The Ballad of Echo Company - Episode 2 - Toujours En Avant

[Waistcoatwill]

Doc follows Sal's lead trying to calm down the fleeing woman. He launches into the l'aquitaire he'd learned on childhood holidays and practiced again in the field hospital.

Mademoiselle, we mean you no harm. If you give us a moment we can get you to safety. We just all need to keep quiet.

Spoiler: Action

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Persuasion but I'm happy if giving Sal advantage is more appropriate (1d20)[18]

[Cavir]

Xilo watched as the others lowered the Krieger. "He had a choice. He chose poorly. Search him quickly then let's keep going." He wipes his blade on the Krieger then sheaths it. Heading back to the hallway he also puts his pistol away, assuming Doc and Sal stopped the elfess' escape. He hoped so, and that he could talk some sense into her, elf to elf.

Spoiler: OOC

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Doc and Sal's result would come before Xilo gets to the hallway. Intent is to talk to her in elven (safe to assume she would speak it?) or with his limited l'aquitaire.

[MrAbdiel]

Spoiler: OOC:

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Well, that's two pretty decent persuade rolls. Hard not to respect the team effort: sometimes the dice are kind.

Startled, doe-like eyes shoot between the tiefling and the halfling; and she squeezes the coffee can to her bodice as one might clutch a talisman to squeeze its second hand divine guidance in a moment of struggle.

"S'il vous plaît, messieurs. S'il vous plaît, je dois partir. Je ne dirai rien ! Je sais rien! Je ne suis que la femme de chambre, je le jure."

Spoiler: L'aquitaire

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"Please, sirs. Please, I need to leave. I won't say anything! I don't know anything! I am just the maid, I swear."

The dual appeal seems to have been enough; buying her calm at least for a moment, and long enough for the team to regroup. The addition of Xilo, and his elf-to-elf appeal, does not immediately accomplish the desired result. He has just stabbed to death a man in the other room, after all; the presense of that slaying hangs on him, and reflects in her eyes. But quickly it becomes apparent that whatever romantic notion the slain Kreiger was playing at, this woman is no romantic: she is a survivalist, and a pragmatist. All that is required to win her cooperation is for it to seem more practical immediately and good for her longterm health. Once it is clear to her they mean no implicit harm, she answers questions in a rapid-fire gabble that the listeners who know the tongue in part can piece together.

Her name is Danielle. The soldier was Klaus. The can is full of Kreigmarks and Amcaran dollars, which had been squirreled away for just such an escape when the time came. But the ferocity of the reversal of fortunes in the war has been so swift, and the flight east from the front so catastrophic, that it has somewhat taken the region and its occupants by surprise, and scattered such carefully laid plans. The regional magistrate who ostensibly dwells in this house is Dame Candeece le Velle; a human woman in her middle age, who - according to Danielle - is wilting even as she enjoys the company of the high status Officers of the Vult who tour Alonn, as well as the other satellite villages of Agoreau.

Spoiler: Wilting

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Wilting is the a somewhat tasteless term employed by some elves to describe the aging process which, famously, spares their race almost entirely. Elderly elves encounter some thinning and silvering of the hair, but almost always in a distinguished and becoming way; and the edge they lose in mild physical deterioration they surpass with experience in all arenas of comparison to younger elves. The Kingdoms of the Old World are considerably less cosmopolitan than Amcara, and elves tend more to isolate into cities and domains of their own, supported by a strong social class of merchants, diplomats and traders - called rangers in the elven parlance as the spiritual inheritors of that dynamic rover mantle in an age where the maps have no more dragons.

For Old World elves, a world which has become choked with competing human dynasties within the past four hundred years (read: the last generation, in elf time) is confronting and sometimes disgusting. Most races go through senescence, but humans being so numerous might be unfairly characterized by it. To old elven eyes, humans shoot up like flowers one day, then wilt and shrivel the next. Amcaran elves, being more cosmopolitan in the New World's Princedoms, are all rangers in the continental sense, and accordingly do not often use such blunt descriptors. It would not be unfair to consider the term condescending and even mildly bigotted against humans and especially human women. Whether Danielle is aware of this or not is anyone's guess.

She continues in slow, sloppy common now that she's calmed down enough to attempt it.

