"Yeah, actually," the tech replies. "We had a scout turn rogue on us or something, went and blasted up a rescue convoy." The tech still (moderately) hard at work adds, "Yeah, but it was an all-units broadcast. How come you - oh."
The two techs look at each other, then to Mandall, in his scraped and battered Snowtrooper armor, and finally raise their hands. "Look, just set it to stun before you blast us, all right?"
---
The sights, sounds, and smells of Naga's "pleasure farm" assault the senses of each Vandal who enters. Nestled in the meaty superstructure of the Hutt's spire some distance above the great glittering drydocks, the various goings-on are roughly divided into gambling, intoxication, and sex, with further distinctions between levels of kink and bankroll for all three.
Calsera's almost immediately propositioned by both genders. Ty's somehow disappeared into the hive of gambling machines - he's brought some short-range surveillance equipment but it would take quite a feat for him to place the bugs without being spotted. Especially with the nubile Zeltron that's taken a shine to the Nubian pilot. She's not even "on duty" - the Zeltron appears to be a rather intoxicated patron, and starts laying it on thick for Tynam.
Ganet's at home among people. He moves through the pleasure farm with practiced deft and savior-faire. MDK, however, doesn't find too much to catch his attention except for the gambling and the drinking. Well, 2 out of 3 ain't bad.
As you do your thing, you can always catch one of Naga's more personable thugs out of the corner of your eye. Mostly Human or Rodian, with tasteful hand blasters concealed within crisp tunics. The electronic surveillance is overwhelming, though. Ty's little hand scanner picks up a morass of holo-cams secreted throughout the den of iniquity. There's a chance the private rooms might have less... complicated countermeasures. Alternately, there's enough people in here that one might be able to slip away into the rest of the spire. Finally, there's always conversation, bribes, and intimidation - not to mention the actual products and services being sold on the dance floor.
"Sure, just don't kill us. Today's codes are 45-K48, the engineering password is 'dewback'."
---
Calsera gets down to business, hunting for a patron that could provide a mutually beneficial arrangement. It doesn't take long. Cat hooks up with a pasty but handsome man in the gambling pits. Several cheesy lines about the various parties' potential for increased fortune are exchanged, and Calsera learns that her new plaything, Vorik Mazof, is a shipping overseer. He pursues contacts with mercenary-minded freighter captains, runs acquisitions on private dockyards throughout the local sector, and whatnot. Deciding her target's a good choice after all, Cat leaves with Vorik in tow. She gets the names and locations of a number of Hutt smuggling fronts operating out of nearby systems. Furthermore, this recent scuffle with the Empire is driving a rift between Booda, Naga's Zabrak advisor, and the slug himself. Booda's hardcore pro-Imperial, and with Naga prone to overreaction, well, their relationship is being tested right now.
A combination of charm and hefty tips gets Ganet the undivided attention of a young serving girl. Pleasure farms being what they are, it's no surprise that attractive women are here doing droids' work.
"Puttin' honest droids outta work is what they're doin'", mumbles MDK to himself as a cute thing wiggles past with a drink tray.
As Ganet passes the time, sloooowly nursing his drink, he chats up his mark, even convincing her to stay and toss one back with him before doing the rounds again. Lyr's her name, and she's trying to line up something else soon, because Roga, Naga's younger brother, is in the pleasure farm all the damn time and he takes too many... liberties... with, well, everything. He's a spice-headed freak and the only reason he's alive is because he's Naga's blood.
Meanwhile, Ty's run out of money. That's OK, though, because the Zeltron who's taken a shine to the Nubian is pretty obviously loaded - she's looking for a diversion while her sugardaddy is in town for Naga's meeting. Apparently he's called the local crimelords together for "something about the Imperials, I wasn't listening past that part, and hey, take this and get us some more drinks, would you?"
Roga the Hutt actually makes an entrance, just as Lyr predicted. Furthermore, the Hutt tells his bodyguards to shove off, he's looking for tail and they're cramping his style. As luck would have it, one of them sits down opposite Murdock, who's been trying to drown his capacitors in the sauce for the past 90 minutes. A friendly bet is made, the holochess table starts up, and MDK loses.
