buildings in front of them were their only salvation, and there was a block between it and the houses. Their only saving grace was the angles they had were limited, but droids had numbers and angles that they couldn't get. Clones were getting picked off by accurate fire, sending bodies sprawling from the ground as Lucky quickly glanced up, catching sight of the flash of sniper fire.

"Popping smoke!" Lucky said, holstering one of his pistols to hurl out a pair of smoke grenades. "Smoke! You see them!?"

"On it!" Smoke said, moving next to Lucky as Stitch moved with Skid and Boomer to the building. Smoke leaned out a fraction to get a visual of the blaster fire before he focused and leaned out, rifle raised high. When you were paired up with ARCs, you learned some incredible things. You had to, or you'd be dead. They expected the impossible made possible, and to that end, you'd not find a set of troopers as experienced and well trained as they were.

"Frag out!" he called, his shoulder jerking faintly from the thick twhump of his grenade launcher. It had to be a shot at least three hundred meters out, but the beauty of EMP was that he didn't need to hit, just close. It slammed solidly underneath the window of the sniper perch, and the faint explosion could be seen even over the chaos.

"Good hit," Lucky said, firing into the mass formations of droids. "Boomer, we need that charge on the door yesterday!"

 

[Hero]

Boomer's only cover was the Arc Troopers forming a perimeter around him. Placing detonite was not such a simple task as stick and click like so many people seemed to think, it was a fickle substance with a hunger for electrical current to blow sky high. But he was efficient at it, first step was the probe. A long metal rod dangled from his pack on one side. He swiped it off and jammed it roughly into the brick and mortar of the wall, getting only so deep before he had to activate the pressurized hydraulic pin inside that sank a spike through the wall. There was a tiny panel on it with incandescent lights he checked, no current. That was where to spike the detonite charge in.

Pack open and a set of breaching charges pulled out he jammed it against the wall, a laden spike on the back ensuring it wasn't going anywhere even if the adhesive didn't work as intended. Next was the part that always made him nervous even though he knew better, arming the detonator on the charge. "Demo's primed!" He called and rose from his crouched position behind the rest of his team.

"Where the fuck did Skid...!" Lt. Hero was almost livid until he caught Skid sauntering up through smoke screen Lucky popped moments earlier. "The fuck did you get that thing?!" He demanded noting that instead of his usual rifle Skid was towing a Z-60 rotary cannon against his hip.

"Brother wasn't using it, figured it could clear a room or three." Despite the helmet the smirk was damn near visible through it with that attitude.

"You asked to go first." Hero muttered before signaling to the rest of the team. "Breaching order in 2! 1! Blow it!"

Boomer triggered the blast the second everyone was ready and the order given. As Lt. Hero promised Lucky was first in the room. He stormed in and cut right, the cannon whirled to life as the rotors fired up and a hell fire of blaster bolts poured from the barrels in such rapid succession it was almost impossible to tell it wasn't just one massive beam of super heated plasma. He swept left quickly, there were several droid in the building, more were probably in the upper floors firing from windows, the ones down there were trying to cover doors and sure enough the remnants of their chassis still were covering the doors.

"Rooms clear!" Skid shouted into his com and tossed the rotary cannon onto the ground, it was spent. The downside of such a rapid fire weapon.