"That's a good thought, Verne. I do wonder where you all had your storehouses, or did you just keep everything in your own homes?"
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"I swear, it's like y'all aren't even listening," Aibretta growls at Jarix after his request for batteries and ammunition. "Allow me to spell it out slow for you so you'll get it - the Aeon schmucks have us on lockdown and they've confiscated anything valuable or useful as supplies, munition, or raw goods to make supplies. Hell, they've even begun rationing us water and food. I've got a hydro-powered energy hub that they've not recognised, but I don't have the water to power it. If you'd get me the water, then I might be able to get you some of those things you want."
Aibretta rolls her eyes at Mallura. "Oh, yeah, fat lot going to the storehouse will do ya." She stands up from her chair, stomps over to the galley, and clanks her empty cup down in the sink. She calls out from the kitchen in a sarcastic voice. "It's right next to Glimmerock. Go check it out; it's where we kept all our colony supplies, but there's that turncoat Tace you'll have to deal with."
"Glimmerock?" Verne inquires, intrigued by the name. "What's that?"
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"It's the massive hunk of crystal that the village was built around. Madelon chose the site - he must've thought it was pretty. You haven't seen it yet? I mean, I know y'all been conniving through the trees since you arrived, but a 30 foot tall crystalline boulder in a clearing is hard to miss. Turns out, it ain't natural but it does boost our communications antenna signal - or at least, it did before the occupation."
'Which leads us back to taking another shot at the water, once we've rested some, I mean."
Without looking up from the open panel on Sh-Ux, JD asks "What can you tell us about Tace? Is he the quartmaster at the storehouse?"
"I'm curious about Tace too, Aibretta. You said he's a turncoat? That's a pretty big accusation. What'd he do?"
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Aibretta grunts as she resumes her seat, a hunk of an unknowable mechanical apparatus in her hands.
"Rendell Tace is the store clerk for our supply house here at Madelon's Landing. Or was. Now he's sucking up to the Aeon Throne bastards and pretending this occupation is ultimately a good thing for all of us. He's the one who informed the squibs of who had what weapons stashed - nearly got Quorsica killed when they raided her place. Tace is trash." Aibretta spits on the apparatus for punctuation, then produces a grimy rag and begins polishing it with a scowl on her face.
JD closes the hatch on Sh-Ux. "That's it for now, Shim"
He turns to the group. "What's the move then, go hit the water elemental and let Sh-Ux sneak to the Hob Box like Verne suggested? Or should we lay low for a little bit and maybe go shake down Tace? Could acquire some weapons and supplies that way"
"Eh...I'm doubtful the yellow fleem-head has any weapons stashed away from what Aibretta's saying about him. I dunno. Maybe it's worth checking in on him anyway, though. If we get the elemental outta the way, maybe we can raid his place for UPBs."
JD shoots Mallura a oh here we go again look at Aibretta's outburst.
"Can't imagine why Fulson left this lady" he thinks to himself. As a transient with a roof and a meal, however, he keeps his opinion to himself.
"Well, maybe he's got smokes, or liquor or food that's bad for you at least. All I'm sayin' is I ain't to interested in getting wet again. On the other hand, now that they know there's trouble, we ain't as worried about shakin' the hob-box. It wouldn't take much for Sh-Ux here to check out the hob-box for the voice box, while we try the moisture collector again."
"Alright alright, keep your coveralls on, Aibretta." The captain finds a suitably large piece of machinery to sit against and takes a load off for a moment.
"Okay. Let's do it. We go up against the elemental again next. It didn't seem like it wanted to stray too far from the pools of water, so maybe let's keep our distance and try and take it out with potshots and grenades. It'll probably be slow work, but we might actually manage to get it done that way. Any other ideas?"
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Aibretta shrugs at the words meant to assuage her.
"The sooner you get me the water, the sooner I can make you some 'munition. Y'all take care of patrols. Bound to be more of them now."
As Aibretta says that, almost prophetically, the colony-wide loudspeaker sounds another message in accented Common.
"Bligh's balls," Aibretta curses, hefting herself out of her chair. "Y'all please go irritate them some more so they stop irritating me so much." She punctuates that statement as she slams off the main light switch to her domicile, leaving the interior dimly-lit only by residual electromagnetic signals from her multiple generators.
"Any other ideas?"
"If there was a way to determine the command word the Azlanti used, we'd likely be better off," Verne chimes in. "That, or find out how to drain the moisture collector to the elemental is less...in its' element? Whatever we can do to better even out the fight."
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After taking a breather and waiting out the repeated announcements via loudspeaker warning Madelon's Landing citizens to remain indoors, the crew of the Brilliance slip out the secret rear entrance of Aibretta's junk house into the darkness of the Nakondis night. Strange insects and stranger-still animal noises call out from the darkened trees as the group make their way east towards the cemetery. The sight of their recent firefight remains eerily quiet, heightening paranoia as the group exit the trees and head in a southerly direction for the moisture collector.
As the group reach the clearing around the moisture collector, a distant detonation sounds off far to the west. The crew freeze, considering their next move as they strain their ears for further sounds of violence.
Jarix will take lead. He warily moves about to keep from being ambushed. He'll pick up a stone along the way.
