Log:The Shadowport: The Hapan-ing: Gotta Go Fast
You thought you could just fly away in your overpriced family van with its heated seats and sunroof?!
OOC Date: December 8, 2020
Location: Hapes
Participants: The Shadowport: Rale, Liz'diot, Ora, Kaavenn, Sapphira, and Zhu Yan as GM
The short story: Rale is a tiny Steve McQueen, Liz'diot causes collateral damage, Ora is bequeathed responsibility, Kaavenn MacGyver's a technical, Sapphira narrowly avoids hurling, Yan cops a mouthful.
The long story:
[20:00:06|Zhu Yan]
Would that it were so simple.
Setting aside the idiomatic complexities of the above phrase, the message behind it was correct. With the Retainment Demesne and the surrounding buildings literally up in smoke (you can see the plume from the hoverski resort across the valley!) there was no way the Skunkworks Team was going to have anything resembing a clean getaway. And clean it was not. It was dirty like Ryo Odessa's entire schtick.
Skunkworks Team was two elements now: Rale driving the overpowered and overpriced holosoccer airSUV with the added features like a sunroof and heated seats that happily accepted all the dinged and exhausted Shadowport members, and Zhu Yan in a set of shiny CNG Void Armour that fit him quite well (shut up Ryo) held aloft by his legendary enchanted jetpack. Well, it was a FormStar but it could carry him as fast as a small airspeeder and was twice as nimble so it'd do.
The third element to this equation, as Yan found out when he did a lazy aileron roll to check the rear and spotted them approaching rapidly, was the trio of black pursuit vehicles. No sirens. No markings. No warnings to stand down. Probably the owner of the Retainment Demesne they'd just bombed.
His unspoken suspicions confirmed, Yan let out a mirthless chuckle.
"<<Thorn, three pursuers. Cut across the noble district and head towards Star-sea Park,>>" instructed the jetpacking flyboy, unclipping his Bryar and holding on to it for dear life. "<<Pop some windows so the rest of the team can shoot at them. If we blow them up before the park, great. If not, we'll take 'em out when we arrive, ok ka?>>"
The team had a minute to breathe, they weren't in firing range yet, unless someone on the crew happened to be carrying a weapon designed for long-distance murder...
[20:07:02|Rale]
<<"Acknowledged.">> The normally-chatty Chadra-fan, still fully armored behind an opaque-seeming black helm, is entirely in his element, calmly turning the luxury hovercraft on a dime and diving down onto the street level, ducking around and through alleyways and parked vehicles to try and deny the pursuers a clean angle. He taps the console, and all the windows and sunroof roll down as he speaks aloud. "Alright team, need someone on the roof with the heaviest piece we have, rest of you on side window cover fire, this is gonna get real rough, and fast. Vas is a right beeeatch when you hack her off, and her men don't play."
[20:09:55|Liz'diot]
Liz didn't have a gun. He didn't even have one of his droids with him. He did, however, have some questionable explosive materials and a few breakable bottles that he could throw out a window... or hand to those who wanted to throw them out the windows.
"Fetid, of all the times for me to leave my grand army behind. Alas, I must move to set up mines for our persuers!" He starts to moves out to plant the explosives in the most stretegic of positions!
[20:17:52|Ora]
"Oh I ain't got the skills to go up top." So says Ora as she lifts her back end up off the seat to reach in behind her to unsling her slugthrower, free hand reaching out to lower the window down. Gun in hand she twists and gets up on one knee, leaning out of the window as she calls out, "So I guess this is what I'm doin'!" Leaning in on her ribs she slinks in her right arm back into the car to grip the back of her seat, steadying herself, "I do NOT understand the appeal of this for canines." Said as her hair whips back, cheeks fluttering as she thanks the stars she didn't wear fake lashes, or those'd be floppin' round all willy nilly.
