USCMRPG

The chaos of the stampede was truly shocking. Bodies and objects were tossed aside or crunched underfoot. More then one bone was broken under the heavy feet or due to the thrust of the armored beasts. Human shouts and screams were muffled by the baying of the great beasts.

Staff Sergeant Morse opened fire with the mounted turret of the buggy. The height advantage allowed him to fire downward with minimal risk of friendly fire. He spotted one of the leading rhinos charging directly at the hospital tent where the medics were attempting to move the incapacitated and sick. Beading in on its head, Morse opened up. The chatter of the machine gun overwhelmed the great baying in his ears, and he felt the pressure of the recoil absorbed by his shoulders. The rhino’s head was shredded by the deadly gunfire and it toppled only meters from the hospital tent. Swiveling the turret, he blasted a second beast that was headed in his direction. Two people hopped in the front seats of the buggy and he felt the engine start. (Roll success)

Hall, Perez, Barayev, and three others piled into the first APC. The engines powered up and it stirred from where it had sunk into the soft ground. It turned 90 degrees to the right and began to move in the direction of the hospital tent. Samantha Hall was still hanging out of the door, ready to jump into action.

Paulson shook and rattled as the tank gun opened fire. After the initial shock, he opened his eyes and saw the external MG turret under his face. He dropped into the man-shaped slot and put on the noise reducing earmuffs that were attached to the gun with a steel cord. He interfaced with the gun controls and opened fire, but by then it was nearly pointless. Quinn was no rookie with the tank gun, and it was not a toy. The rounds went flying downrange into the thick of the herd, which was just entering the camp. He didn’t dare fire directly into the camp itself. The 115-millimeter shells turned the rhinos into fountains of gore as they hit their mark again and again. One, two, three, six, ten, fifteen rhinos were eviscerated, leaving only pools of purple gore where they were struck. While this was happening, Isabel Orozco was strapping into the driver’s seat a couple feet from Quinn. She started the massive vehicle rolling forward to protect the APCs and the wounded. A particularly large beast was running by, straight for the wounded. The tank struck it at 30 miles an hour and the massive herbivore was crunched underneath the treads. (Several successful rolls)

As the last of the wounded were being piled into the APCs, the ground began to shake like an earthquake. Marines grabbed whatever they could to remain upright. It was at this point that they realized the nature of the stampede. These massive herbivores were not attacking Camp Sierra, they were running for dear life. A truly enormous lizard burst from the east woods, toppling and splintering the trees in its way. Blood was spattered on its mouth, which hung open in a hungry, bestial look. It was at least 20 meters long, not including the tail. Without a second’s hesitation, it charged straight into the camp. An unlucky seaman was caught underfoot and made an audible crunch as his frail body was shattered. The pretty Lieutenant Allison Davenport was the first morsel it saw, and it snapped her up in a heartbeat. Her scream died away as they saw her flailing legs disappear down its massive gullet.
(Actions)

Quinn’s face was one of fierce concentration, his ice-blue eyes blazing with determination as he fired shell after high explosive shell into the herd. The shots weren’t so much as placed as fired with thought given to the kill/casualty radius of the ordnance. He kept firing until the shell carousel in the tank was empty, the computer beeping as it asked for the selection of the next twenty shells of ammunition. A bright green HI-EX and APHE was glowing on the monitor. He felt the tank move forward and ram another animal, the creature being ground under the tracks with a squeal of pain.

Sixtus saw the megafauna emerge from the jungle and dart forward. A creature that large should not be able to move that fast, but it did. It stomped an unlucky navy rating, and ate the Lieutenant. Quinn slapped the screen to reload the carousel, and a stack of twenty Armor-Piercing High Explosive shells filled the mechanism. The medic turned tank gunner settled the gun’s targeter on the dinosaur, and pulled the trigger.

The Armor-Piercing High Explosive shell functioned in a similar fashion to the smaller version of the sniper rifle round. The remarkable difference was the level of penetration and the amount of explosive filler. Where the sniper round was measured in milligrams, the larger shell had approximately three hundred grams of modern high explosive filler, set to detonate... after penetrating the target.

[[Roll Ground Vehicle Weaponry: Expert]]

Samantha had been helping others pile into the APC when she suddenly found herself being bodily flung into the vehicle a few moments before the armored vehicle started up and after bouncing back and across a couple of seats, she took a look at the Marine who tossed her in and saw SGT's stripes and a vaguely familiar face....Perez? was it? she wondered....

