Log:The Shadowport: Spirit Level

It looks like a B2 Spirit, it levels things, that's why.

OOC Date: November 17, 2019
Location: The doomed planetoid Laramus-A
Participants: The Shadowport: Liz'diot, Sapphira Yavok, featuring David Ironside, Tharyn, and Zhu Yan as GM.

The short story: Yan pulls off a betrayal, Sapphira sabotages stealthily, Tharyn kicks out the trash, David tidies ugly things, and Liz smashes a planet.

The long story: Laramus-A, a moon so tiny no one cared to name it, and the home of the Parmic Predators. Not to be confused with market vendors at the spaceport district on Nar Shaddaa though the comparison would be apt considering their prices, the bastards. The Parmic Predators were a small-to-moderate sized pirate force, specialising in raids across the, surprise surprise, Parmic sector. Ealor, the Spice Terminus, Laramus itself, you name it. They'd attacked the BWC-HF-001 in the past therefore the vessel's illustrious and noble captain, the honourable and trustworthy Zhu Yan, held a grudge.

"Look, I don't like to brag," lied Yan, who was he kidding, he loved to brag, "but this time I'm basically giving these munitions to you, because you've earned it." Okay this time he wasn't lying but his choice of words could be better. Oh right, what's going on? Yan was at the moon base with Tharyn, his pal of the day, explaining to Captain 'Skin' Tagg (don't ask) of the Parmic Predators that the extremely powerful ordinance that was about to be express delivered was in fact a charitable donation. The pirate captain was nodding along to what Yan was saying, what with a rapport having been established over repeat business. Let's not harp on that too much, we all just want to kill people. "It's like a bonus, we've both made good profit after all. My guy should be in the system soon. I'm going to head to the Three Move Mate," the Redline, Yan had changed the IFF back to the one they used for the cyber-job some years back, "and meet him in orbit. Sit tight, and when I'm back you can check out the merch."

That wasn't going to happen, see. Sure, Yan had made money off selling these guys weapons, getting their trust, earning a profit by selling weapons elsewhere, etc etc. All good smuggler things to do. But as mentioned previously the BWC-HF-001's conniving and scheming captain, the dishonourable and lying Zhu Yan, held a grudge. The ordinance would arrive alright, with all the force of a planet smasher.

"Let's go," Yan said to old mate Tharyn. "All hell's gonna break loose when that bomber leaves hyper," he explained, sotto-voce, looking at the weird twitching of his right hand and fetching a small crinkled plastic bottle from his jacket, "and we had better be out of here by then." He capped that off with a sip of the golden liquid from the bottle, letting the substance do its job and calm the shivers. He could quit any time he wanted, promise.

In fact, at any moment now, a small fleet of mismatched motley miscreants should be popping out of hyperspace above the small moon, believed to be a trader group. Actually a hit squad with a disgusting amount of air-to-ground ordinance. The plan was simple. Exit hyper, protect Liz'diot's bomber from ground fire and air superiority, and literally crack this base in half. I sure hope you all like fireworks.


"MISTER LIZ'DIOT, CAPTAIN, SIR! We have entered the System desired and our piloting our way towards the target!" Liz was not flying the Bomber, he could not fly. No, hired goons and or droids could handle that. He was Fifth, no now Sixth Dimensional being after all. Reguardless, he had a first mate here simply to repeat his orders. A wimpish young boy he likely pulled off the station with a very very strong lisp.

"Indeed... Prepare the 'Planet Smasher'." The PLT-5MR. A big flying wing with dorsal and ventral turret PDC and three Proton Bomb Shoots emerged from hyperspace and started it's slow lumber towards the planets surface. "YASSS."


Who's a snek? Sappy's a snek. Dressed in an all black shadowsuit, Sapphira has moved from one ship to the other on the landing pad down on the planet. Her steps are silent, her movements hidden by dusk and elegance. She slips out of one ship's landing gear, carefully creeping between the massive vehicles while bright green eyes keep a sharp lookout for ner-do-wellers. Besides her, of course.