"But Dame le Velle 'as not been 'ere in sree days. I see 'er with Kreigsmarshall Steiger and, ah... a labcoat man; 'is name I do not know, but 'e push ze Kreigsmarshall around. But only ze Kreigmarshall leave in 'is car with 'is driver; zen we just wait. Zere were soldiers quartering 'ere, until today; zey flee today. Rupert - ze 'ead servant - keeps us tasked, but zome of ze others flee now zere are no soldiers. Klaus came back for me; saying 'ze whole place will go up'. Explosifs, you see? Please, you must let me run!"


A crack of a pistol shot echoes through the floorboards from above, followed by a thump, and a clatter of metal muted through the structure. K'ral, who has been listening intently from the hallway closer to the sound's approximate issue, quickly looks over to the squad and gives a negatory shake of the head, and a rapid sequence of hand gestures.

Spoiler: Amcaran Warrior Hand Sign

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"One round. (Sounds like) One of ours. (Sounds like) Necessary kill. Not broad contact. (Sounds like) Operational subtlety still in tact."

[Waistcoatwill]

Doc flinched at the sound of the shot from upstairs. He keeps glancing towards the LT as he talks to Danielle, chexking that he isn't jeapoirdise operational security.

Mademoiselle Danielle, what happened to this lab coat man? Is he still in the village? Have you seen any other lab coat people?

We will help you escape to safety, but that information would really help us.

[Novabomb]

Pvt Gabriel Ginger
Having overheard "explosives"
El Tee, if they have rigged the building, the main stash will be on the lower floors, probably the basement. I will see if it can be disarmed. I recommend getting ours off the higher floors.

Ginger will make haste looking for stairs down.

[MrAbdiel]

"No no - yes, but... zey have many come and go, you see? Ze Dame, she ah... entertain zem. But I do not know where zhey are not. Fled, per'aps. I did not see 'im leave, but I 'ave but two eyes." Daniel confesses at once, oscillating on the spot like a child who needs to urinate, desperate to be permitted to flee.

But when Pvt Ginger starts looking for a way down, she shakes her head in a growing panic. "Zhere is only two levels, 'ere! No wine cellar; bottles are run up from ze village."

Spoiler: A Message To 2Lt Xiloscient

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The familiar voice of 1Lt Bathory chimes into your head. "Xilo; top floor secure. Just one civvy. Tried to draw on us; too slow. Still scouting. One room with strange dimensions. Secret compartments, doors? Respond."

[JbeJ275]

"You heard the lady, the likely artificers are out of here. We can keep clearing this place for security, but let's hurry up about it."

[Cavir]

Xilo responds to Bathory in a silent whisper. "Enemy KIA. Civilian being questioned. Said they're leaving due to building going to explode. Unknown when. Labcoat possibly here. Strange room here too. Searching."

The LT gets his people moving. "Sgt, K’ral, take security. The Krieger had nothing of note? The rest of you search that room. Its size doesn't match what it should be. Illusions or secret passageway?"

Xilo spreads his hands out in a calming motion to the elfess. He speaks to her in elven but quickly switches to common if she doesn't seem to understand it. "Miss Danielle, we are here for the labcoats. This town will soon be clear of Kriegers and you won't have to keep running. You'll be safe." He points to the room with the weird dimensions. "Something different about that room. What was it used for? By who? The labcoat? A secret passage in there?"

[Waistcoatwill]

Doc

As the LT continues to question Danielle, the halfling slips down the hallway to have a look at the strange room he mentioned. He looks for signs of a secret passageway that might not be so obvious from his tallet squad-mates bird's eye view.

Spoiler: Action

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Investigation (1d20+8)[28]

[MrAbdiel]

Mademoiselle Danielle shakes her head, in naked confusion. "Who use it? It is Dame le Velle's meeting room; one of several. Ugly, I thought. But the officials, and the Dame, zey use it sometimes; the labcoats, yes. Discreet meeting. Rupert maintains zis one personally, and ze one above it; ze ozer staff forbidden. Lest we learn, ah..." She strives for the word, failing in l'Aquitaire, failing in common Albinonese as much as she knows it; reaching then for another loan word. "Sasaeta?"

Spoiler: Elven Speakers: "Sasaeta"

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Probably refering to the general war discussions and intelligence that takes place in official discussions in the Vult heirarchy.