[20:18:22|Kaavenn]
Pain. So much pain. He's not certain if he was shot because of the sword he won't let go, or because he blew a hole in that stained glass window. He spends time first slapping bacta patches on one handed. It hurts to breathe, bad. He's ignoring a faint gurgling sound from his right lung. Pain is merely weakness leaving the b- nope. No. This hurts. He spends the next moment struggling to get his armor on as the bacta and pain meds start doing their jobs. He still won't give up the sword. He's leaned back panting. It's all good. Everything is fine now. Then he hears Yan in his ear. There is a moan from the Shistavanen. He looks to the rest of the team. Liz? His head shakes, too risky. Rale? Another shake of the head, he's busy. Ryo is an unknown. Finally he looks to Ora. "Need. A favor." He shoves the Jyn'til sword at his new favorite tater. He labors to talk. "Lady Jynell needs to know. She needs to know I snagged this for her, okay? It'll even out a debt that's a few years old, I think." He doesn't mention any other potential debts, or that he was blackmailed, or a half a dozen other issues. He's too busy trying to prep one of two sniper rifles he brought.
The EZ Snap is left in the double rifle case. This one the size of a human. Instead out comes a large Merr-Sonn SX451... an Anti-Material rifle... damn near mobile Artillery. Kaavenn takes a new tab. This one a mix of calming agent as well as painkiller. First, the quick harness is strapped on to secure the gun to himself in case he loses his grip. Then, Kaavenn clambers up the open sunroof and braces himself. Hopefully not smacking someone with a tail in the process. He settles the bipod to the roof in the seam. His glowing red eyes focus. Time to give this a shot.
[20:25:50|Sapphira]
So, okay. This situation might be at least //partially// Sapphira's fault. She might even admit it herself that today was not her best showing. C'est l'vie. Well, vie for most of them. For Ryo, that remains to be seen. The currently-disguised Zeltron looks at the man's unconcious body with a flash of guilt before drawing her own weapon and leaning on the back seat for stability as she too opens fire. Even with the added stability, however, the wild swaying of the car chase means she probably just murdered a baby in an apartment building or something.
[20:29:49|Zhu Yan]
The gap closes, and the battle is joined.
A lance of pure death streaked from the top of the airSUV and pierced one of the fore repulsors of the pursuiing aircars. This caused it to hiccough into the path of a floating explosive device, which promptly reduced it to its constituent atoms and left behind a smoke cloud that Zhu Yan flew STRAIGHT THROUGH. A hacking coughing noise came through the comms from the smuggler who clearly forgot to turn on his environmentals, and he fell behind the pack as a result.
The highly incensed and particularly beautiful passengers of the remaining two aircars opened fire on the low-flying airSUV, encountering stiff difficulty when considering the Chadra-Fan's talents at aerial navigation. Still, blaster bolts stitched up the rear fendor, winging off a repulsor and causing some damage to the car's resale value.
[20:35:55|Rale]
Okay. Okay, things have officially gotten hairy. Inside his helmet, Rale swears as blaster bolts stitch up the car, one singing the panel RIGHT next to his face. He loses focus for a split moment, car scraping along the side of an incredibly expensive boat, crumbling it into a twisted mass. "Good shot! Watch the hands!" And he spins around one corner, then another, one of his repulsors dragging slightly and causing him to slow if he wants to keep up evasive maneuver. All the more creepy is that he has the headlights off, driving them in what passes for the 'dark' on Hapes. "Aim for the repulsors! At this speed, they can't recover from a hit." Never mind that he can't either...
[20:48:50|Liz'diot]
Liz cheers in sweet victory as one of the cards explodes. "YASSSSS. You can no possibly outsmart Liz'diot THE OMNISCIENT!" Picking up what looks like a heavily modified bottle of booze, he lights the fuze and then chucks it. It slides by one of the cars and explodes against a wall of a building, hopefully killing many homeless hapans in the process. "PHEWIE!"
[20:50:15|Ora]
Ora will glance down briefly as she sees something pretty being pushed her way, ducking back into the car briefly, backwards on the seat with her knees to the back of it, to eye the Shistavanen with a furtive burrow of her brow, "Oh, oh no, you ain't dying sweetheart, I mean, I'll keep this on me just to make you feel better 'bout things, but you die and I'mma sell this thing and blow it all on really dumb things, like ..you know. Puppies and shavit." Drawled out as she gives him a serious nod, taking the sword nonetheless and tucking it under her arm, pinning him with a last serious eyeballing, "You use that as incentive, right, and don't go dyin'."