She makes it to another ship and, peering this way and that, she finally takes hold of the landing gear and hoists herself up into the belly, sliding snakelike around wires and vents and machine parts to a control panel. A few flicks, a few button presses, and ... oh, no now she's pulling wires out and plugging them into different places.


Aboard the so-called 'whale', David had met up with the others for several reasons. One: to learn what's going to happen. Two: Booze. He could sleep it off on the way probably. And so he is, alarm waking him up with the gentle BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP BEEP of the apocalypse starting in the morning. "I'm up!" he starts, his eyes opening just as that sweet effect happens where the stars form from lines. <<This is Bravado 1, tell me where to point the guns.>> he reports to all nearby friendlies, as he pulls levers and hits buttons all over the cockpit to reveal his X-Wing's namesake shape.


Predators. Savages. Reavers. These people listen to too much heavy metal. Tharyn remains quiet as he walks with Zhu Yan, notably not wearing a blaster - indeed, he is bare-handed short of the harness he wears, and what sits nested in the elastic loops of that harness is a nest's worth of stressed-cased durasteel eggs, packed with detonite and spray-painted olive drab. They're eggs, you see. The kind that explode.

So he follows the one who's paying the check, checking over his grenades as if counting beads on a full-body rosary. Soldier's ritual, as it were. "Whatever you say, um, boss," he replies, pulling on his sallet helm. << You point, I, um, punch. >>


Elation turned to alarm as... the PLANET SMASHERRRRRR appeared in orbit, followed by Bravado 1. Trade fleets are one thing, but that? That was obviously some form of assault.

"Get into the air! Go go go!" was the shout from skintag- SKIN TAGG, far out. Who comes up with these names? He was gesturing towards fighters, freighters, the small air fleet that made up the Parmic Predators. Pilots bolted on to their ships, dispensed with the pre-flight checklists, powered up, and legged it towards the skies.

Well, two of them did, an old T-65B and an ugly mishmash between a Y-Wing and a TIE Interceptor. The others? There was a whine, some lift, and a sickening CRUNCH as they promptly decided that gravity was not a thing to be ignored. Shame about the deckplates, but it's okay, they'd be gone soon.

"Alright time to go!" erupted Yan, bursting into a short fat-man run (he was not fast). "Red!" he barked out, then fished out his commlink and turned it on. Right. <<"Red! Get back to the ship, it's go time!">>

Unfortunately for all, 'Skin' Tagg was not stupid. A fool, yes, but not stupid. Pointing to the retreating forms of Yan and Tharyn, he cried out, "GET THEM!" Two guards at the landing pad, still startled by the ominous entities in orbit, shifted their vision towards the retreating saboteurs. They moved forward with vibro-axes and menacing intent, and to get to the Redline and avoid absolute certain doom, Yan and Tharyn were going to have to get past them.


There was no 'Captain's Seat' on the Planet Smasher. No, that was just Liz in his hover chair with the neon runners, leaky exhaust, and purposfully bad motivator and back spoiler. Chop Shop special, sitting behind the cockpit. "Are you prepared for the Slaughter, HUMONS? You have not convinced the MIGHTY LIZ'DIOT! PREPARE YOUR SELVES FOR THE SUBJUGATION!" The laughter echos loudly though his ship, the gunner droids and of course, little Gee his R2 Unit plugged into the back engineering section.

"Could you shut up back there?" Came the voice of Clap Finnigan, a drunk who Liz had hired on the simple fact he wouldn't shut up about what a great pilot he was. "We got incoming."

"YAS... let them suffer. Fire. FIRE EVERYTHING!"

"Uh, Dad?" Came one of Claps kids on the turrets, "I'm not familiar with this targeting system."

Clap sighed, "It's going to be a long day."

Liz too busy laughing manically, which can be heard over the comms, to comment on Clap Finnigan and his crew's ignorance over Turret Mounts.