Sasaeta; noun. Modification of aeta, with the emphatic prefix sa to compound to saeta, and compounded again to sasaeta.

Aeta is something like a secret, or special knowledge which is defined by its exclusivity. Saeta is then extremely rare knowledge. The second emphasizer makes sasaeta knowledge of utmost importance.

In this context, the import may be relative; classified war secrets may be only somewhat important to the officers who know them, but for a maid likely to be executed on suspicion of snooping and possibly being a spy... one can see how, in relation to her position, it is critically important for her not to learn things that make her disposable.

Meanwhile, with his eye for surgical detail, Doc rapidly eliminates the sparse furniture in the room from contention for important feature, and finds no secret doors or passages - but there is an access panel. Hidden in the optical illusion of bland wallpaper, the halfling pries open the flap of plywood to find a fusebox, an orderly network of wires... and two barely glowing buttons; one featuring an up arrow, the other featuring a down arrow. Elevators are a fairly recent addition to the world, only coming into wide use in the last twenty years or so and still viewed with suspicion and occasional superstitious dread by cloistered older folks. But Doc definitely knows one when he sees one: the extra space around the walls must accommodate the mechanisms of the elevator's shaft.

[Waistcoatwill]

Doc

Doc rushes back along the corridor to he rest of the team. He can barely keep his voice to an operationally appropriate volume.

LT, that "secret room's" an elevator! No dea what's down at the bottom though.

[Novabomb]

Pvt Gabriel Ginger
Lets get these doors open to see if the shaft has been tampered with.
(He is mostly looking for explosives)

Spoiler: OOC

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(assuming some others help him open the elevator doors, or assuming that it can be opened via open lock)
Spot: (1d20+8)[21]
Thieves tools (1d20+10)[15]

[MrAbdiel]

Gabriel - and soon the rest of the squad - are probing over the mystery room. A little curiousity and vigilance verifies Doc's initial analysis - not so much that the room contains an elevator, but that it is one. Gabriel finds a few more panels hidden around the walls; they reveal the hollow sides of the shaft, steel beams, a narrow two feet of crawlspace, functional cabling and wirework, and everything to indicate the health of the machine; and nothing to suggest a trap, or sabotage.

Hector Longfoot appears in the doorway; the scruffy halfling carrying word from 4th squad above: "Looks like upstairs is clear, too. Just one butler; rushed for a trenchgun hidden in an umbrella stand, but we put him down without incident. But the room above this one is an odd-man-out, too; no controls up there, though. Looks like the lower one is the one that sets the agenda. Never seen a double-decker elevator before, but I guess war is a great time for innovators. But if there's a giant secret elevator here, I guess Lieutenant Xiloscient's instincts were right about where we ought to start sweeping the town. We might have lost a lot of lead knocking on doors down the hill."

[Cavir]

Lt Xilo nods at the information from his men and Hector. "The controls are here. We'll take this room and go down. Tell Lt Bathory I suggest they occupy the second floor part of the elevator while the elevator goes down. Our guest Danielle here is a civilian and will be leaving on her own."

He turns to Danielle. "Thank you for your help. You are free to leave. I suggest you head to the library, exit through the window and out into the woods beyond. That's the way we came so it will be safe that way. Don't go too far, the enemy will be gone from here soon enough and then you can come back to town even if this manor is gone. If I can and you are not too far I will send you a message through magic that you can return. Good luck."

LT sets up their next move. "Alright, everyone into the 'elevator'. Check your gear and be ready for a fight when the doors open. If the labcoats are down there and the staff didn't know it, there may be tunnels leading down to the town too." With Danielle gone Xilo arms himself with his M1 and attaches the bayonet. With 4th squad having had time to be ready or at least send a message, signals the down button to be pushed.

[Waistcoatwill]

Doc nods his assent the LT and even gives half a salute. He checks over his med kits and various webbing pouches before finally checking his gun. Hunkering down in the far corner of the elevator he hopes he'll be able to avoid any incoming fire long enough to start patching up his team.

Hey Sal, are they all going to be like you down there? I don't know whether to feel more sorry for them or us!

The slight tremble in his half-hearted jibe betrays the waves of epinephrine courses through his body.

