Log:Free Enterprise: Delivery From Di'an
Delivery From Di'an
OOC Date: March 21, 2019
Location: Syngia
Participants: Aliraet, Ektor, Jarret Sur, Oozlevort, Riwa, Sera West, Free Enterprise
The outline of the plan was as follows: a convoy of heavy freighters was passing through the Shaltin Tunnels from the Corporate Sector toward the Lianna System. This required a short passage between hyperspace lanes at Syngia, where a handful of allied starfighters would ambush the Aetherium Hypernautics ships, immobilize and scan the freighters, marking the most valuable for boarding by the storming crew. Board, take the ship, get the hyperdrive functional and jump to the rendezvous point.
The assault ship Sparrowhawk emerges from a microjump into the Syngia System at precisely the appointed time and place, into a scene of chaos. This cargo must be something valuable, as in addition to the two armed Sienar Mark I Bulk Transports, there is a Guardian-class Light Cruiser firing turbolaser salvos into the skirmish and no fewer than ten starfighters scrambling for supremacy amidst the wreckage of several other small craft.
The laser turrets on the Sienar Heavy Transports go dead within moments of each other as a pair of Scyk fighters strafe each in turn with ion cannons. An HLAF interceptor finishes off a wounded TIE/fo, before being hit in turn by another System Defense fighter. The friendly channel is cluttered with overlapping transmissions from a half dozen throats:
<<Got him! Lick my- DREK, I'm hit->> A female voice hollers.
<<Freighters are dead! Scanning- I found it, I found it!>> A youthful male voice cries.
A musical babble of Sullustan joins the comms, as a Preybird fighter banks and hammers another TIE with a volley of heavy cannon fire.
<< I hear you, Fecia->> the lead pirate Preybird transmits. "Tell me we got a lock, girl- I need a lock, now," Ektor notes to his co-pilot, before signaling the Boarding shuttle, <<Sparrowhawk, check your targeting comp- you should have the prize freighter flagged for boarding. Now, I KNOW that light cruiser looks like a problem, but no lie: we got this. Start your approach and we gonna kick in the door, yeah?>>
In the pilot's seat of Sparrowhawk, Jarret Sur - alor of Clan Sur, first of his name - frowns faintly as he arrives in the midst of a battle. Chaos on every side, another who did not have his upbringing if not his blood might be surprised, even shocked; for the hardened, however, there is no trepidation. << Yes, I hear you, >> he replies to Ektor over the comms. << We are approaching now. Preparing the lock for boarding. >>
Sparrowhawk isn't /extremely/ fast, but she /is/ agile - the graceful, insectile craft makes its approach, but a terrible firefight erupts just off the port bow, and he is forced to yank the ship away into a tight bank to avoid disaster.
"Usen'ye," he snarls, hissing through his helmet's voxgrille before keying the comms again. << Combat spoiled our approach. We are setting up another - keep those fighters away from the transports. >>
Riwa was ready with her ax strapped to her back with her helmet in hand. In the cockpit, she stands next to the copilot seat as her eyes go wide. The young Chiss woman looks to Jarret as he speaks then looks back ahead. Quickly she pulls her hair up into messy low ponytail before pulling her helmet on. As the fire fight breaks out she gasps, grabbing both seats before she looks and speaks to him. "I'll go get ready...." And with that she's gone as she makes her way out of the cockpit and to the central part of the ship. Well this was going to be....interesting.
Oozlevort is a bounty hunter but it has been slow with the First Order impeding planetary governments. If the First Order controls the airspace and the New Republic is gone, who really has the authority to issue bounties? And hunting them on the planet, between two governments, is even harder. So a little piracy will do. The Gand hooked back up with Aliraet's gang for a cut of the profits. Feeling their Surronian Conqueror jolt out of hyperspace, the short alien reattaches his powered armor's helmet and fires up a scuffed blaster carbine.
Sitting in one of the jump chairs in the back, her helmet clipped to her belt but otherwise fully armored, Aliraet is all wolfish grins as she feels the ship buck and change course in rapid shifts. Her fingers tap idly against the hilt of her vibrosword as she readies herself for a bit of the ultra mayhem. Or, you know, just boarding. She's pretty sure they'll have a good guard complement that probably is paid well enough they can't be bribed to give up.
She makes a face at the intercom. "...hmm. Hope this thing can get close enough to actually dock.." she mutters. The Sparrowhawk not being the fastest ship, though it does make up for it with armor. Which has its own benefits, not the least of which is that it can probably survive catching a laser bolt or three on the way in if needed.
