X-Com's Finest (An X-Com 2 play through)

Operation Steaming Serpent

Zalewski looked over Central's shoulder but was stopped again. "Well, you managed to take out one of the squad's members. Congratulations. You just volunteered to take her place."

Pritchett leaned on two of her comrades as she limped out of the room, a dark scorch mark on her ankle...

***

OPERATION STEAMING SERPENT
Zalewski – Cpl Combat Hacker
Van Dyke – Cpl Combat Ranger
Watt – Squaddie Grenadier
Svangerko – Squaddie Ranger

The Skyranger rumbled along, the team of four huddled in the back. Svangerko sat near the front, looking aimlessly at the far wall before turning to the rest, "Which one of you boys brought the meds?"

Van Dyke looked around and brushed the question off, "Whatever."

Watt just shook his head and looked down at his grenades.

Everyone looked at Zalewski who had been fiddling with a loose screw on Bastion. It took a minute or so before he looked up and saw everyone staring at him. He looked around for a second before looking back, "What?"

"Meds – you brought them right?"

Zalewski just stared back.

Svangerko burst out, "You've got to be kidding me! WHY do we even bring him along? He and that maniacal droid are going to get us killed!"

Zalewski was about to defend himself when Van Dyke butted in, "Wait a second, wait a second. It's really not that bad of a situation. I've got an idea..."

He got the attention from all of them before responding, "Don't get shot."

The daggers of irritation from Svangerko were music to his ears, and he sat back and smiled.

***

Svangerko looked over the side of the plateau she was on, looking down on the two unsuspecting aliens. One was the run of the mill grunts, while the other looked to be some snake commander the previous squad had been talking about. She guessed they weren't making it all up after all. She quickly glanced behind and down below her to see a thumbs up.

They were ready.

Svangerko pulled the pin, counted to three, and lobbed the grenade between the two aliens patrolling below her. The explosion killed the grunt immediately. The snake-man rushed for cover thinking the attack was coming from behind him – and ran straight into the ambush that had been prepared for it. Watt filled it with enough holes you could actually SEE through the thing when he was done.

Van Dyke peeked around the corner and noted only the smoking remains of the snake-man and a blasted crater from the grenade. "Nice work, let's go find the rest."

The squad decided to take the far side of the train first. You really don't want to run into an ambush if you can help it. They slowly inched their way around the side, noting the placement of the cargo when a guard jumped out from cover inside the train and dove for cover behind some unloaded boxes on this side of the train. Van Dyke looked over at Svangerko who was sitting right beside him, "Think they were trying to lighten the load so they could push it?" Svangerko just rolled her eyes.

Watt quickly assessed the situation, "I got this..." Quickly pulling out his grenade launcher, he carefully launched a grenade at the guard. It stunned the guard there, but more importantly, destroyed his cover. Van Dyke quickly pulled out his assault rifle and finished it off.

The action attracted the attention of two more guards inside the train car. One immediately spotted Svangerko and decided she was its target of choice, running right to the other side of the boxes she was taking cover behind. The other stayed inside the train car, waiting for an opportunity. Watt, enjoying the feeling of his machine gun – ripped through the guard hunting Svangerko. But these guards were made of sterner stuff. His shots sent it bleeding and panting up against the boxes. Zalewski had been watching the action from one of the open train cars. Upon seeing the opportunity, he whispered to Bastion, "Now's your time Bastion, go get him!"

Bastion with its newfound ability to actually CONTROL its electrical charge buzzed off across the battlefield. Upon encountering the bleeding and panting alien, it charged right at it, but reversed its commands for electrical charge on and off. The wounded alien batted away the GREMLIN once, then twice as the GREMLIN tries to electrocute the alien. Finally, the alien had enough and pounded Bastion with the butt of its gun. This was enough to reverse the commands again, and Bastion ran straight into the alien, giving it an extremely nasty shock. The alien's body couldn't cope, and jolted to the ground.

The alien in the train car moved out finding a nice angle on Svangerko and fired, hitting her in the upper leg. Svangerko curses, "Come ON! There are THREE OTHER PEOPLE TO SHOOT AT HERE!". With a forced effort, she jumps out from her position, and dives into the open train car where she dives to the ground, surveying the damage to her leg. Watt, on his path of destruction, gave her cover unloading on the alien making it look much like its comrade.

The alien, realizing its tenable position, dashed to some better cover away from the rampaging Watt. Unfortunately for it, the alien sat right below where Svangerko had decided to take cover in the train car. She peeked out and sees the alien paying no attention to her. It was time for some payback. A shotgun blast to the head made her feel slightly better. The alien might have gotten her, but she'll heal. This alien? Not so much.

Svangerko took rear duty, and as Van Dyke passed her he chided her, "I see you didn't take my advice... You just had to go out and get hit didn't you. Tsk, tsk. REAL rangers don't get shot." He winked and kept moving. The lying, cheating ranger would get his one day. She'd see to it....

Another trio of aliens had been hiding in a train car towards the back of the train. One dashed out to the side of the train. Svangerko just had hate emanating from her and blasted it with her shotgun. It slumped down leaving a streak against the otherwise pristine boxcar. This left two left. There was a chance they could end this quickly.

Zalewski and Van Dyke rushed the car taking cover on one side. Zalewski fired first with an easy shot against the alien trying to take cover straight across from him. Bastion tried to help by bumping Zalewski that caused the shot to go wide. Zalewski grimaced. Van Dyke groaned and quickly assessed the situation. He took aim and quickly took the same alien out, leaving one alien left. This particular alien was a peace-keeper. They had seen these guys before, normally in more heavily populated areas when VIPs were around. They weren't exactly uncommon, but seeing one on a train in the middle of nowhere was a bit odd. Seeing one up close was unsettling.

The alien, however, had no reason to go after the two easy targets right in front of him. Instead, it jumped over both of their heads and sprinted right towards Watt, who was crouched behind a tree, prepping his next round of heavy machine gun bursts. Apparently the alien figured the only he was going to live is if Watt went down first, and pulled out his stun rod and jabbed it right into Watt's chest. Watt went down. Hard.

Svangerko still wasn't amused. With a grim attitude and wishing it was Van Dyke, she unloaded once again taking all her aggression out on the poor alien in front of her. She put it on the ground with a single shot from her shotgun. When nothing else fired at her, she limped over to Watt to verify he was ok. He wasn't ok, but he would live. A thorough search of the area verified no further life signs, so they called in the Skyranger.

The cargo was ready to load.

***

The trip back to the Avenger was quiet. Van Dyke was smart and didn't say anything as Svangerko jerked in pain with every jolt of turbulence. Her leg was messed up and she knew it. Watt just sat with his eyes closed the entire way back. He'd said very little but they all knew his innards were scrambled eggs from that bout with the jolting stick.

They were both taken to Med Bay to join Gunner Van Dyke and Campbell, but these two would take several weeks before they saw action again. Apparently having a med-kit around would have made a huge difference. It was a lesson painfully learned. Regardless, they were both promoted – Svangerko was promoted to Cpl – Stealth Ranger. Command figured it'd help her to prevent getting hit next time around. She'd be even less amused about it if she weren't in pain. Watt was promoted to Corporal as well. He was given his nice new armor that minimized blast damage. Watt wasn't amused either. He'd be forced to be the target in explosive situations.

Regardless, it'd be awhile before either of them got to play with their new toys. But that is another day.