IC: E-i-E - Ardent Emancipation

[Felhammer]

Opening Crawl (http://www.starwars.com/play/online-activities/crawl-creator/index.jsp?cs=pfb2vbxuay)

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v614/RHO1/StarWarsOpeningCrawlnew-1.png


You find yourselves aboard the Rogue Kestrel's stately briefing room. An obsidian-colored, horseshoe-shaped table stands at the center of the room. It is roughly three meters in diameter. Commander Zarn, a short, stalwart human stands in the center of the horseshoe. The lights have been dimmed, with most of the light in the room emanating from a gigantic blue and red holographic representation of Feldrona. Sitting around the table are the six of you, as well as the handsome, fifteen year-old Apprentice Bail Gann; the masculine female Zabrak Kaia Kalar; the beastly looking Herglic Jax Jade; the hulking Celegians Ronium Ette who floats inside a dimly glowing tube-like transport chamber.

Commander Zarn begins, "This is Feldrona. Currently there are no Star Destroyers in Orbit and a minimal amount of troops. Since this is a Prison World that still means there is an unfathomable amount of enemies stationed there. Our target is this man," The Commander flicks a button and the image of an Ee (http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Ee) appears, "Doctor Pfiffigtein. He is one of the foremost experts in laser technology. His knowledge is vital to the future of the Empire, we must retrieve him at all costs."

The Clegian chimes in, "The fortress is strong. The enemies stalwart. A plan must be made."

The Commander agrees as he pushes a button on his remote to change the image again. This time displaying an image of a prison, "This is what we are up against - Icecrest Fortress - one of the most confusingly laid out and terrifying prisons ever constructed. We do not have data about the inner-layout of the Prison. We do know it is filled with lots of traps and a labyrinthine layout. There is only one entrance, which lies in the city of Feldraka. The only exit lies atop the glaciated Icecrest Mountain." You will enter in the foothills and be forced to find a way to get to the mountain's peak for extraction."

Bail Gann looks to his master before blurting out, "Why not enter through the Peak?"

Zarn smiles gently, "We have tried that once before, the shaft that leads into the bowels of the prison is specifically destined to destroy anything going the wrong direction. A hundred Heavy Blasters will target you and blast you out of the sky. It is, as they say, impossible to enter from that direction." He holds up a hand, "Before you say anything else, the shaft is protected from Ion attacks and is shielded from orbital bombardment."

Zarn looks at each of you in turn and says, "We need a miracle to pull this one off. Any ideas?"

[Noedig]

Jarik tugged at the collar of his officer's uniform. He'd never been able to puzzle out why they were all so damned uncomfortable. More uncomfortable was the mission being outlined by the commander. His metal fingers made a klinking sound as they drummed the table.

"A map would be a good first step. We're going to get chewed to karking bits when we go in there, and the longer we spend karking about inside, the bigger the butcher's bill is going to be. A control room would be a good initial target. Infiltrate, take it, hold it, get intel on the interior, snag our VIP, exfil. Maybe cause a riot are two, just for giggles. It'd be a great distraction."

He paused and tossed Jax a wolfish grin.

"Another way we could do this come knocking with the big guns and make doors where convenient. That'll probably be a lot messier. Bit more fun though, eh Jax?"

[Felhammer]

Jax slams his hulking fist down on the table. The sheer power of the slam violently shakes the table. The Hurglic looks over at Jarik and simply whispers, "Boom."

[Noedig]

Jarik chuckled. Jax did not seem the subtle type

"Read my mind. Commander, do they know who they've got? If we drag this out we could end up losing the VIP. Kicking in the doors may knock them off balance long enough for a team to secure Wormy. Course, you're talkin' to a sapper so I'm a little biased against subtlety."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
The diminutive Mrlssi rests in his booster seat, feathers ruffling slightly at the description of the prison.
"How about faking a prisoner transfer order?" Ice asks, without looking up from his datapad.

[Mithric Gunn]

Dr. Sharka stands in thought a moment, then speaks, "Good idea, Ice. Though if he is such a high value target, we should come prepared with a very convincing tale.
If they rely too much on technological surveillance systems, I could probably infiltrate myself and another. We could then secure the scientist and help clear the path to the extraction point.

If we strike hard for the PoW's while sending infiltrators to retrieve the doctor, we might be able to get to him before they realize what we're really after. Maybe bring a bag of blaster pistols for the PoW's so theyre not bringing fists to a gunfight."

Dr. Sharka reluctantly adds, "Another option would be to send me ahead alone. I can phase through the walls and maybe open some doors for you. I dont like the idea of being alone without hope of backup, but if we can't find a safer way, its an option."

[Major]

Kelaeon is quiet as he watches the meeting and listens to the various plans with his chin in his hand. As Ice mentions his plan, he removes the hand from his chin and points at the map slightly. "So, how many other high level prisoners are there? We don't want it obvious who we are going in for." Kelaeon states, "Depending on how well known this scientist is versus the other prisoners will make it easier to pick. Is it possible for us to get stealth field generators or something to help out?" Kelaeon asks. He was still trying to figure out how he felt about the strange doctor. The past few months hadn't helped. The man was a Force-user, but not an Imperial Knight and while some might call it paranoia he didn't trust it. The last thing he wanted was the man phasing in and out of sight. "Let's try not to risk the good doctor's life by walking through walls. We don't want our support staff walking into a trap and getting shot." He states calmly.

[Iron Victory]

Krells’aire’nurudo sits patiently at the table with his fingers folded. The Chiss' temples are mildly throbbing from his night drinking with Jarik. The previous evening was a haze. He vaguely remembered an arm-wrestling match, but couldn't recall who won. The edges of his mouth turn up into an almost imperceptible grin at Jax’s display. The cold planet reminded him of home, a fact which made his smirk vanish. “A direct assault may not be the most prudent course of action. If they realize the prison is under attack, the guards will immediately move to lockdown or execute VIPs. Subterfuge is our best option. Thindle's plan seems ideal, with the Sith in chaos we just might fall through the cracks.”

[Thundercracker]

Ice
Ice sighs, feathers flattening against his scales.
"Only my mom calls me Thindle," Ice says.

"Do we know if there's any Sith at the prison? If not, we could dress you two up like a pair of Sith and put together some red lightsabers," he says.

It's not immediately clear which two Ice is referring to.

"Or we could take a gamble and send them 'official' advance notification. They'd never expect a prison break to be advertised," he continues, "We'd have to change the IFF signal from the frigate to a valid Sith IFF, and we'd have to do the same to whatever ships we send down to the surface... it'd be tough but I think we could pull it off, depending on how much time we have."

"Who's in charge of this mission, anyway?" he asks, putting his datapad on the table, head swiveling about the room.

[Major]

"If I brought along that crystal you got off the Darth we might be able to use it to our advantage as well." Kelaeon says nodding, "Nobody would question a Sith and that crystal would make me feel like a Sith in the Force as well."

[Noedig]

Jarik snorted a laugh.

"Wait a minute. Your name is Thindle?"

[Iron Victory]

Sairen turns to the small avian. "My apologies... Ice, is it?" He addresses the table, "That plan actually has merit. If some of the squad were to masquerade as Sith, the officials would be too frightened to thoroughly question our motives. And even if a Sith is stationed there, Knight Kelaeon's crystal would mask our presence in the force."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Laugh it up, Tin Man," Ice says.

The Mrlssi turns to Sairen.

"Did you think everyone was saying 'Ice' because their drinks were warm?" Ice says, sighing, "speaking of which..."

Ice pulls out a Photon Fizzler from his pack and twists off the cap, taking a long swig of the sugary, carbonated beverage.

"It'll ONLY work if there's no Sith there, otherwise they'll be able to tell just like Kel would be able to tell a Sith isn't a Knight," Ice adds.

As he finishes speaking, he turns to Kel as if to ask 'right?'

[Major]

"Actually, I wouldn't fully toss it out. On one hand, I'd prefer there not to be any Sith, but Kyrat's gang is rather big. I doubt every Sith knows every other Sith. While I could tell a Sith from an Imperial Knight because of their dark side presence, and a Jedi due to their lack of discipline, it isn't always fool proof. It's one of the reasons that Force Sensitives should all be military so that you can add an extra step of official status, paperwork, etc. It's one of the reason I dislike rogue Jedi running around doing their own thing like little vigilantes. Hard to tell the Sith from the Jedi sometimes." He says with a shrug, "Regardless, the point at hand is that normally, it would be a bad idea because of the ability to sense them in the Force. However, that crystal we found is VERY tainted to the point where I'm not sure it is possible to purify. With that much of a dark presence, it would probably work..." Kelaeon hesitates and leans back trying to think of the wording, "I don't know...like a cloak? I guess that's the best choice of words. If things go right, while wearing that with so much radiating from it, it would be possible to feel like a Sith in the Force."

Kelaeon glances around, "Of courses, we'd want mundane disguises, temporary tattoos, eye contacts, sith robes, sith lightsabers, etc." Kelaeon explains, "But I'm sure we could get a hold of those. It's not like the Empire has never killed a Sith. So we get the right disguises, use the crystal to hide ourselves, I choke an idiot or two, and things might work. I'd of course still recommend a form of stealth and merely use that as a 'if noticed play it off', but shouldn't be impossible."

"Alternatively, I use the Force to hunt for our good friend from the Wheel, see where he is, and if far enough away we impersonate him. Being a specific Sith with his specific lightsaber crystal should make it even more convincing. At the same time, we'd have to work harder on the medical team or scientist or whoever disguising us. Perhaps a holoshroud if we can get one?"

[Philistine]

"Do we know for sure that this doctor is even bein' held against his will?" Graff drawls while the mission parameters download to the computer on his arm. "Might be embarassin' if we show up and offer to rescue him, and he doesn't even know he needs rescuin.'"

Hardly pausing for breath, he leans back in his seat and stares at the hologram display. "Commander. You said there's no Star Destroyers in the system. That's a good start, but what about smaller cap ships? Frigates, corvettes, system patrol craft and such? And what about starfighters? 'Cause I have an idea how we can get their IFF codes, but it needs them not to be watchin' the outer edges of the system real close."

[Noedig]

Jarik chuckled again.

"I will. And since when do we get to get drunk during briefings? Anyway, back to the prison break. I feel like the Sith imitation could work, but only if we were sure there weren't more Sith onsite. If that turns out to be the case, we dress up Stumbles and the boy as some ugly red bastards and send 'em through the front door. A second infiltration team could go in another way. Bones has got some pretty interesting talents in that regard. The two of us could cause a helluva lot of trouble working together."

[Felhammer]

Commander Zarn looks at a datapad, "Hmm, no one of interest is being held at the prison. A few thousand civies, sixty Imperial POW's... There are quite a few Galactic Alliance Prisoners - nearly three hundred. It appears the highest ranking Alliance officer is Commander Luke Solo. Hmm, never heard of him."

As he listens to the group, Zarn pipes up, "We do not have any Sith Lightsabers. The Emperor has been confiscating all of them for some unknown reason. We can create a non-functioning approximation. It won't fool a Sith but it will fool grunts."

"The doctor is definitely alive and in the prison. We have irrefutable - but secret - intelligence on this."

"We have enough men and equipment to assault the prison. We have the medical and disguise equipment necessary for subterfuge. With Chief Operational Scientist Ice's aid, we could even rig up a temporary IFF."

[Mithric Gunn]

"Worst case scenario, we sneak in, run into a Sith, and have to improvise from inside the prison. It's better than improvising from outside of the prison, and with assault teams distracting them from out side, and maybe Jarik and I from within, I think we can pull it off."

[Noedig]

Jarik's head snapped around at the mention of 'Luke Solo'.

"I've sure as hell heard of him. He busted me, Ice and Deadeye out of the Broadsword's brig a little over a year ago. I owe the kid a few drinks for that still. He's GA, but he pulled our collective asses out of the fire on that one. We personally owe him our lives, and without his help the Vicious would be a very real problem for us."

Jarik scratched his beard.

"Not saying we should shift mission parameters, but we can consider him an asset if we bust him out."

[Iron Victory]

Sairen's mismatched gaze sweeps across the table. "This is what I propose: You disguise myself and Knight Kelaeon as Sith Lords, rigging a shuttle up with the IFF. On approach we can drop Squadron Leader Graff, First Lieutenant Jarik, and Dr. Sarka, along with a detachment of paratroopers. They would have to to exit at a low altitude in order to avoid detection. We can discover the whereabouts of the VIPs while you infiltrate. If our ruse works, we stroll out with the scientist, if it doesn't, then our boys go in shooting. Chief Operational Scientist Ice could accompany us into the prison as one of our aides, to size-up its security systems."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"If it works, how do we pick up the other half of the team and the paratroopers?" Ice asks.

"What about the AT-TEs and AT-MTs? I say if we're going to have a backup plan involving a lot of shooting, we shouldn't hold anything back," he says, "might make them seriously consider surrendering."

"What if the Kestrel hides out just outside the system? Only problem is how do we rig up a signal for the infiltration team to call the cavalry if things go sour?" he asks.

[Mithric Gunn]

"I can help with that. If things go badly, Knight Kelaeon can send me a sensation of danger, and I can telepathically alert someone on the ship."

[Iron Victory]

In response to Ice's concerns Sairen pries a band off his left middle finger and holds it up, "As for the signal, this panic ring could be programmed to alert the infiltrators through their comlinks, not that I don't have faith in Dr. Sharka." He nonchalantly rolls it across the table to the Mrlssi scientist. "Provided we get out without complication, we could pick up the infiltrators a few miles from prison. However, I don't see us extracting more than a few prisoners without a firefight. The scientist, maybe, sixty POWs, not likely. The Kestrel on standby would be ideal."

