"Why don't you scout out the camp ome more time again around mess time, but very discretely, and see how many of the workers and guards attend. Then maybe we could plant one big bomb near the mess, and smaller bombs at the equipment that's furthest from the mess?"
●Sounds good. I'm tempted to just try to wipe the group out entirely, though that is probably unnecessary, and might cause the locals more trouble than we intend. Doing minimal damage might be a better plan. Saboteurs can be caught. An entire group gets wiped out, and the Coalition might just carpet bomb the whole forest.●
"Ok, let's go back to just planting smaller bombs near all the big equipment."
●OK, lets do it. I suggest we go at end of day; second mess. People will be the most tired, but it won't be dark yet.●
"I've got yer charges all rigged up 'ere. They'll do the most damage if ye can contain 'em somehow; the pressure builds up more an' you get a betta bang. Put 'em inside an access panel or in the crew cab, if you can manage."
"These ol' Enforcer bots have some design issues too, like most bots. They gotta figure out how to get all those parts inside the frame." He pulls out a grease pencil and sketches out a rough image of the UAR-1. "Right here. This part distributes power to the whole frame. Thing won't work without it, and it's too big an' complicated to rebuild in the field. You'd need to replace the 'ole unit, and with bots this old, they'd likely have to replace the 'ole thing. Place your charges as close as you can to this point, and the 'ole thing is basically an overgrown paperweight."
Jingu activates his invisibility in order to move in.
Burgurk activates the invisibility and silence devices Josiah made for him.
= 1 Raise
Jingu and Burgurk, with their enhanced stealth capabilities, both mundane and psychic, easily slip into the Coalition logging camp undetected. Now all they had to do was set the bombs and then get out just as quietly.
Burgurk Boosts his Repair skill :
= Raise (Repair : d4-2 --> d4 --> d6)
And then tries to set his bombs :
= Success
As soon as it is safe to do so, Burgurk and Jingu set about their plan, to destroy the mining equipment and vehicles. Jingu is particularly proud of how he set the charges in the modified UAR, so that when the workers start it up, the thing will collapse in on itself and become all but useless. After setting the timers and getting sufficiently far way, you are rewarded with the resounding echo of explosions throughout the forest. Not long after, the sounds of men yelling in the chaos also reaches your ears, but it is neither of these that jar your mind, as they were to be expected. No, what gets to you is that was also what sounded like a sigh in the wind, perhaps from the blasts or perhaps something else entirely. In this world, it is difficult to tell.
Sunday, December 24th, 109 PA (2395CE). 1043 hours. 30 Degrees F (-1 Degrees C), Light Wind (2 mph (3 Kph), Cold Rain). Northern Arkansas Territory, Castle Refuge. (Lead Hill, AR)
You spend the next three days keeping low over the trees and hills of Southern Missouri, and even going into the trees when you think there might be trouble ahead. The cold, rain and fog keep visibility low, but that also works in your favor, as no one accosts you until you reach the first Legion checkpoint. As you check in you are told that there have been border skirmishes recently by unknown forces and when you go back out to be careful. Once Elsie is packed away in the garage and Josiah gets to work maintaining her, the rest of you make it up to see Lieutenant McDare waiting for you. She seems like she is lost in thought as you approach. ”Back so soon?”, she says as she acknowledges your presence. Composing herself, she returns your salutes and gets right to business. ”What did you find out?”
If appropriate, Jingo makes a report to the officer. He tells them what they discovered about the smuggling ring, that they are using local wild Psi-Stalkers to capture the apparently energy rich blue skinned d-bees. The wild stalkers bring them in drained and docile, and then the coalition is shipping them out again.
He'll also report on the grove of sentient trees, and inform them about the sabotage operation that was performed on the logging crew.
Lieutenant McDare listens intently as you make her aware of the goings on North of here. She then nods and says, ”We were worried about what was happening to the Faelerin and now we know for sure that the Coalition is involved. While we can’t go after them legally, we can at least slow down their trade. I will have a mission for you shortly, but I need to go and talk to command about your findings on sentient trees and the Coalition attempting to collect them. In the meantime, you are on leave until I contact you.” She taps her comlink to indicate that you should be paying attention to yours and then turns and leaves, tapping away on her data pad.
Edit:
”Alright, team.”, Lieutenant McDare begins. ”Your information from that CS location north of here and some intel we got from a few other informants finally gave us a lead on where these Faelerin are being taken. There seems to be a major shipment passing through our borders within the next week. That should give you plenty of time to intercept, detain the perps and bring in the Faelerin. I’ve already given the travel plans to Josie, so the only thing you should have to worry about is any stragglers along the way. We do expect the shipment to be heavily guarded, so be prepared for anything. Questions?”
"Can we get some seasoned, well-equipped troops to come with us? With just the three of us, things might get a little dicey."
●An airborn transport would be highly advantageous if we could get one. Quick evac. Any indication what level of protection they'll have? Are these prisoners considered high priority, or routine? It would be good to know if we should be expecting two guards in a truck, or a power armour unit with Samas escorts.●
●I wish we had more regular members in this unit. It would be nice to have some other resources to call on.●
Lieutenant McDare checks her data pad for a moment, mulling something over, her voice muttering to herself. Finally, she looks up. ”Your old team member, Jace, has recently returned from his mission, I can brief him and he can meet you on the way. I can also have two squads for you to take with you as well. We don’t have any extra air support at this time, but we do have a mobile command trailer to hook up to your vehicle, if you would like. It can carry your squads and you and provide a much wider communications area.”