<<Shields out, hull damaged- gimme shields back, damnit!>> the HLAF implores aloud, juking to avoid a pursuing TIE's cannons. The paired Scyks rejoin the dogfight, evening the odds.
<<Working on it->> Ektor drawls back to the Sparrowhawk, grimacing with focus. "Switching fire control to linked missiles and disabling the reload timer- trust me this'll work," Ektor states to Sera with a manic smile. Weaving between the laser turrets of the Sienar cruiser, the heavily modified pirate Preybird unleashes a cascade of five linked missile tubes, twice in rapid (and engineer-cringing) succession. While he might have just burnt out the firing mechanisms in doing so, a phalanx of ten deadly concussion missiles streak toward the small cap ship, overloading the cruiser's port defenses, punching through shields, piercing armor and hull in a sudden wave of destruction that rips the light cruiser apart.
Hoots, shouted profanities, and crows of triumph compete on the shared channel as the pirate starfighters celebrate, and turn their attentions to the remaining- rather suddenly disheartened- Lianna System Defense TIE fighters. <<Arright, what did we tell you? Nice and easy approach. Have fun, Sparrowhawk!>>
It's a smooth approach this time around; under Jarret's control, the ship gracefully banks into position, and rotates to match the collar with the freighter's starboard docking port once more - but the destruction of the Guardian causes the ship to buck, and what is meant to be a whisper-soft kiss becomes the worst kind. Like, when your braces all get locked up and you have to get frog-marched through your high school in front of everybody and you're traumatized forever.
"Black blood of the Void," Jarret roars as the ship docks - if roughly. << We are connected, if imperfectly. We begin our slaughter. >> Keying off the comms, Jarret leaps out of his seat, preparing to head aft.
Well that was a rough landing. Holding on tightly to not fall over, Riwa huffs through her helmet now as she loosens the ties around her form. Grabbing that ax with her left hand she hefts it onto her shoulder now as she squints. Looking back, she seems to be looking for Jarret to make his way as she waits to make their exit. As the 21st kids would say: #YOLO.
Oozlevort rises to his feet in the awkward powered armor suit. He says to his droid, "Droid, watch the door!" and then surges through the blown hatch, carbine at the ready!
As the assault ship docks, roughly, Aliraet is thrown against the straps of her jump chair, but rapidly recovers and unbuckles, sliding on her helmet and locking it in place before she moves quickly to the hatch, already reaching down to the bandolier of explosive toys she has across her chest. Selecting one, she sets it over the lock for the transport's hatch, pressing a button as she glances over to see Oozlevort starts his charge, then looks at Riwa, stepping back. With a hiss of metal her vibrosword clears its sheathe. "Let's let the eager one go first, hmm? He might absorb the blaster fire for us." she quips.
Then...BOOM!
The hatch is expertly breached, tumbling into the airlock beyond as Oozlevort leads the charge, Aliraet moving at a more sedate pace as she reaches up to unclasp a grenade in her free hand, humming cheerfully to herself as she follows.
Sera is seated in the co-pilot position of the Preybird named Bad Day. It's namesake is because of the rare missile system specifically engineered to the craft. It didn't have two, nor three, or four. It had five launching tubes that fired simultaneously, or through some custom set up via the targeting module. The same module the Jelucan engineer was looking at. "Solid impact on that target, nothing on the scopes. I'd say you that's a win!" Her Imperial accent is spiked a bit, thanks to the craziness of combat in space and her not being accustomed to it from the point of view of a fighter. She pats the ace pilot's shoulder and squeezes. "Good shooting, Xer."
<<Sounds great, you... you do your slaughter, yeah?>> Ektor returns over the channels, looking over his shoulder to give a grin to his co-pilot. "That was a real great boom though, yeah? Wreck me, but-" The modified Preybird is hit by a blast of TIE cannons, causing the heavy fighter to rock with impact. "Right, right! The battle thing.."
Once the bulk freighter's dorsal hatch is blaster open (giving the pilot an ominous view of the powerless dorsal cannon turret a short distance ahead), looking down through the shuttle floor into the dorsal airlock and cargo hold beyond, the boarding can begin in earnest. The pirates find themselves dropping onto an elevated catwalk near the ceiling of a large central hold, with four tightly packed bulk freight modules in orderly rows, below. Engineering lies at the end of the catlwalk to the aft, bridge to the fore.
Nearby, a crewman is sprinting along the clattering catwalk, carrying a backpack sized piece of machinery from the cockpit toward the engine roomâ?¦ but skidding to a panicked stop as the first of the boarding party drop through the airlock ahead of him. Promptly turning to run back the way he can, with the shout of "PIRATES!"