[JbeJ275]

"I thought you'd finally managed to figure it out doc. There are no artificers like me on the continent. Neu Titansberg's the only place to get this smart and this mad."

As Sal is speaking, Sparky starts to crawl out and emit another shielding pulse, and Sal switches between examining his hellfire rifle and any signs of something untoward in the mechanics of the elevator

Spoiler: OOC

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Everyone gets (1d8+5)[13] Temp HP

[Cavir]

Xilo

"This may be like the underground headquarters we faced at the beach. Sgt, set up the squad for when the door opens. Covering fire, assault, all the standard stuff. Remember, we do want at least some prisoners."

[Continental Op]

Wolf nods to Xilo, enters the room, and looks around. He says, mostly to himself, [COLOR="#008000"]"So, the way in is probably the only way out, right? And we should assume they will know someone is coming down. " He thinks for a second.

In a normal voice (not shouting, but enough to carry through the room) Wolf addresses the group. "You hear the Lieutenant, gents. We don't want to get bottle-necked in here wherever we land. So let's form up. K'ral, you take the lead position. Get out of the doorway and try to cover the rest of us. Ginger and I will be right behind you. Ginger, you break left and I will go right. We move forward and try to find some cover, or rush any Kriegers shooting at us. But remember not to shoot unless we have to. Maybe we will be lucky and no one is down there to greet us."

He turns to Sal and Doc. Sal, can your doohickey give us some shielding on the way down? And you and Doc should be the last out, in case the rest of us get into trouble and need saving. In the meantime, watch out for any grenades thrown in here. Doc, we all know you are handy at catching and returning grenades." He grins.

Wolf looks around again. "There. Did I forget anyone?"

[MrAbdiel]

Pvt. Longfoot hustles back to 4th squad; and as 5th squad assembles in the mystery room, the shuffle of boots up top confirms their counterparts are doing the same. Mademoiselle Danielle watches the Amcarans head back into the hallway, her expression washing through phases of surprise at her freedom, releif for the opportunity to flee it grants, and finally dread for the danger such a flight must entail. Still clutching the coffee can, she backs off with a few clicking steps of her needlessly heeled shoes, and offers as a final, insistent point of wisdom:

"Vous devriez courir!"

Spoiler: l'Aquitaire

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"You should run!"

...And then takes her own advice; rushing off to another room and with the rattle and shuffle of a lock, out a door into the mauled and torn countryside.

Pvt. K'ral checks his weapon and hunkers in beside the doorway, as the rest of the squad squares in. Then Pvt. Ginger hits the button... and nothing happens. A minute of trial and error with with the combined minds of Gabriel and Sal reveals the problem - the circuit is incomplete, and completed by locking the door (accomplished easilly enough, from the inside with the handle's thumb-compression mechanism). Then there's a shudder; a sudden and horrifying one foot drop, and then a smooth and suspiciously quiet sense of lightness and motion. Only the whizz and clink of chains revealed through the exposed panels assure the squad they're moving at all, marking a subtlety to the mechanism of the conveyance that must be some kind of extrusion of a silence spell. But it's only thirty seconds or so of presumable descent before it ceases. Another thirty of caution with no intrusion before K'ral signals his intention and unlocks the door; peering through a crack of it then nudging it slowly open all the way with the barrel of his rifle.

Beyond is an antecorridor lined with brushed steel panels held in place with blued rivets; a pair of red and black banners emblazoned with the four-fold lightningbolt of the Vult Imperative flanking the exit corridor.

Spoiler: 2nd Lieutenant Xiloscient:

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A now familiar voice, in your head: "Two levels here, atleast. Ours spiders off three ways from here. No bomb we can see; sounds like the officer Vults lie to their underlings to keep them scared. Proceed on your level, we'll go on ours. We'll likely to loose orientation for Message, but if this is going to be all tight corridors, more than one squad'll just get in the way. Split up and cover ground. Only burn a Sending stick if you have acquired the primary objective, or some other critical result. Godspeed, Fifth."