[Felhammer]

A green and black R4 Droid bursts into the briefing room, squealing. The Commander looks down at the Droid and asks, "What is it?" The little droid whistles and buzzes for nearly ten seconds. Zarn nods, "It appears we have a complication. According to Imperial Intelligence, Darth Krayt will be arriving on the planet to extract Dr. Pfiffigtein. The Alliance on one side and the Mandos on the other, obviously the Sith are running scared. R4 says Krayt will arrive with a full fleet in six hours."

Jax jumps to his feet, his poor chair flying backward into the wall, smacking it with a loud thud. "Not good."

Flight Lieutenant Kaia Kalar pulls out a datapad and performs a few calculations, "Even with our best pilots and navi-computers, we're still an hour outside of Feldrona. That means we will have five hours to get into a fortified citadel - and get extracted - lest we become permanent residents of the Prison."

Jax quietly echos the Lieutenant, "Permanent..."

[Major]

"Darth Kyrat? Personally?" Kelaeon says his eyes wide and surprised. Suddenly a frown crossed his lips, "Alright, this is too much. Who knew about this mission?" Kelaeon says clenching his fist, "Between the mission aboard the Wheel and now this? We just find out our mission and coincidentally the Sith decide to extract him NOW?"

[Mithric Gunn]

"I think we don't have much time for discussion. We must move if we're to have a chance at accomplishing this mission. You make a good point, Knight, but to pursue it now would be waste of precious time. We must focus on the mission."

[Noedig]

Jarik frowned across the table at Jax.

"Sith me, Jax, calm down. He's not in the room. So we're playing on hardmode? No biggie."

[Iron Victory]

Sairen merely raises an eyebrow at Krayt's sudden appearance, "If we have such little time, we must move immediately. Ice, could you please connect that ring to the infiltrators' comlinks?" The Chiss stands.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"We know where Krayt's going to be in six hours? We could alert the Mandalorians and the GA, get them to try and take him out," Ice says, "after we've left the system, of course."

"Not sure what we're waiting for, we should be preparing to jump to hyperspace right now, and exit just outside the system, perferably far enough away or behind a dust cloud or something so their long range scans don't pick us up," he adds, "we can plan on the way."

[Felhammer]

All of you feel the sudden wave of gravity as you zip into light speed.

Jax looks over at Jarik. As he does, the Herglic thrusts his behemoth-like arm into the air and flexes his beastly bicep, "I could take him."

Zarn taps his comm and makes a ship-wide announcement, "This is Commander Zarn. All hands to battle stations. Prep the Red Dawn, the Predators and the LA-AT's. Muster up the Stormtroopers, rouse the pilots. I want Alpha and Gamma Engineering shifts on duty with Delta and Beta shifts covering damage control. I want all cannons brought on line and all gunners to man their posts. Lieutenant Tenant, I want a ship wide status report in fifteen minutes. That is all."

Zarn looks to each of you and says, "We have a mission to complete people. Move."

[Major]

"If we have a spy leaking our every mission then rushing to run in and ignoring it will not help." Kelaeon says annoyed, "We barely succeeded at the Wheel and that was more luck than anything. Do we really want to form a plan, walk in, and find them sitting there waiting for us? I realize it is urgant and we don't have time for a full spy hunt, but what we do need is a way to lessen or eliminate anymore threats. Communication jamming, whatever." Kelaeon says clenching his fist. "Impersonation and stealth don't work when they know what we are doing."

[Mithric Gunn]

Dr. Sharka nods, leaving the room. He heads to his quarters, ensure his kit is packed well. Then he reports to the ship and calmly waits for the others.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"What if there's no spy and they're just using the Force?" Ice asks, sliding off his chair and making a beeline for the door, "can't you guys see the future? And if you can see the future, can't they?"

[Major]

"Note quite like that, and not the ability to pick individual tiny groups." Kelaeon says, "It is on thing to know a wide-scale change, and even then that is limited to seers, it is a whole different one to TWICE in such a short amount of time know what one specific squad's mission is going to be."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Well then, there's probably a spy somewhere, and it's above the team, since the Sith knew about the Wheel mission before we did," Ice says, stuffing the emergency ring into a pocket, "we'll have to put together a plan to figure out who it is, eventually."

[Major]

"That's fine. I agree now is not the best time for a full examination, but at the same time precautions need to be put in place until the mission is done. Right now anyone who knew about our mission knows what our mission is, so the Sith are on the way to retrieve the doctor, but only the people in this room know the actual plan. As such, I'm suggesting something is done to ensure that the specific details of our plan do not leave this room and get to the Sith. Be it a communications lockdown of everyone here, or whatever."

[Felhammer]

After an hour of faster-than-lighttravel, you arrive in the Feldrona System, or rather just outside it.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
Ice shows up on the bridge just as the ship exits hyperspace.

"Emergency ring is linked to comlinks," he says, tossing the ring to Sairen.

"Well, what do we have in the system? Do they know we're here?" he asks, attempting to peer beneath a crewman's arm to get a good look at a sensor screen.

[Noedig]

The briefing ended without a solid plan, but maybe that was best. No plan they'd ever made in the past had lasted longer than first contact. He stood and motioned for Jax to follow him. He issued his orders as they walked.

"Jax, get my boys and girls ready for war. I want everyone to double up on ammo and grenades. If we get pinned in the prison, I want to be able to last. Make sure they've all got at least one medkit on them, because this is going to be messy and we've only got four medics in the platoon. This is op is probably going to go sideways in a hurry once we get groundside, so go ahead and bring some of the heavy weapons. Tell Staff Sergeant Kenzee we're packing an extra load of detonite and timers on top of our standard sapper kit. We may need to make some doors, and I'll be damned if the Panthers run out of Boom. Tell Mynock, Banshee and Acklay to do the same. You've got one hour. Get it done Sarge, I've got to speak with Bones."

He split off from Jax and went to find the Felucian. They had business to discuss.

[Major]

With a sigh, Kelaeon gets up and heads out to get his disguises, beckoning for Bail to follow. He didn't particularly like having to look like a Sith, but the mission was the mission. Hopefully between the dark side crystal and the disguise, he'd be able to get this done. Shame the spy chick had left. He bet she would have probably had a holoshroud or something to do the job even easier.

Once they were out of the room and walking to get his disguise, Kelaeon spoke, "I'm leaving you in charge of looking into this spy. Use the Force, draw on instinct. Look for suspicion and strange factors. While our strike force is gone, it is highly likely the traitor will take this chance to warn the Sith of our plan. Do not act unless it is an emergency, gather the information, trust your instincts, and let me know upon my return."

[Mithric Gunn]

As Jarik walks onto the ship, Sharka is sitting in meditation. His eyes dont open, but Jarik hears, Can I help you Lieutenant Jarik?

[Iron Victory]

Sairen was twitchy, he hated the quiet before the storm. Producing a small flask, the Chiss takes a swig before retrieving a small disk from around his neck. He smiles longingly as it projects the hologram of a young Chiss woman. Tucking it beneath his uniform he departs for the shuttles. As always, Titus follows, programmed to defend his charge.

[Noedig]

"Your dossier is an interesting read, Bones. Says you can do some crazy stuff, like walk through walls. Can you?"

[Mithric Gunn]

Sharka's black, alien eyes open. It is not easy, Lieutenant. Even for me, it takes great concentration, and may require multiple attempts to succeed. But I am capable of such a feat.

[Noedig]

"Can you move more than one person? Say yourself and one or two others?"

[Mithric Gunn]

Unfortunately not. I could maybe sneak you past guards and electronic surveillance, but I can only phase myself through walls.

[Noedig]

Jarik sighed.
"Aw, see that's a shame. Was looking forward to walking through walls. You can't imagine how damned useful that would be in my profession. The ESP is pretty sweet too. Beats the hell out of comlinks."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Kel," Ice said over the comm, connecting directly to Kel's comlink, "all they've got are a few frigates in orbit, and a few thousand troops and ground vehicles, maybe some armor, but it's all spread out across the planet."

He pauses for a moment.

"What's the call?" Ice asks.

[Major]

Kelaeon sighed and lifted the comlink. He hated giving the order, but while he might have been in charge, the group was a team and ultimately they had mostly wanted to lead the direct attack.

"It seems the desired objective is to blast them hard, fast, grab the VIP, and get out. If we can move fast enough we can hopefully get in and out while they are still mobilizing." Kelaeon said rubbing his temple. "Let's try and get the ship as close to the planet as we can without being picked up as hostile. If possible use codes or whatever so that we can get our ground teams headed down. The longer we can keep up the act that we are friendly, the bigger the surprise when we start the blaster and the less time they have to react."

"We'll get close, get our troops on the ground, and then begin blasting as much of the defenses as we can from orbit until the frigates get involved. The more they can blast to help us before having to defend themselves, the better. Any concerns or problems?"

[Felhammer]

Commander Zarn activates the outdated IFF and gleefully commands the Kestrel into the system. None of the Frigates take note of the new arrival, preferring to take the IFF at its word. "Excelent," says Zarn, "We have them right where we want them. Knight Kaeleon, we stand ready to commence the attack at your leisure."

[Noedig]

Jarik sighed as Kel came over the ship-wide comm.

"Good talk, Bones. Suggest you get kitted up, it's going to get ugly down there. See you groundside."

He stepped out of the Felucians room and jogged down to the hangar where his platoon was hopefully waiting to go. The lift ride was short and as the doors opened he could see his troopers bustling about getting ready. Some of them were still dressing, and there was a playful bit of 'grab-ass' happening, but that aside Jax was keeping things ordered.

He moved quickly to his locker and pulled out his armor. It was a new set of his old Stormcommando armor, modified to his likings, but it still felt a bit unfamiliar. His 'new' weapons were also waiting for him.

Jarik grinned as he picked up his IWS. He wasn't sure how, but Broody had heard a bit about the Wheel, and she had sent him her own rifle. Delta-45 had etched words of encouragement on the various modules. The sniper mod had Broody's 'One Shot' in flowing cursive, the anti-armor had Drang's nearly illegible scrawl and read 'Go Loud'. Carga had signed the rifle itself, 'Check your corners', a private joke between them.

He clipped the rifle to his harness and grabbed his sidearm. It was a DC-15s, like his old one. They were even harder to come by than the IWS, and it had come with a note from Wren. She spent most of it chewing him out, but it was otherwise friendly. She had also etched a message for him along the side of the slide. 'Kill 'em all.'.

Jarik slid the sidearm into his holster and walked to where Jax stood presiding over the chaos.

"You mind shutting' 'em up for a second, Jax? I've got an announcement."

[Major]

Kelaeon bid Bail goodbye, trusting the young man to do his mission well as all Imperial Knights should and then he moved quickly to get to the hanger.

"Commence." He ordered once everyone was ready.

[Noedig]

Kestrel, Pre-Attack order:
Jax called for quiet twice but the noise in the hangar drowned him out. Jarik smirked and pulled out his sidearm.

"You want somethin' done right..."

He aimed it at the ceiling and fired three shots. The whole platoon jerked their heads in his direction, some even going so far as to reach for their weapons. Instead of an attacker they saw Jarik chuckling quietly and Jax silently glaring at all of them. Jarik hollstered his weapon and stepped up on a crate.

"Gather round boys and girls, your CO has some things to tell you. First, the chain of command on this op may be a little new to some of you, so I'm going to lay it out nice and plain for you. You have Imperial Knight Kelaeon at the top, then the company captain, then me, then Jax and then your sergeants. Having a Knight over us might irk some of you, but let me be perfectly clear: get over it. That's the C-O-C, you don't have to like it."

He paused, pulled out a cigarette and took a long pull.

"Secondly, this op is going to be a knife fight. The definition of CQB. Hall to hall, room to room. As far as this platoon is concerned, every one of those halls and rooms are heavily defended and every door and lift is booby trapped tohell. Check your corners, and keep your damn heads on the swivel.

He puffed on the cigarette for a moment before continuing.

"Thirdly, there are some True Imperials being held down there. Some of you may even have friends there. Much as I hate to say it, they are not the objective. We'll try to rescue them of we can, but if it comes down to a choice between the mission and them, the mission comes first. That being said, I'm checking with Kelaeon and the captain about taking some extra weapons down when we assault."

There were some murmurs, some less than pleased at his most recent announcement.

"Lastly, quit karking around and get kitted up. We drop in ten, and I want us ready well before that. We'll do comms and signs on the way down. Dismissed."

He stepped off the crate and checked his kit one last time.

[Philistine]

Shortly before the reversion of the INS Rogue Kestrel to realspace near Feldrona
Squadron Ready Room, 1st Imperial Navy Fighter Squadron, Imperial Navy Ship Rogue Kestrel
The tall, lean form of Squadron Leader Graff entered and marched to the lectern, and the room grew quiet as thirty pilots and flight crew broke off their conversations. "Eyes front," he began - a formality, as the assembled fliers had already directed their attention to the front of the room.

"All right, ladies and gentlemen. You might be wondering about the unannounced high-speed hyper transit - though no doubt some of you already think you know what's going on," Graff said. His eyes flicked toward where Homer and Songbird sat, one eyebrow and the corners of his mouth quirking up almost invisibly as quiet chuckles swept around the room. The Ronto's flight crew were notoriously well-connected to the shipwide scuttlebutt network - it always provided answers fast, though whether or not those answers were right was a different story. After a brief pause, he continued, "We're going to Feldrona. Intelligence tells us there's a prison down there, and we have a short window of opportunity to break it while the Usurpers are redeploying to cover their losses. And when I say "short," I mean our best information has us beating Darth Krayt himself, personally, to the system by five hours or less." Graff paused again to let the chorus of muttered profanity subside. "That's right. The Big Bad Boss Sith himself. So we want to be long gone by the time he shows up."

