1.2 - A Bo-Right Good Time (Closed)

[Emmettmcglynn]

"That's it?" Mahan asks, half suprised and half annoyed. "You want a total lockdown and us to go over their belongings because a Sindalian station might be advanced? You made it sound as if you had damning evidence. We both saw the scratched message, the jamming could be an automated program tuned to the strength of our signal for all we know."

Shaking his head, he resheathes his blade and returns his revolver to his holster with a sign, then covers them both with his longcoat. "I'll talk to them, see if I can't get them to give something away. Keep an eye while I do that, but we're not declaring a lockdown and tearing through their goods unless we have a reason. Keep me appraised"

With that, he steps from the bridge and heads down the hallway to the staterooms, forming a plan as he walks. He'll start with the four from Borite, ply them with wine and friendly talk ostensibly to calm their nerves, and in doing so try to subtly bring up the jamming to get a reaction. Even if they didn't, he could at least try to get a general picture of the situation on Borite, as even if they'd been gone for a while they would still know much about life on the planet. Indeed, it seemed like the quest to restore Drinax might be best started here on Borite, who had a problem that needed solving and a weak industrial-economic base desperately in need of outside intervention. That was getting ahead of himself, of course, but he could dream a little while he walked. Raising his hand as his reached their door, he wrapped his knuckles on it a few times and spoke up.

"Hello, this is the Captain. Mind if we speak for a little bit?"

[DJ P4NTSL3SS]

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Urien, Mahan
Docked with the High Watch station
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

The ship is silent as Mahan steps from the bridge. You don't realize just how quiet a ship can be, absent so many of its crew.

Mahan steps out from the bridge and the door automatically comes shut behind him. Urien is left wholly alone on the bridge, with just the hum and buzz of the communications system to keep him company. The quiet lets you both listen to the way the almost imperceptibly warped paneling of the valve catches on its housing ring as it opens and closes.

Mahan's footfalls echo up and down the passageways.

Having docked using the first-deck airlock, as Mahan comes to stand by the entrance of the second-deck airlock, just outside the bridge, if he is of a mind to do so, then he can peer out through a small window and see a view from one of the few "real" - transparent metal - windows on the entire ship. Staring over the 'top' of the station, out towards Borite. The rotation has the planet slowly coming onto the daylight side of the planet, with yellow-white sunlight coming through in rays through the extended communications array of the station.

A wall panel pops. An air pump has kicked on. The sudden pressure shift makes the metal pieces jostle in place.

Coming down the passageway to the right, Mahan walks past your crew staterooms, to include his own. The doors don't automatically open like some of the other passages of the ship, at least not by default security settings. Were any of the crew of a mind to change that, it would be a simple matter of asking it of the ship's intellect. But the passengers - as either Urien or Mahan would know from having checked the security cameras prior to Mahan stepping from the bridge - have not left their quarters since ordered.

When opening the door, the control panel on the inside of the room gives a tone designed to let the room's inhabitants have the courtesy of knowing they are about to have a guest. All four seem to rouse and focus on the door. The two lounging on the top bunk swing their legs over the edge and turn whole-body to watch the door. The older man of the quartet comes to his feet and squares his shoulder. The woman over by the room's small dining table was in the midst of reading, and she gives the book a one-handed toss to see it slide out of view into the refresher.

When the door opens to reveal the by-now familiar sight of the ship's captain - and not a towering furs-clad slaver - the four of them visibly relax and exchange a look between the lot of them. The oldest of the four, a large fellow with a thick gray beard and a face raw and wrinkled from harsh winds and time, looks to the woman at the table and makes a motion. She quickly snatches up the wrappers and left-overs of what they had been eating, and sets the cups and plates to the side to clear the table. The man motions for Mahan to take the newly vacated seat as he takes the other, "Of course, Captain. How can we help?" He glances over Mahan's shoulder at the other three, giving them another look. The two younger men hop from the top bunk. One opts to lean against it all the same, arms crossed, and the other moves to the room's desk in the nearby corner, "Is something the matter?" The older man asks.

[Emmettmcglynn]

"Nothing the matter. The away team is pushing through the station towards the source of the beacon now. I just wanted to talk with the four of you for a little bit." Mahan says, taking the offered seat and folding his legs nonchalantly, as if unaware of the awkard tension in the room. "Specifically, about your planets raider problem."