"Hey Sarge, the next time you wanna sweep a girl off her feet...try poetry or someting okay mon?", she joked, as she quickly got back into a position near the door to help out with getting more Marines onboard. Then the APC was rolling and she saw the herd of.....whatevers....getting annihilated by high-velocity tank shells and machine-gun fire....and THEN she saw the sight of the massive reptile.....

"What in de BLUE HELL mon?", she asked nobody in particular as she hung half out the open door. Yelling back into the APC, she called out, "SOMEBODY GET ON DE CANNONS AND LIGHT THAT LIZARD UP!"


<Tag Perez>
<Tag any/all in the APC>

Cursing a blue streak under his breath (in Russian and damning the giant lizard's offspring to the 99th generation), Dmitri aimed for the fucker's eyes, firing off several bursts. If the bullets blinded it, fine. That might make it stop long enough for the bigger guns to lock on and take it out. If the bullets shredded that damned thing's brains and dropped it in its tracks, even better.

[[ROLL: Rifle}}

The predatory creature that emerged was like nothing Morse had ever seen before. He had witnessed the Xenomorph Queens in action, they too were large lumbering monsters. But the Xenomorphs were thin, insect like, with a hard outer shell for skin, but not like this. This beast was muscular and more massive. What was more was that it was freely moving through the open, where the Xenomorphs hid in the dark and waited for pray to come into a dangerous trap. And though the creature did not give him an innate shrinking feeling that Xenos did, with the an alien morphology so hard to comprehend the mind denied it, it did give him a different thought.

'We may actually die here.'

It was not a thought Morse had not had before, but it was a point he had not fully comprehended since they landed on the planet. Prior to that it was small isolated attacks from smaller animals, easily managed by machine guns. This thing was so immense and had herded its pray right into their camp and rendered it useless.

What was worst was that none of it appeared intentional. They were almost like ants compared to mongoose. Though their society, organization and intellect far exceeded these beasts, the sheer size and hunger they had was more then enough to completely overwhelm them, which it demonstrated by destroying two of their number in as many seconds.

Morse was glad that someone had hopped on the buggy, and though he did not see who, he gave commands none the less.

"BRING US FORWARD n' ROUND! GO! GO! GO!" Morse roared, feeling the buggy twist and grind on the uneven terrain.

Through the gunfire Morse gave an order through the microphone and screamed it so as many could hear over the violence.

"MOUNT UP OR GET CLEAR!" Morse demanded of any who could hear him. "PUT FIRE ON THAT FUCKIN" ZILLA!"

Morse, being the ever willing practitioner of his own preaching, spun the turret to face the creature. Aiming towards its throat and eyes he laid down a consistent series of bursts at the monster, unsure of the effect.

<Roll Machine Gun - G
<Tag Anyone

It was only the steel frame surrounding his torso that kept Mark from being face-down in the muddy dirt. It had all happened so fast there hadn't been much time for anything else. As the last of the stampeding beasts had seemed to pass, Mark keyed in the activation sequence into the keypad conveniently located on the handgrip. After bypassing a half-dozen warnings related to "unit not upright", he finally managed to get the system online and responding. It had been months, if not years since he'd last been called upon to use a powerlifter but the basics were thankfully exceedingly simple. Try to move, and the anthropomorphic suit would move with you. With slow, careful movements Mark got to his feet, just in time for a whole new set of stability warning alarms to go off.

It took Mark a minute to realize it wasn't him or damage to the suit causing it. The ground was actually shaking like a small, repetitive earthquake. He looked around as best he could without moving the suit and spotted the creature as it broke into the clearing around the camp. The marine's eyes went wide. This planet was giving him a whole new definition of megafauna.

Struggling with his footing in the machine, Mark tried to reposition himself near the greater transmitter assembly, all while keeping an eye on the rampaging monstrosity. He saw the tank's cannon wheel around to target the creature and hoped it would be enough. There was a time he would have been confident in the weapon's killing power, but if the years with the Eights had taught him anything, it was the alien life could be incomprehensibly resilient.

He steadied himself and the lifter rig. If the creature didn't stop, he would have to make a run for it and he wasn't leaving that transmitter behind to be smashed.

Having noticed that the APC she was headed toward had finished loading up what wounded it could, she stood nearby it, taking aim at the large hulking lizard, making sure to take close aim before she sent out a spray of bullets from her rifle in the creature's direction, aiming for the creature's front side.

<Roll: Rifle>

Murmuring a few curses in Ukrainian at the thing under her breath, she then sets back toward the APC nearest her, hoping to at least get a bit of cover if she doesn't manage to fit in.