"Nice hit, Verne! Just watch out for this big lummox!"
JD attempts to take advantage of the shield being turned and fires at the soldiers side.
Jarix takes a pair of shots at green hoping to quickly take her out of the fight.
Verne shakes his head slightly to rid himself of the daze of the rifle blast.
He nods briefly at his captain, then turns to the nearby cadet and gathers his mental energy.
"Drop," he says, casting command at his nearby enemy.
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The riot shield-wearing cadet abruptly drops both the riot shield and their pulsecaster pistol, the two items clunking off of each other as they land on the ground. The cadet stoops to attempt to pick up the shield, stops, growls, and draws a knife from their boot, lunging at Verne!
The other cadet quickly fires twice at Jarix.
The hapless cadets continue to show their lack of training.
Jarix takes a little more care in targeting green this time.
"Nice job, Verne!" JD calls out as he lines up his next shot on Yellow.
He nods off a little as he pulls the trigger.
Mal focuses fire on Yellow while he is without his shield.
"Any time," Verne responds. He adds a blast of his own pistol to the crew's takedown effort of the unarmed soldier.
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Jarix successfully lands another sonic blast into the reeling rifle-wielding cadet while Mallura and Verne take advantage of the riot-shield-less cadet's unshielded state. JD appears to be entering severe alcohol withdrawal.
The knife-wielding cadet slashes at Verne again, then grabs the riot shield from the ground. The other cadet speaks aloud into his helmet in Azlanti as he steps back from Jarix and fires again.
"ကျနော်တို့လေးယောက်ထိတွေ့ဆက်ဆံနေကြသည်။ သူတို့ဟာမျှော်လင့်ထားသည့်အဆိပ်။ အင်ပါယာအတွက်!"
"ကျူးကျော်သူတွေက။ ကျူးကျော်သူတွေက။"
The same message repeats on a loop, klaxon blaring in tandem.
"We've just been positively identified." Jarix loosely translates what the cadet reported. "Here's some of those anger management issues I have." He fires again at green.
"Perhaps we can find a way to lock down the building," Verne replies, his voice strained as he dodges the angry cadet's knife, "once we take care of this situation."
He lashes out at the cadet with his baton.
Mal grins as the battle continues to turn in the crew's favor. She raises her laser pistol and fires another shot at the yellow cadet.
"I think we can expect more company soon" JD fires again at the remaining cadet.
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Verne and Mallura ping shots off of the riot shield. The cadet takes an opportunity to peer around the shield after the two missed shots, but catches a bullet in the face and collapses like a deflated balloon.
With a chance for a breather, the crew look around the room as the alarm continues to blare. The long room is lined with bunks, each with a footlocker bearing two different insignia. All the beds are neatly made. The side of the room you entered contains two rounded protrusions with a narrow hall between them; the northern protrusion has a small door with WASHROOM' painted on it in Azlanti. Two doors lead out of this room to the south and one more leads east, all labeled with green letters.
Can Jarix get one of the comms from the one of the dead guys?
"That way." Jarix points to the door closest to him. "It says 'Main Staging'."
OK then, how about finding the channel to listen in?
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Apart from the (basic) riot shield and the single Azlanti hunting rifle, the most-recently terminated cadets each had pulsecaster pistols and survival knives. The partially-armoured cadet also had a survival knife, but upon further inspection, you see an articulated compartment in the greaves of his armour with space to hold a one-handed weapon (a quick-release sheath).
Verne checks the cadets for any ammunition for his Pulsecaster pistol. Then, he attempts to help Jarix determing the Azlanti communication frequency.
JD will check the footlockers quickly to see if they're locked, or contain anything of value. While he doubts the over zealous Azlanti might have any stashed away contraband, it never hurts to look.
While he's playing with the footlockers, he inspects the two different insignia.