Sapphira was so close, so very close to taking out this other ship's engines, as she had the previous few (and missed some, to be fair). But the ship suddenly lifts off and her belly drops into her ass. The little snek gives up on her project and instead propels herself along the inside of the hull to the gaping landing gear hatch, letting herself fall out of. Now, falling wasn't the plan: the plan was to gracefully take hold of the landing gear and drop to the ground as she ship goes up. But she just wiffs it, and instead backflops onto the tarmac several feet below. Laying there, she's concealed by the dust kicked up by the engines as the ship takes off.

That dust allows her to lie there for a moment, groaning into the comlinks. <<I'm okay.>> She promises, rolling onto her belly and snek-crawling among some large crates of parts. <<I'm okay,>> she reiterates. <<Be there ... in a sec.>>


David breaks away from the mad bomber as soon as the cackling and shouting starts. Did that dude just say 'fire everything'? At this range? Instead of staying in harms way, the T-85 X-Wing heads directly into the line of fire of the Franken-Y-Wing, David's finger squeezing the life out of the trigger on his stick, barrel rolling out of the way after seeing several hits light up the enemy shield. <<That's a hit.>> he confirms, turning the craft for another run, this time at the engines.


The angry men with axes should probably scare most people, but Tharyn isn't most people - either he's too stupid to be aware of the danger (he certainly sounds it) or he's just that hardcore. Further hammering in the case for stupidity, Tharyn steps into the cleaving range bare-handed, ducking low and snapping a kick at the chest of the would-be axe murderer, but his bootheel does not make sufficent contact despite the sudden speed and skill of the attack.

His gloved fist, however, does, and the follow-up stroke lands with the exact sickening thud of one struck with a claw hammer. Probably hits with the same force, too, from the way the man's body lurches. << Drop it and keep your spine, >> Tharyn bellows as he punches, as if perhaps the goal for the day is, in fact, to punch a tunnel through the other man. And everyone needs goals.


The battle was joined! As the flying wing of the bomber rained point-defence fire into the air, the Ugly caught flack from David M-F-ing Ironside, having its shields shredded and solar panels peppered with laser fire. Caught between two flanks, it did the only thing it could do, sneeze upon the bomber's mighty shields. The X-Wing, unassailed and unwounded, took a shot at the bomber as well, and did so from the side where its extremely narrow target profile meant landing a hit was difficult at best, impossible at worst. So it missed. Sucked in.

On the ground, Zhu Yan's portly and slightly drug addicted frame copped the worst of a vibro-ax from the guard to the landing zone. Digging into his left arm, sparks emerged from the hole that had been torn into his jacket. The guard was dead a second later, two craters appearing in his torso before Yan had even processed that he'd drawn his blaster. His arm being cybernetic, it shouldn't have hurt. But he had the Complete Greystorm Experience, so yeah, it was doing a wonderful job reminding him what left arm pain was. "Sithspit," he grunted out, of course irked that he couldn't turn it off. Now his left arm was twitching from the damage. "Red," he grunted, then swapped the comm to his blaster hand. Awkies. <<"Red, prep the ship. My arm is down, I'll need your help.">> Great.

The guy going for Tharyn was a bit bleary-eyed from going up against the fist of the laramus star. It was an absolute miracle he held on to his lunch. His next swing was certainly excellent in the guts department, if somewhat lacking in the 'actually hit the guy' field.

Ships were trying to power up on the landing pad again, ostensibly to join the fray. There was at least one more whrrrrCRUNCH as another one hit the deckplates, before someone in the chaos, probably a ship tech, yelled out, "CAP, THIS IS TOO CONVENIENT TO NOT BE SABOTAGE!"


The Finnigan siblings continue to rain hell fire from the point defence cannons all over the place without actuall hitting anything. At all. Liz could care less, he was in some special happy place, even as the ship rocked slightly with damage, the UGLY catching Ace Pilot Clap off guard. "Shouldn't be too much longer."

Liz stops laughing and looks to the poor kid he'd grabbed as XO. "Excellent. Have you prepared the Planet Smasher."

The kid's voice is mousy at best, "Yes Mr..."

"Ah... what did I say?"

"Yes, my lord..." If Bith could grin, he'd do so manically. "INDEEEEEED. ON MY WORRRRDDDD."

