Nova Wars

Awards may be declined to be worn by a service member at the service member's own discretion. However, the service member may wear no awards earned during the posting during which the service member earned that award. Only certification and school badges may be warn in such cases. - Confederate Armed Services Telkan Award Presentation, TMR 3329

Gunnery Sergeant Zolpad of the Telkan Marine Corps was considered by many a Marine's Marine.

Sixty-three years in service just to start. Combat awards fighting against those who pushed against the Confederacy's borders in some of the most backwater and worst postings the Confederate Armed Services had to offer.

He even had a five year tour of the Clownface Interdiction Station Line.

He had fought everywhere. Jungles, forest, blasted moonscapes, outer space, shipboard, tundra, ice worlds, everywhere and anywhere.

His career packet showed nothing but valor and dedicated service. He was known as a Marine who volunteered to go where he was needed. A Marine with ice in his veins.

He had even faced down Terran Phasic Shades and lived to tell the tale.

There was, however, a little part of his record.

It was in the beginning.

Two years after he graduated from Advanced Individual Training as a Marine Power Armor Combat Specialist. Three months after earning his Advanced Rifleman Badge. A month after he rotated to a new unit. His second unit in as many years.

It had been a prime posting.

First Telkan Marine Division.

That's where the records ended.

They picked up eleven years later.

Drop pod certification. Heavy weapons certification. Telkan Marine Force Recon qualification. EVA Combat Badge with four awards. Zero-G combat badge with 8 awards. Stellar Boarding Operations: 22 awards. Urban Combat Badge 32 awards.

No date. No place. No award letters. Just the same code after each school, qualification, certification, or assignment.

Over and over.

The first thing that was able to be referenced by a Division Commander or lower was his assignment to the 1145th Marine Rifle Battalion stationed out past the Treana'ad Hive Zone.

His record picked up with awards for valor. This time with certification and award letters easy to look up and read.

A sharp eyed commander would have noted that after the redacted section, where he was reduced in rank from Staff Sergeant to Lance Corporal, Marine Zolpad seemed to draw some of the most brutal, out of the way, hardship postings known to the Confederate Armed Services.

He had even fought a six month campaign against a rogue Dark Elf noble.

But the award for valor.

Only awards for time in service, attending schools (Professional NCO Development Ribbon: 5 awards), and certifications.

A few officers had noted his date of entry. That he had entered on Telkan-2.

Then the dates of the redaction.

Starting two months prior to the Telkan Civil War.

Ending six months after the war was officially over.

Gunny Zolpad reappeared signing in at Empty Carton Station, Treana'ad Hive Zone as a mere Lance Corporal.

Even his medical records were redacted.

They showed the medical treatment he had received. They showed the injury in clinical terms but never how the injury was received.

Never where the injury was received. Never where it was treated. Never any unit or physician attached.

There were no physician notes. No nurse's annotations.

Just cold, clinical data.

A few of his officers had noted that.

Noted that he wore no ribbons, no awards, from those years.

One sharp eyed Sergeant Major had noted that Gunny Zolpad, then Sergeant Zolpad, did not even wear his service chevrons for those years.

A few officers and senior non-commissioned officers had pressured Marine Zolpad about those awards.

He merely went to attention, staring above the questioners head, staying completely silent.

General Trucker and others like him would have understood.

He didn't know them well enough to talk about those years.

But Gunny Zolpad was a Marine's Marine.

He had a thousand stories. From getting caught with a neo-raccoon in his ruck while climbing a cell tower to the time he had held onto the landing strut of an enemy striker even as he had gutted it with his chainsword, realizing too late he was damn near past the limit of the Icarus System.

Just his silent presence could stiffen the men's backs.

Which is why he stood nearest to the back deck so that when it dropped down into the loading ramp he was first off the boat, the first targeted, and the first boot on the ground.

The heavy dropship shuddered as it banked hard and everyone's stomach lurched up into their throat as the retros roared, pasting the landing with heavy radiation from the thrusters.