He tapped a sequence on his bracer datapad, and a schematic of the system, centered on the prison, appeared on the room's central projector. "Here's what we've got. Science Division is confident that we can spoof the Sith IFF, at least for long enough, so we're going to put up a patrol - just like it's business as usual - as soon as we break hyper. Jester, I want you and Easy for this one, and I'll join up as your number three. I'll fake an in-flight emergency to get me in close enough to blow the facility's comms, then set down on the surface. Then Snoot and Boost are going to escort the Red Dawn and the Ronto down as well, and Green and Gold Flights will pretend to conduct a CSAR op while our Stormtrooper contingent, who will be riding down on the shuttles, storm the place from ground level. Papabear, you'll have the Red Dawn with a command crew for this run, and Snake, you'll ride down as well to pick up Hellhound. Though you'll have to keep it on the ground until time to leave, or until local security arrives on the scene." Graff's mouth twisted in a parody of a smile, "I'll be going in with the ground team."

Graff shook his head and spoke into the stunned silence that filled the room. "I told you I used to be ImpInt; Command wants me back in the saddle one more time. Whisper. While I'm dirtside, I want one Predator flight covering Gold and another covering the Kestrel at all times, rotating people through to keep everyone fresh. The assault team will signal Gold Flight for dustoff. Snake, that'll be your signal too." He stopped and looked around the room again. "Not much point in asking questions. This is a target of opportunity, and our intel is limited. Local forces are expected to be significant, but spread thin. Major forces are supposed to be completely out of position for the next few hours. Well, we'll see."

"All right, Gunfighters. You shouldn't have to fire a shot if this mission goes according to plan. If it doesn't, then we'll kick their ass so hard their kids will be born with their ears ringing. So make sure you've got today's comm frequencies and challenge codes, and good hunting!"

The Present, above Feldrona
At the Imperial Knight's order, a trio of Predators drop clear of the Rogue Kestrel's hangar and curve out on a standard patrol course. Moments later, a bored-sounding voice drawls over the open comm, "Home Base, this is One-Three. I'm getting some anomalous readings from my nav system - request telemetry check." A heartbeat later he returns, sounding slightly more excited, "Kark! Home Base, One-Three. I've got crazy feedback on my comms, and my weapons system just kicked itself offline! Declaring an emergency at this time, request immediate vector to the hangar bay for RTB!" Suddenly, the number three fighter in the formation breaks away and screams down toward the planet's surface below. The Predator plummets on an erratic course, while the pilot's cries of "Mayday" fill the ether as his transmitter locks open.

Scant meters above the ground, the fighter suddenly rights itself and opens fire on the prison's communications array. The pilot brings the Predator to a wrenching stop just up-slope of the fireball, settling down on the repulsorlift drive and killing all transmissions. Waiting.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
On board the Red Dawn, Ice was in his customary seat at the sensor station, next to the pilot's chair. He monitored the Sith communication frequencies, listening for anything that might indicate they suspected anything.

"Did I ever tell you about the time I jury-rigged a holding cell's force field projector into a plasma beam?" he said casually to the pilot, "good trick if you're ever stuck in a prototype star destroyer's brig that hasn't had all the design flaws ironed out."

The ship angled towards the prison, in response to the 'distress call'.

"Take good care of my ship while I'm out, would you? I spent a lot of time on her," he said.

[Noedig]

Jarik swayed with the turbulence. The ride down in the Ronto was far from the most unpleasant shuttle ride he'd ever taken. He slipped on his helmet and did the comms check.

"This is Crash. 4th Platoon report in, over."

It took about a minute for the platoon to report in and he used the time to ask the Captain for a sign-countersign call. What he received amused him.

"Listen up. Sign for this op is 'Hammer'. Countersign is 'Stumbles.' Do not karking forget it, because that'll get you killed. Sergeants will make the calls. Copy?"

A chorus of affirmatives rang in and Jarik smiled.

"For the True Emperor. And remember, we've got a deal with Death. We keep the void packed with souls, and he leaves us alone. Don't renege."

[Felhammer]

With a "hoorah," the Stormtroopers of the 4th Platoon pile into their LA-AT. Graff takes a Predator down to the planet and pulls off the ploy like an expert deceiver and marksman. Meanwhile, the Kestrel launches all of the LA-AT's as well as the Ronto and the Dawn. The Ardent then zips forward to shield the invasion force and to quickly disable the enemy frigates. With a timing and precision only Commander Zarn could pull off, all four of the enemy Frigates' shields, engines and communications and power grids are wiped out. The Rogue Kestrel now has complete control over Feldrona's Space.

The landing party swoops down to the planet and finds little resistance... In fact, none. As you zoom over the nearest city, you see mountains of contorted, dessicated, almost mummy-like corpses. There doesn't appear to be a soul left alive in town. As you speedily race to the prison, you find only the automated defenses are active. There are no troopers, no guards, no shields, just turrets.

Graff: As you near the planet's surface, you get an eerie, unsettling feeling in your gut. You also feel itchy.

[Mithric Gunn]

Upon seeing the empty city and prison, Dr. Sharka stands up. "I need a hazmat suit and equipment for taking samples. Knight Keleaon, with your permision I'd like to take a team down to take samples. If this is a new bioweapon, we need to develop a cure."

A look of concentration distorts his alien features, and Sharka reaches out with the force, trying to get a glimpse of what happened here.

[Major]

"If it does not endanger the mission. We can't just land and check things now and it is unlikely we will have time blasting off." Kelaeon says calmly. "Right now it'd be too dangerous, I can't see a safe way you'd do that."

[Thundercracker]

Ice (on board the Red Dawn)
Ice quickly scans the immediate area for life forms, and if he finds none, scans any area within line of sight. If there are none (or very little), he'll send an encrypted message to the Kestrel to scan the planet and the four frigates.

"Don't open the airlock or the cargo hold until we know what's going on, I'm much too pretty to end up like those corpses," he says to the pilot.

[Noedig]

Jarik heard Ice mention corpses and something began to worry him.

Ice, this is Crash. What corpses? The LAATs don't come with windows, over."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Those funny looking hills in the middle of that city over there? Unless my scopes are wrong, those are corpses," Ice replies to Jarik's comlink.

The Mrlssi flips a switch to send an encrypted message to friendlies.

"All craft, stay above 2500 meters, repeat, do not descend below 2500 meters. Predator pilot, do not exit your vehicle," he says.

"What chain of command?" he mutters after making sure the comm is switched off.


Ice wants to talk to Kel and Sharka (edit: make that the entire party), which ships are they on? If they're not on the Dawn, he'll open a channel to their comlinks. Also, have we taken out the automated turrets yet?

[Iron Victory]

Sairen's eyes go wide with terror as the Chiss' composed expression fades. "I've seen this before, an old file... Imperial bioweapons Project I71A. It was an infectious viral agent that attacked biological tissue and transformed its victims into violent, undead monstrosities. The last known outbreak was over 100 years ago, its presence here is... troubling, to say the least." He takes a moment to contemplate the situation. "I agree with Dr. Sharka, we need to gather samples. I request to be part of the landing team. Extreme caution is required here, full hazard suits only."

[Mithric Gunn]

"If we can figure out how the virus affects the hosts, we may be able to synthesize something to destroy it."

[Noedig]

Jarik popped off his helmet and scratched his beard. Standing in the back of the LAAT was starting to get tiresome. They'd removed the speeders from the back to accomodate both Jax and himself, and it was more uncomfortable than usual. He pulled out his comlink.

"Crash here. Are we going to snag the VIP or not? The LAATs can't stay airborne forever, over."

[Major]

"Negative." Kelaeon says in reply to Sairen and the Doctor, "Our mission is not to deal with bioweapons, our mission is to rescue the VIP. While knowing of the weapon is useful and allows us to protect ourselves against it, needlessly going around and gathering data is a risk to the mission." He says, "I repeat, if there was a way to grab it another time sure. But right now we aren't going to land, grab samples, and do the mission. We are on a timer and we do not want to cause questions by us randomly landing."

[Philistine]

Graff doesn't reply to Ice's call - playing dead means electronic silence, after all. He double-checks the indicators on his suit, and then on his ship, to be sure that the airtight seals on both are still holding, shifting uncomfortably in his seat as he does so.

Using active sensors is out of the question, of course, for the same reason he's staying off the comms, so he stares out the fighter's viewport while he waits for his ride to arrive. After a minute or two, he remembers to activate the electronic augmentation package included in his new helmet - the new systems don't help him much while flying, but they do wonders for ground-based scouting.

Perception: [roll0]

[Felhammer]

All the LA-AT's are sent back to the Kestrel. The 4th Platoon sticks around to aid the PCs, given that their suits are environmentally sealed, for a few hours. The rest of your suit up in Hazmat outfits. Their bulk makes moving awkward and their iridescent yellow color makes camouflage all but impossible. The Red Dawn and one LA-AT slowly slink into the Prison via it's gaping maw-like entrance. The lights are all off, save for those being generated by the ships and the Hazmat suits. The Troopers jump out of the LA-AT and form a perimeter. The room is large enough to house several small prison ships. Large red and black tubes (with holes large enough to fit a single wookie) dangle eerily from the ceiling, some 6 meters above. Jarik has heard of such devices before, they are used to dock with prison ships and suck up prisoners deemed too dangerous for anything except maximum solitary confinement.

To the north is a wide, open staircase, leading to a grand cargo holding area. Hundreds of crates, both large and small, litter the platform. Beyond them, atop two spiral staircases, are two doors. One appears to be lead to an elevator, the other a hallway. To the east is a massive bullet-shaped ship, painted in reflective, shiny silver. Ice and Sairen recognize the design as the latest model of yacht from Naboo. Beyond the Yacht is a doorway leading to a room called "Initial Interrogation Chamber". To the west lies a very basic prison ship. A 20 meter long cargo container, docked to a small sub-light shuttle. Ice recognizes the design as being the bog standard workhorse of the Empire. He fiddled with one a few years back, the shuttle is slow and not very maneuverable but it is cheap and easy to repair. It also seats a crew of 8. Beyond the prison ship, lies a door leading to a room designated "Prisoner Cleaning Chamber".

No one sees anything that looks like a control panel in the immediate vicinity. Wireless Access has been disabled.

[Noedig]

Jarik checked the power pack in his rifle for the sixth time. The lack of resistance in the prison was...unsettling. He keyed his helmet com.

"I don't like this. Things must've gone sideways in a real hurry for these ships to get left behind, especially the shiny one. Bet it's worth a karking fortune. Whaddya think Ice?"

[Thundercracker]

Ice
Edit: "Yeah," Ice replies to Jarik, "250k at least, no signs of combat though, which could either be very good or very bad, depending on if you're a glass half-full or half-empty kinda guy."
/Edit

Figuring the shuttle was the last ship to arrive, Ice heads over to the 20 meter cargo container to inspect its manifest and possibly get a date of arrival.

"Looks like hallway, staircase, or interrogation chamber from here," he says, "we could try to clear each level before moving up to the next, or we could try to guess where the control room is, your call, Kel."



I'm assuming there's nothing that looks like an active computer terminal where Ice can try to access logs and/or a map of the prison. If there is, he will naturally try to take a look.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
The Mrlssi weaves his way between crates, to the prison ship and inspects the door control panels.

"I'm going to try to get inside the ship to see the logs, he says, "someone cover me so I don't get my face chewed off?"

The slicer pulls out his pistol and then attempts to bypass the door lock and activate the shuttle's gangplank.

[Noedig]

Jarik nodded as Ice stepped over to the prison shuttle and tapped his comm.

"Nomad, Shaggy, Scratch: I want the Panthers, Acklay and Mynok to form a tight perimeter around this ship, on the hop. Twenty meter circle, nothing hostile in or out. Aim for the head and for karksake don't let them get close or I'll shove a rifle up your asses sideways. Jax, you stay out here and keep my platoon in order. Hammer, you and the Banshees are with me. Form up on me and Ice, double time, weapons up and hot."

He waited for his orders to be carried out before giving Ice the go ahead. He keyed his comm again, almost as an afterthought.

"Oh, and keep your hats on. No smoke breaks. And no wandering off for a piss. You have to go, go in your suit. Jax will feed you your rifles if you test me on this."

[Major]

As he climbed out the ship, Kelaeon clenched his fist as he looked around. This was very bad and he didn't like the looks of it. "Make it quick. This biohazard slowed us down and we want to get the prisoner and get out of here, if that is still an option." He says, "Check for danger and anything quick, and then we move on."

[Felhammer]

Ice climbs up into the shuttle. His footfalls clang against the metal ramp like giant bells. CLANG! CLANG! CLANG! The inside of the shuttle is lit only by a humming red emergency light, which flickers at random intervals. The seats have been ripped out of the floor and flung around the room. The upholstery has been ravaged and ripped up. Blood is splattered everywhere on the seats, the deck plating and the windows. There is a single active, blood stained monitor. The screen is completely black save for a single line of text, "Pounding. Pounding. Pounding. They are right outside. We are out of ammo. They have clogged the engines. We are doomed. Oh god they're coming i"

[Noedig]

Jarik swept in behind Ice, rifle poised. As Ice checked the cockpit, Jarik took point as he and the Banshees swept and cleared the rest of the ship. His new eyes had other uses than being unnerving and the dark interior of the ship resolved itself into a sharp black and white.

Very useful indeed.


Perception test with my darkvisiony goodness.
[roll0]

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Wonderful," Ice says, checking for a date to determine how long ago the attack took place, "once we're done here, I want to check the other ship."

Once the sweep of the prison ship is done, Ice will head over to the Naboo yacht.

"Nothing like wandering around a dead virus infected planet on a schedule," he mutters as he waits for the platoon to get into position and opens the gangplank.

