Play@YSDC

committed hero wrote:"Hard to say, Private. I tend to doubt it, as Khe Sahn is our ground and someone would've noticed excavations nearby."

The response does nothing to put Berkowitz at ease but then, considering the circumstances, nothing probably would....

The jungle is a big place... Berkowitz grimaces.

He begins to remove the condoms from his backpack but spies Whitehouse putting his back into his own pack....

There must be a reason to keep them in... Berkowitz thinks. He follows suit.

OOC,Thanks Seon, good point concerning the multiple uses of condoms. As for the bayonets, I'm assuming they must fit the M-16's since that is the only rifle we were all issued. As such, I'll be mounting mine to save space in my pack.

James puzzles over the contents of the pack. It all looks so useful (well, most of it), and they can only take half?

He starts by removing the items that he knows he won't use anyway: candies, cigarettes, condoms, and the writing materials. Everything else seems too important to him, but of course, he's constantly thinking of worst-case scenarios.

Like being left behind in the middle of the jungle, with no can opener.

They did say they wouldn't be out long, but anything can happen, right?

OOC,Leave it to Seon...

Eric affixes his bayonet to his own M16 with practiced ease.

As the group prepare their packs, Mullins gets up and grabs two flash lights from a hook on the bomb shelter´s wall. He hands them to Berkowitz, "To keep you enlightened, private. Just don´t point it at me and we´re cool."

He exits the bunker and starts for the PX. "We have time to get some grub before we leave. No need to head out on empty stomachs."

Eric follows. "Thanks, I could do with some chow," he says.

Up in the PX, the squad gets a breakfast stew with bread and veggies. While eating the meal at the adjacent mess hall tent Kreuter gives some advice. "Forget anything you learned about kicking in a fight. If you try to land a kick, you are out of balance and your enemy can incapacitate you or kill you in twenty different ways. Never kick in a close combat situation."
He finishes his meal and offers a quick lesson in hand to hand maneuvers by Charlie Med. He tells whoever who is interested in knowing how to use their fists instead of their feet is welcome to learn a lesson.

Experience: After the training, Mullins leads the way to the hel pad - carrying only his M-16 and four mags, camo paint, a canteen and two knives sheathed in his utility belt.

The heli at the pad speeds up the engine and takes off towards the hill, heading for the first fake drop. Present on the heli are, Sarge, Whitehouse, Berkowitz, Hobbes, Beckett and Mullins. Piloting the heli is Wallace from the previous ride.

Berkowitz finished loading his pack and went with the squad for breakfast. He savored what was offered, knowing the C rations were not the most pleasant meal and that would be what he would be enjoying while on the mission...

Upon Kreuter's offer for additional training, Tobias enthusiastically accepted. The tight confines of a tunnel were a challenge for combat so the more one knew about hand-to-hand combat the better...

Hand-to-Hand Rolls?,Syrinx, will you be conducting these rolls for us or do we do them? I'm all in!

After training, Tobias boards the chopper with the rest of the squad and is again left to his thoughts under the loud droning of the rotars. He notices Mullin's gear and wonders....

Did I pack too much?

He exhales deeply and tries to contain the balance between adrenaline and fear...

Eric also attaches the camo cover to his helmet. He gladly joins the training session and learns a good deal about throwing a punch. He definitely doesn't want to try kicking after what he sees.

Hobbes popped a chewing gum into his mouth as he went through his gear again. He had taken out the sewing kit... he had no idea what the brass wanted him to do with that. Safety pin, writing paper, pencils, nail-cutters, razorblades, fuel, penknife, signal rockets, wire, foot powder, bayonet, and sunhat as well. He figures that if he really needed them, he could borrow one off of James.

He kept the cigarettes though.

He then eagerly listened to Kreuter's advices and lessons.Might as well learn how to beat people up with his hand. Although he would prefer to use a knife for that kind of thing. Isn't that why the brass issued him that big-ass machete? Now that was a knife.

Or maybe that was just for cutting through branches.

After listening to the advice, he made a mental note to never resort to kicking and walked away with Mullins

Upon seeing what the others have in their packs, James instantly regrets packing so much. Not much he can do about it now, though, and the breakfast does a little to soothe his worries.

He takes the Colonel's lesson with some reluctance, since he didn't retain much of what he learned at boot camp. At the end of it, he's mentally cursing the draft. At least he knows not to kick so much.

OOC,Looks like I should be rolling then...I'm a follower :lol:

Berkowitz thought about the impromtu lesson in hand-to-hand combat and wished he had picked up more...

However, despite learning about giving up the edge, he would have no problem using whatever he could to survive underground...