"Tobacco, anyone? Or some wine from the gallery, if you'd like." He asks, taking his pipe out of his pocket before swapping back to the previous topic. "Anyway, I was hoping you could maybe tell me a bit about your home and its regular visitors from Oghma. As you may have noticed, our ship is not exactly a conventional courier. As it happens, we on the Intent specialize in the sadly uncommon profession of pirate hunting, and your home seems a good place to work for such a thing."

Edited August 26, 2023 by Emmettmcglynn (see edit history)

[DJ P4NTSL3SS]

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Urien, Mahan
Docked with the High Watch station, aboard the Reclaimer's Intent
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

The four Borite natives are silent as Mahan introduces himself and takes his seat. When offered a seat, the older man gives a small smile and a shake of his head. Instead he fishes into his coat and draws out a battered tin-bodied lighter and a wrinkled paper pack of unfiltered cigarettes. While he refuses the pipe, he does take it as an invitation to smoke, and goes to light up. Though after a few strikes get him nothing but sparks, he grunts in frustration and sets both cigarette and lighter down on the table.

"Station? I wasn't aware we were docking with any station." He looks to the other three, and then back to Mahan, "Borite doesn't have a station, Captain. Is this station where the distress signal was coming from, then, Captain?"

As the topic then shifts to raiders, the old man's expression sours, "Ah. The Oghman. Yes. They are why I - we," he gestures to the others with one hand. "left. A troubling thing, they are. They take what they can. Scholars. Technology. Food. And then they run to the stars on their ships, often before we can even take a full count of what, and hwo, they've taken. They trouble more than just us, of course, but we aren't as able to defend ourselves as those few offworlders like you that we see each year."

To take in the four physically, they seem guarded. Somewhat stand-offish. This has been a trend they've shown not just to the crew, but to all of the other passengers who they have interacted with in the confined spaces of the Reclaimer's Intent. They seem to have generally timed when they take their meals to either be shared between the four of them in this stateroom, or when the galley to the deck's rear was largely empty save for crew who might be getting themselves something to eat.

The oldest-looking of them - the man speaking with Mahan now, Earodd Coxand - is a bald-headed gray-beard with a reddened and wind-whipped face. He wears a pair of nicely kept dress shoes, slacks, suspenders, and a white button-down shirt. In a clash with this, he also wears a light cloth bomber jacket with a few patches on the shoulders. That jacket doesn't seem to fit the rest of his ensemble but other than sitting here in this stateroom, he has almost never been seen not wearing it or at least having it folded over his arm.

The young woman - Aman Coxand-Robarn - is dressed similarly, save for substituting the bomber jacket with a simple leather windbreaker. And while they have not kept it a secret if asked directly on the matter, if the last name didn't give it away then perhaps the faint remnants of red in Earodd's beard matching Aman's brilliant ginger hair would give away that she is the man's daughter. She sits quietly on the bottom of the two beds now, watching Mahan with intent interest as the two men speak.

The two younger men are Chrone Robarn and Selly Jenker.

Chrone is the youngest of the whole quartet, looking as if he barely shaves more than four times a month, and with a sloppy mop of blonde hair atop his head. He wears heavy workman's boots, stained overalls, and the tank-top he wears leaves thickly muscled arms covered in a wide variety of ink visible for anybody who cares to look. Though it took him several days into the jump before he stopped wearing long sleeves when stepping out from the stateroom that he and Selly share. He seems just as interested in watching Mahan as his wife.

Finally, Selly, leans against the desk in the corner. He's dressed in simple, pressed khaki trousers, and a pair of well-polished leather boots, a simple olive-drab t-shirt, and a plain black tunic that he seldom wears, adorned in similar patches to those of Earodd's coat. He has shortly cropped black hair and a 'beard' of shadow - and a thicker mustache that he occasionally strokes at in idle boredom while he watches Mahan and Earodd talk. He narrows his eyes at the mention of a station, seemingly as confused as the older man or his peers.

 

---

 

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Rhane, Eirene, Kesperziaiepr
Searching the High Watch station, Section 8
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

Heading from section 5 into section 7, you see what looks like a command and control center of some kind. Two of the walls are lined with terminals and consoles that sit dark - long since without any power or command. Chairs knocked aside or otherwise jostled and shifted away from their stations. Papers are crunched under boot as the three of you move with as much quickness as mag-boot running would allow you. This place is in just as much disrepair as the rest of the station.