[Felhammer]

Jarik sweeps into a completely pitch black containment and transportation trailer. The hallways is narrow, just one meter wide. On each side of the hallway are black durasteel plated walls. Every four meters lies a magnetically sealed door. Suddenly something small skitters along the ceiling. Before anyone can react the small creature lunges down upon Grim, the female Kel Dor. The creature's pointed limbs pierce her eye lens. It then sticks a different limb into the hole and sprays a fine, glowing red mist inside. The creature then jumps back onto the ceiling. Grim screams in pain as she desperately tries to rip her helmet off. As Jarik wheels around to see what just happened, he catches a glimpse of a glowing red eye and eight metallic limbs. The little droid then screeches - "SECURITY ALERT! PRISONER X-91-ALPHA HAS ESCAPED CONFINEMENT! TARGET HAS BEEN NEUTRALIZED! Prisoner X-34-BETA HAS ALSO ESCAPED. SUMMONING REINFORCEMENTS."

Ice can see the blood splattered screen in front of him light up with a warning of a prisoner escape. The door leading to the containment and transportation trailer slams shut. Suddenly, a mechanical hissing noise can be heard, along with the sound of metal scratching against metal. The northern end of the trailer slams against the ground as it is no longer being hoisted up by the shuttle.

The slam is as loud and unexpected as it is jarring. All of the Banshees are flung to the ground. Jarik only manages to remain standing thanks to his mechanical limbs. Grim screams, "MY SKIN IS MELTING! AHHHHHH!"

Ice then sees another window pop up, "Automatic spacing of unruly prisoners commencing in T-Minus 20 Seconds."

[Noedig]

Jarik ground his teeth and drew a bead on the little droid. He hadn't seen it and that had probably cost Trooper Lai her life. He took a breath and squeezed the trigger.

Aim and fire, activating deadeye, sniper and careful shot.
[roll0]
and a force point, because I liked Grim.:smallannoyed:
[roll1]
[roll2]

[Felhammer]

Jarik lines up and shot and snaps off one of the little bug droid's limbs. The other troopers furiously fire into the bug as well. Fixer manages to aim true, piling a shot directly into the droid's ocular mechanism. As the droid falls to the ground dead, five more of the same spider-like bug crawl out from underneath the deck plating. They skitter forward and screech in unison, "EXTERMINATE REBELLIOUS PRISONERS!" All five of them lift up a leg and spray a fine, glowing red mist. The cloud quickly wafts about, contaminating the entire hallway. Much of the mist collects on your armor, coating it in a blazing red powdery dew.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"There's still prisoners on the ship?? They're going to dump the prisoners into the prison!" Ice says.

The slicer begins to attempt to override the prisoner spacing command.

Suddenly the spider droids attack, and Ice furiously attempts to shut them down before more casualties are taken.

Take 10 for DC 32, otherwise:
[roll0]

[Noedig]

Things were going from bad to worse. Grim was down, possibly KIA, and there were five more of the little karkers running around. He had no idea what the mist did, but if Grim's screams were any indication, it was very, very bad. He lined up another shot and keyed his comm and shouted furiously.
"ICE! WE'VE GOT DROIDS! SHUT THEM DOWN! NOW!"

He picked a droid and fired.


Aim, fire, kill.
[roll0]
[roll1]

[Mithric Gunn]

Realizing that there is little he can do in this situation, Dr. Sharka immerses himself into the current, picking out a trooper and helping to guide that trooper's aim.
Using Enlighten on a trooper:
[roll0]
Using my immersion to hide myself and the trooper from the droid's sensors.
[roll1]

[Philistine]

In the hangar bay, Graff stalks the 4th Platoon's perimeter restlessly. The hazmat suit isn't nearly as comforting as might be expected under the circumstances, due to the way the unaccustomed bulk interferes with movement; Graff's movement is partly intended to familiarize himself with the suit, as well as to burn off nervous energy and keep an eye on the team's surroundings.

He's passing behind the shuttle when the boarding hatch suddenly hisses closed, followed a moment later by the end of the cargo pod dropping to the surface below with a tremendous noise, and he whirls, crouching and reaching for the blaster at his hip. When nothing else appears to be happening outside he straightens, and begins trying to make sense of the com chatter from Crash and Ice. He immediately rules out trying to force his way aboard the shuttle - the people already aboard must be packed in like canned meat (a simile he swiftly regrets), and crowding yet more people in there isn't likely to help anything. And besides, they might be about to have problems of their own out here. Opening the door might help, but first he keys his comlink.

"Jax, this is Squadron Leader Graff. I'm not gonna tell you how to do your job - but if I were going to make a suggestion, I'd say it might be a good idea to have a few of your people covering this-here cargo pod in case it spits out something ugly from the transport pods down the sides. Meantime, I'm gonna try to re-open this hatch." With that he steps up to the just-closed hatch and keys the access panel.

[Iron Victory]

Sairen, who had been hanging back and examining the wreckage rushes forward to help Jarik and his troopers. "In the name of the Emperor, hold your ground!" The Chiss' bodyguard, Titus, fires at the droids while shielding his charge.

I'm really sorry for the delayed post. I'll be much quicker in the future.

Sairen (I'm not very effective against droids...)
Move Action: Move up towards the droids and Jarik.
Standard: Know Your Enemy: Galactic Lore [roll0]
(Try to learn their Reflex Defense.)
Swift: Activate Born Leader.

Titus
Move Action: Move up towards the droids and Jarik.
Standard Action: Fire his Blaster Cannon with Rapid Shot at the droids. It's an Area Attack so he'll try to target as many as possible
Attack: [roll1]
Damage: [roll2]
Swift Action: Activate Harm's Way on Sairen.

[Major]

As the door seals Kelaeon looks at Graff and nods before quickly activating his lightsaber in case of trouble. He looks around and draws on the Force to try and sense his surroundings for any danger.


Use the Force: DC 15 to ignore cover and concealment, DC 20 if total cover
[roll0]

Perception:
[roll1]
Force point
[roll2]
[roll3]

[Mithric Gunn]

Sharka immerses himself in the force as he scans the area for potential threats.
He turns to Keleaon, "Knight Keleaon, if there are only droids left active, I could sneak myself and another into the prison, possibly to disable any defenses."

UTF to stealth and hide from electronic sensors: [roll0]
Perception: [roll1]

[Felhammer]

Ice finds that the droids are not networked in the least - they are fully autonomous. It is as if the Sith created these bugs for the specific purpose of confounding and bewildering any prisoner that dare escape his cell.

Jax glares over at Graff, "If you were any other man, I would rip your arms off, shove a pile of detonite down your throat and laugh as I detonated the explosives. But..." He smiles, "you are friend Graff and I do not harm friends." Jax then turns away from Graff and yells in a very guteral, almost incomprehensible voice, "Karking sithspit get the load out you weak-kneed Hutts! I want the lieutenant extracted in 30 seconds! Boom Panthers, have at.

Several of the Panthers run up and begin laying down a small charge along the cargo container's hull.

Kel senses 9 souls within the cargo container, along with one life that has recently been snuffed out. He can sense the existence of four spider-like robots inside. He also senses... What feels like a dark and ominous presence coming from deep within the bowls of the prison. The presence notices Kel and becomes intrigued. It reaches out for you and whispers, "Kel. Here. Reasons? Invasion? Reconnoiter? Extraction. Desires something special. Me? Secret Sith Project? The Ee. Interesting. Did not foresee this eventuality. Must extrapolate new plan."

The good Doctor easily hides himself from all surveillance and sees nothing out of the ordinary in the immediate vicinity.

Sairen's attack must be retconned away since he is not inside the cargo container/prison ship/shuttle.

[Noedig]

Jarik was rapidly upgrading from annoyed to furious with these damned droids. The more rational side of his mind argued that, while unfortunate, a single casualty was hardly worth getting riled up about. The other of his mind said 'kark that' and he kept firing.

"Come on you karkers! Come dance with Crash! Banshees! Fire your weapons!"

Aim fire kill (hopefully) and order my squad to do the same.
[roll0]
[roll1]

[Felhammer]

All of the Banshees and Jarik fire into the four bugs but, alas, to no avail. The little droids prove very agile and vexing. The four bugs lunge forward in unison. Jarik quickly realizes the little karkers are using advanced tactics as he takes aim at the droid leading the charge (who swiftly evades the assault). This realization comes too late as one of the bugs jumps up and attaches itself to Smash's helmet. In an instant, the droid dives its spear-like leg into the glass and, once through the thin material, sprays an obscene amount of the red mist directly onto its target's vulnerable flesh.

[Felhammer]

Momma Bear howls with anger as she clutches the screaming Chiss.

[Noedig]

And now Jarik was pissed. Two soldiers, good ones, were dead and they'd been on the planet for maybe twenty minutes.
"GOD DAMMIT! JAX! POP THIS CAN!"

He drew a bead on the 'leader' and fired.

Aim Fire Kill.
[roll0]
[roll1]
[roll2]

Damage
[roll3]

[Felhammer]

Jarik blasts another bug away. The remaining Banshees fire into the enemy but all miss. The little Droids hold up a different limb and fire off little round orb. One of the orbs strikes Fatty in the head. He collapses onto the ground seemingly dead. Momma Bear rushes over to Fatty and checks his pulse. She howls that he's alive but unconcious.

[Major]

"It couldn't be..." Kelaeon mumbles before thinking and hoping the figure would read his mind.

Who are you? He thinks, hoping that the answer is not what he suspects.

"We've been detected." He states with a frown, "And by detected I mean they know not just that people are here, but me specifically." He points, "Nine souls there, one dead person inside, four robots. But that isn't the problem. There is a very dark presence in there who sensed me. Do NOT phase inside and do NOT get separated. If it is who I think it is, this could be a very dangerous enemy."

[Felhammer]

Kel senses a wry smile and a tiny bit of excited elation. No words, just emotion.

[Major]

Suddenly so quiet, I hope my presence here didn't scare you off. You become one of these zombies? Kelaeon ask trying to get the voice to talk more. If it was who he thought then he wasn't sure if he should be thrilled to get the chance to make the man pay, or worried that the man was here. Then again, you are more a skeleton than a zombie aren't you? Perhaps a ghost?

[Philistine]

Graff scrabbles at the door's access panel, finally prying it loose - only to remember that his tool kit is on his belt, inside the biohazard suit. "That was karking stupid of me," he mutters to himself.

His snarl is unseen by anyone due to the two helmets between his face and the outside world, but everyone can see him step back from the shuttle's hatch, draw his heavy pistol, and fire a brilliant emerald bolt directly into the exposed circuitry of the door.

Han Solo check!: [roll0]

ETA: LIKE. A. BOSS.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
Ice attempts to immediately space everything in the cargo pod, which would presumably open all the cargo pod's doors and cells, giving the platoon an exit route.


take 10 if possible for DC 32 otherwise;
computer use: [roll0]

[Felhammer]

Graff pulls out his blaster and pops a shot into the door's control panel. As expected, the doors fly open. A fine red mist bursts out of the trailer and coats your bio-hazard suit with a crimson dew-like substance. Contained inside the trailer is a scene of horror and dread. Two Stormtroopers lie on the ground, a Wookiee howls loudly. Four little bug like droids with glowing red eyes skitter about, obviously looking dangerous.

Ice uses his magic-like hacking ability to tell the trailer to vent. He takes note that there is no "stop venting" button. The entire trailer is designed to be disposable. Once vented, it cannot be un-vented. However, to his surprise, only a thousand small holes open up across the entire exterior of the pod. Obviously the Sith preferred to incite fear and panic in those unfortunate enough to try and break free.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Wow, that's... really smart," Ice says, wondering who designed that little function.

The explosion rocks the shuttle. Ice scampers over to the exit ramp and peers out into the hangar bay, pistol in hand.

[Noedig]

The door at the other end of the container flew open, flooding the dark space with light. Outside, Jarik could see a figure in a hazmat suit with a heavy pistol.

"There's the door, Banshees! MOVE IT!"

He wasted no time to see if the squad advanced toward safety, instead attempting to draw the droids attention to himself by continuing to shoot at them and stop killing his squad.

Aim fire kill, and order the Banshees to get the hell out of Dodge. Shooting as they go of course.

[roll0]
[roll1]

[Iron Victory]

Approaching the shuttle, Sairen arrives just soon enough for the door to seal shut in front of him. As the sound of blaster bolts and screams of dying men erupt from within, the Chiss shouts into his comlink. "Lieutenant Jarik, what's your situation? Ice?" Upon hearing the doors open, he rushes to the exit ramp. Titus shadows his charge while moving to intercept any hostiles.

This whole damn place was wrong... just wrong.


Sairen
Move: Approach the recently opened door.

Titus
Standard: Ready an action to Rapid Shot anything hostile-looking.
Attack: Blaster Cannon [roll0] (area of effect 2x2)
Damage: [roll1]
Move: Move ahead of Sairen (still adjacent.)
Swift: Harm's Way on Sairen.

[Major]

As the blaster shots become open and the door opens, Kelaeon stops the conversation with the mysterious voice for a bit. He'd find a way to contact the voice soon, but for now it sounded like danger.

He turned and looked towards the ship, the people inside better have found something or else they were wasting valuable time pointlessly when they should have be getting inside the prison.

Suddenly he stopped and smirked. If there was danger an entire squad was crammed in the ship and trying to do melee with everyone inside would be a pain. However, he had a better idea.

Closing his eyes, Kelaeon tried to imagine the Givin he had met aboard the station. Then he drew on the Force to try and envision where the Givin was at the moment, be he alive or dead.


Farseeing
[roll0]+5 (force point, see ooc)
If I connect force point to see his surroundings. Can't spend two a turn sadly...

