"Stop it Chase! It cannot give information on us!"
Ben, rather unkindly, shoots one of the androids in the back as it flees.
At Katherine's shout, Penny makes a sound, an annoyed growl kind of sound, as the witnesses start to get away. The blonde quartermaster runs to the far wall, slightly surprised that there is one left "You are one brave little soul..." she admits before slamming her mind into it.
Not expecting the android to flee, Chase swings wildly. But with the boost from Katherine, she rushes off in pursuit. "Get back here!" she shouts, rushing down the hall and delivering a hammerblow to the wounded android!
Katherine pokes again and Chase fills a rush of adrenaline flood her system. Ben fires at the single remaining android, burning a hole in his shoulder.
Round 2
Penny turns her mind-crushing attention on the visible android and it goes down like a puppet with its strings cut. Chase races after the fleeing pair into the factory space and cuts one down with a heavy blow. Boots follows after as well and takes a finishing shot at the single escaping security guard.
Combat Ends!
Silence descends again, disturbed only by the hum of the climate control system and the slight buzzing of one of the anacite cleaning bots humming along the factory floor.
Sheet metal floors and gleaming white walls frame a massive space packed with equipment; tables are littered with technological parts and arcane components. To the east, a large assembly area includes scaffolding and frames that surround an empty space. Vid boards line the walls, filled with scribbled notations.
"So they built it here..." Ben says, scanning quickly. "Right, we need this information as quick as we can. Dispose of the bodies and then find out where this ship is!"
He is remarkably unruffled, keeping cool has never been a problem, but then again his parents both had ice water rather than blood in their veins so that should be no surprise.
Body disposal is far beneath Katherine's skill set, and would be much better assigned to grunts such as Boots or Kez or maybe even Chase. So she ignores that particular request and heads to the vid boards to start collating information.
Penny collects the guns off the corpses, which is her contribution of disposing of the bodies "Numbing guns..." she says with disdain.
Chase hefts the fallen androids one at a time, looking for a good spot to stash them where they won't be discovered quickly.
Penny finds an industrial trash bin for Chase to dump the bodies in.
Penny, Chase, and Kez work quickly to dispose of the 'evidence' of the conflict while Ben removes their appearance so far from the security logs.
Katherine takes a moment to look over the notes on the vid walls. She's not quite able to determine what it means until Penny pauses a moment to point out that some of the symbols are mystical in nature rather than technical. With that hurdle overcome, she's able to tell that this area was used to construct multiple large lybrid null-space devices. The work looks to have been completed.
There are a couple of computer terminals here as well.
In their clean-up efforts, Chase and Kez discover valuables in crates around the area that could be 'repurposed' as well as four fist-sized cubes of raw inubrix . They also find a serum of enhancement .
"Maybe cargo haulers was never what our crew was meant to be doing." Penny says looking at all the crates. "No ship though, so no way out yet. Tech people, shoudl you be looking at the computers?"
"Ben..." Penny waves her hand in front of the captain's face, noticing him looking around in wonder that Something Horrible had not exploded in their faces in the last few moments. With the luck that they have been having she understood. Completely. "Should you and Katherine see if there is any data on these terminals that we could steal and sell?"
"I could take Chase and Kaz to the doors over there to see if there are any alarms or triggers before opening them. And Boots... maybe you can send boots to the front door where the alarms started to defend it to her death, just in case." she sweetly suggests to the most amazing captain ever. The gleam in her blue eyes is quite devilish in hope.
"Selling it might be a risk." Ben replies, "But no harm in looking at least." The suggestion regarding Boots provokes a sternly raised eyebrow. "Now now Penny, no trying to get the crew killed. Even if it does let you calculate all your manifests with a nice round number."
With that he sets to work on the terminal, hoping to find out where the damn Oliphant actually is.
As her stunningly amazing plan is rejected, Penny gives a cute but obviously fake pout, then going with the two jocks to check on the door.
As Boots starts to walk back to the entrance and Penny, Chase, and Kez move towards the unopened, large double doors, the mystic sees a shimmer of movement out of the corner of her eye. As she turns towards a large table manned by robotic assembly arms, a shape sheds it's camaflage distortion and fires an ray at her. The smell of burning plastic and flesh hits her just a moment before the pain.
It's a anacite of a type that you haven't seen yet on the station. Large and mantis-like in shape, with two delicate-looking wings, six long legs, and a distinctive
triangular head.
"You are trespassing in a restricted location and have assaulted a legitimate security detail. Surrender your weapons and put your grasping appendages behind your head," it demands in a monotone voice.
Combat Begins!
Round 1
”I’ll grasp your appendage!” Chase shouts defiantly, moving up to punch the anacite!
Penny yelps at getting electrocuted. As she grimaces, panting in pain, she hisses "I don't think they have that kind of appendage, Chase"
Kez indicates that she has no plans to surrender via the expedience of sending a round from her tactical pistol towards the anacite. It only clips the carapace, but shards of plasteel scatter across the floor. Boots follows up by shoving one of the monitors crashing to the floor as a distraction before sinking a slug into one of the creatures joints. Chase takes the more direct route of stepping up and punching the construct.