The dull beating of the rotors in the hull sounded like a heart ready to explode....

How did I end up here?

Berkowitz massaged his forehead and then rubbed his eyes, feeling a severe headache coming on...

He thought about Myra and the way she would carelessly (or intentionally?) brush up next to him in his mother's kitchen...

He started to reach for the picture in his pocket but then pulled his hand away...

He hoped this helicopter ride lasted forever...The noise producing an eerie feeling of calm upon his brain...

We could just fly on captain... Berkowitz thought as he began to feel the calming fingers of sleep begin to descend upon him...

Waiting, the ever present wait. Just another day in the Marine core.

Wallace keeps the heli just above the tree tops to avoid being spotted by half the VC present. The plotted five fake drops closed in and he alerted the squad of the first descent. Hobbes leans against the HMG mounted on the rim of the opened side of the heli.

The first down, is swift and by the looks of it goes well. Wallace navigates the helicopter in a zed-pattern towards the hill coordinates. The HMG cringes and threatens to hit Sam on the shoulder. The maneuver by the pilot brings Berkovitz back to the jungle.

A few minutes later, after having past a group of 20-30 NVA the pilot takes the air craft down in the second feint landing. He is up and away before the enemy reach the LZ... Up ahead dark clouds are building up and distant thunder can be heard. Approxamitely 3 clicks away.

Having taken a double back u-turn to throw the chance encounter off their tracks, the squad make their third successful mock-up landing. The jungle gets more dense and it´s a hard task to find a suitable descent site. The thing starts to become a routine, now. Hold on, keep steady, let go. Till the next descent. Only one more to keep their destination hidden from the enemy. The plotted route starts to look like a badly drawn star.

The hill is clearly visible due North east of their current direction. Wallace points at a dried out river bed serpenting westward. "I´ll put you down here! Then you can trekk directly east to get to the hill."

Down the heli descents. The sky leaves way to the shifting green of the Vietnam jungle.
Getting ready to exit, Beckett, Whitehouse and Sarge see that the river is really dried out. Something the closing rumbling will take care off, for sure.

Having made five successful descnets, the squad exit the heli without any mishaps.

Wallace salutes the guys by touching his shades. Then he spins off in a continued north western trajectory.

The dried out beige river bed presently has six black dots on it.

As soon as the heli starts off, Mullins darts across the river bed to take cover in the tree line.

Five dots stand out against the beige background.

Pan out and zoom out.
A lense glides across a camera on a satellite high above.

"Thời tiết xấu trong khu vực, thưa ông!" , a voice cracks in a NVA bunker.

A slight drizzle starts to fall down on the river bed. What seemed to be a nice day quickly gets a lot darker.

"Rally to Mullins - let's get under some cover before the serious rain starts up." Sarge humps his gear and follows the eager grunt towards the east tree line.

Eric wastes no time in following the sergeant to cover. "Rain, nothing, Sarge," says Eric. "Out here, we stick out like sore thumbs. Harder to see us in the trees. It'll be raining bullets if we get spotted."

Raining bullets?!

James is caught between trying to hurry after the sergeant and trying to maintain silence. It isn't helped by the load he's lugging around.

The chopper's erratic manuevers jolted Berkowitz awake but he is still groggy when he finds himself on the ground with the rain starting to fall...all the while still hot and humid...

committed hero wrote:"Rally to Mullins - let's get under some cover before the serious rain starts up." Sarge humps his gear and follows the eager grunt towards the east tree line.

Berkowitz follows suit among the chatter of his fellow grunts, all the while determined to don the rain poncho he brought in his pack once he was (seemingly) safe along the tree-line...

From the tree line, Mullins wait for the rest of the new arrivals to join up. "We´re 400 meters from the first couple of buildings. When we get there we´ve got to enter quietly. Subdue any hostiles and gather as much INTEL as possible. Then we get back. Simple as that.", Mullins says and gets one of his knives out and disappears through a wall of green.

From afar they all hear the helicopter make a turn, the sound of a .50 and several bursts of automatic fire is heard from the west. Almost directly after that the treeline is crawling with motion.

Rolls:

Berkowitz reaches the tree line and catches the mission objectives from Mullins. As Mullins disappears into the jungle foliage, Berkowitz makes to follow suit but is fumbling with his rain poncho. It is then that he hears the helicopter and gunfire in the distance....

Berkowitz freezes and takes a breath then follows into the thick brush....

OOC,Whewww! That was close! Something tells me I should have invested more into that Stealth skill because my luck is only slightly better. Oh well, got it this time. Charlie will have to pick me off later ;) As for the delay, no problem on my end Syrinx! I understand that one gets busy from time to time...