Later, he would say that he lost on purpose because that hairy son of a bitch was being a jackass and he wanted to put him in his place.
MDK is an angry drunk by this point, and the Wookie's howls of anguish drown out everything happening in the pleasure farm. MDK drops the hairy beast's arms next to where he lies twitching on the ground.
Mandall sets the blaster to stun, then sends one of the techs to lalaland. With a grab into the armor's utility belt, he fishes out a small roll of Imperial-issue duct tape and throws it to the conscious tech.
Ty has set about for the evening to add as much has he can to both his information about the underworld and the squad's information about Naga's operations. Unfortunately, the first attempt he makes at information gathering is poorly made, and the mark winds up sticking with him like a Wookie with a life-debt. Despite his best attempt to beg off after discovering that the information the female knows is minimal at best, he is stuck, and his attempt to keep their interactions professional and in his character is foiled by the persistence of the woman's advances. He is left speechless and with no idea what's happening, something that he rarely experiences, as he is dragged around the gambling area, gradually eating through the money he had brought.
However, he does manage to get some information. Apparently, Naga is organizing some sort of gathering of the local underworld bigwigs, and Ty wonders if the meeting is being organized because of the squadron’s attempts to foster discontentment between Naga and his Imperials. It’s either that or the squad is getting caught up in something larger than they were anticipating. However, before Ty can continue, he hears the commotion of Murdock’s “incident”, and decides to make his exit. “If you’ll excuse me, ma’am, I think that’s my lord’s droid. I’d best be seeing to it before something untoward happens,” he gives the scene a glance, “Or it gets worse.” In the shock of the noise, he manages to slip away.
Calsera will share a couple drinks with Mr. Mazof before arranging a private room. Luckily for her, he's not actually bad-looking and seems possessed of at least a minimum of wit. Once they reach the room, she proceeds to engage in pleasurable activities, including just what a Cathar's tail is good for.
During all this time, Cat will maintain a charade of small talk meant to hopefully cover the tidbits of truly useful information she's attempting to extract from him. As they draw closer and closer to the pinnacle of the evening, the tidbits will get larger and more valuable...
The Imperial tech grimaces as he secures his unconscious comrade, then starts tapping away at his comms console. Mandall checks the tech's bonds and glances up to see
"Thank you. You guys keep your head down when you wake up, I have no idea what I'm gonna have to blow up."
Mandall stuns the second tech, ties him up, then gets to testing his access to the Imperial network. Priorities include base schematics, vehicle and crew manifests as well as access codes for hallways, hangars and the armory.
Ganet gently pumps the serving girl for information on the various interpersonal conflicts, playing the role of a sympathetic outsider. Things look like they might become more than that, until she's summoned to clean up some damn wookie's arms. That kind of kills the mood.
(we kinda need Dieter to post about his doing something horrible to someone over a holochess table before we can continue in the pleasure farm)
Mandall's got the base schematics on call, as well as access to all the low-security areas that anyone with Imperial insignia can enter. The city's spaceport is definitely open to him. The Imperial hangars, however, are of a different clearance level. Comm techs don't get to fly TIEs. The same goes for the heavy artillery. Mandall can grab any small hand weapons he needs, but the repeaters and detonators are off-limits with the access he's got.
The active commlinks for patrolling Imperial vehicles are his best find. He downloads the pertinent information to a nearby datapad. With the periodic radio checks, he should be able to avoid nearly all of the Imperial patrols - at least until his mischief is discovered. With luck, he'll be off Mygeeto by then.
Repeater fire pours down a plasteel hallway until the last stormtrooper doubles over, crying out in pain. Steps echo and close in until Mandall appears, his snowtrooper armor scorched, dented and missing its helmet. He walks with purpose, firing off short bursts down the hall at anything that twitches. As Mandall reaches the downed trooper, the man looks up to him, cocking the shattered lenses of his helmet up.
"Who...who are you?"
"Mandall Daygon," the Vandal supersoldier replies. "Rebel Commando."
Everything blows up.
Mandall shakes his head to clear the vision from his head, then memorizes the way towards the spaceport. As much as he'd like to whup some Imperial ass, he's got some serious debts to the Force for even getting this far, and he won't push try to push that...