Captain Mal bravely brings up the rear, knowing that even Verne is more combat-savvy than herself, especially with his powerful magical abilities. She tries to follow in Jarix's footsteps to avoid making noise as much as possible.
JD will follow Jarix as they snake along the bush. He appears a little on edge as they pass by the cemetery, and approach the moisture collector again.
When the explosion sounds, he freezes to listen. "What was that, combat, or maybe the mining operation Jerrik was talking about?"
The drone shimmers and vanishes. It follows the group along past the cemetery.
Verne pulls up behind JD, scanning for signs of Azlanti.
If we capture another soldier, I'll see if I can delve into their mind to find the command code, he thinks to himself.
Jarix whispers "There's a firefight over that way. I don't think it has anything to do with us." Almost as soon as he's done speaking, he whispers again. "And I think it's over."
Jarix continues to lead them toward the water station.
At the edge of the clearing, a clearly nervous JD peers out at the lonely moisture collector. His face has a look of grim determination, but his constant shifting about gives up his true nature.
"Well, we're back. Do we stake it out for awhile, or start shooting?" He whispers to his crewmates.
From what he learned last time, JD will assess the equipment and see if he can find some kind of weakness to gain an advantage over the creature.
"I'll draw it out like last time. This time, you guys put it down, ok?" Once everyone is set, Jarix tosses the stone into the pool, hopefully getting the attention of the water creature. He'll then go up to the pool with his knife at the ready.
The one where we fought the water creature. NE?
Verne pulls up the rear behind Jarix. He peers into the still waters and tries to find a sign of the water elemental.
There must be something we can do to turn an advantage, he thinks somewhat optimistically. The android reflects on his training in the life sciences to see if there is something he could use to help them fight or otherwise defeat the creature.
Mallura follows the thinking of her lead engineer and lends her help with sealing off one of the tubs.
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Jarix's rock plunks into the empty collecting vat to the northeast. Mallura comes over to take a look at it, but there's no mechanism that she can determine that would allow her to seal it off. JD scratches his head as he tries to determine how to use the collecting system to their advantage, but has no specific ideas.
Verne considers what he knows about the natural world. He concludes that whatever attacked them from within these collecting vats was not of the natural world.
Sh-Ux makes it's way towards the garrison and the Hob Box, keeping a constant watch out for Azlanti patrols. At the sound of the distant boom, it pauses a moment, before determining the sound did not come from the crew.
The little drone will scan the box for signs of a Hobgar with anything in its hand.
Knowing the hobgars will react to nearby tech, Sh-Ux will climb the pole to about the halfway point or close enough to get the Hobgars agitated, hoping the voice box will be dropped.
Jarix warily moves in to work on the control box. "Every one stay alert. It may attack again." He expects to be attacked by the water creature and not actually fix the system.
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As Sh-Ux gets halfway up the pole, despite being unseen to the numerous furry creatures hooting from inside, they seem to detect his presence and begin rattling the cage walls, suffering a few sharp electric shocks for their efforts. An occasional electric ray rockets out in a non-specific direction from the open mesh, punctuated by louder hooting noises.
Sh-Ux spies a small control box resting right under the metal plate at the bottom of the cage, its stable red electronic light shining out from the mists enshrouding the Hob Box a further ten feet up the pole.
Jarix begins fidgeting with the moisture collector control box in a non-specific fashion, attempting to draw the attention of the elemental creature. Sure enough, a few minutes of fiddling results in a sloshing noise from the northwestern holding vat as a familiar-appearing watery form lashes out from within at the operative!
Despite being prepared for the appearance of the creature, Jarix finds himself slower than the lithe and lethal water elemental.
The creature's watery appendage buffets Jarix in the chest, knocking the wind from his lungs.
"I hate this thing." Jarix goes into motion trying to put it off balance.
JD rushes out of the foliage with rifle at the ready, and fires a blast off at the elemental.
Sh-Ux will make the rest of the climb to the control module. It will extend a manipulator arm and position it over the button. Instead of pressing it however, the drone focuses it's single iris on the Azlanti Barracks to the south.
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JD and Jarix both miss with their attacks as the fluid villain sloshes around the vat. Mallura determines that the alarm would likely act as alarms often do when they are activated; a simple bit of mechanical engineering would remove the hastily-installed device.
Sh-Ux detects no immediate activity from the barracks.
"Give me some cover boys. They've set up an alarm system in here. I'm going to pop it out so we don't end up with more company than we want."
With that, Mallura reaches down into the southwest tub and begins working.
Verne takes a moment to reposition himself where the watery creature has emerged ().
He fires off a shot at the elemental.
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Verne's shot pings off the centre module of the moisture collector.
The elemental bursts forth from the collecting vat at Jarix.
Jarix dodges at the last moment, catching a sheet of non-damaging mist in the face. The elemental splashes back into the vat, disappearing from view.
Jarix readies to attack when the water thing appears again.
Verne casts Reflecting Armor in preparation for the next round of attacks.
JD will ready an attack for when the creature appears again.
Mallura looks across from her side of the tower to check on Jarix. The operative looks pretty beat up, so she gives him a pep talk before backing off so the elemental can't come out swinging on her.
"Keep it up, Jarix. You get that thing working, we might never have to deal with this stupid elemental again!"