NameVera Artyomovna Volkov
Age18
GenderFemale
Birth-date / LocationApril 11, 1930 / Perm, Russia
AppearanceVera is a shorter woman, standing at 5'2". While on duty she typically keeps her short blonde hair in a bun or pony tail, tied with string. She usually has soviet tankers goggles on her belt or around her neck, using them to protect her blue eyes when operating her armor. She wears a tight VDV telnyashka, white and blue striped undershirt and has standard issue infantry pants. Over these, she wears a loose fitting camouflage snipers uniform to hide her figure, and for stealth when she's out of her armor. She also has laced kirza boots from the VDV and Pattern 1941 RAF leather gloves, a gift from her father. Underneath all the layers of clothing, she is surprisingly fit. She has yet to wear the various belts, bandoleers and harnesses available to Squad 914. She has a nonstandard issue green beret she is fond of, but she only wears it when she's out of her armor. In armor she has a soviet tank crewmans helmet with a build in mic and headphones. Typically when she goes into her armor, she strips off the snipers uniform. While she's able to operate the machine with the baggy clothing on, it's far more convenient to be out of it while in armor. She keeps her fathers bayonet strapped to her right boot, but the blade is so long that it runs along the length of her entire lower leg, with the hilt going beyond her knee. Her other boot has an NR-40 strapped to it. She also has a shoulder holster for her side arm, but it's usually hidden under the sniper uniform.
PersonalityFiercely protective of her Object-342 and more or less her friends, Vera shows great compassion and caring through her own special muted way. Vera is a very practical person, a quick witted problem solver, capable of diagnosing a problem with her armor in minutes and repairing it in the same time it takes to identify it. She is a very straight forward person, disliking any beating around the bush and lies that complicate things, though she does take an interest in gossip. She has ice in her veins and a talent for understatement. Her calm demeanor stems from her armor in which she feels safe and confident, although she knows that any tank, tank destroyer, anti tank gun, anything with a big enough bang can harm her. Outside of her armor, her ice melts a little and she becomes a little bit more like the young girl she actually is. Against strangers, Vera is incredibly cautious and slow to trust, especially against male soldiers. Despite this she is capable of following orders and working alongside her squad mates.
RelationshipsN/A
ClassificationCombat Engineer
NR-40 Combat Knife (5.9 inch blade)
M1898/05 Sawback Bayonet (14.6 inch blade)
TT-30 Pistol (7.62×25mm Tokarev)
PPS-43 Submachine Gun (7.62×25mm Tokarev)
Experimental GearWeighing at roughly 1700 kilograms, the
Object-342 is an eight foot tall
mechanical armor with the goal of mobile fire support for infantry groups at the front lines. The project began in 1942 when a group of British Special Operations Executive Agents handed over a packet full of intelligence to Soviet agents. Among the many things in the package were early blueprints to the German Walking Tank. As Soviet scientists began working on their own armored bipedal unit, using these early blueprints as a base, Stalin ordered a group of engineers and scientists to create something that was original to the Russians. While the walking tank design was to make a tank walk, Object-342's group wanted to make a walking man into a tank. Six years later, the prototype Object-342 was finalized.
The Object-342 is a single pilot operated machine, with the cockpit situated in the chest of the armor. A great deal of time went into developing the controls of the Object-342. Allowing for the pilot to more precisely control the limbs of the machine, letting it to move with more lifelike movements and pull off more complex maneuvers in combat. The armor is thickest around the torso where the cockpit is located, and the head where the optics, radio and most of the periscopes are in. The head also features an active infrared device, inspired by the German ZG-1229. The optics, also inspired by the Germans specifically their adjustable tank sights, allows for 2x to 6x zoom. The rear of the armor is where the power pack and engine is located, combined in a backpack with the ammunition. The front chest plate has a bright headlamp attached to it. The arms and legs of the armor are particularly strong, the arms having to move and carry heavy weapons, and the legs having to carry the whole thing. In controlled conditions, the armor is capable of jumping vertically up to four feet. Although landing is fairly difficult. The armor is also able to easily lift, push, and pull 800 kilograms of weight, without the weapons mounted on the arms. Unlike a tanks turret, the torso of the armor is only able to twist 130 degrees from the center, where the torso is aligned with the legs.
