"Affirmitive."
Rolin takes up postition at the top of the stairs, watching the squad decend but keeps most of his focus on the surroundings.
my bad, i shouldve said that rear door.
"Roger that." Rolin moves off to the rear door.
Iggins nods and steps up the front, scanning the area. Perception:
Jenkins continues his conversation with Manus, as he builds a long range comm, he to keep up the subterfuge.
The street out the front is still and quiet. In the distance you can hear the rumblings of explosions broken by staccato bursts of blaster fire.
In the concealed storage area Ianthé heads down one of the rows heading towards the back she notices the blastech symbol printed on several of the crates. Before she can look into this though she hears a muffled whimpering coming from further in covered by a gentle shushing.
Ianthé tosses her light forward, concerned she is making a target of herself. The glowrods beam spins around in the darkness flashing several times across the crouched form of a person holding something (a child?) tightly in thier arms. The whimper turns into a scream and wail of a young child. A mans voice cries out in the dim light thrown by the glowrod "Please, don't shoot! I'm unarmed and my boy is here."
With no Immediate response the man stands slowly and places himself between Ianthé and the child. "Please we were just trying to escape the battle."
Outside the shop the sky has darkened into night, flashes of explosions and blaster fire light up the city scape. The sounds of fighting get steadily closer and from the other direction and a rumbling noise echoes through the streets.
Manus completes his makeshift long range commlink
Rolin finds the back door secure. A large durasteel door to allow the unloading of transports. There's no way to see out the back of the store. The door looks sturdy. It might even take a few explosions to get through, though it's not military grade.
Rolin listens at the door, pondering how wise it would be to take the chance of giving away their position by opening it.
As you listen at the door you only hear the muffled distant sounds of battle as well as the new rumbling noise. However you are pretty sure that there is nothing nearby on the other side of the door. Opening it to check might be ok. The chance that someone would see the light shining out would be the biggest give away but the city is still occupied by civilians and you would guess that a new light would not necessarily mean enemies to an unoccupied rebel squad especially in this sector of the city where the main imperial force has not reached yet.
"For better or for worse, it's done."
"Good work, Manus. Though I don't want to test it yet. Gear rigged together likes this has a habit of only working once, so we will save it till needed. Besides, I wouldn't have requested you to my team if you didn't have the skills to gt it right first time, he soldier?"
Then he whispers, "Hopefully there's nothing down and we can go complete this mission ASAP."
oh great, civies. calahan grunts, lowering his weapon.
i got an idea, jenkins. he says. over the squad frequency, Calahan says alright everyone. pony up a ration bar. thats right. time to pay the tithe. he goes around holding out his hand and taking the bars offered.
Ensuring that his rifle is slung across his back, Calahan stumps down the stairs.
Seeing the man and child for the first time, Calahan is thankful for the mask over his face to hide his features. Coughing a little bit, he holds out the rations to the man and child. here, take these. This should last you a few days. Stay down here with your kid and you wont get hurt from the fighting. Its well supported and well hidden.
Iggins hands over his rations, and keeps his eyes open for any Rebel surprises that may be on the way...
"Jack, did you say Blastech? That's the imperial weaponry manufacturer! Hold those two secure till we see what is in those crates. I'm coming down."
"You don't want to be seen as being too sympathetic to an arms-smuggler, Calahan. Give me a hand to open some of these crates."
Jenkins Has a look around the basement and all the crates before working to open some of them.
Perception
Calahan glares at Jenkins, taking a moment to raise his visor to ensure jenkins sees the look on calahans face. Just for the record, i dont see an arms dealer. i see a man protecting his child from an invading army. If it is proven in court that this man is an arms dealer, fine. But until then, he is just a man protecting his kid.
stepping up to jenkins, calahan says for his ears only
"You need me down there?" Rolin asks as he hands over his ration for the chip-in. "Do they look hurt? Malnourished?"
Rolin opts to keep the door closed, instead he makes his way over to the top of the stairs and listens in on whats going on in the basement.
"Yes, Calahan, indeed any man will protect his son. But this man has a cache of imperial weapons carefully hidden beneath his store. When you have a stockpile like this of military weapons you are no longer a civilian. And I'm sure he knows that.
"Tie him up, and his son. I'll arrange to have him picked up by some MPs as soon as possible.
"Leave them food, sure. They are still human after all. We have a more important objective to achieve yet.
"Now, let's see exactly what it is they would have used against us, given the opportunity." Jenkins works at opening the crate.
The man looks shocked at the Captains words "You can't tie up a little boy!" he says and then as Jenkins starts to open on of the cases "Uhh don't, you shouldn't... um. "
Jenkins lifts the lid off one of the smaller blastech cases to find two magazines of Blastech Missiles.
Manus looks over his constructed comm, quite pleased with the way it looks your sure it will work perfectly.
Iggins stands guard at the window, the noises continue outside with the sounds of battle getting closer every minute your sure it won't be long before the fighting will reach this street. Presently the low rumbling noise stops and there is a sudden explosion before a second later the rumbling continues. That explosion couldn't have been more than a few blocks from here!
Kn, Tech
"This should help a little. I guess I should thank your daddy, young man, for bringing this here for us to use against the rebel scum that are trying to control your city."
Jenkins pulls out the missile launcher, and holds it out to his team, "Who is going to get best use of this?"
"Manus, see if you can contact Colonel Cal Delmont's office on that, and request that he sends some men to pick up theses two detainees.
"I think it is time to move on, soldiers. For the Empire!"
He nods his head towards the door, indicating that they should head out.
really, jenkins, you have to ask? calahan says in a joking manner as he takes the missle launcher from him, inspecting it with a critical eye.
lets check the other crates for more missles
Searching through more of the crates turns up mostly blaster rifles and pistols. However Calahan spots a small crate filled with grenades. 5 stun grenades and 10 frags.