Edit: Ick, scratch that. Force point to add to the roll. See ooc thread. Doubt it will matter...

[Noedig]

What's my situation?

Blue had to be joking. He had to be. It was not as if Jarik had been subtle about was happening, and he'd been using an open channel. He hoped Jax would wise up and come barreling around the corner to lay down cover fire, but hope was being a right bitch today, so instead of trusting her, he barked into his comm.

"Three casualties, we're coming out, cover us and shoot the karking droids!"

[Philistine]

Graff stands at the base of the boarding ramp, making sure to leave a clear path for the surviving stormies to clear the shuttle. He takes careful aim at the nearest of the little droid-horrors and fires off another blast from his pistol.

Aim, Aim, Fire.
Attack: [roll0]
Damage: [roll1]

[Mithric Gunn]

Drawing his blaster, Sharka heads over to the ramp. He concentrates, immersing himself and Graff in the flow of light around him, and helping guide Graff.

UTF for stealth vs electronic sensors: [roll0]
UTF for Enlightenment on Graff: [roll1]

[Felhammer]

Jarik lobs a shot in but does not find purchase. Titus is next but his torrent of fire proves futile as well as the bugs jump onto the ceiling to avoid the spray of laser bolts.

Kel taps into the Force to locate his target. However, he is met by a stern voice, "Cheating. Hmm, not allowed. Game is not fun without risk and ignorance. A race. Yes. A race to the Doctor. Winner takes all."

With a guiding hand of the Force, Graff easily blows one of the bugs away with a single shot.

The Bugs skitter about, this time aiming for different enemies. One bug lunges down from the ceiling and lands on Showstopper. With a stunning display of agility and power, the droid slashes the Twi'Lek's armpitt joint. The slash would have been a meaningless gesture if not for the cloud of red mist that is still permiating the air of the trailer. She screams in agony as she drops to the floor. Preferring a swift death to a slow one, she rips her helmet off. Graff, Sairen and Jarik bare witness to the mist condense on her flesh and (quite like napalm) lights on fire and quickly melts her flesh away. After a few agonizing moments her body collapses on the deck, leaving only a charred, smoking skeleton. Her last words are, "Kill these mother karkers, sir."

The other Bug rushes forward and lunges onto Graff's shoulder. Try as it might, Graff girates and contorts himself in such a way so as to deny the droid a good angle to pierce his hazard suit.

[Major]

"We need to move now." Kelaeon yells out, "We have an enemy inside the prison heading to the doctor!" Kelaeon says clenching his fist, "And damn it Ice, I'm pretty sure it's that Givin." He says turning to look towards the cargo hold and looking around for who wasn't involved yet. "Anyone not engaged, with me. We'll start working on getting inside so that once these droids are dealt with they can catch up with little resistance."

With those words, Kelaeon moves quickly towards the prison entrance, saber still activated.

You have one chance to quit this game now or die. If you interfere with my mission again, I will put you down. If you leave now I will not pursue you, I will not look for you. But if you stay, I will find you. And I will kill you.

[Felhammer]

Jax and the Red Acklays will join Kel, the other two squads acting as backup.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Do people just like randomly yelling my name?" Ice says over the comlink, "why is it my fault there's a givin in the prison?"

"What the-" Ice says as Kel moves towards the prison entrance, "we're all kind of busy trying not to die over here, where are you going?"

Ice knelt down at the top of the shuttle's boarding ramp and braced his modified pistol against the hull to steady his aim.

"Make it count, make it count, make it count..."


Destiny point for automatic crit: [roll0]
I doubled the dice and multiplied the modifier by 2 for the critical hit, not sure if we're supposed to just roll the damage and multiply it or multiply the number of dice...
Edit: Also another +2 damage if the spider is in point blank range.

[Felhammer]

With uncharacteristic marksmanship, Ice lines up and shot and fires off a blazing fast bolt that not only hits, but goes through, the bug droid. A pile of ash falls upon Graff's shoulder where there once stood an enemy.

[Iron Victory]

Sairen stands stunned, unmoving as the carnage unfolds before him. He had forgotten the true brutality of the Sith, having been out of combat for so long. Remembering the fate of his troops on Corulag, he shudders. "Bring them down!" orders the Chiss, snapping out of his daze. Titus re-calibrates his aim and fires again at the skittering automatons.


Sairen (I'm not very effective against droids...)
Standard: Know Your Enemy: Galactic Lore
(Try to learn their Reflex Defense and if they have the Evasion talent.)
Swift: Activate Born Leader.
Move: Battle Analysis (Auto-succeed.)

Titus
Standard Action: Fire his Blaster Cannon with at the droid(s). It's an Area Attack so he'll try to target as many as possible
Attack: [roll1]
Damage: [roll]3d12+5) 24
Swift Action: Activate Harm's Way on Sairen.

[Noedig]

Jarik watched in mute horror as Taki's face was cooked away. He was glad Grim and Smash's helmets had still been on when they died because seeing them die like that would have probably broken the squad's morale. It had sure as hell shaken his. The butcher's bill was growing far too quickly for this mission. If it kept up, there wouldn't be a platoon to lead by the end of it. He glanced to his left and saw Hammer. Her helmet obscured her face, but he could tell she was seething. There eye's met, and he saw her tense. She hated him right now, but it was fine. After fifty percent casualties to her squad in under two minutes, he hated himself.

Sairen's assistance droid clatter up and let loose with its cannon and Jarik snapped his attention back to the fight, adding his fire to the droid's.

Aim Fire Kill.
[roll0]
[roll1]

[Major]

"I repeat, we have an enemy in the prison. I trust you guys can wrap up the droids, but if we sit here waiting each second we wait the enemy gets closer to the doctor. Wrap things up and then group up. Better for us to start clearing a path than trying to cram aboard."

Kelaeon says through the com as he moves with Jax and the Red Acklays.

"As for reasons for your name, you said he was dead."

[Felhammer]

Titus' targeting subroutines see through the dense fog, locate the droid, predict his likely movements and fire where the droid will be, rather than where it was. As expected, the droid lunges straight into a bolt, disintegrating its tiny frame.

Meanwhile, Jax keeps pace with Kel. The hulking Herglic heaves his hefty Vibro-Hwandudaedo out of its heavyweight sheath. Jax twists the curved blade in his hand a few times before saying, "I can kill anything I put my mind to." He then sheathes his sword and draws his standard issue Blaster Rifle, "And what I can't cut, I'll blast." Smiling the Herglic continues, "I have your back Mission Leader."

The two of you and the Red Acklay squad rush up the broad staircase and burst onto the docking platform where hundreds of crates have been laid out in a seemingly random and bizarre pattern. Together they form a large labyrinth, beyond which are two spiral staircases leading to an unmarked hallway and an elevator. As you make your way through the labyrinth, Kel becomes cognoscente of the fact that one of the Acklays has gone missing. You crouch down with the squad in a fairly protected portion of the maze. A headcount is called and, indeed, one of the troopers has gone missing - the Kel Dor named Wheezer.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"You mean the givin on the Wheel who helped me and had his head blown off by a stormtrooper?" Ice asks, "Yeah, I'm pretty sure he's dead."

[Noedig]

Jarik let out a breath he didn't know he'd been holding when the last droid went down. He led the Banshees out of the cargo container and as far from the mist as possible, making sure their dead were brought with them. He had to resist the intense urge to remove his helmet and hurl it across the hangar.

"Bones, get over here and take a look at Fatty. Try and get him up if you can. Police weapons and ammo. Sorry everyone, but there's nothing we can do for Smash, Grim and Showstopper now 'cept avenge 'em and complete this cluster-kark of an op. And can someone tell me what the hell just killed them?! The hell kind of chemical is this stang?"

He looked around searching for Jax and noticed that he and the Acklays were missing.

"Jax, Crash here. Where the hell did you and Acklay kark off to, over?"

[Felhammer]

Short as always, Jax replies, "We're up top in the docking area boss. Lost Wheezer. You see him?"

[Noedig]

Momma Bear was howling a few feet away from him, so he hoped he had heard wrong.
"Shh!"
Everyone around him, including the wookiee went silent.
"Repeat last, over."

[Philistine]

Graff grinds his teeth as he listens to the comm chatter. He'd noticed the Imperial Knight and one of the stormtrooper squads moving away during the fight with the droids, but hadn't had the time or leisure to really pay attention to it; now it's all he can do to stop himself unleashing a blistering torrent of invective. That green-as-grass Knight... "Stumbles, recommend you re-establish visual contact with the main body, soonest." There was a difference between speed and haste, after all; dividing your force and rushing headlong into an ambush was exactly the sort of hasty decision that ended up costing speed. And usually lives.

[Mithric Gunn]

Sharka follows along behind Keleaon, and light ripples along their forms as he immerses them in the current, light flowing around them.
Right behind you, Knight Keleaon
Immersion: [roll0]

[Major]

As the Red Acklays gathered around and the head count was called, Kelaeon clenched his fist. "Something is using this labyrith to try and pick us off, I doubt someone just got lost." Kelaeon warned the Red Acklays. "Pick a partner or two, and constantly maintain visual contact with them. Call out any strange sightings, best to be too cautious than too carefree, but we need to keep moving." Kelaeon said, "As much as I'd prefer to stay, this is no longer just us and is a race. We are on a timer and failing the missing isn't an option." He says motioning the group to keep moving.

With a sigh, he lifted his comlink.

"You check a pulse, Ice? Not sure how he did it, but I'd be willing to bet two thousand credits it's him. And I don't take bets usually." Kelaeon states.

At Graff's voice, Kelaeon replies as he walks, "I will again repeat myself, we have a new enemy in the prison who is already moving in toward the doctor. Each second we wait is a second we are losing. I recommend once you get the chance, you re-establish visual contact with us. We are spearheading out way forward and will be dealing with hostiles and security as well as moving slowly so it shouldn't be too hard." Kelaeon says trying to keep the annoyance at bay. "Wrapping up a few droids shouldn't take too long so I highly doubt we'd get too far ahead that you can't catch up. Better to spearhead to at least give a small speed advantage and try and keep a safe path for the rest of you. On that note, there is a labyrith up ahead on the docking bay and I suspect something is inside. Make sure everyone has a partner or two to maintain eye contact on them at all times. If you see 'Wheezer' as the group called him, good. But I suspect he is dead and not the priority as the doctor is."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Sorry, I was too busy trying to get away from Mastigo to check the pulse of the guy whose brains were spattered all over the floor," Ice replies, "You're on, if you can prove it's the same givin I killed, and he's not a clone, or a zombie, or a droid, or anything else, the credits are yours."

Ice opens a private comm channel to Graff.

Graff:

"Guess that means we're expendable too, huh?"

[Noedig]

Jarik was silent for a long moment, weighing his options. Stumbles wasn't wrong, cold as his logic may be. The fact was the doctor was priority, and they were expendable. The older soldiers would understand that, they'd been around long enough to know the score. The younger ones would raise a stink, but they'd follow orders. He switched his comm to the sergeants channel.

"Hammer, Crash here. We need to catch up with Knight Kel, and we can't bring our dead with us. Call in a CASVAC, and you and the Banshees ride it back up. I'm declaring you combat ineffective due to loss of personnel. I know you still want to fight, but doctrine says no and I'm not going to argue with you. How copy, over?"

[Felhammer]

Hammer sighs as she nods, fully understanding military protocol. Momma Bear, however, rushes straight for Jarik. She latches her meaty paws onto the Lieutenant's shoulders lifts him off the ground and screams, <NO! I WANT TO KILL THESE KARKERS! I WANT TO KILL THEM ALL! THEY MURDERED MY FRIENDS AND NOW I WANT TO MURDER THEM! DON'T SEND US AWAY, SIR! DON'T!>

Meanwhile Kel, Jax and the Aklays agree to the new plan. As they wind their way through the maze, two of the troopers go missing. Jax hears a call for help and so peels off from the group to investigate. He rushes backward, retracing his steps. He finds a large, dark hole where there was once none. All he can do is shake his head as he peers down the five meter hole. Brains and Lurk triggered an laser tripwire trap that opened up a trap door that lead down a deep hole, filled with jagged scrap metal spikes. Both of their legs are pierced, neither can walk.

[Noedig]

Jarik sighed as he dangled from the wookiee's hands. He'd expected this. He was more tired than angry at this point, and so kept his tone level. Momma Bear was very attatched to the members of her squad, and it was only natural a wookiee would demand vengeance.

"I know. Believe me, I know. But look at yourself; you're holding your superior officer by the scruff his neck, in direct defiance of his orders. You're angry, that's fine, I understand. But I gave you an order, and you will follow that order, trooper. Now put me down, before either of us does something stupid. Please."

[Philistine]

Ice:
"ImpInt, remember?" Graff replies with evident amusement. "I'm used to being considered expendable."

"'Course back then I always had the idea that, if I died, at least it'd be for something," he adds sourly.

Graff watches the confrontation between Jarik and the Wookie with some concern, surreptitiously thumbing the selector on his blaster pistol to Stun. Maybe he could drop the big hairball before she tore the Lieutenant limb from limb, if it came to that. Maybe he couldn't. hopefully he wouldn't have to find out.

[Major]

Hearing the call for help, Kelaeon nods and beckons the troops backwards. Just because everyone was expendable didn't mean they'd needlessly be thrown away. As he got near Jax he looked down and cursed. "Frak, on the upside we know the problem now. We need to bypass this labyrinth somehow, triggering all these traps will just cause an early death for more than possible. Had it been a hostile target it could have been killed and moved on." He states.

He picks up his comlink, "Be advised, the scouting team has discovered that the labyrinth has laser trip wires that will cause you to fall onto metal spikes. Unless you have a way to detect that, I'd recommend working on trying to bypass the labyrinth." He states.