"No, *urp* I was thinking something to the extent *hick* of more beer and hookers...and Sabaac....eh...forget the Sabaac. How 'bout *urp* something more like...THIS!"
Murdock grabs the wookiee's paw shoving it between the metal armrest of the hairball's chair and gives both a full-power yank from his hydraulic servos.
Ty sees Murdoch standing over the maimed wookiee. The big droid's looking rather pleased with himself. The wookiee's partner, apparently also one of Roga's (flashback: Roga is Naga's spice-addled out-of-control brother) bodyguards, shoves past Ty in the crowd. He's making a beeline right for Murdoch. Roga's not even paying attention. He's throwing piles of credits down at the sabaac tables in a futile attempt to impress a blue Twi'lek chica (why is it always blue?).
"ROOWWWOWRRR!" screams the wookiee. Ty and Murdoch both think for a second, but they don't recognize that word. Oh, it's not a word. Just the sound of a wookiee going berserk. The angry roar does serve to get Roga's attention, and he blathers out a faint warning to his minder not to cause trouble. His admonition is ignored as the hairy beast slams into MDK and they both crash into and over a row of holo-pazaak machines. A massive smelly paw backhands MDK with enough force to pulverize the bones of a meatbag species, but the droid doesn't even feel it.
---
Elsewhere, Mandall darts the last 2 meters to the hangar access shaft, narrowly avoiding the sweeping eyes of a patrol of stormtroopers. He cycles the iris and begins his climb up to the docking bays. So far, so good. Having the patrol routes on his datapad turned a deadly infiltration into a nerve-wracking cakewalk.
The real challenge would come when his boots hit tarmac outside the access shaft. Mandall didn't have launch codes, didn't have access codes for any of the vessels, didn't have clearance to launch, and in his dingy, battered armor he certainly didn't look like anyone who had the right to be in the spit-shined and obsessively clean hangar floor.
The good news: Mygeeto had the cream of the Imperial fleet. There were two TIE Advanced sitting on the deck, and three wings of Interceptors in their launch racks. Assault shuttles and Blastboats rounded out the remainder of the city's defense fleet.
"ROOWWWOWRRR!" screams the wookiee. Ty and Murdoch both think for a second, but they don't recognize that word. Oh, it's not a word. Just the sound of a wookiee going berserk. The angry roar does serve to get Roga's attention, and he blathers out a faint warning to his minder not to cause trouble. His admonition is ignored as the hairy beast slams into MDK and they both crash into and over a row of holo-pazaak machines. A massive smelly paw backhands MDK with enough force to pulverize the bones of a meatbag species, but the droid doesn't even feel it.
The furball's attack not having it's desired effect, Murdoch's iris turns from a perturbed maroon to bright red...interestingly, that's the same color his wrist blasters produce.
*brrr-weee*
(Grabs a huge clump of wookiee head hair with one hand and shoots him in the face with the free blaster-hand)
Ty thinks fast, which he excels at. Droid won't stop until the other combatant isn't a threat, so you gotta get the wookie outta' the picture. Kill the Wookie, Hutt kills you. Wookies are stun resistant, but luckily droids just don't stun.
Following his logic to its conclusion, Ty pushes to the edge of the crowd and pulls his blaster, checks that the target area is relatively clear of noncombatants, then sets it to heavy stun. With the barest hint of a grin, he opens up, pouring five or ten blue stun bolts into the fight from the wings. Though his aim isn't terribly good, he does manage to not hit anyone behind him, nor make it look like this is the first time he's handled a weapon, which it very nearly is, other than training and practices he's put in over the years. Hopefully, enough will hit the Wookie to put him out, and those that don't shouldn't be a huge problem to Murdock. Overall, it's only been ten or twenty seconds since the fight started, but it's not going to last much longer.
OOC: Sorry to pull the wind out of your sails, Dieter. Murdock just needs to stop before somebody (the Wookie) gets killed, and we all die. Have some fun, you've got ten seconds before Ty's ending it. The question is, how bad is a d6's aim? Oh, and Mandall, I recommend an Advanced or a Blastboat, whichever you want, then burn the hanger on your way out and head to some unaligned world. In fact, if you can, steal an Advanced and slave a Blastboat to it. Sell the Advanced and the Blastboat and use the cash to get back to the New Republic.