Toward the back of this militant queue comes Jarret, and stepping through the breach there is the first hostile - unarmed and freaking out, Jarret chooses to drill him with a burst of nerve-disrupting fire. Though the buzzing blue lances snap toward the poor lad, only one strikes him, which means he's going to meet a darker fate at the hands of his companions.
Ri doesn't have time for this so she just moves and whips that ax around with her left hand before the right catches on to grip. With a spin she slices up and the poor man is cute down. Does she stop? Nope. She's just going to keep moving forward now.
Oozlevort surges through the corporate ship, leaving the surprised fellow to die to Jarret and Riwa, and moves with a hum of powered armor to the forward bridge. "Get on the deck plating!" he thunders through his helmet, standing at nearly 5 feet tall in his heavy armor. While he doesn't have a high opinion of ESPO troopers, the Gand shoots one just to be sure. One shot hits the bulkhead while the next blasts a hole into a tall trooper.
Normally, Aliraet would not resort immediately to grenades. I mean, the random destruction, chance of wrecking controls, damaging expensive goods...
Who are we kidding, Aliraet is EXACTLY the sort of person to start with grenades. Thus, while Oozlevort advances, laying down fire as the taller trooper crumples, she underhands a cryoban grenade towards the remaining troopers. Unfortunately she misjudges it just a bit, the grenade bouncing off the door frame and detonating where the target is safe...his friend, not so much.
Aliraet swipes a finger over the activation switch of the CryoBan Grenade and the small blinking lights across the weapon's surface suddenly deactivate...
The Boarders gain the bridge first, greeting the defenders with a hail of blasterfire and a grenade. The return fire strikes Oozlevort squarely in his lung-variant heavy powered armor, while the pilot sends a pistol shot past Aliraet that came close enough for the Devaronian to smell.
Marching into Engineering, Jarret does not hesitate as he comes upon the compartment's single armored guard - again he fires, this time a storm of red plasma seeking the man at center mass. But for whatever reason - it certainly isn't his skill at arms, or poor quality of the weapon in his hand - the man gets a chance to avoid his shots, and they spend themselves into the bulkhead.
Staying with Jarret, the smaller Mando'a is hot on his heels. Licking her lips behind that helmet she sees him firing than squints. Moving around him she just yells out as she spins around lets that ax fly, slashing at the man's abdomen with no remorse. Using that momentum she brings that ax back to her shoulder now and looks...waiting.
Oozlevort is backed up several steps as both a grenade explodes and a blaster bolt impacts his armored breastplate, doing some damage to the Gand's exoskeleton and perhaps internal organs. "Stop resisting!" He raises his old carbine and fires two blaster bolts into the last trooper, killing him in a quick fashion.
Aliraet ducks low a bolt narrowly snaps past her helmet, lowering her shoulder as she charges past the crumpling form of the remaining trooper, throwing a right cross that the pilot ducks under, before she brings up a knee into her ribs hard enough to make the woman gasp, trying to keep her off guard. She COULD draw her sword and just stab her, but...well...where's the fun in that?
The boarding action grows bloodier.
In the cockpit, the last standing trooper is gunned down (Gand down?) , and the Devaronian grenadier is upon the pilot an instant later, driving the Aetherium employee back into the dead flight console. teeth gritting in exertion, the blaster pistol is brought up and a desperation shot is fired at close quarters. It hits.
In Engineering, the Mandalorians find a trooper prepared and awaiting the opening door. What he wasnt prepared for was an axe. To the abdomen. A wild shot misses the axe murderer, but the ship's lead engineer does take advantage of being overlooked to fire a pistol at Jarret to better effect.
Given a shot in thigh where his beskar hide cannot shield him, Jarret stumbles when he attempts to return fire upon the engineer. The resulting storm of fire is largely spent into a different bulkhead, but he nonetheless strikes the man with a single shot.
Ri was caught off guard by that shot towards her as she stumble back, her ax coming back up but she misses. A gasp is heard as she stumbles back and out of the way of the other shots. As she sees Jarret she just stays back to not get flame broiled by accident.
Oozlevort has downed the troopers, but someone is still shooting! He turns around to see Aliraet and the pilot struggling. A shot rings out. "Get on the floor!" He rushes forward and smashes the pilot's face with his armored boot, sending him or her sprawling. The Gand clicks on his comlink. "Bridge secure. Four humanoids down."
