A human colony lost in an isolated star system. Left to their own devices on a hostile, resource-poor planet, endurance and mettle had to make up for the lack of state-of-the-art technology. Cossack, American, French and Scottish fought each other and they all fought the planet, and from all this fighting emerged Ariadna, where only the toughest survive. Welcome to Ariadna. Welcome to Hell.
Discover the Ariadna troops of Operation: Crimson Stone!
ROKOT VOLUNTEER DEFENSE TEAMS
During the Ariadnan Commercial Conflicts, the extraplanetary invaders found that, in the seemingly defenseless Kazak industrial areas, a rumbling echo foreshadowed their defeat. This rumble emanated from the throats of the men and women of the Cossack militarized work crews: volunteer units known as Rokot willing to die for their Motherland. In Ariadna, Рокот ("Rokot", meaning “rumble” in Russian) is the generic name for any laborer of Cossack origin. It’s an ancient industrial Kazak tradition to name the different work crews from the factory town of Dynamo after Russian space rockets and probes. When the Rokot team was born, its members decided to honor their name and become the noisiest crew in all the factories in the city.
Tireless workers by day and true troublemakers by night, they became so famed in the city of Dynamo that its dwellers began to call all the factory workers Rokot. So, progressively and due to the Cossack industrial diaspora, this became the nickname for any Kazak industrial laborer in Ariadna. However, it was not until the Ariadnan Commercial Conflicts that this name became legendary. The Rokot organized irregular defense teams that, thanks to their perfect knowledge of the maze-like industrial areas, were able to slip through the lines of the PanOceanian forces besieging the city to harass their troops with their dirty urban guerrilla tactics.
Very soon, their example was followed by Rokot teams in other cities and they became a true nationwide phenomenon to the dismay of the invading forces. When this conflict came to an end, the Stavka, impressed by the effectiveness and toughness of these men and women, decided to regularize these teams by integrating them in the Kazak Army as volunteer units. Since then, the Rokot is the symbol of all Cossack laborers in the Ariadnan military: hard as nails workers always ready to stand up and win the battle.
1ER RÉGIMENT OF PARA-COMMANDOS
“Preux et audacieux” (Valiant and audacious). Motto of the 1er de Para-Commandos.
The 1st Para-Commandos is the Merovingian airborne infantry regiment that acts as a rapid response and interdiction unit both for the Force de Réponse Rapide Mérovingienne and Kosmoflot. The Para-Commandos is the first on the scene, often deployed before the battle even begins. Basically, the job of the 1st Para-Commandos is to carry out the riskiest duties of light infantry: airborne insertions, rapid advances, surprise attacks, and hurried withdrawals to their exfiltration point before the enemy can react.
ZENIT-7 DETACHMENT
International forces. Joint deployments. This is all great and it is very necessary at a political and strategic level, but the Stavka likes to maintain control of any operation in which its interests or troops are involved. Of course, this is not always possible. The chain of command—or simply distance—can prevent such control, but this does not mean that Stavka has not sought a solution to this problem. This solution is called Zenit-7, an elite special detachment that has been defined as Stavka's security mechanism. The members of this select unit, all graduates of the Kazak Spetsnaz Skhola, have been carefully selected and stand out for their unwavering loyalty, icy gaze, and a sinister appearance. There is always room for them in special operations command meetings, and perhaps more than they need because everyone prefers to keep their distance from them.
The reputation of this unit is somewhat shady. They are said to be a monitoring and control unit, a Plan B of the Stavka, and to always carry sealed orders that even the commanding officer of the operation knows about. That it is their mission to correct the course of the situation when it begins to go in a direction that damages the interests of the Stavka, and that they have carte blanche to do anything that is absolutely necessary. Anything. Wipe and Clean they say they call it. And that includes the lives of their teammates, especially if they belong to foreign forces, which for them includes any Ariadnan of non-Kazak origin. That’s what people say. Of course, this is all rumors, corridor gossip, nothing proven. Although it is not the first time that only Zenit-7 has returned from a mission with the objective in one hand... and the identification plates of their comrades in the other.
VOLKOLAK ASSAULT TROOPS
There is one quote that racing drivers, as well as special-operations commandos, totally agree on: "Power is nothing without control." This statement resounded in the Stavka's meeting rooms when a reconfiguration and upgrade of its units were being considered for the new corps that was to become Kosmoflot. It was in these meetings that the idea originated to build on the achievements of Project Polaris, the program that created the tactical bearpodes, to develop an equivalent specifically designed for dogfaces. In this way, they would become more efficient and versatile operatives, even if this meant sacrificing part of their power, which in many cases was almost counterproductive. With this objective in mind, Project Vervol'f (Верво́льф Проект) was developed and would soon bear fruit, although its costs made it impossible to implement on a larger scale.
The result of Project Vervol'f was the assault unit named Volkolak (Волколак), an ancient Russian word for werewolves, which is composed of veteran dogfaces with good records, and a few younger ones with not-so-good records, but excellent skills. It is quite easy to tell Volkolaks from any other dogface by the way they move, without haste, stress, or rage, but equally resolute and determined.
Thanks to the Vervol'f treatment, the Stavka has produced troops with superhuman physical qualities, similar to those provided by servo-powered armor, and they only need a few strong and light Teseum armor plates to become unstoppable in battle. Trained to become part of Kosmoflot and to carry out special operations jointly with other units, the Volkolaks stay calm and cool in combat, perfectly in control and moving in synchronicity with their team members. As effective as they are deadly, they are Kosmoflot's clenched fist, still a little too intense, but very good at ending a fight. The perfect combination of power and control, the dream of any racing driver or spec-ops commando.
1ST HIGHLANDERS S.A.S.
The Highlander SAS (Special Ariadna Service) is a Caledonian commando regiment comprised of experts in “Incursion, Contact, and Exfiltration” operations. They are tasked with advanced reconnaissance for both the Caledonian Highlander Army and Kosmoflot. They adhere to the old motto of the unit, "Who Dares Wins", and they still honor it in every mission. The SAS prefer the cover of night for their operations, and they adore staging a good ambush. Their style is to remain concealed until the last possible second and wait until the enemy is right on top of them before silently slitting their throats or taking them out with close-range firepower.
It was their distinctive modus operandi, so well suited for the narrow settings typical of space combat, that led the Stavka to select them to join Kosmoflot. The Highlander S.A.S. adapted well and quickly to zero-gravity combat, like true professionals who are used to new challenges, honoring the poem inscribed on the walls of their headquarters: “We are the Pilgrims, master, we shall go always a little further…” In this new posting, the highly dangerous and exposed nature of their work would increase exponentially.
The S.A.S. are required to be team players and coordinate with other units, but they know that being a forward unit, in actual combat, they will always be isolated and on their own. This is not a problem for the members of a unit well known for its independent initiative, its resolve, and its bravery. A unit that has become as deadly an attack force when operating in spaceships and orbitals as it is on a planetary surface. After all, what challenges can the blackness of space pose to commandos who love the night? Do not forget their motto: the S.A.S. always dare, and they always win.
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