"We don't know where we are. We don't know what we're going to do. We barely know who we are," Gunny Zolpad called out over the linkage when the dropship's engines reached a screaming pitch. "We only know who the enemy is but we don't know how many of them there are."

"ALL WE KNOW IS WE MUST KILL!" his Telkan Marines roared back.

The back deck slammed down and Gunny Zolpad stepped out into the thick mist that had been present in a blast driven crater the last time he had boarded one of the enemy ships.

Again, the blast had driven past the ship's armor, leaving the edges of the crater curled up and out. There were multiple levels, debris and tangled machinery and structural members everywhere. Electricity snarled and arced, mist poured out of several breached corridors, pooling into the bottom of the crater as the enemy ship's artificial gravity did its work.

Captain Nakwel quickly portioned out his Telkan Marines with the Terrans that had come along.

Gunny Zolpad had not blinked when the CO assigned him to work with two massive Terrans in black armor that was covered in spikes and twisting, burning runes that hurt the eyes to look at for too long.

"Brother Zolpad," one rumbled over his speakers and the comlink, nodding. "You are known to us."

The other just stared, then nodded slowly.

Two of the other Telkan ran up. Both riflemen clad in the gray spiked Helreginn Mark VI Type IX Anti-Mar-gite Full Contact Powered Combat Personal Protective Equipment Systems, AKA Hell Suits.

"You know these guys, Gunny?" PFC Gel.prek asked.

"I know of them," Gunny Zolpad said. He flashed an emoji for silence. "Keep it zipped."

"Objective loaded. Recon in force," one of the Terrans said.

Gunny Zolpad and the two others followed as the big black armored Terrans clanked toward a breach in the crater wall that exposed a corridor.

"Fingers on the triggers, boys. Keep your smart-trigger set, make sure your friendly profiles are loaded," Zolpad reminded everyone.

The other Telkan just flashed icons nodding.

The two Terrans were silent.

The corridor was wide enough the Terrans could advance shoulder to shoulder, tall enough that they did not have to duck under the loops of wiring and the broken pipes hanging from the ceiling. The mist swirled around the five boarders, but high technology in the visors and sensors of the power armor all five wore cleared it away and presented a picture as clear as if they were in vacuum.

The BATTACNET icon flashed, then went red with a lightning bolt through it.

"Tactical net offline. Enemy contact imminent," one of the Terrans growled over the short range comlink. Both lifted their rifles, easily as long as Zolpad was tall, to their shoulder pauldrons, the barrel pointing down slightly.

Gunny Zolpad tensed slightly. "Fingers on the triggers," he restated, checking his smartlink and his reflex trigger.

The group advanced down the corridor, heading toward an intersection.

"Enemy contact," one of the Terrans said, their voice over the comlink heavily synthesized. The Terran stepped out into the intersection, leveling the rifle as he turned to face to the left. The other faced to the right.

Rounds whipped down the corridor, hitting the heavy armor of the Terrans and exploding in shower of sparks as lasers, plasma rounds, and crystalline rounds hit and were shrugged by thick armor. The two Terrans started shooting back. Short, controlled bursts even as they took a single step forward, parting the way for the three Telkan.

"Advance under fire, brothers," one of the Terrans said.

The rate and intensity of fire was slacking as Gunny Zolpad ran through the gap, between the massive forms of the Terran. His battlescreen snarled as rounds impacted it from both sides, but he made it across the corridor. The two other Telkan with him sprinted across, Private Nelmaken stumbling slightly as an armored hand interposed itself between him and an oncoming round that exploded against the thick armored gauntlet, doing no damage to it.

Zolpad saw it, somehow, he wasn't sure how. It was a flicker, a twisting slightly of the air, or maybe his perceptions of the air.

"CONTACT!" he bellowed out, lifting his magac rifle and firing. Both privates glanced at him like he was crazy until the rounds hit something in midair, exploding and snapping, some rounds bouncing off to explode against the wall.

Tentacles around a conical body appeared, the lights a baleful green as blades slid in and out of housings on the tentacles, as graspers clacked open and shut, and built in weapons started firing short, sharp variable frequency laser pulses.