And when you move further into section 8, you are met with quite a few. This area has some of the few windows you've seen on the station and you can see that the emergency shutters are closed over them. This is likely why you weren't able to simply look into the comms area with visual sensors from where the Reclaimer's Intent is now docked. Your headlamps cut through the darkness across those heavy crystaliron window guards as you advance between banks of communications equipment, having to be mindful to step over thick bands of cabling and wiring that is laid out over the floor as you advance to the source of the signal.

The door to the second half of section 8 sits open. Unguarded.

And the static begins to grow louder.

Stepping in to what is clearly the main room for sensors and communications, you are surrounded by high-tech but long discarded technology. A main terminal sits at the far side of the room, with secondary stations swept out to either side of it to form a large U-shaped working space. Panels pulled from walls, wiring reworked over the years. The place looks like it was in disrepair and ad-hoc long before this station was ever abandoned to the rigors of time and vacuum.

And the static in your ears grows louder.

Edited August 27, 2023 by DJ P4NTSL3SS (see edit history)

[Dastardly Tristar]

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Urien, Mahan
Docked with the High Watch station, aboard the Reclaimer's Intent
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

Urien's monitors were spit between the video transmission from the Away Team, the interior of the Reclaimer's Intent, and Mahan's interrogation of the Borites. Dividing all of his attention between the three screens slowly accumulated tension in his jaw, clenching it tighter. His breathing slowed to combat the sharp pangs that assaulted his temple. He took a sip of a hydration packet that he had retrieved from underneath the console, one of the many stashes of repacked liquids around the ship, squirreled away just for these sort of occasions. He had gone through several rolls of duct tape to achieve his squirreling habits, but convenience was always worth a few credits and preparation.

As the Away Team navigated their way through the station, he listened to the interrogation, and spotted a few interesting items. He tapped into his earpiece and connected to Mahan's piece. "That man, registry has him as Earodd. BCA Captain - Borite Continuation Authority. Basically part of the Drinax bureaucracy, so he definitely knows something we do not about Borite. "

Glancing at Selly, he cautions Mahan. "The one by the desk - I would be careful. Part of the Borite SDF, Lieutenant. Might respond better to author-"

His words were interrupted by a request on his terminal. Urien froze, and checked where it came from. "Oh . . . **** me."

He checked his energy pistol, tucked in its gauntlet. Full charge. Good.

"Mahan, stay in the room. We have a guest. I will deal with it, but if I do not return in 5 minutes, initiate a lockdown and get this ship away from the station stat."

He got up from his seat and made a quick pitstop by his room to pick up his tool belt. As he passed by Astrid, sauntering back from her nap, he clicked his tongue at her, and she responded by waddling quickly into his room. The door slid shut.

Urien pulled out his pistol and paused before the airlock. Quickly entering into a spare Vacc Suit, he slipped a thick, gloved thumb through the pin on the grenade, and then opened the airlock, quickly drawing his pistol on whoever was knocking on the door.

"Three seconds to give me a reason not to kill everyone here and now." Urien threatened calmly.

[DJ P4NTSL3SS]

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Urien, Mahan
Docked with the High Watch station, aboard the Reclaimer's Intent
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

It takes several seconds for Urien to pump atmosphere from the ship-side airlock interchange. The whole while, if Urien keys his radio, he can listen to the same static that plagues the away team. Ear-splitting if he leaves the line open or doesn't turn down your output volume. Just like the away team, you are now deaf and mute, but at least you have the comfort of still being technically aboard your own ship.

Once that is done and the door comes open, its far less time to have the grenade already prepped. Having been floating in micro-gravity, the man on the other side of the airlock is clearly weak in the legs. He comes spilling in, sprawling onto the floor and desperately scrambling over the demarcation of the airlock doors between the station and the ship. He scrambles up to you, seeming to not even notice the gauntlet or grenade prepped for his arrival as he clings to Urien's leg.

He motions frantically, both to himself and then to the still-shut door behind him. At a glance you can see nothing. A shut door, a dark window.

He looks to Urien and there is clear panic in those gold eyes, seen through the visor of his Vargr-cut vacc-suit. He clings to the human desperately, like a drowning man finding a bouy while he drifts lost at see. Even with a gun leveled at his face, he smacks desperately and shakes the side of his head as if to mime that he can't hear.

[Sneaksby]

The entirety of the room got a good look down the barrel of Kesper's rifle before he was satisfied it was clear. He had already determined that threatening life-forms weren't present in this section, but there was such a thing as inorganic enemies: automated defenses, robots, gaudy Sindalian artwork.