Clap rolls his eyes.


"I'm here." Sneaky Sapphira waited until Axeman was disposed of before revealing herself. She has a hand arced behind her pressing on her lumbar, as if that's sore there. Also she's walking a little bent-like. More of a shuffle. "I'm going," she tells Yan as she shuffles into the Redline, moving toward the controls where she can sit. How blissful. Only once she's there does she yank off the balaklava, revealing the now-frizzy red hair. "Okay, so how hard can this be? Engines need air so vents...." she starts to look around for the vents. "I mean you'd have to vent the engines frequently, so it should be pretty close to where you'd normally reach so..." her hand floats over a few buttons on the console before she looks behind her. "Yan, wher'es the vents?"


David squints at the enemy fighter tactics. One of them is essentially flying around in a death bucket and decides to go for Liz'diot's bomber. While there's a fighter on his tail that's already taken shots at it. Said fighter pilot shakes off his momentary confusion, neatly separating the Y-Wing bits from the rest of the fighter with a volley of laser fire. <<That's one fighter down.>> he tells the bomber crew, peering out his viewports to see the remaining one. <<Why's it always X-Wings on their side, too?>> he asks, not expecting anyone to really answer.


The sudden swing of the axe puts Tharyn off his feet at first, the scything swish of the vibrating blade causing him to abort his next kick. But as fast as he is, and as liquid his movements despite the armor on his too-thin form, Tharyn is able to get behind the man and drive his fist into the back of his skull. You can't punch through a skull, not with your bare hands - that nonsense is in the realm of fighting holos. Physics doesn't work like that. But physics /does/ allow a man like him to strike so hard, so precisely, as to cause the bones in his skull to shatter, for the shockwave to carry forward and pulp the entirety of his hindbrain, in one terrifying stroke. Of course, all this can't be revealed to the outside eye: to the outside world, he simply thrusts forth with his open palm, connecting to the back of his head as if cradling it for just a moment, all for the axman to drop his weapon, as he stumbles forward and drop like a sack of wet cement to the ground. There's very little blood, just a bit oozing out of the fallen man's nose. Only the undertaker will now the details.

<< Here, boss, >> Tharyn says even as his opponent falls, stepping up to support his employer. << You all right? Let me get in front of you, draw the fire. >>


THARYN WINS.
FATALITY.

Chaos spread to slightly more organized chaos as crews started busting out the repair equipment. Such a simple sabotage was likely to go unnoticed considering how quiet Sapphira had been, which bought them time. "Remind me to pay you double," Yan hissed at Tharyn, out of frustration more than pain. One day he'd get through a firefight without being injured. The focus being on repairing evac ships, for the moment, Tharyn and Yan were unmolested on their way to the Redline, the smuggler limping all the way. It's funny, especially considering he hadn't been shot in the leg. Jackass.

The space battle was picking up pace as the Ugly was reduced to a smouldering, burning wreck. It careened off into space, where it would do naught but drift for eternity as scrap and possible salvage junk. The X-Wing turned to face the more threatening target, David, but wasn't quite able to attach to his rear in the way of most dogfighters. Because honestly, how do these pirates keep getting X-Wings?!

"Sap, get... get out of the, just... vents? Really? Go prime the engines or shoot something!" he erupted at the tube to the cockpit as he started to walk down it himself. "Augh gonna have to do this one-handed. Tharyn, watch the hatch!" I mean, Yan, you could CLOSE the hatch, but that would be smart and Yan doesn't do smart, it'd be out of character.

From a distance was the shout of Captain Tagg yelling, "KILL THEM, STOP THAT SHIP, JUST MAKE SURE THEY DIE!" Two of the pirates, those closest to the Redline, made a beeline for the ramp! Head them off at the pass!


Clap is a damn good pilot and one might think he'd piloted a heavy bomber before. It also helps that the advanced targeting computer on the PLT-5MR made out of Bio-fiber and faster than most anything out there known to the galazy when it came to dataprocessing, made the whole thing practically effortless. The HVB Prototype was made to take a beating and cary a massive kriffing pay load. "We're here, opening Chute Doors!" Clap announces. The kids on the Dorsal and Ventral guns aim at the one remaining fighter and let the scarlet death rip. One doing slightly better than the other when it came to getting a hang of that particular platform.

