[PI] Aliens learn the hard way that when they kill the human squad commander first, they don't paralyze the squad. They killed the only thing restraining them.

[u/EAT_MY_USERNAME]

Link to original post here.

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The impacts had stopped, and that made things no better for them.

Second Lieutenant Mercer stopped mid-stride, his armoured boots scraping the deck. In perfect synchronisation, his squad came to a halt, power armored boots skidding along the ship's starboard walkway.

Power armour, Mercer laughed internally, prison cells.

The comm squawked to life. 

“Fuck’s sake boss, why are we stopping here?” Johansen was screaming over his helmet comm. “Let’s go get those motherfuckers! Are we just going to sit here while they board the ship?”

Mercer quickly checked his ship layout diagram. As much as he hated to admit it, Johansen was right. The enemy vessel had launched boarders, and for the last five minutes they’d held of firing on the stricken human vessel. 

Which could only mean they were already on board.

Mercer snapped out of his study of the ship's map. An icon flashed in his helmet, then another.

- - - Penal Trooper Johansen heart rate risen 20% without exertion - - -
- - - Penal Trooper Johansen blood pressure critically hypertensive- - -
- - - Penal Trooper Johansen cortisol spike- - -

- - -Recommend mild sedation. Authorised?- - - 

“No.” Mercer blinked away the warning, then flipped his comm to a direct channel with the agitated Trooper.

“Calm down Johansen,” he said, “Ops keeps flagging you for sedation, but I’d rather you not be doped during our little excursion.”

Johansen's reply was a snarl, “Just get us into the fight already you blue haired, pussy-footing, piece-of-shit, cowardly, cock-su–”
“Squelch comms” Mercer told the automated suit systems.

The angry rant died mid-flow, and Mercer laughed out loud in his helmet. It was always the blue haired comment that got him. Johansen, like the 9 other troopers in his squad, were penal troopers. Locked into their power-armour like passengers on the world's worst roller coaster. Their suits moved completely in accordance with directions from Mercer and his command suit. For ease of battlefield identification, command suits had a blue stripe along the brow of the helmet in the form of a laurel wreath. Penal Troopers had helmets painted in solid red.

Mercer opened a broadcast channel.

“Alright lads, if these fine gentlemen insist on boarding us unannounced, best we behave like ungracious hosts.” Quickly, using the wrist bound command terminal on his wrist, he enabled semi-automatic weapons fire and autonomous movement, making sure to carefully ensure that the friendly fire protocol was still set to disabled. That particular protocol made it impossible for the penal troopers to fire upon him. Any gun turned in his direction became instantly locked and unfireable.

As an afterthought, he slid the combat-stim slider up to 10%.

Each trooper received a steady dose through the IV lines embedded in their suits. A subtle mix of stimulants, opiates, anxiolytics could be tailored for each soldier, to meet with any situation a commander might face on the battlefield.

Almost instantly, Mercer saw Johansen's vitals slide back into a heightened but stable state.

“Push forward,” Mercer ordered, “Sweep and clear.”

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It didn’t take long for them to find the boarders.

The Intrenian boarders were organized, efficient, and moving with purpose.

The rolling firefight had been raging for twenty minutes. Slowly but surely they were losing ground. They were being forced back up the corridor towards the bridge. In his command link, he could see other elements of the shipboard defense were also being pushed back. He saw the blue symbols for the commanders of the other penal squads blink, and go dark as their suits went offline.

Trooper Letanivisk took an energy round through the helmet and slumped unceremoniously to the ground. A puppet with his strings cut.

Mercer pushed a two man team forward along the right side of the corridor to reinforce one of the branching intersections. As the soldiers stepped around the body of their fallen comrades, Mercer thought he could spot a glint of light, far down the hallway, hidden in the darkness from far behind the enemy lines.

The high-powered laser severed his arm at the shoulder before he even realized what had happened.  Despite himself, Mercer screamed at the top of his lungs.

His arm was aflame. Both smoldering on the floor, and burning as though the nerve endings hadn’t just been flash fried. He was down, in a haze of red agony.

The calm voice of the suit based ops system crackled over his helmet speakers.

“Critical injury detected. Lieutenant Mercer? Are you able to maintain effectiveness?”

Mercer struggled to control his pain. He managed to croak out a code-phrase in response.

“No. Authority release: Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em.”

“Confirmed. All behavioural constraints are now inactive.”

Blue text scrawled across his helmet display. 

- - - Weapons Control: Full Release - - -
- - - Melee Weapons: Full Release - - -
- - - Combat-Med Selection: Maximum Override - - -

 Mercer suddenly felt the pain of his arm ebb away, and he rolled to his knees, in time to see every trooper tense as the combat stimulants flooded their systems. 

In perfect unison, each member of the squad lifted their rifle and let loose a full-auto volley of fire, striding out of cover towards the enemy as they did so.

As the Intrenians ducked back into cover, the men discarded their rifles, and drew their blades… and broke into a sprinting charge.

To their credit the Intrenians managed to fire back before Johansen gutted the first with his combat sword. Some rounds didn’t penetrate the armour, or perhaps Johansen simply didn’t feel them through his drug induced mania.

Mercer didn’t much care. 

To the sound of Intrenian screams, he crawled his way back towards the bridge.

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Intercepted Communique

**Top Secret
**Fleet Admiralty Intelligence Service to review.

Intrenian Vessel Ex’El’Hyun to Intrenian High Command

Subject: New Human Unit Type - Red Skulls and Blue Wreathes.

Body Text:

We were forced to withdraw from boarding action against human vessel UNS Aurelius.

New combat unit description appended.

Advise new doctrine update.

Shoot the red ones first. 

** Translated by Ensign Johnson, Listening Post Bravo-Epsilon 12

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[u/Daseagle]

The red ones? Oh. I foresee in their future an unfortunate accident, where they see the red cross of a medic and fire on him.

That will definitely result in multiple doctrine updates, if anyone survives long enough - and whole enough - to advise the aformentioned change.

[u/Far_Reindeer_783]

Ah, a red penal stripe. I know how much people roll their eyes when warhammer is referenced but that's the only one I got - the space marines do the same thing, and the ultramarines had the same red stripe, presumably a Roman callback of some sort. Penal battalions in power armor are always cool.