He pointed repeatedly at the bank of computers and the crudely wired vacc suit comm equipment floating in zero gravity. The sign language to his more computer-literate comrades was clear, please please please turn these things off.

[Emmettmcglynn]

When the other man's lighter fails, Mahan removes his own from his breast pocket and lights up Coxand's cigarette before turning to his own pipe. As the older man speaks, he simply puffs away and takes in the information. When Urien interrupts with information that they're about to be boarded he has to hide his alarm with a particularly long drag on his pipe before breathing it back out. He wasn't sure he could trust the Solomani's judgement yet, but he said he could handle it and the sound of a fight would make clear the truth of the matter.

"As it happens," he says casually, "Borite does have a station. Not functioning, of course, but still intact and partially powered. A High Watch Station from the Sindalian Empire, to be precise, used as defensive bastions on worlds without armed Highports back in the day. With some help from outside it could probably be brought back online, though I get ahead of myself. You are correct that it is the source of the distress beacon, or rather that the source is onboard and the station is magifying it throughout the system. We've got an away team moving through now to the sophont onboard, though there seems to be some kind of jammer attempting to block our communications. I suspect a holdover automated system, but thankfully it's nothing that our bird can't pierce through."

He allows the lie to hang in the air, disguising the intentional pause by taking his pipe out and tamping down the tobacco ash before relighting it. Within the casual motion he lets his eyes drift around the room taking in their reactions to the reveal of jamming. He was no good at spotting a liar, and didn't even particularly suspect them, but there was always the chance of spotting something worthwhile.

[Dastardly Tristar]

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Urien, Mahan
Docked with the High Watch station, aboard the Reclaimer's Intent
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

Urien cursed the static in his radio - he had forgotten about it, in his haste to open the airlock. He recoiled back as the Vargr lurched onto him, but sensing the immediate danger behind the stranger, he pushed them behind him and tossed the grenade down the airlock. Of course, he wasn't stupid enough to pull the trick with an explosive grenade, but he had banked on the mere threat being enough for most people. Instead of an explosive barrage of shrapnel, the cylinder floated through the airlock, and thick black smoke billowed out and covered the entry. Slow down whoever was pursuing the Vargr, perhaps.

He didn't wait to see what was around the corner, and slammed the airlock shut. Pressure refilled the chambers, and then once he was sure they could finally speak, drew his gun on the Vargr, standing a safe distance away from him. "Let me redo this, shall I? Your name, if you will, and maybe why you were left on this godforsaken station."

He gestured towards the airlock, several inches of thick steel between them and whatever horrors lurked in the dark corridors. "And why is there a Charmax here?"

As he waited for an answer, he quietly pinged Mahan through the party communicator. "We have the mutt. You can interrogate this one while I try and reach away team. Time we boogey out of here, too."

[Kiro Haas]

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Rhane, Eirene, Kesperziaiepr
High Point station.
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

---

Rahne stays close to Kesper as they move through the station, a third of their tiny fire-team. She moves with caution, keeping her laser pistol trained before her whenever she moves, sweeping it back and forth to make sure that anything that leaps out of the shadows will taste laser beams before Darrian flesh. The quiet - especially thanks to the damn jamming - was keeping her nerves on edge. Her hearing was higher than those of humans and the other branches of Humaniti, such as Kesper, so being unable to hear anything at all except her own breathing and whatever vibrations managed to come through the soles of her heavy boots was particularly eerie.

When they reach Section 8, her gaze is drawn to the computer console - though she's dilligent enough to sweep the room alongside Kesper and Eirene. She simply nods to her squad leader and quickly moves towards the console after his frantic non-verbal commands. She grabs the floating vacc-suit communications suite, quickly examining the wiring bodge-job that connects it to the comms array, before examining the computer itself, trying to find the source of the jamming - if it was coming from inside the station in the first place - or if nothing else, a way to use the system to contact the Reclaimer's Intent.

[DJ P4NTSL3SS]

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Urien, Mahan
Docked with the High Watch station, aboard the Reclaimer's Intent
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

Earrod huffs a bit at that with a small puff of gunmetal smoke escaping from the corner of his mouth - having uttered a small 'thank you' and leaning over the table when Mahan produces and offers the use of a lighter. As Mahan goes on to describe the station, the fact that it seems to be where the sophontic source of the distress signal is located, and the jamming he gives another long drag on his cigarette while his brow furrows.