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The two pulsecaster pistols each have batteries in place. A quick look by Verne indicates that they're both half-full (i.e. 10 charges each). Verne and Jarix attempt to fit their heads into dead cadets' helmets to listen in to a channel that doesn't seem to be broadcasting anything.
In the meantime, JD goes to check the footlockers. Each of the footlockers has two side-by-side hinged lids. A different insignia emblazons each side.
After only a few moments, Jarix gives up on the radio. He says, "Company's coming. We should get moving." He goes to the door marked main staging and tries to stealthily open the door enough to see what's in the next room.
JD passes the photographs to Mallura. "Figures. Not a cigarette or drop of booze anywhere, so they get their jollies by shooting innocent people."
He'll get ready to follow Jarix into the next room.
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Jarix attempts to stealthily open the door. The room beyond is sparsely furnished but well illuminated. A heavy metal double door to the west resembles a starship airlock door. Flashing red lights and klaxons in synchrony with the intruder alert are specifically localised to that area of the chamber. A layer of detritus and dirt lays on the floor in front of the sealed door. A smaller door to the east is labeled in Azlanti (as indicated previously by Jarix) as 'Mess' in bright green lettering. The south wall bears several holovid screens displaying a detailed composite map of Madelon’s Landing, with heavy annotations scrolling beneath each building. A computer panel fits snugly beneath the screens on a sleek foldout shelf. Standing at the panel is another cadet behind another riot shield, but this does not immediately draw Jarix's attention.
The small metal canister that goes plink-plink-plink across the floor towards Jarix's position at the door does.
Verne pockets the ammo from both pistols.
"These insignia appear to be some kind of family crest," Verne muses as he surveys the footlockers."
Jarix tries to get close enough to the cadet to keep it from having cover and fires.
The grenade's boom ringing in his ears, Verne speeds into the room .
He aims his pistol at the cadet and fires off a shot.
JD moves into the room and fires at the cadet.
Mal moves in, hugging the walls, and fakes a charge across the room to get in the cadet's head.
Observing his previous shot reflecting off the cadet's shield, Verne tries the same spell he had successfully cast moments earlier in the bunkhouse.
"Drop," he commands the cadet.
Jarix continues to try and position himself to keep the enemy cadet from cover.
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JD pings a bullet off of the riot shield as Mallura charges into the room.
Somewhere between Captain Mallura's feint and the android's mystic command, the riot shield drops to the floor. Jarix takes the opportunity to bring the sonic boom once again! The cadet shouts in alarm and draws another grenade from her belt, tossing it between the android and the engineer in a desperate attempt to escape as she runs from the room!
The cadet races through the eastern door!
"Where do you think you're going?" Mallura demands as she wheels around and focuses her mind on freezing the cadet in their tracks. Her antennae stick out straight at the cadet and a faint glow emanates from their tips.
JD takes a step back into the room to line up a shot on the fleeing cadet.
"Pull him back in here."
Jarix goes to see what the cadet was working on.
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Jarix doesn't need to do much to call the screen of the computer back online after ending the cadet. Reading in Azlanti, the operative determines that this cadet was most recently completing counter-insurgency lockdown measures to seal the front door of the barracks from any further attacks. A camera feed focused on the path leading up to the main entrance of the compound shows just the right amount of chaos with the remains of Sweetums embedded in the outer door and burning merrily.
Mal steps up next to Jarix after giving JD a little salute for his excellent shooting. "Well, soldier boy? Can we open up this tin can a little more, or the systems not wanting to cooperate? Maybe I can help a little."
Shoving her way in front of the terminal, Mal begins search-and-pecking on the keys to try to quiet the alarms and disable the security measures.
JD reaches down to grab the cadet and drag the body back into the room as Jarix suggested. and struggles due to his exhaustion. He looks down at the face of the cadet he finished off and looks away, leaving the body.
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Jarix looks from the screen to Mallura. To the screen again then back to Mallura. "Laser fight must have busted it." He goes to guard the door until they're ready to continue on.