As the marines began to board the drop ship FATHER dutifully, counted down the time till departure, announcing as each minute passed. At the two minute mark the drop ship's engines began to run, a loud whine filled the hangar bay as the ship prepared to depart from the belly of the USS Mitchum. As the final seconds passed by FATHER said, in his ever consistent monotone voice "All preparations for planet fall are now complete. Initializing combat drop."<br/><br/><br/>The ramp into the drop ship slowly closed and the drop ship's pilot's voice came loud and clear over the speakers "All right ladies and gents....lets do this!" The drop ship was slowly lowered down by it's docking arm. FATHER opened the belly of the Mitchum, "Prepare for docking release in T minus 5....4.....3.....2.....1......Release!" the pilot called out, the drop ship gave a hard lurch as it pulled away from it's docking harness and began to move under it's own power. Flying smoothly for a few seconds before it hit atmosphere. "The atmo's a bit thick on this world! It's gonna be one helluva ride!" the pilot called out his voice betraying his excitement and obvious adrenalin high.<br/><br/><br/>A second later the craft began to shake, first only slightly almost imperceptibly so, but after 30 seconds it was almost as if the drop ship was jumping around in midair, jerking from left to right, up to down, and ever direction in between. The drop ship's hull could be heard groaning under the stress of breaking through LV-1875's atmosphere. As it moved closer and closer to the planet's surface its trajectory began to change. The pilot did his best to keep the change as unnoticeable as possible. Just like he had been trained to, ideally the marines' bodies wouldn't even notice that they had stopped 'falling' and were moving on a horizontal path until it had already happened. The shaking seemed to get worse and worse as the ride went on until finally three minutes later the shaking gave way to a sudden stillness "Now THAT was fun!" the pilot called out. Grinning as he did "Alright I'm bringing her in to the LZ that you indicated lieutenant it shouldn't be more than a minute now......once you've disembarked I'll fly a holding patter for 3 hours then head back up to the Mitchum for refueling." The pilot was a Captain and as far as he was concerned he didn't need to follow some ground pounder's schedule. "if you need evac or fire support at any time just give me a call."