There's a high-pitched buzzing and two of the small circular cleaning anacites come rushing out from behind workbenches. There's a series of electrical pops as small polishing lasers are put to combat use. Both Chase and Boots feel the burn of weaponized light.
Penny was going to run behind some cover. Getting shot is stupid, she tells herself quite intelligently. But there are vacuum bots suddenly in the place she was going to very wisely Hide. "Behind You!" she yells to Ben and Katherine, pulling her pistol and shooting rather poorly at one of them.
Katherine swings around at Penny's warning, her rifle in hand and fires, a small modified dart quickly whizzing out of the barrel.
Ben aims for the largest construct, fires off a snap shot to distract it, and then goes for the torso.
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Polli's shot careens off one of the many robotic arms in the area while Katherine's needle shot disables a computer display that was no doubt about to attack at any moment. Ignoring the potential blitzkrieg from the surrounding computer monitors, Ben targets the construct and damages one of the scythe-like limbs.
The construct takes umbrage at Chase's refusal to surrender and slashes at her with one of its bladed limbs. She manages to easily avoid the clumsy attempt, though.
Round 2
Chase accepts the sting of the laser blast as she calibrates her Fistigons against the large anacite. "Try this on for size!" she shouts.
Neither Kez nor Boots manages to hit the large construct. The cleaning bots, however, exhibit marksmen-like abilities as they hit both Boots and Chase again.
This time Ben manages to neither fool the creature, or hit it.
Penny keeps squeezing the trigger at the robot. Bam Bam Bam with nothing even close to a hit. "STAY STILL!" she yells in frustration, even though it has barely moved.
Katherine's face screws up in frustration as if she is merely dealing with a set of live cultures that are not providing her with the results she wants.
Penny glances a round off the large constructs carapace, but doesn't do much more than chip the paint. Having dealt with the threat of computer paripherals, Katherine hits one of the cleaning bots with some sort of compound that causes it to slow slightly. Ben's shot goes wide.
The large anacite takes a half-step back as if to flee. But as Chase advances to follow up, it slashes forward with one of its sharpened limbs, opening up her belly.
Round 3
Kez and Boots each take shots at the construct, but only Kez's hits.
Chase falls to the floor, though her force of will is strong enough to allow her to stabilize.
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With the utter gushing of Chase all over the deck, Penny makes a sound of pure annoyance and rushes over to the leaking mechanic. Unfortunately she slips a bit in the blood, coming down on her rump with a whoop from her mouth. Crawling over the rest of the way, getting rather mess with all sorts of Chase, she reaches out and touches her "Please stop making such a mess."
Since Penny seems to have the situation with Chase well in hand Ben tries to stop the creature once more.
Chase stabilizes and the two cleaning bots take a shot at Boots and Ben, but both miss. Penny heals the mechanic in the midst of her grumbling. With a well-aimed shot from Ben, sparks fly from the large construct and it jerks to the side, slumping into inactivity.
With their controller out of commision, the two cleaning acacites stow their weapons and return to their default activities; The ongoing war against dust and dirt.
Combat Ends!
"Well that could have gone better." The Captain says with a frown, double checking the logs to make sure there are no new alerts to their presence.
"We need to get going to the ship. Now."
"Sure thing, boss," Chase says wearily. "Just...give us a few minutes first, yeah? That cyborg got me good." She takes several deep breaths as she rests and recovers her stamina. Fortunately, Penny's healing patched up most of her severe injuries, though there's still a scar across her belly.
Eventually, she hauls herself to her feet. "Right, let's rock n' roll!"
While Penny does a last check over Chase's injuries and attempts to clean the blood off her jumpsuit, Katherine spends a few more minutes interrogating one of the data terminals nearby. With a little effort she manages to pull up plans for the Oliphaunt as well as detailed schematics for the hybrid null-space cargo holds installed in her. Once that's completed, the team approaches the large doors leading to the attached docking bay.
With the team's luck so far, most of you are half expecting the docking bay to be empty. Perhaps your luck is taking a turn for the better, though, as sitting elegantly in the middle of the large space is what you assume to be the ship you seek.
It looks to be a Evgeniya-Jaimisson Sledgehammer, but you've never seen one in such pristine condition. The lowered entrance ramp leads up to the airlock on the starboard side and the door opens easily at a single touch on the access panel. As you reach in for the touch panel for the lights, it's a bit of a suprise when the lights come on automcatically with a slow and soft fade in. Unlike the harsh flourescent lighting of the BD514, the lighting here feels low-key and natural. Every surface is clean and untouched with no scuffs or stains. You can already see the quality of the build in how things are put together with precision and care. Protective paper covers the floor as you make your way to the bridge.
At your entrance, the bridge controls begin coming to life. Displays fade in and the lighting level slowly rises. Set off to the side is a large self-cooled bucket with two bottles of expensive champagne and a row of glasses.