Liz cackled, he cackled like the madman he is. "ATTAXXXXXXX!"

LIZ'DIOT THE OMNICIENT ATTAXXX!!!! Large Blue Proton bombs drop from the two swept back wings and from the centeral fusilage on the HVB all at once and in perfect sync.


"No, wait, this is it, right? I'm pretty sure this is it-" Sapphira is trying to show Yan that she TOTALLY knows what she's doing. But Yan yells her out of the cockpit and she goes, now standing up straight again that hte pain in her back as subsided. "I was trying to help!" She scolds Yan as she stomps her way back to the hatch. Somewhere in there she removed her DL. The first shot strikes true. However, it's around the time she's lining up the next shot that she sees the bloody mess that Tharyn has left. She turns her head, staring at the man and his victim, eyes widening in surprise. Pew pew. Two more shots that aren't even aimed. SHe's too busy staring.

Then, at last, she exhales. "....wow!" Like she's seeing a fine peice of art.


The lads tearing for the ship across the tarmac gets a grunt from Tharyn, who's already marked the big one on his mental threatboard. << Hold tight, boss, >> he tells Yan, clapping the other man on the shoulder lightly before tearing off down the hall toward the mad lad and the absolute unit.

As it turns out, busting units are his apparent specialty. Hurtling down the ramp at the two men, Tharyn leaps forward onto Bronzy Dan - as Sapphira's shooting the mad lad, Bronzy Dan is greeted by a flying ram in the shape of Tharyn, who leaps off the ramp to drive his boot into the big man's solar plexus, splintering his sternum and two of his ribs as he surfs the man down the rest of the ramp onto the ground. As he turns he deftly kicks Dan's head aside, football-style, before his attention is leveled upon the fellow named Sticky Finn Gus. It might be noted by the other man, his wounded target, that Dan's head is twisted too far around to support life functions.

<< You. >> Tharyn stabs two finger into the air toward Gus. << Leave. Now. >>


David steels himself. Forgive him for the sin he's about to commit. Not that he's a religious man, if he was he'd be going to hell for murder a bunch of times over. As it is, David locks onto the T-65 X-Wing, stealing a peek at his targeting computer before laying down a volley of laser fire. It's more designed to keep the fighter away from the Planet Smasher, but some lasers do hit, lighting the shields up in bright blue before settling back down.


Whatever background music is going on right now falls silent as an absolute motherload of planet smashing goodness falls from the gaping maw of... the PLANET SMASHERRR. The bombs dropped, and with nothing in the sky to intercept them, it was only a matter of time. Captain 'Skin' Tagg could only look up to see his doom arriving, and screamed out in impotent rage.

Yan literally fell into the pilot's seat of the tramp freighter slash gunship and with his right hand (his left had shut down in protest). The ship whined and lurched as repulsorlifts picked it up off the deck, and he hit the engines. "Someone close that ramp!" he shouted into the intercom, before leaning over to bite the throttle with his teeth. "MMMF!" was his cry of irritation. This was going to be so awkward.

The X-Wing, under withering fire from a newer, sexier model and a bomber designed to destroy... everything, had to make a judgment call. The coin was flipped and came up 'run the frack away!' So it turned and set an exit vector, trying to put distance between itself and the impending detonation. Also from the people shooting at him. Right.

Bronzy Dan didn't even make it onboard, the poor sod. Sticky Finn Gus, on the other hand, was made of wirier stuff. Entering some sort of mad barbarian rage at the death of his friend, he grappled the open ramp and pulled himself up to brawl onboard the rapidly raising Redline! Or he would have, had he not come face to face with Friend-Surfer Head-Puncher Magic-Fisting-Man Tharyn and Frazzled Redheaded Saboteur Sapphira. That moment of 'oh crap I've made a terrible mistake' stopped him cold, frozen in fear. He couldn't run, it was a fatal fall. So he had to fight. But he was taking too long to make that connection.