It's a short corridor, immediately leading around a bend to another unlikely sight. To most of the squad, it's a novelty; to the Neu Titansbergers, uncanny in its familiarity. A wide, long room divided down its length with bare, scuffed and scraped boards on one side which then drops in the centre of the room, butting up against the open ended tunnel that fills the other half. The tunnel vanishes into darkness left and right; but on the ceiling, set into heavy bored fasteners in the stone, a pair of "I" shaped rails hang down. They are patinaed with rust, but polished bright and smooth in long lines from one end vanishing into the dark to the other; suggesting frequent and consistent wear. A single, tall lever stands tall at the edge of the platform. The room is clean of materiel, except for a few empty hardwood and steel benches, and two large trapezoidal concrete footers with no-frills lamp posts set in them. The twin globes atop them bathe the room in an warm, electric glow. But there is no obvious way to proceed from here except to drop down into the tunnel and forge on into the darkness, to your left - east - or your right - west.

Spoiler: Doc and Sal

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It doesn't hold a candle to the Neu Titansberg Lowrail, but this is some kind of underground rail-car system for sure - one where the cars have to be hanging from the ceiling for some crazy reason. The rails are far enough apart that they either draw a single huge car or two smaller cars going either way. But damn - if it works, and the Vulties were able to bore and install any kind of subterranean shuttle system during their short occupation, then they have a level of industriousness and resource that borders on the miraculous. But it sure wasn't the product of weekend work by Aquitainian dairy maids and vinters.

Spoiler: Perception DC 20, Hearing

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There's a rumbling sound - foggy and muted perhaps from the tunnel's accoustics - coming from the right tunnel. And it's gaining in volume, as if something is approaching rapidly.

[Waistcoatwill]

Doc didn't realise how long he'd been holding breath until he almost had a coughing fit in the antechamber with that damned squiggly flag. His breathing cut out altogether again at the sight of the two giant rails in the ceiling of the tunnel.

They might not be anyone like you over here Sal but they must have got a fair few distant cousins or something to build an upside down abomination like this. How could they dig these tunnels in such little time?

He looks from side to side as he listens carefully fornthe sound of an approaching Lowrail car.

I ain't seen a lever like this on the Lowrail platforms either. Any idea what it does? I won't even complain if you monkey around with it.

He pauses as his ears catch a familiar rumbling sound. His eyes open wide and he points to the right hand tunnel.

Better make it snappy though, sounds like the express is coming right on time.

Spoiler: Actions

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Rolling Perception assuming it's open to everyone
(1d20+5)[22]

Edit: Included a response to the noise.

[Cavir]

Lt Xilo responds to Doc's announcement of Incoming. "Quick look at the lever if you need to but we need to get ready for our guests. L-Shape Ambush time. K'ral and Doc in the corridor to provide cover. The rest of us up against the right wall so they'll go right by us. Ginger, can you then put up an image covering us? The train could have one person or a whole squad. Let's be ready for the later." Unless there's further input (which is known to be ok when there is time), Xilo quicksteps to the right wall about 5 feet in from the tunnel, to be the one closest to the wall. When the time comes he crouches down, back against the wall, M1 at the ready. Once the sniper crew is ready Xilo will throw up an Minor Image of dark shadows to cover them.

Xilo sends a Message to Bathory, not sure if they are in range but just in case. "Incoming underground train. About to engage."

Spoiler: OOC

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What's our Inspiration status?

[Novabomb]

Pvt Gabriel Ginger
On it. (casts silent image making this section look like more wall)

Spoiler: OOC

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Perception (1d20+8)[12]

[JbeJ275]

”Yeah, thier machines aren’t pretty and they’re too fiddly by half but they know how to make some crazy stuff work…. And crap, no time to break it I guess. Good luck Doc.”

With that Sal joined the sniper team, Hellfire rifle in hand as he suppressed it’s active foresights and got ready to add his firepower to the upcoming ambush.

[Waistcoatwill]

Doc hurries into position with a hasty nod to the LT.

[MrAbdiel]

The squad has just enough time to get into ambush position, before their precautions are validated. A few seconds later and a railcar clears the tunnel entrance on the right. An unusual railcar; a standing platform rigged to an arch of steel threaded through mechanized runners than zip along the insides of a ceiling mounted I-Beam. It bobs slightly as it goes, at the allowance of some kind of suspension mechanism built into the carrying arch. But the sides, back and front of the car are essentially open, except for a waist-high encircling guardrail. It could accommodate, perhaps, ten men at a time. One can guess this with some accuracy, on account of the fact that it presently contains ten men: grey and black uniforms with smart angles and Vult iconography, uniform caps rather than combat helmets, brown leather gloves on hand lightly holding the guardrail surrounding them. They are mostly human, it seems; two in the back with elf or half-elf blood in them, though no one could reasonably assess for sure in this moment. They are whipping by at a fine clip, and are likely to be in the squad's view for no more than a couple of seconds. One of them, a blond haired korporal, is first to notice the ambushes as the saga of their squad intersects with them. The alarm in his features, the desperation to cringe away behind cover that doesn't exist, accrues in slow motion as the critical moment comes to pass.