Chrone and Aman react similarly, with the young man and woman exchanging curious looks with one another. After all, in a world where the printing press is considered a lost and tightly guarded art? To find that you have a space station - let alone one old enough to be abandoned by its former creators after presumable years of use? - can be news to chew on. Chrone makes a slight motion as if to offer conjecture of his own, but Aman places a hand on his thigh and with a shake of her head he nods in agreement and returns to comparative silence.

Selly shifts from one foot to the other, watching Mahan intently.

Earrod picks up after the first few moments of silence, "Mm. Well, we aren't much where starfairing is concerned. Most of what we know and had was bought over years out of the belly of traders like yours." He takes a moment to look around, obviously reconsidering, "Well. Not quite like yours. Trading sorts. Big, fat things." He vaguely gestures with his hands, pantomiming the approximate sillouhette of a Type-A Free Trader (or, to be technical, more likely a Type-A2 Far Trader), "Torpol was the first any of us had seen of a station." He once more gestures with his hands as if gesturing to the diameter of the Highport, "Properly massive. Incredible. Amazing to think we might have one of our very own." He shakes his head, puffing on the cigarette with an idle, "Incredible."

Meanwhile, down in the first deck airlock...

The Vargr - heaved into the airlock and tumbling under the effect of the newly pressing gravity - tumbles ass-over-ears until he smacks into the airlock leading into the Reclaimer's Intent. The smoke grenade is sent tumbling in the beginning of a parabolic arc until it hits the demarkation where the gravity of the Intent ends and the micro-gravity of the station begins. AT that point it turns into a more-or-less straight line up towards the top of the other airlock. It belches out volumous clouds of thick, heavy black smoke. With no atmosphere to help disperse it, it resembles more a blotchy line that goes up to the roof before angling down, but still blocks the view down into the hall well enough to trouble parties at either end.

When the door comes shut, air starts pumping in, and once Urien's suit systems read just enough air to be breathable, the Vargr is desperately pulling at his helmet and tearing it off. He hacks and wheezes as there isn't quite enough air to breath comfortably, but that doesn't seem to be a concern for him. He lays curled up in the fetal position as Urien speaks to him. He's got thick tan fur, with a thicker and deeper brown coat on his chin and jaws, and some atop his head roughly styled in something like a mohawk.

When he's finally recovered enough, he shakes whole-body, "My - my name?" He looks to the door that Urien gestures towards, "I - my name? Its Hsrrk." He nods, his voice a rough growl even eithout the rasp of a lack of proper breathable air, "Yeah. Captain Hrrsk." He scoots to sit with his back against the airlock door leading into the Reclaimer's Intent to prop himself up, "The Chamax? It - this is a pirate throw-away." He shakes his head, "Crew abandon folks here. I... " His ears splay flat against his head, "I was a first-timer. Didn't - didn't keep on the guns."

 

---

 

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Rhane, Eirene, Kesperziaiepr
Searching the High Watch station, Section 8
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

Heading to the communications terminal, Rhane will have two things made apparent to her rather quickly.

The first is that the only power to the communications terminal is coming from this vacuum suit communications suite. Its emergency power - normally able to run for several days on its own - is maybe going to have a day while providing just enough juice to make one of the dishes of the station's communications array work to broadcast the signal. It doesn't have any process or system that might be the reason for the jamming. None of the terminals here have any power besides this jury-rigged job. Turning it off is an easy matter, if desired.

And then over the radio, the crackling static wanes and rises again for all to hear.

A pair of voices in the noise, warbling as it rises and falls to the waves of static.

"hElp!"

"HeeeeEEeLP!"

"heEEEeEEeLP!"

"heEEeEelP!"

"HEEelp!"

"HEeEEEeeEEeELp!"

Yet the jamming persists. Trying to speak to each other through your vacc-suit radios will prove fruitless.

Edited August 29, 2023 by DJ P4NTSL3SS (see edit history)

[Dastardly Tristar]

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Urien, Mahan
Docked with the High Watch station, aboard the Reclaimer's Intent
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

Urien contemplated his next actions carefully. He didn't really trust the vargr at all, and it was all too easy to lie about where one came from or their identity. A small smile curled up on his lips - he was starting to feel old habits kick in. "Hsrrk?" he said slowly, making sure to roll the Rs aloud. "Here is what is going to happen. First, welcome to the Reclaimer's Intent." He kept the barrel aimed at him whilst he opened the door into the ship. Once through the airlock frame, he beckoned for the wolfman to come in, but made sure to keep a meter's distance away from him.