When the paylod finishes, the Finigan kids rat-tat-tapping away at the fleeing X-Wing that the bomber could never hope to catch up to, the large wing profile turns into a steep climp upwards, the blue engines flaring to life. Clap pulls hard on the yoke, making sure this bomber achieves escape velocity from the massive thermo-nuclear explosion that's about to go down at the base. "Bombs Away!" He announces over comms.

Liz just continues to laugh like a madman.


Sapphira's eyes turn from the previous-made mess to the current one that Tharyn's making, and her eyes this time narrow instead of widen. She makes a gutteral sounds from her throat. It's a female sound. A sound of heterosexual appreciation. Perhaps of a base, possibly even carnal nature. She takes a few steps forward, sliding her pistol back into it's holster. "If you jump now, you might make it," Sapphira informs poor Gus. "If you stay, you definitely won't." With those words delivered, she very calmly and easily pushes the hatch button to start closing the giant ass-mouth of the ship.


David is off in pursuit of the fleeing pilot! The two X-Wings shoot through space, one WAY more awesome than the other one, and that's not even counting all the stupid battle damage. There's flashes of red lasers from the hunter to the hunted, but other than a shield blast flaring up brightly before fizzling out pathetically, a kill shot isn't in the cards just yet.


He gave him the choice, but Gus ain't moving - and considering how spun up this apparenty kick-murder machine that Yan has hired, Tharyn isn't going to wait for him to get any better ideas. << Fine, >> he says simply, leaping for the man, and once his hands make contact with Gus's shoulders, the man executes a leaping snap kick, one that moves the man in a lateral fashion. A speedy lateral fashion. That is he literally kicks Gus ten feet out the back of the ship's hatch, causing the unfortunate pirate to hit the landing ramp, smash his head on the decking, and pinwheel out of sight into the night. Tharyn looks out the hatch after his latest victim, narrowing his eyes behind the night-sighting visualizer built into his helmet mask, then punches the close control.

<< We warned him, >> he offers to Sapphira, heading back up the corridor past the redheaded woman toward his employer. << Boss! Uh, bad guys got shown the door! >>


The thing about proton bombs, actually, the thing about quite a lot of proton bombs is that they aren't particularly discerning about the precision of the damage they cause. They are much in favour of quantity. Staggering amounts of quantity. Utterly ridiculous amounts of quantity. The first batch of ordinance took apart the base, rivet by rivet, girder by girder, corpse by corpse. Sticky Finn Gus, removed from the now-disappearing Redline, didn't even have the dignity to hit the ground. The nuclear initiation simply consumed him like a Hutt eating an olive. What wasn't vaporized was shattered, and what wasn't shattered was clearly on the other side of the moon.

Which, speaking of 'other side of the moon', brings us to the next batch of ordinance. Did you know that proton bombs had their origin in specialized deep-core mining technology? When you want to crack a rock, you talk to Krupx, that's was the slogan. The next batch of ordinance shredded what little had survived the first round, boring deep craters into the remains of the Parmic Predator base, making and then exploiting severe structural integrity issues in the small moon upon which it lived. Sound doesn't carry in space, so aural replicators filled in the giant CRACK noise that occurred when the bonds between rock and rock went through conscious uncoupling. Many, many additional cracks followed, and what was figuratively shattered became literally shattered as the base and the metaphorical horse it rode in on went back to kingdom come.

In the glory that was pure annihilation, a limping X-Wing hopping into hyperspace was barely a hiccup on sensors.

"Thhmfffhh yhhh khhhnnnbhhlllyyhhh!" was Yan's response to Tharyn. At full throttle, and outrunning a fireball (he didn't look back, cool guys don't look at explosions) he let go of the controls with his mouth and breathed in sheer joy as his neck stopped hurting. <<"Alright,">> he said, over comms. <<"Let's go home.">>

The Planet Smasher was a complete success, and the Parmic Predators were literally wiped off the map. Today was a good day.