The armament of the machine is simultaneously impressive and unimpressive. On the right forearm are two modified RP-46 Medium Machine Guns, belt fed with detachable box magazines. Mounted under the right arm is a heavily modified 76mm M1943 Regimental Gun, with a cut down barrel, stripped of nonessential parts, and an added three round revolving autoloader. On the right arm is a single belt fed DShK 1938 Heavy Machine Gun, with all of its ammunition stored in the armors backpack. The backpack stores four additional RP-46 box magazines of 250 rounds, giving each RP-46 two reloads. The 76mm M1942 has an additional six rounds, and the DShK 1938 has a 600 round magazine in the backpack.
While the sheer volume of fire is impressive from the three machine guns and the cannon, accuracy is highly dependent on the pilots skill as there are no sights to assist in the aiming of any of these guns. The short barreled 76mm M1943 also has very limited anti armor capabilities, as the cannon can only use the OF-350 Fragmentation High Explosive, O-350A Fragmentation and BP-350M High Explosive Anti Tank shells. The armor itself is fairly slow, at most it can keep up with an infantry mans jog. The slow speed coupled with the limited ammunition carry, and comparatively poor anti armor capability means that the Object-342 would only be useful in a small amount of situations, in defensive action or attached to unarmored infantry. Due to the small amount of information released, expectations ran wild amongst the military leadership. Generals dreamed of outfitting entire regiments of infantry with this suit, steamrolling anything the Germans had. Soviet Airborne leadership gossiped about finally having armored units being able to leap from planes. Soviet Naval officers spoke of suits that were fully submersible, letting their marines storm beaches without needing landing craft. When the prototype was featured to these officers, it was met with a mixed reception. "It needs further testing? Put it in Squad 914." they said.
The interior cockpit of Object-342 is painted white, with the controls being in front of the seat. On the left side wall is a gun mount where Vera puts her PPS-43 SMG with a pouch of ammo for it. On the right wall is a blank space with four small red stars, for four simulated duels where she won. Just below the four stars is a small hook where Vera puts her tankers helmet when she's not piloting. When she is, that hook is where her beret goes. Above the seat where the periscopes are, she has a number of photos. A family photo of her sitting on a park bench with Viktor next to her and her father and mother behind them standing is taped to the front periscope above the headrest. On the left periscope is a picture of Viktor and his tank crew sitting on their old T-34-85. The right periscope has a picture of her mothers cat, and the rear periscope has a picture of the research group that developed the armor. In that picture Vera is sitting at the front with the rest pilots. On the left side of the head of the armor is a white painted decal of three wolves, one leading with two following. The lead wolf is scarred and old, the second is plated in steel, and the third is a younger wolf. Underneath her seat is a small tool kit she uses for field repairs.
BackgroundBorn in 1930 in some village near Perm, she was abandoned at birth because her biological parents were too poor to raise her. She was given to a roaming band of orphans who agreed to adopted her into their gang, where she was raised to the best of their ability. She met a boy named Viktor, who protected her and fed her the most out of all of the children there. Their destination was the city of Perm, where they peddled, begged and tried to find work to feed and clothe themselves. The city proved fruitful for the small gang of orphans, many of them found work here or there and soon most left the gang to more profitable opportunities both good and bad, until only Vera and Viktor were left.
