<div align="center"><strong><strong><strong>Lcpl. Roman "Rome" Beneke - 1st Squad - Regrouping at the downed dropship</strong></strong></strong></div><br/>The blast from the device warmed his back and nearly threw him from his feet as the squad reached the wreckage. Rome's heart thudded loudly in his ears, his huge, barrel chest rising and falling with quick breaths, winded from their life or death sprint. Thumbing the safety toggle into the safe position, he swiveled his bulky weapon skyward, locking it into the neutral position. His massive, strong hands moved behind his head where thick fingers laced, locking securely as he slowly paced to and fro, heaving and trying to catch his breathe. He was sucking wind, hard. Sweat gathered on his dark skin, the humid jungle climate thick and seemingly tangible exacerbated his perspiration. After a minute or two of pacing, he neared the dropship, turned and collapsed on the mangled rear loading ramp of the wrecked craft. He pressed the release switch and hefted the M56 from it's harness. Carefully propping the weapon against the ramp beside him, he leaned over, resting his elbows on his knees, spread wide. He glanced up at Zippo and smirked.<br/><br/>"You move pretty good in that tin can, Zippo. Kinda makes me wonder how you move when you're not in that gorilla suit. Maybe I'll take ya for ride sometime, find out for myself." He teased, flashing his pearly white, toothy grin. Even in times of great stress, Rome often teased and flirted, or recalled random sexual conquests of his. It was a coping mechanism, just one of the ways he dealt with stress. No sooner had those words left his lips than he glanced over with an appreciative, ogling glance at DeSilva's long, stretching legs and her lush ass.<br/><br/>He was just about to comment on DeSilva's... assets when his thoughts were interrupted by the familiar sounds of the orbit-to-ground strike missiles screaming down from USN ships high above, and he glanced up to see the beautiful contrails spreading out in all directions like veins, or a spider's web. The screams were accompanied shortly thereafter by the menacing sounds of the muffled, yet still thunderous "BOOM. BOOM BOOM," the explosions reverberating one after another in quick succession, vibrating in his chest even at such distances. Rome finds the sounds and the sensations of the precision orbital strike relaxing, and he closes his eyes for a moment, an odd smile stretching his thick lips wide. "Gorram, that's a beautiful sound. Music to my fucking ears." He enjoyed the sight and sounds of the strike for a good 20 minutes, laughing occasionally and cursing those being struck. "Compliments of the Navy and the Colonial Marines, bitches."<br/><br/>Suddenly his radio crackles to life, FATHER'S "voice" filling his ear with the squad's new mission. He listens intently, eyes shifting to and fro in frustration, which grows into anger.  "You gotta be fuckin kidding me?! Our Lt. is dead, our synthetic is out of commission, we're down to four marines and there's a goddam invisble badass out there, laughing his fuckin monster ass off as he nearly blew us to kingdom come... and they want to send us into some fuckin caves to fetch some pussy-ass Wey-Yu exec?!?" Rome shouted incredulously. "I mean, no one even knows if the mother fucker is still alive. It's just a goddam signal! Fuck this shit. We need to regroup, refit, get reinforce..."<br/><br/>His bitching and moaning was cut off as the radio was flooded with heated shouts and the confusion of combat, sporadic gunfire interrupted intermittently with static and white noise. Rome's thick brow furrowed angrily. Somewhere out there, it sounded like second squad was getting its ass handed to it and Rome was sitting here helpless to do anything about it. He griped and groaned the entire time while waiting on the dropship. The dropship finally arrived and Rome grabbed his M56, affixing it to the harness once more before clamoring up the ramp and up to the pilot. "Fuck this cave nonsense, Take us to second squad's location, ASAP!" The pilot shot Rome a look but didn't reply, bringing the dropship about after the remainder of 1st squad was aboard.<br/><br/><div class="quoteheader"><div class="topslice_quote">Quote</div></div><blockquote class="bbc_standard_quote">Pilot:<br/>"he's somewhere in there. My orders are to fly a holding pattern here, I can't give you any covering fire but if you need to bug out I'll be able to grab you as soon as you get clear of the caves....good luck."</blockquote><div class="quotefooter"><div class="botslice_quote"></div></div><br/>Rome cursed under his breath, stomping towards the lowered ramp. He quickly wondered how Senjo would be and the thought of how she would be missed in the caves passed from his mind as quickly as it came.<br/><br/><div class="quoteheader"><div class="topslice_quote">Quote</div></div><blockquote class="bbc_standard_quote">Pfc DeSilva:<br/>“Well, today Lady Luck seems to have taken a holiday and exchanging a raging clusterfuck for spelunking in a shithole cave is just the fan-fucking-tastic cherry on top of my day. I HATE caves.”</blockquote><div class="quotefooter"><div class="botslice_quote"></div></div><br/>"Fuckin A, baby girl. This is some fucked up shit, no doubt. FUBAR!" He chipped in, landing beside her in the cave's entrance. He gave her ass slap as he passed her, believing he would be on point.<br/><br/><div class="quoteheader"><div class="topslice_quote">Quote</div></div><blockquote class="bbc_standard_quote">Sgt. O'Shay:<br/>"Put a sock in it, DeSilva! Squad! Watch your corners and lines of fire! I don't want no friendly fire! DeSilva! Cover Zippo! Rome! Bring up the rear! Move out!"<br/></blockquote><div class="quotefooter"><div class="botslice_quote"></div></div><br/>"Yes, Sarge," he said simply, giving DeSilva a wink as he turned to the back of the column, "bringing up the rear..." he muuttered as he passed her, flashing her smirk and a wink.<br/><br/><br/><br/><br/>