Spoiler: The Ambush

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You have about one to two seconds before the car passes by. There are ten targets, all squishes into a ten-foot by eight foot platform with no effective cover, and no drawn weapons. They're moving fast, but between being so densely packed and having nowhere to hide, being surprised, and moving at least for some of the motion -toward- the angle of your shots, you can make any ranged attacks you intend to with advantage; though lobbed grenades are at disadvantage instead, because it'd be a hell of a trick to time one into the speeding car.

Additionally, I'll ask for an extra roll, just from the party Artificer here:

Spoiler: Sal, Artificer's Tool Check: DC 20

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In a flash of insight, you make a leap of logic: if this is a rail way, that lever must be some kind of braking mechanism - something to stop the car from passing by this 'station' when there's someone here to get on board, since there's plainly no driver on the car. It'd be crazy to build something with a completely abrupt halting lever, inviting a mistake when a car is whipping by at fifty miles an hour like this one and then is halted instantly; but it might screech to a halt, if you dash out now and throw it. If the ambush doesn't go so well, that's just inviting a squad of guys with machine guns to fight your squad. But it'll stop them going to wherever they were going, and might halt the cart for your use, if you think the ambush is going to clear them out good and quick.

If Sal spends his turn exposing himself by rushing out to throw the lever, he'll be vulnerable to return fire; but it seems likely it will halt the railcar.

[JbeJ275]

Gritting his teeth and with Sparky wrapped around his arm Sal screams. ”Cover me!”

Then he dashes out to pull the lever, and dives to the ground once the lever has been properly wrenched into place.

[Continental Op]

When Wolf sees the recognition on the Krieger's face and realizes they have been seen, he doesn't hesitate. Not even waiting to shout an order, he opens up with his M1 just as Doc starts running towards something (for no reason Wolf can figure). He focuses first on the blond one who spotted them, ready to fan his fire out to the other fish in this metaphorical metal barrel.

Spoiler: OOC rolls

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Shooting with advantage:
First shot to hit: (1d20+9)[24] or (1d20+9)[23]
Damage: (1d10+4)[13]

Second shot to hit: (1d20+9)[25] or (1d20+9)[26]
Damage: (1d10+4)[6]

[Waistcoatwill]

Doc presses against the wall of the corridor, hoping in vain that the railcar will be carrying freight. As the faces of the occupants speed into view he pulls up his weapon but couldn't bring himself to squeeze the trigger.

His horror doubled as Sal ran straight into the face of danger, towards the infernal contraption he himself had pointed out. He cursed Sal when he really meant himself.

Dammit Midtown!

His hesitation broken, he sighted along the barrel once more. He aimed for centre mass, trying to ignore the soldier whose chest that mass belonged to.

Spoiler: Actions

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Attack with advantage (1d20+7)[11] or (1d20+7)[12]

(4d6+4)[16] damage including sneak attack

[Novabomb]

Pvt Gabriel Ginger
Is unclear on what Sal is up to, but he get to work putting down these Kreigs.

Spoiler: OOC

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Attack: (1d20+7)[8]
(Adv Roll) Attack: (1d20+7)[15]

Dmg: (4d6+4)[16] (Sneak attack)

[Cavir]

The ambush was seen but the enemy wasn't in any position to avoid it. The shooting had begun. The LT did more than just cover fire for Sal, each shot was made to count.

Spoiler: OOC

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They are packed in with nowhere to move. Even low rolls will probably still hit. Ginger doesn't get a second attack yet?

Shot 1: (1d20+10)[22] or (1d20+10)[16]
Dmg: (1d8+5)[10]

Shot 2: (1d20+10)[26] or (1d20+10)[13]
Dmg: (1d8+5)[13]