The alarms began to blare, Calvin knew what they meant. He began to run.

"All helldivers to hellpods, all helldivers to hellpods." Calvin entered the ground combat bridge, where Space Cadet Alfred Higgins and Sergeant Jacob Bynez were both also running to the command and control center. Calvin could see their leader, Death Captain Drex Owens discussing battle plans with the Ships Democracy Officer.

Once Captain Owens saw them, he stood up from leaning on the command console with the holographic projection of the planet below. He saluted the Democracy Officer, who returned his salute, and made his way up the catwalk to hellpod 1. Calvin took his position next to the captain at hellpod 2, the other two men were already stepping into the locks that held a divers feet during descent.

"I want this one by the books, just like always." Owens said.

"Yes, sir." The other three men responded."

Calvin locked his feet into the platen and it began to lower into his pod. He made his pre- launch checks. Which consisted of checking and double-checking that he had his sidearm, grenades, tactical targeting beacons, all of which he had plenty of and plenty of ammo for. He was short on stims, and he knew the other supplies were not far behind in the ships stores. They had seen a lot of combat on this deployment. Most important of all he checked on his R-63 Diligence, a sniper style rifle that was currently equipped in the standard variant, with sufficiently sized magazines and light armor piercing ammunition ready to punch through the faceplates of the evil socialist automatons one would find roaming the surface of the planet below.

Calvin heard Drex speak through the comm. "Listen up gentlemen, objective is standard smash and out, we land near the primary target, take it down, and hit smaller targets on the way to our extraction. This is routine but don't let it feel routine."

"Yes sir!" The other three responded.

No sooner had the group responded in the affirmative than Calvin felt his guts jump into his chest as the hellpod was accelerated downwards at breakneck speed. If it were not for his feet being clamped into the floor he would be smashed into the ceiling of the pod. At the edge of the roof tiny windows were now glowing red with the fire of re-entry attempting to claw it's way into the vehicle.

Static came over the comm. "Co..and has detect... cautio.. Advised."

The planet was rolling out the welcome wagon for them with an Ion storm today. Great.

Calvins' Pod began to have difficulties after hitting the cloud layer. Flashes of lightning scarred the sky, and the magnetic fields made by the storm messed with all kinds of sensitive electronics. Calvin's forehead began to sweat under his helmet. Those electronics controlled all manner of things, navigation and approach steering at the very end of the drop mainly. They also engaged the retro rockets. Without those he would be a pancake in a metal coffin. It was rare for a hellpod's retros not to fire, but not unheard of.

Calvin took a breath. "Not today." He willed the pod to land without issues. He checked his comms device. All he could hear was static. Another flash of lightning was visible through the tiny windows in the pod. It was bright, and then, nothing.

The electromagnetic storm had knocked the lights out in Calvins' hellpod. No, not the lights, as the controls panel and instrument cluster were also dead. Calvin fumbled immediately for the emergency manual backup for the thrusters, his pod and his hands trembling violently. Calvin knew from his other misadventures on this rock that the thickest cloud cover was about 10 seconds from the point where his thrusters would normally fire. But had it been 2 seconds or 6 since the power was knocked out? Time fell away and Calvin cursed himself for not being more mentally ready.

He decided it had been 6 seconds, now 8, if he waited any longer, death would surely greet him with his landing. He pulled the manual firing pins. Usually now would be the time where he steered himself to a safe landing with the hellpod's console, but no power meant no console. All Calvin could do was hold on and hope he wasn't landing in a lake. Drowning was a bad way to go. He felt the bones in his body shudder as the thrusters flared to life. Calvin worried for a moment he had been too late or had a bad altitude estimate for the landing zone. 

The fall in the dark felt like it took ages, the only light coming from the boot up screen in his heads up display. It had needed to reset itself after the pod took the electrical discharge of the storm. Had he pulled the switches too soon? Or was he over a lower elevation than expected. He hoped it was not the latter as this would surely mean a water landing and certain drowning.

Calvin's fears cleared when the orbital insertion came to a screeching halt, his ride embedding itself into the soil. Shock absorbing jelly in the tip of the hellpod absorbed most of the impact. If not for this, no man would survive the massive forces sustained during planet-fall.

The blasting charges embedded in the top of the pod went off, ejecting the casket lid more than 30 meters in the air. The moonlight beckoned to Calvin from the open door in his pod. At this point the craft would normally lift it's contents to ground level, delivering the trooper to battle with full kit. The power being dead in Calvin's hellpod of course prevented this. He had to manually unlock his feet. While he fiddled with the locking mechanisms he noticed a red glow bathe everything inside of his pod.

Calvin grabbed his pistol from his hip and aimed it up at the light. Without hesitation he let loose a spray of bullets. The spray put the light out, and hot oil rained down on him in his prison. He went back to the mechanism holding his left foot. He felt as though he was caught in a bear trap.

"For the love of democracy!" He thought as he struggled to release the mechanism. "You'd think they would make this easier to release in an emergency."

He got his left foot free, and then took a moment to prep his diligence and just in time too. Another light peaked over the rim of his hellpod and this time the bot attached took a shot at him with a laser. The rust bucket had bad aim though and the bolt only sizzled in the control console of the hellpod. The smell of hot electronics and ozone became thick in the cramped confines of the pod. Calvin quickly liberated this one's head from it's shoulders as well. Sparks sprayed from damaged circuitry in the mechanical man’s skull.

"I'll die if I am stuck down here." Calvin said to himself. He pointed the rifle down at the edge of the locking pin on his right foot and shot it. He winced at the pinching of the metal deforming around his foot, but it did not do damage to him through his thick boots, and he was free.

Yet another light was approaching the opening above. He grasped at the ladder and heaved himself up it and then immediately dove for cover behind a rock just outside the pod’s final resting place. Laser fire rained down around him.

Two more troopers and a strider were on top of him. He tried to lean around the rock to get a better look at their position but fire from the striders' guns sent him back into cover. He needed to get rid of that strider. He could hear it approaching with regular metallic footfalls. They were going to flush him out.

Eric saw the thickest part of the clouds dissipating, the Ion storm was clearing up.

He pulled the pin on a grenade and lobbed it over his shoulder. He then rolled and leaped out of his hiding spot. The explosion created enough confusion he was able to turn and fire on the troopers. He shot one of them square in the head. It's skull faceplate fracturing as the high caliber round pierced through the circuitry in the unit’s head. He put two bullets through the other one’s chest plate. Oil spilled onto the ground as the lights in the robot’s headpiece dimmed and it fell over, either dead or crippled. The strider pilot maintained it's focus however, and it again fired at Calvin's position. Fortunately for him it missed.

Calvin aimed for the slit in the armor on the strider’s chassis. He was aiming for the pilot, and with an exhale and a finger pull, the strider tipped over and was no longer a threat. He got up and dusted himself off. He had used most of his first magazine in that fight. He reloaded, keeping the magazine with three rounds left just in case he needed them later. He wasn't in a hurry until the comms channel come back to life.

It was the only then that Calvin noticed the red as blood flare in the sky a few hundred meters to the south. Calvin began to run towards the flare, It was a beacon that meant the Automatons were calling in reinforcements and at that position - judging the comm traffic and the bots apparent interest - was Juliet Two and Hotel Five pinned down by the Automaton menace and in dire need of assistance.