There's a definite howl of pain as the blaster bolt slams into her side, causing Aliraet to stagger back...but then Oozlevort uses his dreaded 'Boot to the Head' technique and...well she's down. "Thanks..." she rasps to Oozlevort, wincing a bit as she rolls her shoulder, then walks over to the controls, looking them over. "...well, puu'du..."
She reaches over and slaps the intercom. "Controls are ionized, I'll try to get them working!"
The pilot only barely saw it coming. She had just blasted the crazy grenade thrower backward when out of the corner or her eye, she saw a boot. A big boot. Which promptly struck the corner or her eye, along with the entire side of the face, knocking the pilot out, cold.
To the aft, one engineer is unarmed, and cowers for cover. The lead Engineer is more determined and places a second shot on target against the Mandalorian. Meanwhile, grunting in agony and holding one arm across his midsection in a vain effort to staunch the blood that stains his brown armor, the last trooper one handed fires his carbine at the axe-wielding Riwa.
His gun is almost dry - and finally, with Riwa taking a shot, whatever cold beast there is in him awakens. << I will eat you, >> he says, flat and empty through the tinny speaker of his helmet, and jutting out from under his left vambrace comes an extendable tube - a tube whose terminating nozzle now spews a cone of fire that engulfs the offending engineer and turns him into a column of screaming, rolling flame. Shot to hell he might be, but Jarret /will/ have his barbecue.
Riwa is still moving as she's shot at that first time but then a bolt hits her, a gasp leaving her. The young Mando'a stumbles for a second as she uses her ax as support but a roar of a yell leaves her. Grabbing her ax with both hands she moves in close and spins around, that ax slices through that trooper like a hot knife through butter. As he falls she uses the momentum to place that ax on her shoulder, her free hand on her side. Looking to the barbecue her brow raises behind that helmet then looks over to Jarret as she speak through her speaker. <<Please don't....>> A beat. <<It's not healthy.>>
As Oozlevort stands guard, Aliraet plugs in the pack and starts to work. The pain of her wound makes it a little hard to concentrate, but she gradually starts getting the hyperdrive and thrust systems online, enough that after a few minutes she can start the calculations and being moving the ship to get it pointed to where it needs to go. "Hyperdrive coming online, you got things back there?" she says through the intercom.
The warleader of Clan Sur smokes from wounds drilled through the soft armor beneath the plates, struggling somewhat to get to his feet. The flamer nozzle retracts into its mounting and he staggers up the catwalk to where the chief engineer lies burning, and Jarret spends the last round in his powerpack square in the man's chest. << Go to fore, >> he tells Riwa then. << I will deal with the other. >>
<<On it, Alor.>> With that Riwa turns, making her way out of the area. Wincing slightly she exhales as she pauses outside of Engineering then nods as she starts her way as instructed. With ax in tow and well used, she exhales deeply as she tries to ignore the pain from that shot.
Aliraet grumbles to herself as she plops down in the pilots chair, idly using a boot to shove the unconscious woman out of her way. "So, attitude thrusters back on....it'll just take a bit to actually turn this pregnant bantha around. Then a bit to reach the rendevous..." She winces, then reaches down to start undoing her breastplate and gauntlets to slide them off so she can get at the wound on her side. "Every time I try to be nice, and what do they do? They shoot me. You'd think, just once, they'd drop the damn pistol and surrender when they realize they're outgunned, but noooooo..." she mutters.
"I think we've gotten them all, Xer. I'm reading no more hostile contacts. I have to say, this craft didn't turn out terribly. I hate its hyperdrive, but I can dig its teeth." She runs a gloved hand over the targeting monitor and then reaches up to tuck her hair back. She wasn't wearing a flighthelmet, just a beany cap. Her gaze is averted port as she watches the small squadron of pilots do another defensive fly by.
As the hatch seals behind Riwa, a gush of pressure and the budding of a scream - and then nothing. << Engineering is secured, >> intones Jarret through a tight haze of pain. << Let us go. >>
As Aliraet restores life to the crippled freighter, the sensors flicker to life. The only signals are red: five hostile fighters, one of which signals the freighter, <<Hey down there. You have fun, yeah? A couple TIEs got away, but we're all good out here.>> Over his shoulder, he cracks a crooked grin. "Hey, some good things are worth waiting for, yeah? When it gets where it's going? Boom, baby." Back on comms, <<Meet you all at the next jump point, yeah?>>
Aliraet taps the com. <<Was exciting. Got shot. Always fun. This thing is frellin' slow, but we'll get there eventually. I'm putting us into hyper, see you there.>> She'll reache over and slowly push forward the lever activating the hyperdrive, sending them on their way. Then she'll tie up the pilot girl and toss her in an escape pop. She got moxie.