She pauses for a moment, reading something more on her data pad before continuing. ”We have very little intel as to what the Black Market uses for security forces, but this ‘is’ considered a high priority target, as we firmly believe the Coalition is involved somehow. We do not know if they are being openly protected by them or if they are trying to pass as regular commerce. You will have to figure that out in the field. If there are no other questions, I need to brief your squads. You should be ready to go in a couple of hours.”
After waiting for more than a couple of hours, your two squads are found waiting by Elsie, standing at attention, though neither of you are officers. Lieutenant McDare meets you there as well. ”These two units have seen some action recently, but not as much as you. They are prepped and ready for combat. You’ve been given a command and transport trailer to attach to the hauler. It will carry these men and provide you with 50 mile communications and scanning, should you need it. Other than that, you are fueled and ready to roll out. Good luck, gentlemen.” She leaves and the two squad leaders look to you.
”Both squads are ready roll, at your command.”
After an inspection and final preparations, you head out, leaving the safety of Castle Refuge behind. The first day is uneventful, as you are still well within Legion territory. You spend the time getting to know your squads and what they are capable of.
Griffin Squad is a heavy weapons team and it consists of 9 men, most of the human or as close as possible. The main weapon crew has a rocket launcher with several rounds and a plasma rifle while the rest have laser rifles.
Hunter Squad is an infiltration team. The nine of them are all human with the exception of an elf from another world. Their armor is light and they carry only smaller laser carbines, vibroblades and smoke grenades.
On the second day, you come across a deep ravine where the bridge has been destroyed. Elsie could hover over it, but there are know to be CS patrols in the area. Or, you could try to set up a temporary bridge to cross. The last option is to simply find a new path around, but that will take more time to do. Which do you choose?
"Josiah, Jingu - could either of you rig up a temporary invisibility for Elsie and the trailer, so we could fly across? It would only have to last for at most a minute."
Wednesday, December 27th, 109 PA (2395CE). 1122 hours. 15 Degrees F (-9 Degrees C), Light Wind (1 mph (1 Kph), Cold). CS Arkansas Territory, Thaytown. (Thayer, MO)
Josiah gets to work setting up Elsie to be able to turn away the spectrums of light that would give her away as she increases altitude to get over the ruined bridge. A half an hour later, Elsie soars over the top and is able to find purchase on the other side down to a safer altitude and you continue on your journey.
You spend the rest of the day traveling through wild lands, seeing herds of fury beetles and the occasional CS patrol flyover, but these become rarer as you continue. It isn’t until early on the 3rd day that you start to see signs of civilization again. As you pass through a tunnel that is surrounded by forest, it opens up into a wide plain that has numerous buildings that look prefab and only temporarily put into place. You are sure you see a few vehicles parked in various locations around the area and several people milling about and going about their day, most of them in armor or some other protection from the cold. Luckily, Elsie’s heater keeps you warm as well.
You are enough of a distance away that it appears the inhabitants haven’t noticed you, about 300 meters. They also don’t seem to have any patrols either. Now to decide how to approach them..
As Burgurk scans the inhabitants, he notes that most of them wear long dusters and other thick coats and some wear armor openly with no covering. What he does not see is any sort of marking telling him what group they might belong too. What he does notice is that most of their weapons, at least from here, look of civilian make.
"So, what's the plan? Some of us go in to recon the place first? Jingu, could you go invisible, fly over them and scan everything?"
●I certainly could. It wouldn't be difficult to do a flyover, get a headcount and log mechs and defensive emplacements.●
Jingu zooms in with his optics, trying to get a better view from here.
Zooming in and trying to get a better view of the place, Jingu starts noticing that some things appear out of place. While there are some human females, they appear to be just as ready to fight as the males do. Some of them even appear to be in charge as they walk around giving orders. Jingu also notes there are no children among them which, for a human settlement, is rather strange. While there are a few vehicles, they do not appear armed and instead are simply for travel, most of them hoverbikes or ground cars. There are no robots that can be seen. In all, Jingu counts about twenty people armed and armored and another twenty or so who are not. As he is giving his report, he also notices that near one of the buildings, two men with guns are accosting another, but on closer look, that other man is blue-skinned and pointy eared. Most likely, a Faelerin.
After scouting things from a distance, Jingu cloaks himself with his best invisibility, in case they have scouts watching with Thermal Imagining or magic, and then cloaks his psionic signature as well. Thus prepares, he does a closer flyby of the encampment to gather more details.
Jingu flies over the buildings and realizes that they are indeed a temporary setup. There are a total of twelve individual buildings, each one single story and having at least two entrances. They are definitely prefab. As he watches, he notes there is one building in particular that the armed guards seem to rotate around. The one Faelerin that you see is punched a few times and then led back into the same building. Another of the soldiers, a female human by the look of her long hair as she takes her helmet off, begins to yell at some of the soldiers to get back to work and a few of them start making an ever widening circle around the buildings, at least until they are out of sight of their boss. Then they go back to chatting amongst themselves and every once in a while looking around. Jingu counts five total vehicles. Three of them are hovercycles, one is a ground car and the other is a tracked transport vehicle. None of them have any similar markings other than personal logos that look spray painted on. The ground car has what appears to be a rail gun mounted to the roof and several plates of armor welded to it. The three hovercycles are similarly armored. The transport has no such additions.
The people who are not armed and armored follow the directions of the others and spend their time cleaning the area, going in and out of other buildings and generally doing what appears to be menial work. None of them look up when they are spoken to by the guards.
When watching the boss, you notice she keeps looking at a device in her hand and then replacing it on her utility belt every few minutes, as if she is waiting for something.
"So, Jingu - any strategies come to mind?"