The shooting behind him ended and he could hear the Terrans moving up as he kept his fire on the one in the center. The privates got their weapons inline, firing, the reflex triggers aiming and firing as soon as their visor picked up the enemy squids. The rounds started hammering home, hitting a shield only inches from their tentacles and body, exploding in sparks as the squids spun in place, whipping their tentacles around to take the rounds on the shielding.

Tentacles started exploding, the main conical bodies of the squids started jerking and shuddering as rounds slammed through the shielding to hit the biomechanical squids directly. The two Terrans were firing over the Telkan's heads, their large heavy rifles hammering the squids apart with .70 caliber rounds. The squids, which were twirling to take the blows, flew apart in a spray of technorganic material, bodily fluids, and grafted armor pieces.

"Team Charlie-Nine to Operations, we are advancing into the enemy toward the objective," one of the Terrans said out loud even as they spoke across the command channel whose icon was flashing with a lightning bolt through the icon.

The corridor seemed to fill with snow that the visor couldn't clear. Visibility was dropping as the static and snow got thicker.

"Enemy counter-measures detected. Going to visual light range," Gunny Zolpad said.

"Affirmative," the two Terrans said at the same time.

The two Terrans moved ahead of the Telkans, moving in a slow steady marching further into the ship. Three times the Terrans fired. Three times the group passed squids shattered at the middle cone. At a corner the two Terrans paused. One looked down at Gunny Zolpad.

"We will draw enemy fire. You will stay behind us as we advance into the enemy. If the enemy possesses heavy weapons, you will take cover against the right hand wall. Do you understand, brother?" the Terran asked.

"Roger," Gunny Zolpad said. He checked the amblok counter on his rifle.

70%.

The two Terrans stepped out into the corridor, around the corner. They were immediately firing even before they were taking fire.

Only a few shots hit their armor, exploding against the thick plating.

"Advance, brothers!" one called out.

"Engaging the enemy," the other stated in a cold synthesized voice.

Gunny Zolpad found himself rushing to keep behind the right hand Terran, who was shooting even as he was moving forward. Lasers were exploding into rainbow colored sparks, plasma rounds were detonating, and crystal shards were shattering on the Terran's armor as they advanced down the corridor, their rifles firing.

Gunny Zolpad's psych suppression system was at 83.5% and rising, even though it kept dropping by 5-6% ever explosion of weapons fire from the Terrans.

He gritted his teeth through the glitter as his psychic suppression jumped to 91%.

A long burst of what sounded like full-auto but Zolpad knew was carefully controlled bursts and his shielding dropped back down to 62%. His psychic suppression kept jumping and dropping and he knew it was because more of the enemy was joining the fight and the Terrans were killing them just as fast as they arrived.

He moved to the side of the right hand Terran, getting next to the wall. He could see the weird tentacle creatures rushing into the hallway just in time to catch a burst from one of the Terrans. He could tell the Terrans were alternating their fire, so there was a constant stream of fire into the newly arrived enemies.

The few times he went to help, his rounds smashed into an already dead creatures.

He'd always considered himself fast on the trigger, and his reflex trigger was faster than even cybernetic enhanced reflexes, but by the time his armor and the reflex trigger ID'd the enemy, the Terrans had killed it.

"Why are we even here?" Private Nelmaken bitched.

"Fire support," Zolpad answered. "Eyes peeled."

Finally, the two Terrans quit firing. The group moved forward, kicking shards of armor and pieces of the alien tentacle creatures out of the way.

Zolpad swallowed. He'd been here before.

The calm before the storm.

There was a large hexagonal door, with the blast door lowered.

"Prepare for combat, brothers," the larger Terran said. He reached forward and slammed his stiffened fingers into the armored blast door. It crumpled around his fingers like jello and he pushed them further in, the servos in his armor whirring. The blast door slowly slid open, showing The other one did the same once the door itself was exposed. As soon as the blast door on the other side of the door was exposed, the Terran drove his hands into it and began pulling it open.

The doors ripped out with a shriek.

And everything went from bad to worse.