"Any of you with utility belts get out the liquid cable dispensers and start climbing to the top. Those without give me a call out so we can get you loaned one or up there with the Force." He states as he fires his up to the top of the crate, "Wait till I've gotten up in order to make sure it's not a trap..." He says saber drawn and at the ready, if whoever had set up these traps had been trying to kill everyone, he expected another trap on top of these crates.

[Felhammer]

The Acklays and Jax follow Kel up on top of the crates. From this vantage point they can see hordes upon hordes of traps of various makes and models have been strewn out across the maze. Thankfully, it appears the trap layers were not worried about rigging the tops of the containers. As you rush about, you spot lots of corpses, many of them beaten, mangled and gnarled. Many of the bodies appear to have suffered egregious wounds far before they entered the labyrinth...

All of you make it to the end of the maze and find yourselves at the beginnings to two spiral staircases. The right one leads to the elevator, the left one leads to an unmarked hallway...

Kel can once more sense the foul chuckling of his dastardly opponent in his mind.

[Felhammer]

Momma Bear drops Jarik and looks him square in the eye and whispers (as best a Wookiee can), <If you and your men don't make it out of here alive, I am stealing a nuke and making sure no one will ever come here again.> With that said, she rounds up her fellow soldiers and walks outside of the prison. The light from Feldrona's sun glistens off the Stromtrooper's armor as they slowly climb aboard their evac ride. Momma Bear doesn't look back, not even once.

[Major]

"Update, there are no traps were triggered as we went over. I see a lot of dead bodies and a lot of traps in the actual labyrinth however. Try to go over the labyrinth if possible." Kelaeon says over the coms, "Let's try and avoid unnecessary deaths."

As he arrives at the two staircases he paused. He didn't like either option. The elevator was almost definitely trapped and it wouldn't be that hard to make it collapse. And with all these traps he highly doubted that the elevator would be exempt.

However, an unmarked hallway would be a very bad idea if it didn't lead to the objective.

"Men, if the elevator doesn't blow itself up we'll blow it up ourselves and use the turbolift shaft to head down." Kelaeon says as he waits a bit longer at the two staircases not moving yet.


Quick question, can I see the elevator from my spot? If so, Kelaeon would summon it, press a random floor, and then wait as a test.

Also, we don't have a map or anything or the prison do we? I mean, I assume we were given something to find the doctor, but not sure what?

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Kel, do you have a lock on the doctor's position?" Ice asks, holstering his blaster.

Vicious little karkers...

If there are any droids not completely destroyed:

"Mama Bear,Take these destroyed droids up to the science lab, see if there's a signal we can use to shut them down, in case there's any more," he says, "And make sure you run them through decontamination first."

[Noedig]

Jarik let out a sigh as the wookiee walked away. They always had the most irrational plans when they were angry. Hopefully she'd cool off, but he had no doubt she would at least attempt her insane plan. He noticed Graff had his hand pistol and he smirked; it would've been a helluva fight if he'd pulled the trigger. He keyed Hammer's frequency as the squad boarded the LAAT.

"Make sure you have the squad go through a full bio-hazard scan and detox when you get up there. Karking mist. And keep Momma Bear busy with something that'll take her mind off what's happening down here. I don't need a raging, grief-stricken wookiee tearing apart the ship while I'm gone. Fly safe Banshees. Crash out."

He keyed up the Panthers and the Mynoks next.

"Ok boys and girls, you heard our Knight. We're going to link up with him and Acklay, and maybe kill some stuff along the way. Find a partner and don't karking lose sight of them. Safeties off, heads on a swivel. Let's move it."

His orders given, he moved double time toward Jax and Kel, making sure to stop before entering the trap laden labyrinth.

[Mithric Gunn]

Sharka continues to follow Keleaon, maintaining the immersion.

[Major]

"We'll wait here for the others. We've cleared enough of a spearhead and with the ability for them to skip the labyrinth hopefully they won't be far behind." Kelaeon states, "It will be easy to cut us off and ruin the point of moving ahead inside."

[Iron Victory]

Still in a bit of shock over the horrific murder of the troopers, Sairen silently follows Jarik.

[Mithric Gunn]

"Knight Keleaon, with your permision, I would like to attempt to contact the Doctor. It may allow me to get a glimpse of his surroundings, and may give us advance warning if the enemy gets to him."

[Noedig]

As the rest of his troops navigated the top of the maze, Jarik scanned the area for his missing troops. He wouldn't leave anyone behind if he could help it.

Perception to find my boys.
[roll0]

[Thundercracker]

Ice
Ice walked quickly to keep up with the others, his eyes peeled for a computer terminal or a datapad belonging to one of the prison guards, anything that might lead them to a map, detailed or otherwise, of the prison.

[Major]

"Negative on the lock of the doctor yet." Kelaeon replies to Ice, "Our other doctor is going to attempt some of his things though." He says.

"Permission granted." He states, "It'd make it easier to find him at the very least."

[Mithric Gunn]

"Very well." Sharka reaches out with the force, sensing for the doctor, attempting to send a message:
We are coming to rescue you. There is a Sith attempting to get to you first. You wont be able to reply back in words, but I will be able to sense your general emotional state. We WILL save you.

[Philistine]

Graff thumbs the selector off of STUN as he falls in with the trailing element of the Stormtrooper platoon. He stays alert, occasionally turning around and walking backward for a few paces to check the party's backtrail as well. But as the group crosses over the labyrinth, he peels off to follow Jarik's search for the two wounded troopers. As he approaches the ground forces lieutenant, he opens up a private frequency to the older soldier and speaks quietly. "You know what has to be done here, right? They've got suit punctures, in a high-threat biohazard environment. The choice is now, fast and easy, or later, slow and painful and a danger to their buddies. I'd want you to do it for me."

[Noedig]

Jarik did not acknowledge Graff's approach but he did open a private channel as he continued scanning the labyrinth.

"Brains and Lurk are professionals. They knew this could happen. I'll make the call when we find them. Wheezer could survive a suit puncture though. That rebreather attatched to his face may be enough to keep him free from whatever plague killed this planet. In any case, I will leave no man or woman under my command behind if it can be helped. Living or dead, all my soldiers will go home."

He paused and stared straight at Graff. He kept his tone level, but he was nursing a fury deep inside.

"Keep this in mind: I am keeping score. So far, a bird's curiosity and a knight's plan have cost me six damned good people. They were my friends. You and Blue saved the Banshees. I won't forget that."

[Felhammer]

Shakra sends feelers out with the force, he locates his target. The Felucian sends his telepathic message to the Ee. The Doctor responds with a chilling dispassion.

Jarik locates his two men. Both wave up from inside the hole.

Meanwhile everyone else is now at the base of the two spiral staircases. One leads to a hallway, the other an elevator.

[Noedig]

This was one of the few times that Jarik blessed the uncomfortable helmet he had to wear. No one could see your face.

"Heh. You boys sittin' down on the job? Who the hell gave the ok for that one?"

[Felhammer]

Lurk looks up at Jarik and half-jokingly says, "Well Jax said continue on but these Spikes said "pop a squat and enjoy your shore leave." Lurk slaps Brains on the back and continues, "And well we haven't had a shore leave in a few years, so we decided to listen to the spikes."

[Noedig]

Jarik smirked.
"How ya feeling? Place is supposed to be a hot zone."

[Felhammer]

Brains pipes up, "A bit hot... And itchy. Nothing to worry about though."

[Noedig]

"C'mon Brains, you're smarter than that. A hangnail in a hotzone is worth worrying about. Your asses are punctured all to hell, so I'm definitely worried. How long you been down there?"

[Felhammer]

"Three minutes, maybe four."

[Noedig]

"Look boys, I'll be honest. I'm not rightly sure what do here. Grimme a minute while I think of something."

He stepped back from the edge of the hole and keyed Nomad's frequency.

"Nomad, Crash here. This is going to piss Kel off, but I want you to doubleback and grab Brains and Lurk. Then head for the entry for exfil. We'll take Mynok and Panthers down with us. This place is a goddamn deathtrap, and three squads is a bit to unwieldy in tight spaces anyway. If Kel gives you grief, I'll speak with him.

Jarik paused. He wasn't sure Nomad would be willing to go through with this, but he had to.

"When you get to the entry way, hold position and watch Brains and Lurk for signs of...whatever the hell killed the people down here. If they get real bad or endanger your squad, I'm trusting you to handle it. I don't like it but at that point a doubletap will be the only way to save them. After that, call in a CASVAC. Don't try to take the bodies back. I will not endanger the Kestrel with a bio-weapon. How copy?"

[Felhammer]

The troopers nod in agreement. They retrieve their two comrades and haul them out of the Prison. The fiery red sunset sets the Stormtrooper's armor ablaze. As you watch the LA-AT maneuver around in front of the two squads, you can't help but feel this is the last time you will see Brains and Lurk alive...

[Mithric Gunn]

Sharka eyes open, and he looks at Keleaon, "He is in a cramped metal box. He seems oddly calm, dispassionate even. But he knows we're on our way now, and that there is a Sith after him as well. I can contact him every so often to gather his emotional state, so we hopefully know if he is in danger."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"How are we supposed to find a worm in a place like this?" Ice asks, "it's like looking for a needle in a haystack. "

He blinks.

"And no bird jokes, dammit," he adds before pulling out a comlink.

"Red Dawn, request sensor scan of the prison, see if you can at least give us the dimensions of the facility so we know how much ground we have to cover," he says.

I'm trying to get an idea of how tall/wide the prison is. If we know how high the ceilings are, we can estimate how many levels there are and how much floor space each level has. With that info, we'll know how much time we have to sweep each floor, and whether we should bypass the lower levels and hope he's up top.

[Major]

"As I noted to the people currently here while waiting, the elevator is most easily trapped. With all the intricate traps, setting a bomb to blow up an elevator shouldn't be too hard. I'd recommend we blow the elevator ourselves and take the elevator shaft." Kelaeon states.

[Noedig]

Jarik jogged up as Kel finished.

"I'm not opposed but there may be more of those droids on the inside waiting for 'prisoners' to try that. You wanna test the elevator first, see if it blows and then take the shaft? I'd love to never see those droids again. There is probably a control room for the lift nearby. Seems reasonable that there would be."

[Major]

"Problem is we have to worry about a trap that will activate when it sees us step aboard it." Kelaeon states. "I'd be surprised if the elevator was not trapped considering the crazy traps in the labyrinth."

[Iron Victory]

"I agree with Knight Kelaeon. We should try to set off any traps preemptively, and after the shuttle incident I’d rather not ride in a metal box dangling hundreds of feet over nothing. Additionally, it seems your troopers are suitably equipped for a climb up the shaft."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"If I were designing the prison, I'd put the killer droids in the shaft, where nobody is supposed to be and where prisoners would try to hide. If we can figure out how the prison guards got around, we should have an easier time," Ice says, "assuming this prison even had guards."

"I'm guessing if there were guards, they'd use the elevator, so all we need to do is convince the elevator that we're guards," he says.

Ice eyes the spiral staircase leading to the elevator.

"Kel, can you do your danger sense thing, if I try to walk up these stairs?" he asks.

[Mithric Gunn]

Sharka says, I can help you with that. He closes his eyes, concentrating on the flow, as his form shimmers.
UTF, search your feelings, if i walk up the stairs with Ice:
[roll0]

[Felhammer]

You do not feel... Anything. It is as if you are reaching out into a void...

[Noedig]

"What's the call Bones? The stairs gonna come to life and prison rape us?"

[Major]

Kelaeon tries to reach out in the Force for a danger sense as was asked before speaking, "I don't doubt that the shaft will have traps. The problem isn't the original defenses either, but the person inside who is on their way to the doctor now, the one I'm pretty sure is our Givin friend." Kelaeon states, "It is much easier to fight off droids than it is to survive a metal box trapping us inside as it plummets to the ground and splatters all of us, as Sairen accurately understood."

Kelaeon sighs, "While jumping over the crates you did see the many levels and craziness of these traps right? And yet, there is no fear that stepping into that elevator it will simply plummet?"


Search Feelings, UtF as well. Doubt it'll work based on the doctor's but he was asked.

UtF: [roll0]

[Mithric Gunn]

"I sense... nothing. Very strange."

[Noedig]

"Huh. Well I guess we'll just have to keep a tight grip on the soap then, won't we."

[Mithric Gunn]

Sharka chuckles. "Yes, of course. We wouldn't want anything to bar our progress."

[Felhammer]

Kel senses the same void.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Alright, let's destroy one of the crates and use the planks to bang on the ground in front of us, to set off any motion detectors and pressure plates," Ice says.

The diminutive Mrlssi moves to one of the crates, looks up at it, then turns around.

"A little help, maybe?" he says.

[Iron Victory]

Sairen moves to Ice and draws a small cylindrical device, scanning the crates for traces of radiation. If clear, he snaps a short order at Titus in Cheunh, who moves to carefully pry apart the crates.

He has a strength score of 20, but just in case a check is needed: [roll0]

....let's hope a check isn't needed.

[Felhammer]

As Titus heaves the crate above his head, it proves unexpectedly dense. The droid's joints buckle under the pressure and the box topples down on top of him, knocking him to the ground. The crate's hatch bursts off in the fall, revealing a shimmering golden stature of Darth Krayt stabbing his lightsaber through the a helpless man whose face is full of fear and doubt. As you gawk at the solid gold statue, you realize the fear-stricken man is in fact Emperor Fel.

EDIT: Titus takes 1 point of shame damage.

[Mithric Gunn]

"Any way we could take this with us? It would be quite rich to melt it down to help fund the war against Krayt."