"Next, we are going to get you in one of our spare berths. A doctor will be with you shortly soon to perform a medical check on you, just to make sure you are not carrying anything contagious. Then, someone will be with you to ask a few questions. You do not have to answer all of them, but I recommend you do, because depending on your answers we might agree to send you to a safe harbor, or uh-" He jerks his head at the airlock and mimics the hissing of rapidly depleting oxygen.

"One more thing." Urien gestured with his weapon for Hsrrk to turn around and face the wall. "Make a move, and I will send your next of kin the cleaning bill." With swift, practiced motions, the man frisked the rescued vargr for any hidden weapons or explosives. Once he was satisfied, Urien breathed normally and ordered him to turn. "Just checking."

He smiles at the Vargr reassuringly, and leads him down the corridor to Urien's room. His weapon trained on Hsrrk, Urien opened the door and marched the man in. Astrid perked up, but immediately arched her back and hissed, claiming the bed as her domain. "One moment." He said, checking under his pillow, the mattress, and then the cupboard in case he forgotten anything in them. Satisfied, he clicked his tongue at his cat, who leapt up onto the cupboard and glared at the Hsrrk.

Walking back out of his room, Urien gave him a knowing look. "You try anything stupid - and I define stupid by trashing this room or trying to escape - and Astrid will be having you for dinner. Be with you in a few." The door slid shut, and locked itself. "Mahan." Urien radioed the captain as he walked to the bridge. "This mutt may be one and the same with Krrsh. Said he was Captain Hsrrk, abandoned by his crew. Let us have the good doctor give him a medical check before you start questioning him. I have him secured in my room for now."

Once he reached his station, Urien burned through the jamming once again and attempted to reach out to the away team. "Away Team, this is Base. We have secured the vargr from the station. Focus on clearing up the jamming, then send the doctor over, I want this mutt checked for any bug eggs. Over."

Edited August 28, 2023 by Dastardly Tristar (see edit history)

[Niraverine]

'Clear off the jamming', the corsair thought grimly while observing the doctor. Easier said than done. Her eyes darted from her companions to shadowed corners of the section, hands gripping raised rifle, her thoughts in disarray.

It was those cries for help that set her on edge. They were suspicious - precisely the kind of a setup that someone luring people into a trap would use. Someone. Eirene stifled a nervous laughter that was threatening to rise in her throat. She knew the type of people who could spring a trap like this one. They even left their signatures. How were those sounds made though if the signal was actually jammed? She would bet a lot on the station being empty save for the monster.

Once more, she tried to remember anything useful about Chamax. Nothing came to mind, other than a fairly common knowledge that they are all psionic. Powerfully so. Which meant that her first, slightly ridiculous idea of a hive mind actually being able to project to other species was not as ridiculous as she thought. There would be no frequency to clear then, nor people to rescue - only the predator awaiting. Well, no people to rescue except for the three of us, she mused, her lips quirking up in a bout of gallows humour.

Standing idly was the last thing she wanted at that moment. She made several frantic gestures at her companions, indicating she's going to retreat and then move towards the admin section. She moved slowly and carefully then looked around once more and tensed. She could swear the door to her left wasn't wide open earlier. I will shoot, she decided grimly, I will shoot whatever it is. I will worry about potentially innocent victims later. A glance behind her, to check whether Rahne and Kesper were following her and she focused once more on the door and the surrounding area, trying to spot something, anything, that would be of help.

What she did notice soured her mood even further. The crank opening the valve was jammed, quite thorougly too. If they needed to close the door entirely, it would take few precious minutes. Even more alarming was the fact that either the vargr managed to slip behind their backs or they already had company. Three steps backwards, another exaggerated wave at her companions to show them her findings, then she typed a short message. 'DOORS CLOSED ARE NOW OPEN. MANUAL CRANK JAMMED. ARE WE PROCEEDING TO THE NEAREST BATTERY?'

Edited August 29, 2023 by Niraverine
Some additional info from the roll (see edit history)

[Sneaksby]

Kesper suppressed his annoyance seeing the communication array was unpowered, and buried the feeling of dread coldly rising inside him at the voices calling for help. If this wasn't conventional jamming, what could it even be?

