Vemka Vall had been mentally steeling himself for the initial assault when the alert came for all hands to man their stations and for the assault force to make their way to the primary hanger for departure. Before any combat mission he did the same thing, steeling himself and clouding his mind deliberately, shielding himself from Force users with old tricks that had been employed by some Jedi Hunters that Republic Intelligence had tracked down and converted to their cause over the years. Clouding ones mind, coupled with strong emotion, could shield them from easy detection with the force, something that had saved his ass on more than one occasion. Add in the chaos of an attack, and a younger Vemka might have even trusted a well placed sniper shot with that alone, but that was not who he was today. Rising, and grabbing the helmet of his armor, he fastened it as he made a brisk run to the hanger, just in time for the boarding order from the Knight, Vasha, who was in overall charge of the operation. She was one that Vemka knew little of, considering how much the Jedi operated independent of Intelligence Agents typically, so profiles on lesser known Jedi were incomplete at best, something the Intelligence Agent did not like.

Like it or not, Vemka had his orders and it was simple enough, boarding a shuttle that contained another strike team of Commandos, Vemka being the only one on board the shuttle not a part of the Commandos. They gave him the usual odd looks that Republic Intelligence got, and there was likely mutterings of 'that spook' on their squad comm channel, but the Mirialan was used to such things at this point. Half closing his eyes, which dismissed the Commandos for now, he focused on the general situation developing while going down, processing the information fed through the comms and building a mental image of the situation at hand. Heavy resistance, dug in and ready for the attack. Typical, the ham fisted approach had been spotted, there was a reason the Wild Space was outside conventional Republic control. But, in as much as any plan, first contact had forced plans to change and to improvise new responses.

Vemka's train of thought was, at that point, interrupted by a series of explosive detonations that raked the side of his shuttle, the Pilot going off about how he'd lost a wing and they were going down. Rather than tense up, the Mirialan forced himself to relax, getting ready for the impact instead of dreading it, dreading the inevitable wasn't going to help. They hit hard, Vemka catching himself as the side door was ripped from the shuttle, and the Mirialan threw himself clear of the shuttle as it continued hurtling and grinding to a halt, rolling across the ground and coming to a halt naturally instead of trying to force himself to stop sooner. Picking himself up, and dusting off his armor, a quick inventory was done. Armor and cloak, intact, weapons, intact, extra supplies, intact. He was lucky, then, the ground wasn't so hard that the impact would damage him or his gear. Those that had rode out the crash though, might not be so fortunate.

Rather than double back after the shuttle, letting the survivors sort themselves out, the Intelligence Agent moved through the woods, oddly calm compared to the raging assault that was occurring so close to them. Reaching the edge of the woods, he spotted Republic forces suffering a counter assault from a dark saber wielding force user. He moved fast, struck hard, but a quick analysis, at the cost of soldier's lives, was enough to puzzle him out for an initial assault. The attack was single minded, reveling in the slaughter, which meant he was focused on the obvious threats. Continuing to maintain his mental shroud, surface clouded with irrelevant thoughts and strong emotions matching the forces attacking and being attacked, he reached into a pouch and produced two sonic detonators. Normally, soldiers used Thermal, but against a force user? The sonic attack tended to disorientate and disrupt their abilities, making them easier targets. Rather than blindly pitch them, he cooked them and proceed to use an underhand toss, sending them rolling across the ground to come to a rest behind the advancing dark sider, detonating within a second of coming to a halt.

[color=598527]"Agent Vall in position, standing by to provide support. Engaging the Dark Sider, bait him into overextending and cut him off."[/color] Punctuating the orders he passed over encrypted commlink, Vemka had his sniper rifle, a BL-28, trained on the dark sider. Rather than fire right away, he braced his vibrostaff alongside him in case he needed it quickly, watching for an opening to fire rather than blindly opening fire and giving himself away yet. Frontline soldier's job was to fight and die, his was to pick off targets he could kill, or otherwise mark them for those that could. Vemka would fire whenever the dark sider wasn't facing him, aiming to harass and irritate the target further, rage could blind as well as it could fuel after all.

[@Alias]