[Iron Victory]

Titus clambers out of the heap, "I am programmed for protection, etiquette, and assassination. I am not a labour droid..." He continues at his task.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Trust me, if the Emperor is up to what I think he is, getting Doctor Ee will help the war effort a lot more than a bunch of melted down gold," Ice replies, "besides, trying to carry enough to make a difference will just slow us down."

The Mrlssi fluffs his feathers up slightly.

"Of course, if you think you can carry some for yourself and not fall behind, then by all means, have at it," he adds with a chirp.

[Philistine]

"Right. Let's consider what we know," Graff breaks in, irritation evident in his tone and in the resurgence of the clipped Bastion accent. "One. This place is trapped like a Hutt's harem, as keenly demonstrated during the Blind Plunge Into The Labyrinth stage of the adventure. This suggests that doing the obvious thing at any juncture is likely to have lethal consequences. Taking the first lift we see, for example, would be the obvious thing to do. Two. This place is a working prison facility - and that means the operators must have had ways to get around safely, we just need to discover them. That's not going to be blowing up the lift and climbing the elevator shaft - Ice is right about that being a prime spot for anti-intruder countermeasures. We have another, non-lift-related option right there," he says, pointing to the unmarked hallway. "That's probably also our best bet to find something like a control room… or any kind of active computer terminal at all. Maybe we can get a floorplan, or even a manifest showing where the objective is." He switches to a private link before going on, "Three. Knight Kelaeon, I don't know why you're so fixated on someone who was last seen spatter-painting a bulkhead with the contents of his skull - someone who, judging by the available evidence, was trying to aid our mission to the Wheel before he was gunned down by Sith troops. I also don't care. You need to get over it, now, because whoever or whatever is down there is using your paranoia against you like a goad. You're allowing yourself to be herded like a bantha, and it's going to get us all killed. Pull yourself together and soldier, soldier."

[Major]

"I'll note that 'ally' of ours knew our entire mission, lured us to the same people that would end up being a danger to us, and enjoyed hanging out speaking with ancient sith statutes. Regardless of if it is indeed the target from the Wheel, the point still stands that we do have someone moving towards our objective. I'm not saying we have to rush to our death, but I am saying we are on a timer and running off exploring and having tea parties aboard pretty ships will not get us to that objective any faster. Nor will dying." Kelaeon replies, "Next, if these traps were set by the prison staff, then you would be correct that there is a way to get around. But we aren't sure about that. Everybody here seems to be dead or zombies and that doesn't seem something prison personal would be apt to do and seems more likely the psychotic presence heading to the doctor that wants to 'play games'."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Nothing's changed. We know Krayt's coming for Dr Ee, we know we need to find him before he gets here," Ice says, "problem is, we don't know where the doctor is, we don't have a map, or a way of speaking to him."

"Now there's someone in the prison moving towards the doctor. If this character knows where the target is and we don't, and the guy is moving to the target right now, why don't we just follow the guy right to the target?" Ice asks, "it'd be better than searching around blindly."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Wait a sec," Ice says.

The Mrlssi, with some difficulty, unslings his pack and retrieves the box Torin the Ithorian had given him on the last mission.

"What are the chances our doctor is in this box?" he asks.

Edit: "I mean, wouldn't it be ironic if we're already carrying the target with us, and the spy planted the information that he was here, and Krayt was coming to get him, just to get us here so they could trap us and retrieve what they missed on the Wheel?" he adds.

[Major]

"Seems a rather silly possibility, but you are the one with the box." Kelaeon says with a shrug. "Only one way to find out."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Yeah...," Ice replies, "let me try something."

Big danger when I was about to open the box before, so can't do that..." he thought.

"I'm with Graff, by the way, I can see the prison staff complaining about having to walk up and down the stairs all the time," he adds.

Ice sits down and begins tapping on the box.. twice, then thrice, then five times, then seven times, then eleven, then he waits, holding the box and listening...

If there is no response:
"Okay, next time you contact Dr Ee, if he comes up with the number 13 as a response, he's in the box," Ice says.

[Mithric Gunn]

Sharka tries to sense inside the box, checking for life.
[roll0]

[Felhammer]

Sharka tries to sense life within the box but his energies are wasted, for the box blocks the force.

[Philistine]

Graff's voice crackles coldly over the comlink. "Open comms, rookie? All right by me.

"Fact Four. The initial mission brief warned of extensive, lethal traps all through this facility, so there is ZERO reason to believe that the traps we've stumbled into are in any way connected to either the Sith bioweapon or to this mysterious presence you claim to have contacted within the facility. Moreover, setting traps does not seem to be within the capabilities of the victims of the bioweapon; and if they're the work of your Mysterious Presence, then it clearly has the run of the facility and the "race" is already lost.

"Fact Five. The "race." You claim this Mysterious Presence - which only you have had any contact with or even sensed - has "challenged" us to a "race" to the objective. Karking think about that for three seconds, would you? If it's hostile and even moderately intelligent, WHY would it tell us its plans? And if you believe someone is so malevolent, why would you ever trust anything they say? We know of an excellent reason for our presumed opponent to lie - namely, to provoke us into rushing ahead blindly. With Krayt inbound we're certainly on the clock, but this "race" idea is like something a Kowackian Monkey-Lizard would dream up.

Fact Six. We don't know the layout of this facility, and we most particularly don't know where inside it the objective might be. For all we know, it could be on this very level - which would make sense in a way, as the one-way design of the facility means that "near to the entrance" is also "far from the exit." But since we have no idea where anything is here, your whole "no time for exploring" schtick is just karking ridiculous. Any move we make at this point is "exploring!" So I'm going to go poke my head down that hallway, because that's the most promising avenue of exploration we have at the moment. If you're determined to climb the elevator shaft, that's your funeral."

Graff turns and strides off toward the stairs leading up to the unmarked hallway.

Perception: [roll0]

[Major]

Kelaeon took a deep breath as he clenched his fist and paused for a moment as Graff spoke. He was starting to question the man's ability to not be a liability or at the very best to not get killed running off by himself. "I was under the impression we had more important things to do then be petty, but since you clearly don't..." Kelaeon says rolling his eyes.

"Fact four, as you put it so maturely, are you even listening to yourself speak? Because if so then I'm even more worried about your mental state. I'm hoping the Vong spores are screwing with your brain, because I'd be very worried otherwise. You say there is zero reason for us to suspect the traps are connected because we knew there were traps. Yet you don't find the nature of the traps, the fact that there is suddenly a bioweapon and a dark presence, at all strange? So far most the traps have served to puncture suits, so unless you consider the bioweapon to be normal prison security defenses I think it is safe to say that at the very least some of these traps are not normal prison defenses. Let's compare the prison defenses we knew about to these new ones. Alright, the droids and the venting of the systems, seems like normal prison defenses. The shield generators that were supposed to exist, seems normal. The heavy blasters that auto-target anyone entering the wrong way, excessive, but makes sense as well. We knew there was a labyrinth and it was confusing, again makes sense to cause prisoners to get lost. Now let's compare to spike pits, bioweapons, and dark presences that recognize us. In addition, it is stupid to plan for the best and all plans should automatically assume the worst. Somebody released a bioweapon here and somebody is going after the doctor, you can assume all traps are normal prison traps, but it is safer and will have much less deaths to instead assume the worst and work on avoiding traps rather than trusting that we can get the prison not to hurt us."

"Fact five, I'm not sure if you realize this but Force Sensitives are sent on missions for a reason. You might not be able to sense it, but honestly, I don't give a damn. I'm here for this very reason. Everyone here is supposed to provide some addition to the team and if you want to ignore something just because you can't sense it then you can turn around and head back to the ship now since trusting the entire squads perception is what is important here, not just your own. This is not the 'Graff' show, and you are NOT in charge of this mission. You can listen to everyone's senses, as opposed to just your own, or you can leave. Moving on past your implied statement and on to the race, you'll notice we are stopped here and working on what is best. You'll notice we made our way to this location then waited and didn't just jump on an elevator. This has little to do with blindly rushing ahead and more to do with saying not to waste time with things irrelevant to the mission. This is ignoring the fact I said the presence was dark and dangerous. As for why? Because the vibe I got from the conversation with them. I don't doubt they want the traps to work, but I also don't doubt they will move toward the doctor."

"Fact six, I'm going to question your ability to listen now. My comment about exploration had nothing to do with whether we went down the hallway or up the elevator, that was in regards to running off and exploring ships. Context, you might want to learn it."

Kelaeon nods at the hallway,"Now then, I will agree with you on one point. We don't know where our target is and sadly using the Force won't help much since in a labyrinth style prison direction isn't much aid. I don't trust the elevator, and can agree that climbing the shaft is not optimal. While I dislike heading toward an unmarked area, it does seem the better of the choices." He nods at the hallway, "Let's move. Again, stick with a partner. At least two, preferably more. Keep an eye on your partner at all times, call out if something happens as quickly as possible."



Forgot the perception roll after the monologue so...see ooc thread

[Noedig]

Jarik opened up a private channel to Jax amidst the tirade.

"Sith me, they sound like a married couple. Makes you wish we had a military leader, don't it? Less moaning and fewer pissing matches, that's for sure."

[Felhammer]

Jax hits his private comm and responds, "Damn non-military "officers". Don't know a karking thing about the military. Heck, most of the time real officers don't know much either. I only follow Gruntficers, like you sir. I'm glad you're here to straighten these poodoo "officers" out."

[Noedig]

"Tell you what, kill 'em both."

Jarik changed his mind as the words left his mouth.

"Nah, scratch that. Deadeye's too good of a shot to get rid of and we need Stumbles to find the VIP. Plus Ice, Blue and Bones are down here and there's no way we could convince them to play along. Damn. Ah well, can't win 'em all."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
Ice is unable to hear anything from the box over the chatter from his team, but he's unable to feel any vibrations coming from the box either, so he assumes either the dampening field inside is preventing any signal from getting out, or there's nothing alive inside the box. He stows it back in his pack, then moves to follow Graff up the staircase leading to the unmarked hallway.

"The prison is huge; too big to search all of it. We need to find a map or an idea of where in the prison our worm is," he says, "keep your eyes open for datapads or computer terminals... and traps."

The Mrlssi pulls out his state of the art datapad and attempts to overlap their location on top of the 3D image sent to him by the Red Dawn's crew.

Ice will begin mapping their progress through the prison on his datapad, and forward it to any datapads the rest of the party may be carrying; let me know if that's not possible.

[Felhammer]

Everyone walks up the narrow spiral stairs, which are only wide enough to accommodate one at a time. Kel is the first to the door. It is unremarkable in every way. Just a standard issue, Imperial Reinforced Door, which is used across the Empire. A small control is located to the door's right, on which two buttons flash - one that says open, the other close. Kel taps the open button. With a swoosh, the door flies open, beyond which lays a long, tight, dark hallway. The light from the cargo area floods into the hallway revealing a simple passageway with - gray-steel walls and ceiling and standardized deck plating. A lone door stands at the end of the hallway. It, like the door you just opened is of standard imperial design with a small control panel flashing to its right.

As Kel takes a step into the passageway, an eerie red hologram manifests before him at the end of the hall. The Chagrin female speaks in hushed whispers, "I am the Lady of Pain. Welcome to my prison. There is no hope of escape except through the lone exit at the top of the mountain. Don't think about stepping backwards, the hallway's deck plating has been lined with thermal detonators. Any back stepping will immediately trigger the trap. I hope you enjoy your time here, for you may die. If you do, please scream loudly..." The hologram whisks out of existence.

[Noedig]

"Oh fan-karking-tastic. We just stumbled into a regular Sith fun house. Brilliant."

Jarik reached for the toolkit in his utility belt, but stopped midway.

"I'm not gonna kark with this set up. It's probably tamper proof, and if there's a thermal det under each tile, I'll blow a hole in this mountain the Dawn could fly through. This is the point of no return. We go into this hallway there's no goin' back."

Jarik turned to the remaining squads of his platoon.

"Anyone wants out, now's the time. I ain't gonna order you into this deathtrap. Volunteers only."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Well, she was nice," Ice says, "anyone see the holo projector?"

[Felhammer]

None of the Boom Panthers move a muscle. They're in this for the long haul.

Ice spots a tiny little projector on the ceiling at the end of the hallway. He attempts to network with it but finds it has no wireless capabilities.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"If that holoprojector is linked to a central computer and someone could boost me up to work on it, we might be able to slice into it from the projector and get a prisoner manifest or a map," Ice says, "Or we could just hope we find something else later, when we aren't in a room full of thermal detonators, your call."

The Mrlssi looks to Kel.

[Major]

Kelaeon pauses, "We'd have to be very careful. I don't want you just lifted since if someone stumbles or you fall it could end up killing you and others. If you think you can access it I'll use the Force to lift you so you can examine it, otherwise we move on." Kelaeon states.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Why not everyone move forward first, just in case something goes off, only me and Kel get blown up?" Ice says.

"And that way, I don't get blown up if anyone decides to accidentally fall backwards," he thinks.

If the holocam is embedded in the wall, the Mrlssi unslings his pack and pulls out a durasteel cutter, hanging it from his belt alongside his toolkit.

"Someone hang on to my pack," he says, "ready when you are."

The idea is that the holo projector is wired to some kind of central computer. If it's immediately apparent that this is not the case, Ice will skip trying to hack the projector.

[Noedig]

Jarik smirked behind his helmet.

"You all are the biggest bunch of dumbasses, ever. I gave you idiots a way out, and I've got witnesses. So you've all got a hard-on for death? Fine by me, we'll see if we can't get you laid."

[Major]

"Right," Kelaeon says with a sigh, "Here is hoping we don't blow up..." Kelaeon mumbles as he waits for the others to move past and ahead.