The two of them had been helping at a mechanics shop owned by a veteran of the great war. As far as the two orphans could tell, he was alone, had no wife and his work was the only thing he had in life. The two schemed and it took only a little convincing. Early in 1938, an eight year old Vera and a ten year old Viktor was adopted by a war veteran named Artyom. Life became good, compared to the old days before he adopted them. Often on the weekends he took the both of them to the forest to camp, teaching them how to survive in the wild, how to shoot a rifle accurately, training them to defend themselves. Very quickly Artyoms neighbor noticed that he was caring for two children. Anna, a woman who worked in a bakery, confronted Artyom about how he was raising his kids. Over the next few years Viktor and Vera would call Anna mother, and Artyom father. Something the both of them neither encouraged nor discouraged. Anna educated them, teaching etiquette, how to cook, how to sew. Meanwhile their father taught them how to hunt small game, how to shoot a rifle, showed them military tactics, and lectured them about the horrors of war and what soldiers would do. Artyom feared another war, and it was obvious. At first Anna was reluctant but as the years went on and as Germany grew in power, she began to join them on their trips into the forest.
In 1942, a group of officers approached Artyom, and he welcomed them with open arms and a bottle of vodka for them. Old war buddies. They admitted that they needed a test pilot for a new project. It took half a year of convincing, but when confronted with the news of the invasion of Britain, he agreed. Once the war started, Viktor joined the soviet Tank Corps luckily becoming the gunner of a very skilled and cunning tank commander. Around the same time the first prototype of the Object-342 was completed, Artyom and two other test pilots showed up, a soviet marine, and a paratrooper. All of them were friends from the great war, or sons of those friends. While the two other test pilots were able to fit uncomfortably into the armor, Artyom wasn't able to at all due to his larger size. Despite that, he was kept on the program due to his mechanical expertise. During the second test run, due to circumstances Artyom brought Vera. During their work, Vera spoke often to many of the scientists, engineers and the test pilots, becoming good friends with them. She asked them many questions about the armor, even learned how to pilot it from the test pilots. All in good fun. Until Vera climbed into the Object-342 when most of the crew was looking away and took it on a 15 minute joyride. Artyom was mortified, a test pilot lost a bet, and the scientists developing the armor were amazed by her display of skill in the armor. After Artyom scolded her, the crew convinced him to let her be a test pilot. After all, she was small enough to fit comfortably into the armor, and all they needed was pilot input. It wasn't like she would go out into battle wearing it.
The next few years were fun to Vera, she showed great aptitude for piloting the armor, she learned many things from her seniors the two test pilots and her father. She developed new piloting techniques based on the observations of battle tactics and flow written down in letters by her brother. When she wasn't test piloting, she was learning how to maintain and repair it while listening to war stories from her fathers friends. She quickly became a better pilot than the other two, and soon she was the primary pilot of Object-342. In 1946, the Object-342 was completed and was shown alongside the Soviet walking tank to the military community. Vera was the pilot as they wanted the best possible performance. After the showing, the many officers there welcomed the walking tank warmly. The Object-342 was met with noticeably colder attitudes. They decided to let the Object-342 prove its worth by putting it in Squad 914, the pilot included. Artyom and the scientists objected loudly, but they dismissed them. With no other choice, Artyom and the research group was forced to agree. Before Vera shipped out, she drilled in the armor constantly, honing her skills. Artyom gave her his leather gloves, which had been a gift from an old friend in the British Royal Air Force, and one of his war trophies, a German M1898/05 Sawback bayonet from the first world war. The other test pilots also gave her gifts, the undershirt of a soviet marine and the boots of a paratrooper, and advice. After she was shipped out, Artyom and the research group was fueled by a new purpose. To keep on developing the Object-342 program and provide Vera with the best armor and equipment they could make.
ExperienceInformal Survival Training - Spread out from 1938 to 1943
Informal Military Training - Spread out from 1938 to 1946
Object-342 Piloting - 1942 to 1946
FamilyArtyom Volkov - Father [Works in the Object-342 Project as an Engineer]
Anna Tarasova - Mother [Works in a bakery/Field ration factory]
Viktor Volkov - Brother [T-44-100 Tank Gunner in the 9th Tank Corps]
Theme SongN/A
Banned