He looked at Rahne, pointed at the vacc suit distress beacon, and raised a hand to his throat, waving it side to side in a cutting motion. Let's shut it off.

Seeing Eirene backtracking he quickly joined her, covering her with his rifle even though he was reasonably sure they were safe in vacuum. The door, previously slightly and now mostly open, didn't concern him overmuch. The vargr must have made a run for it when he saw them passing through and figured there would be a ship docked. Urien's report was only a confirmation. Now that the survivor was in safety, they could focus on extermination and making the station safe for salvage.

Steeling himself and savoring the hike of adrenaline, Kesper pointed at the door to room 10, and typed a message:

This next section has atmosphere
Chamax here
If it moves, shoot it

If the others look at his faceplate, they might see him grinning sharply in anticipation.

Edited August 29, 2023 by Sneaksby (see edit history)

[DJ P4NTSL3SS]

Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Urien, Mahan
Docked with the High Watch station, aboard the Reclaimer's Intent
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

Hauled to his feet, the newly captured Vargr's ears are still splayed flat against the top of his head, and he actually whimpers when he gets to his feet on weak legs. He turns about this way and that as necessary for the search, arms high over his head. And when marched through the passageways of the ship with a gun leveled at his back, he is clearly quite nervous. Each time he stumbles on some loose floor panel or routing of cables, he looks back with sharp concern that he is about to be given a new nose-hole by way of the back of his skull. He especially hesitates when he begins to lower his hands to climb the ladder to the next deck, stopping to triple-check that's allowed before finally ascending.

Directed two the crews' quarters, he eyes the door warily, and his apprehension only grows when the splotchy ball of fur in one corner rouses to reveal its a cat of a size more appropriate to a moderately-sized dog. But he's so off-balance and out of his element that the feline's aggression doesn't even seem to raise his hackles. Instead, he's far more content to shuffle to the furthest wall from Astrid in order to inch his way towards the stateroom's desk in order to take a seat. He almost sits in it as if nothing is wrong, but one glance at the firearm and he seems to decide that pulling the chair out and turning it around - sitting so he faces the open room and his back is towards the desk and wall - is for the best.

 

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Borite / Sindal (Trojan Reach 2219)
Rhane, Eirene, Kesperziaiepr
Searching the High Watch station
019 (Week 2) 1105, Imperial

Heading back the way you have all come, previously, finding the still-open entrance to Section 10 is easy enough.

Section 10 is a quarter circle, curving down as the only way to access the rest of the station from the spherical 'top'. As such, it features some of the most obvious signs of traffic - both mundane and panicked - as the away-team might enter.

And that is when Kesper, at 'point' for the formation, might first notice it, if only a few seconds before the others.

The flickering of a single red light down the hall. A terminal to the doors all the way at the end, twenty meters away. As the only source of light besides your headlamps, its almost a brilliant torch telling you where the door is. Which is why its so obvious when it turns from red, to yellow, and then to green just as the iris valve comes sliding open alarmingly quickly compared to the doors you've been manually cranking open until now.

There's a visible debris and dust-laden plume of air as the atmosphere rapidly equalizes between the connection compartment and the hallway of section 10 - and a large dark sphere comes tumbling out as well. It thuds against the far wall, rebounds, and drifts up to the roof before fully unfurling six spindly legs to moor itself. A pair of near-identical looking arms, capped with sharp pincers, come out. And eight deep black orbs peel open, reflecting the light of your headlamp back at you. Mandibles chitter with silent hunger, dry acid flaking off the creature's carapace.

A chamax hunter. A predatory omnivore the size of a massive dog, six legs, and chitinous armor.

It bristles, shaking its abdomen and bulbous thorax as it locks eyes on the closest of you. It almost seems to tremble in anticipation.

"heElp!" The voice croaks.

You don't hear the thud, but you can still see the form of the second hunter coming from the airlock as it too tumbles into the far wall. This one plants on the floor of section 10.

"HeEeelP!" Another octadic set of black orbs locking onto the three of you.

Like the other, it seems to be holding at the end of the hall, 20 meters away from where the three members of the away team stand at the doorway into section 10. But they are watching. Shivering with anticipation of the hunt.

The static dies away, with a chittering sound lingering in your ears.

Then silence reigns.

Even in vacuum, you might be able to hear a pin drop.

Edited August 30, 2023 by DJ P4NTSL3SS (see edit history)