The man motions to his boy to comply with Ianthé's request and does so himself. " Please be gentle with my boy. " is all he says as they are tied up.
At the same time Iggins hears the explosion of a grenade from just down the street lolling through the window he sees a handful of Rebel soldiers dive out into the street. They quickly get up and start running down the street towards the shop. The rumbling from the other direction gets louder and clearer and Iggins and Manus recognise the sound of vehicle tracks clanking and clicking on the duracrete street over the rumbling of the vehicles engine. The Rebels either don't hear it or they aren't worried and they run on regardless.
"We've got company coming, sirs. Perhaps we should just stun the civilians and move on?" Iggins steadies his rifle, aiming toward the oncoming Rebels. He switches to autofire and pops off a flurry of shots, hoping to delay the Rebel advance by making them think there's a lot more Imperial warriors here than they thought...
Autofire:
Damage:
OOOH this is nice! calahan says, juggling some frag grenades. Strapping the missle laucher to his back, and slinging the extra missle magazine on his side, Calahan grunts at the weight. Shoulda spent more time at the gym
Picking up the grenades, he wanders up to everyone, handing them a stun and frag grenade.
getting up the stairs, Calahan pauses, ensuring that all weapons on him are armed and safetied. Hearing Iggins shout and follow up shots, calahan grunts. Alright ladies, get up here. I think we should head out the back. Te, i want you on point. next is iggins. Manus and jenkins, stick to each other. Rolin will move next, and i'll bring up the rear. Remember, movement from cover to cover.
Rolin hefts his pack and accepts the offered grenades from Calahan before stepping into line, ready to move out.
Jenkins frowns as he thinks about Calahan with all those grenades. His face lightens as he thinks to himself, probably the best the to use them...
He stows the two new grenades into his bandolier and moves to the front door.
"Towards the tower, Jack. We been charged capturing the Rebel Leaders and all intel points them being there.
"Stay tight, and watch out for each other. Let's roll. For the Empire!"
Iggins sprays the rebels with auto fire. They duck and weave and take some hits but they don't jump for cover. They keep on pounding down the road. Then two squads of stormtroopers burst from the same street that the rebels came from and give chase firing their rifles as they run. Suddenly the group of Rebels drop as one man to the ground as from the other end of the road a tracked vehicle comes around the corner sending a massive green beam of energy down at the stormtroopers who are caught by surprise and when the beam dies down you can see the blackened armour of half the stormtroopers lying on the ground as the rest of them dive behind cover.
Calahan grimaces at the lound stomps and clanging of metal coming from the damaged droids that Jack is bringing along. queueing the mic to jenkins frequency
Jenkins slaps the controls for the loading doors of the shop and they split and slowly grind apart revealing the dark back ally that looks clear. As the squad moves out the sound of the laser cannon blasting again is heard from the front of the shop. Overhead in the starry expanse small flickers tell the tale of Rebel ships being shut down with ion blasts as they try to escape the planet. Moving through the city has become more about avoiding the small skirmishes and road blocks as the noise of blaster fire and running feet drown out any sounds the squad is making.
After a couple of hours of slinking through the city the squad arrives at the site of their final objective. In a built up area of the city where the buildings reach up into the night you locate the tower that the rebel leaders are using as their base if operations. Viewing it from around a corner a couple of blocks back a squad of rebel troopers guards the stairs leading up to the main doors of the building. The soldiers sit behind three sets of Durasteel shielding on the stairs and the muzzle of an Eweb repeating blaster pokes over the top of the centre shield.
Kn Tactics
Rolin looks down the road into the 'kill zone' because that's what the courtyard outside the rebels tower is set up to be. If they're doing it right they probably have thier own snipers in those other buildings to. Discussing this with Jenkins the simple plan of sending in the droids to flush out any surprises and watch for the snipers then send teams into the buildings or take the snipers out with Calahans new toy.
"With permission, sir, I'd like to get to higher ground to provide covering fire. Unless sir would rather use a sneakier route?"
Calahan just grunts what about the sewers? a big building like that has to have an access port to the sewage.
calahan laughs takes one to know one. You and i have a date once this skirmish is done
"I have in the past found sewers to be lightly guarded, though the defender can have a huge advantage. It wouldn't surprise me to find light defences beyond this team out the front, though if we get up and in from the sewer we could avoid a lot of fire-fight once in.
.
"Iggins, you know that if you disappear too far off you'll miss all the fun inside.
.
"Jack, are you sure the droids will work for us. I thought you had only set us as Friendly.
.
"Manus, do you think you could bring down one of the adjacent buildings? I should think that would create quite a dust-storm and that might give us enough cover to slip into the building unnoticed. Especially if it were to blow out the windows of the tower and we slip into the second or third level. Get the droids making a lot of noise for us too, to help with cover.
.
"What do you think about that as a plan?"
"Calahans idea might have merrit actually. If Té could pull up the city schematics for the sewers and remotely controll the droids we could sneak in and use the droids as a diversion when we need to make some noise."
Letting someone else take the watch for a minute Ianthé's fingers work madly across the Datapad as she brings up the schematics of the tower. Jumping through the hoops of the government system. A quick inspection reveals no pipes large enough for a man to access the building by, however there is a sewer grate in the court yard that is attached to the rear of the tower.
Looking over Té's shoulder as she works her magic Rolin grunts at the results. "Not what I had in mind, but it could work." he mutters.
"We have a grate at the back of the tower. We could circle round and approach from that direction, or we could blast our way through captain. I reckon both approaches take a similar amount of time to accomplish though the stealthy approach should give us more time to maneuver before an alarm is raised. Orders, sir?"