"Welcome aboard the Oliphaunt. Designation and role, please?" a soothing and almost sultry female voice speaks up.
The BD514 was already pre-programmed for your usage. This ship, however, seems to be a blank slate. And its first order of business is to assign its roster of officers.
"HOLE-EEEE-SHiiiT! FANCY!" Boots exclaims, clapping her hands and dashing off for the champagne bottle. Grabbing a hold of it, she pops the top and takes a swig from it before saying "Boots, your pilot baby. Let's get ta work!"
Champange bottle in hand, she hops into a seat near the controls. She sticks the bottle between her legs and starts rapidly pressing buttons.
"Welcome aboard, Boots," the ship's voice replies. "My designation is Carolyn-5. Feel free to acclimate yourself to my guidance controls. I am currently utilizing the Madoff-Bringam 7.0 human layout for navigation and piloting. Feel free to request a different topology if there's one you'd prefer. The engines are initiating their preflight warm-up sequence. If you're going to partake of alcoholic beverages, I would recommend letting me handle the controls. We can launch as soon as the others have registered with their designations and roles."
Penny looks at the spewing Champagne all over the clean floor "The ship is immaculate, Talah. Please lets keep it as such for more than two minutes."
To the ship she says "Penny Etal, Quartermaster and Magical Support."
"Welcome aboard, Quartermaster Etal," Carolyn-5 replies. "Having skill in the arcane arts, you will no doubt be happy to know that the port-side expansion bay has been allocated as an arcane laboratory. I also appreciate your efforts to keep the bridge clean."
Katherine looks at Boots with disdain as she starts her usual antics and takes a cautious step away.
"Dr. Katherine Hamilton, Chief Scientist and biochemist. Please direct me to your scientific laboratory equipment."
"Benedict Daxos, Captain." Ben adds in turn. "You are quite a remarkable ship Carolyn. Please display all your tactical functions at the captains chair."
Chase snatches the second bottle of champagne, pops it, then clanks it against Boots's bottle before taking a big swig. "Chase Reisora, Egnineer Extraordinaire! Glad to finally be all up and in this beautiful b!$%+. Now, fire up the engines and let's make star dust!"
"Welcome aboard, Doctor Hamilton. Unfortunately this ship is not equipped with such facilities. One expansion bay has been allocated as a arcane laboratory and the other as a technology workshop. With the proper resources and an appropriate retrofit facility, the workshop expansion could be replaced with something more suited to your proclivities. Would you like me to find the nearest suitable candidate?"
"Welcome aboard, Captain Daxos and Engineer Reisora. Captain Daxos, I am happy to give a tactical display at the Captain's Station for your perusal. Engineer Reisora, as I've explained to Pilot Boots, the primary engines have almost completed their power-up diagnostic sequence and shall be available momentarily. And while we appreciate being referred to as 'beautiful', we would prefer to avoid the negatively connotated moniker of 'b$#+*'."
Just a few minutes after Kez's introduction, Carolyn-5 announces the ship ready for travel. With a smoothness no doubt aided by the AI who still expresses concern over Boots piloting while consuming champagne, the Oliphaunt slips free from the docking bay and into orbit around Aballon.
Now it's just the simple question of destination. You still have the forwarded coordinates for where you're intended to turn over the ship to Sinjin's agents. If you determine that's not in the cards for you, then the next probable location would be Absalom Station to contact Tarika.
Boots leans in to whisper to her controls, "Hey Carolyn. The correct way to address Doctor Hamilton is Katie."
When the ship takes off despite her controlling it, she puts down her glass and demands "Whoa, WHOA! Gimme control, Carols, I got this. Ain't gonna be lettin' your maiden flight go down like this, are we?"
With trepidation, she asks without looking over her shoulder, "So uh Cap, where to?"
"What do we all think?" Ben asks, looking up from his tactical read-out. "Sinjin has promised us a significant pay-out, although I'm almost certain he will attempt to renege on it. Shall we stick our head in the jaws of the trap? If we're going to Absalom Station to get Tarika then we'd have to go very quickly."
"Sinjin should kiss the nether region of a bloated slime-covered orc." Penny gives her opinion as she leans over Ben's shoulder to look at the tactical display, especially at the cargo hold. "How much do you think she can hold? Hmmm, I should ask her. Caroline, dear, how much cargo space do you have?"
One of the displays lights up near Penny with a floorplan of the ship displayed upon it. The image zooms in to focus on the rear of the ship.
"With the experimental null-space cargo holds, the Oliphaunt has a capacity of 100 tons of carried goods," Carolyn-5 declares with something sounding suspiciously like pride in her voice.
A look of horror mixed with confusion floods Katherine's face as she realizes there is nowhere for her to work in peace. "There's an arcane laboratory but no science laboratory. We need to sort out its priorities."
She walks up behind the Captain, with nowhere else to go, and looks over his shoulder at the display he is examining.
"It would be very reckless to return to Sinjin without any plan, but why would we go to the effort of stealing this ship if we were not to receive monetary rewards for it? That was why we accepted to do it originally was it not?"