Gah...frakkin' Interceptors, why can't I run into these beauties when I don't need a hyperdrive? Blastboat's too slow, so I guess I'm stuck with the Advanced again. Now I just need to jump a pilot for his suit and codes.
Mandall ponders blowing up the rest of the hangar with a few detpacks - on one hand, he just about knows how to arm these things, so it's not like he can prepare a precision strike, on the other hand, he's going to get noticed anyway when he leaves - might as well make sure they don't come after him in those frakkin' Interceptors, because that'd probably be deadly.
All was well until Ganet noticed exactly who was mutilating the Wookie. He sees Roga, the other bodyguard, and the wookie, and puts it all together.
Hmmn, this could be interesting...
Ganet immediately begins figuring out how to neutralize the two without killing either one. Given that he is a meatbag, it's somewhat more difficult, but hitting them both with about 50,000 volts from a nearby power conduit might do the trick.
Ganet slinks quickly back through the onlookers, Ty clears his blaster from its holster, and MDK struggles with the remaining Wookiee minder, trying to wedge his blaster array under the beast's chin. There's two blaster shots and the Wookiee shudders. He's too enraged to lie down at Ty's gentle prompting, however. Instead, he wraps his massive paws completely around Murdoch's head and twists, trying to pop the droid's top like a beer bottle. MDK feels his neck actuators give just a bit, but that's nothing compared to what happens next.
The pleasure farm lights go dark for a moment as Ganet frees the power cables from their wall housing. The struggle's illuminated in that span by the ruby glare of wrist blasters. With his vision obscured, Murdoch blasts a swath of burning craters into the ceiling. A chandelier falls with a crash onto a group of opulent Gungans. Then Ganet jabs the spitting cables into the melee. There's a sharp BANG!, a geyser of smoke, and when the emergency lights come back on MDK and his Wookiee opponent are lying several feet apart, moving slowly, trying to remember where they are.
"WHOSE DROID IS THAT?!" screams Roga, having finally taken notice of the incident. His bulk, stench, and reputation easily clear a path through the crowd.
It's been a while since Mandall had any hand-to-hand experience, but the TIE pilot getting out of his fighter moves with the slouch that comes from too long a shift. Mandall waits for him between the power droid receptacles and the turbolifts for the barracks. The poor Imperial doesn't see Mandall coming until it's too late, then it's a few nail-biting seconds that leaves every muscle in Mandall's body drained but leaves the TIE jockey very, very unconscious.
TIE pilot Mandall reports for sabotage and escape duty moments later and heads into the pristine Imperial corridors looking for comms and power grids to detonate.
In slightly less time than it took to bring the hammer down on the unsuspecting TIE pilot, Mandall's sprinting headlong back into the hangar bay. Red alert lights spin around him, while the warning klaxons of an intruder alert play their harsh song. Without access to comms or AA control, Mandall decides to at least blow the hangar up real good. He blasts the door controls, hoping it'll buy him enough time to wire the hangar bay.
Almost immediately, cutting sparks begin to spit from the hangar doors. The pressure of impending death by snowtrooper seems to help Mandall's composure immensely. He might not be a demolitions expert, but he knows starfighters front to back and he knows exactly where to plant his charges. Mandall finishes his demo work and rushes for the TIE Advanced just as the hangar doors disintegrate and Imperial stormtroopers breach the hangar. The first blasts are fired too quickly and bounce off the TIE's hull around Mandall. He opts for leaving rather than fighting, slipping halfway into the cockpit as more blaster bolts shower towards him. Once more, the difference in accuracy between stormtroopers and TIE pilots is made apparent. Mandall spins up the ion engines and pulls the safeties as every single stormtrooper manages to miss.
Mandall sets the engines to full burn and blast his fighter free of the impending explosion behind him.
As soon as he can think clearly, Mandall will head for the nearest civilian ship heading for orbit and stick close to it - that oughta make the Imps think twice about trying to engage him with AA batteries. As soon as he clears atmo, it's jump time, no fancy moves, no bragging, just GET THE FRAK OUT.
Admiral Duck Sauce