[Felhammer]

Everyone shuffles through the hallway. There's a tense moment when Graff almost takes a step backwards as he sneezes hard but he maintains his composure. Kell taps the door panel, revealing a small room with three more doors. Ice remains at the far end of the hallway, waiting until everyone is clear. Everyone files into the crammed room. Kel now stands on the opposite side of the hall from Ice.



____________
|.................|
|.................|
|.......K........|
|____ ______|
.......| |.......
.......|P|.......
.......| |.......
.......| |.......
.......| |.......
.......| |.......
.......| |.......
........ I


K = Kel
I = Ice
P = Projector

[Major]

"Alright let's hope this works." Kelaeon says drawing on the Force to try and grip Ice. "Let me know when you are ready and I'll lift you." Once Ice was ready, Kelaeon would try to pick up the man.


Move Object
Use the Force check: [roll0]
Edit: DC 20, so can pick up to large size and if I decide to smash Ice against a wall or chuck him at evil things its 4d6.

Not using as weapon so no need for damage, just making the roll for maximum size. Honestly not much need for the roll anyways since its a DC 15 to pick up Ice and Ice is willing so no need to beat will save, but eh, whatevs.

Spending standard actions to maintain the power obviously from round to round.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Just don't drop me," Ice says, "in case you hadn't noticed, not only are these feathers vestigial, they're inside my suit."

[Felhammer]

Ice is lifted off the ground and slowly brought into the hallway. As he nears the halway mark, the hologram reappears. The woman has a frown on her face as she says, "Shifts in air currents detected. Flying creature assumed. Raising floor to compensate." Suddenly a loud grown can be heard as the floor slowly moves up and up and up until Ice's feet are mere milometers from the deck plating. The woman then says, "No pressure detected. Lowering the floor to previous levels."

A collective sigh of relief can be heard from the troopers behind Kel who were all holding their breaths.

Ice is then maneuvered up to the projector and begins to poke around. He finds that it is not connected to the main server but a secondary server, which includes control over the Prison's intercom. Ice manages to wirelessly network the intercom with his datapad. He also finds a single line of text written by someone with access to the secondary servers; it merely reads, "They're banging. Banging. Always banging. Why can't they go away? Why must I die this way?"

While that is going on, Jarik and Sairen look about their new surroundings. The three doors are painted a different color - one red, one blue and the last green. There are no distinguishing marks or labels other than the colors.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Alright, get me outta here," Ice says.

Once in the room with the others, he lets out a sigh of relief.

"I could only get into a secondary server, which gives us control over intercoms," he says, "listen to this."
The Mrlssi hits a button on his datapad and plays back the recording from the intercom server.

[Major]

Kelaeon sighs, "Better than nothing and good to see how it reacts to us flying over..." He notes as he sets down Ice gently.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Red, blue, and green. Any normal person would pick blue or green, the safe colors, so I say we either open the red door, or look for a secret door in the ceiling," Ice says.

[Noedig]

"I say 'kark it.' You lot are in command, not me. We're the hammer. You point, we smash, end of story. Pick the karking door, we'll kick it in."

[Major]

"One safe against two dangerous also seems most likely." Kelaeon says with a nod, "Anyone else?"

[Mithric Gunn]

"Perhaps they all lead to danger? No way of knowing until we open one. Does anyone have a chance die?"

[Iron Victory]

"Sith torture-prisons aren't exactly my expertise. The red door seems the best pick, however, it could very well be a no-win scenario. The only way to win a game against Sith is not to play." The Chiss gestures absently at Kelaeon and Sharka. "Aren't force users able to sense the short-term outcomes of actions? Couldn't you try that on the doors?"

[Mithric Gunn]

"It didn't work before, but its worth a try."
[roll0] utf if we go in the red door.

[Noedig]

"I would kill for a cigarette right now. Damn plague."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Fine, I'll go through," Ice said.

The Mrlssi pulls out a line from his utility belt and ties it around his waist, then hands the loose end to Graff.

"Hold this," he says.

He then begins inspecting the red door for signs of being rigged with some kind of trigger or trap.

"Knight Kel," he says, mimicking an official sounding inquiry voice, "how did you deem it was in the team's best interest to let your only slicer and mechanical specialist take point position in a prison filled with deadly booby traps?"

With that (assuming Ice does not find any traps), the diminutive slicer pushes the door open while standing against the wall, near the hinge.

[Noedig]

"I thought bad ideas were my thing, Ice. Remember the Wheel?"

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"That's why you're holding the rope,Standing around looking at the doors is worse; we're on a time limit here," Ice replied, "by the way, did you ever find out what was on that recording?"

Sorry, misunderstood noedig's post

[Noedig]

"What recording are we talking about? That's a little vague."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Not you, Graff," Ice says, "the Zeltron found a holo message for him but wouldn't tell us what it was."

[Noedig]

"Ah right, Lilly. Wouldn't mind a little of her too to be honest. Sith me she was fun to look at. Shame she snuck off after the Wheel."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Yeah well, if you ever get the chance, let me know; that's one I'd love to get for the archives," Ice replies.

[Noedig]

Jarik smirked behind his helmet.
"Maybe I've got a few pictures lying around. What's it worth to you?"

[Felhammer]

Ice does not find any traps. When he opens the door he is confronted by a 15 meter long, 1.5 meter wide passageway. Every 5 meters lies a ray shield that turns off and on at irregular intervals. They appear to deactivate on some kind of timer but your immediate attempts at finding a pattern prove fruitless. At the very end of the hallway lies another door. Jarik can just barely make out a soft "thump... thump... thump..." sound emanating from behind the far door.

[Major]

"I'm not sure you going in first is the best idea..." Kelaeon says with a frown as Ice moves, "As you said you are the slicer and are rather important." Kelaeon glances at the red door.


Will going through the door result in immediate danger (Search your feelings)
[roll0]

[Felhammer]

As you watch the ray shields activate and de-activate for a while, you eventually hear a hooowoosh sound as several sections of the deck plating disappear. This is quickly followed by a feeeeessshhhhhh sound as jets of red hot magma pour down from the ceiling and into the holes. You notice that the ray shields seems to be generating a protective ward around the hole, funneling the magma down the hole. If one were caught inside such a trap... A quick yet fiery death would ensue.

Kel suddenly senses quite a bit of danger.

[Noedig]

"Delightful. Wonder who the decorater was. Really love the magma. Adds a nice warm touch to the room."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
Ice stands dumbfounded at the scene before him.
"What? How does the magma get up above the room, do they pump it up? If they pump it up, why does it need to be dropped back down, why not just pump it to the level it's needed? Why does this room even exist??"

The Mrlssi simply glares at the hallway for a few seconds.

"Anyone want to make a bet whether the blue door leads to something icy cold?" he asks.

[Major]

"These traps are a bit...extreme..." Kelaeon says glancing at the blue door. "I'd predict you are right." He says, "Leaving green...what? Acid? Gas? Deadly plants?"


Use the Force (Search for feelings) "Will the blue door lead to imediate danger."
[roll0]

Same, but green door.
[roll1]

[Thundercracker]

Ice

"Could use the Force to open the door at the end of the hallway, see if it's worth going through... though it might be a rancor or a krayt dragon tapping from the other side," Ice says, with just a hint of sarcasm.

[Noedig]

"Kark this room, kark this building, kark this whole damn planet. Why dont we make our own hallway?"

[Felhammer]

danger for both rooms.

[Major]

"According to the Force there isn't a safe room...so it is really more a 'pick your poison' option." Kelaeon states, "What equipment do we have as a group to make it easier to deal with?" Kelaeon ask looking over everyone.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"I like to travel light. I've got the security kit, datapad, utility belt, the visors, and a durasteel vibrosaw," Ice replies, "oh, and a holorecorder."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"I don't think we can risk going through here," Ice says, "the magma is random, so we basically have to get lucky to dodge it. Plus we don't know what's through the other side or if the door is locked; we could get trapped at the far end of the chamber. The best part, if we get unlucky, we're dead; I don't like to play at games I can't cheat at."

"I say we open another door," he continues, pulling the rope back from Graff and winding it into his utility belt, "but it's someone else's turn this time."

[Noedig]

""I'm game. Everyone stand clear of the green door."

When Jarik was sure that everyone was a reasonable distance away, he opened it.

[Felhammer]

Jarik busts down the door and finds a ray shield blocking his entrance. Beyond the shield lies a small, elevator-sized room full of a bubbling liquid.

[Noedig]

Jarik had tried to be gentle but he had misjudged the solidness of the door and it appeared to have broken.
Oops.

What lay beyond his little accident was even more troubling. It didn't take a genius to guess what the green liquid was. It certainly wasn't gelatin.
"Kark me! Back! Everyone back!"

[Mithric Gunn]

"Have my medical gear, but nothing to help with this."

[Major]

Kelaeon sighed, they would need to find a way around these traps. "Do you see a way across? I don't like it, but we can try the levitation trick again...preferably testing it on an item first this time, then a person."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Maybe third time's the charm," Ice quips, "anyone want to volunteer to see what's behind lucky door number three?"

[Iron Victory]

"I'll bite the bullet..." mutters Sairen to Ice as he moves to open the blue door. Titus places a hand on the Chiss' shoulder, halting his master and moving to do the task himself.

Please don't murder my terribly expensive droid... :smalltongue:

[Felhammer]

Jax, quite tired of waiting, pushes past Titus and hits the keypad. He then struts - like a courageous warrior - into the Blue Room. He is confronted by an odd sight. He stands upon a thing ledge that overlooks a pit that is roughly seven meters deep. Inside there are eight crazed prisoners who appear to be eating the remains of several other prisoners. The crazed inmates are sealed in the pit via a light bridge that blankets over top the entire pit. Presiding above them is a crazed looking prison guard who has fashioned a patchwork cape made of flesh as well as a crown made of bones and eyes. He wields a Wookiee's tibia and yells, "My court, we have meat! Rejoice!" The crazed prisoners clamor and howl like animals. The 'King' grasps a black lever next to him and yanks it back. Suddenly the light bridge disappears, with it any protection you may have had from the crazed prisoners...


You guys win initiative. Have fun!

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Jax, get back here!" Ice yells, "We'll waste 'em as they come up the stairs and through the door!"

The Mrlssi takes a step back and creates a makeshift blaster turret at his feet, pointing it at the doorway.

"Front row kneel," Ice says, following suit, though it was hardly necessary.


move back one square, create a blaster turret in square AD14, activate born leader +1 insight bonus to attack rolls.

[Major]

Kelaeon growls and draws his lightsaber and activates it. "Let's not just go running ahead stupidly." He says annoyed.


Move action, draw+activate saber
Move action, move to AB13 and be ready to chop things up as they pass. Obviously not out idiot :P

[Felhammer]

Jax runs out of the blue room. As he clears the doorway, it slams shut. The muffled voice of the King can be heard from inside the room laughing, "I CONTROL THIS PRISON! I AM KING! BOW BEFORE ME SACKS OF TASTY MEAT!"

[Noedig]

Jarik smirked as Jax came charging back into the room. Finally, something that could die.

"Hey Stumbles, can I use some explosives? Is that allowed? You're leading the op, so I need to clear it with you before hand."

[Major]

Kelaeon watched the door shut, "A shame, they didn't follow. Still, I'd rather real with a bunch of crazies that can die then fire or acid." He says with a nod at Jarik, "Go for it. Saves us time with a nice little explosion."

[Noedig]

"That is exactly what I wanted to hear."

Jarik pulled out his anti-armor module and attached it before moving to the side of the door.

"You think you can keep them off me with that fancy saber of yours? I don't intend to get into a fist fight with whatever the hell is on the other side of this door."

[Major]

"Sounds good, stand next to me and I can block attacks for you." Kelaeon said moving with Jarik to try and stand close enough to block.

[Thundercracker]

Ice
The Mrlssi moves to assist with the demolitions effort, but suddenly stops and looks at Kel.

"I'm thinking I should probably take this opportunity to point out the dubiousness of setting an explosive charge in an enclosed space against a door that's connected to a wall that's connected to a ray shield projector, which happens to be the only thing standing between us and a vat of dangerous looking green liquid, especially when you're carrying a plasma cutting tool that would work just as well," Ice remarks, "but hey, you're the boss."

[Major]

"Pretty sure he meant blowing up the crazies to save us the trouble of gunning them one at a time, but if not I agree."

Kelaeon turns toward Jarik at Ice's comment. "To clarify you meant explosives on the prisoners inside the room and down the hall, not on this door here?" He ask.

[Noedig]

"Grenade launcher. 'Nough said."

[Thundercracker]

Ice
"Well why didn't you say so," Ice replies.

[Mithric Gunn]

Sharka concentrates, and suddenly turns invisible, giving Jarik subtle insight through the force. He'll also move so that he isnt adjacent to anyone.

[Felhammer]

Jarik hits the panel and the door swooshes into the ceiling. He rushes into the room and finds the "King" has placed all of his crazed vassals behind the lightbridge and - perhaps more importantly - he has encapsulated himself in a ray shield.

"BOW BEFORE ME PUNY ANIMALS! I AM YOUR LORD, YOUR MASTER AND YOUR PREDATOR! HAHAHAHAHA! OH, WHAT'S THIS, YOU BRING A GUN TO A KNIFE FIGHT!? YOU CHEAT! IF YOU BREAK THE RULES, THEN SO WILL I! HAHAHAHA!"

Ok, we are officially in initative now. Jarik may finish his action, he still has a Standard and a Swift.

[Felhammer]

Jarik rushes into the room and fires off a grenade at the lightbridge. After the smoke clears, the bridge stands!

"FOOLISH FOOLS! YOU CANNOT HARM MY VASSALS WITH YOUR BLASPHEMOUS WEAPONS!!!"

Kel notices a slight flicker with the bridge. It appears to have taken a beating. Perhaps with more damage, it will shut off...