Eyebrows loft upwards to make the point, a very faint ghost of a smile on her lips, "Suck it up, buttercup." Ducking back out the window she keeps her head down to avoid being shot by the others in the car, large eyes squinting as she draws her gun out again to focus her shot.
"Hey, where he goin'? You best not be abandonin' us, fat man!" Called out after Zhu as she watches him fall behind them, "Whoaaaaaa ...holy ...whatt..." The car scrapes that boat and she grunts, hugging her armpit down into the doorframe a little harder as she aims, "Oohh-hooo--kaaay." To Rale, or maybe not to Rale, it's hard to know even for her as he spins around that corner, her eyes widening briefly.
"People do this for fun!" Pew pew, off she sets two shots, trying to aim for the repulsors of car #2, NOT B5T-FRnD who is /no/ friend of hers right now, each shot finding their mark though she doesn't have time to celebrate, no -- she's clutching with one hand to the inside of the car with the other keeps a death grip on her weapon so she can line up again to shoot once more.
[20:59:19|Kaavenn]
<"I have a hole in my lung, smoke terrible things... and sound less harsh than that."> Kaavenn cannot resist the verbal shot towards Zhu Yan, it was throwing him off his rythm. He'd let out a grunt when he'd exploded that aircar, his version of celebration. The Aircar veers side to side at the Chadra-Fan's manuevering. <"Can't pop'em if you keep zipping and zagging instead of zigging."> He's distracted, between the other night, the chest wound, and Yan's Asthma.... he's distracted. Not good. There is blinking as things explode from Liz the not as Omniscient as he should have been.
For Ora he snorts. <"Do some hard drugs for me then? That thing is worth some serious glitterstim."> Kaavenn, were you assessing that blade's worth? Nooooo.... yessss. He blinks trying to focus. The scope lines up on his next victim. The firing stud given a lovers touch... betrayal. He starts snapping <"Damn it, Rale keep the-"> The transmission is lost, after all there are a LOT of horns beeping at them right now and they seems to coincide when Kaavenn speaks pretty much all his words. One thing is clear, he sounds angry, and not professionally cool. He breaks off, and tongues another tab of something illicit from the helmet dispenser.
[21:02:40|Sapphira]
The jerk of the vehicle has Sapphira momentarily plastered against a side-window like some sort of decorative quasi-sentient being with suction cups for appendages. It is from that position that she watches Liz's explosions popping up behind them. She pulls herself back into position to fire off another few shots. "We're never going to lose them making this kind of racket," she notes as an invitation for other ideas, even as her own actions further add to said racket.
At this point, the events of Scurry My Friends and Gotta Go Fast intersect!
[21:47:54|Zhu Yan]
As it was with opposites, though they attract, once they start understanding each other they repulse just as quickly. That's what was happening here. The interaction in the intersection flung Team Jynx and Team Zhu past each other in sheer happenstance, separating just as quickly as they had met after the resultant waves and head-nods and exchanged fire.
Yan springboarded off the doomed Vas aircar, letting it careen into a beautiful looking fountain, leaping through the blasterfire and spurred on by his jetpack on to the side of the next highly-stricken aircar. There was a thump, a priming of the Bryar, and the head of the driver turned into a messy pulp.
Watch out, he had a nasty case of Pwotagonist Syndwome today.
"I don't see any more pursuers! Thorn! Get the vehicle to the park and torch it!" ordered the flying fatman, launching himself off the final heavily-damaged vehicle that was doomed for the park itself. Oh man, Yan almost felt sorry for the designer because the aircar plowed straight into a gazebo and went up in flames. "<<Then scatter and lay low. Meetup is at the scheduled point in two days.>>"
[21:55:06|Rale]
"Right?! That lurch in your stomach, the spike of heat as a bolt almost gets you, the rush of the wind and whine of the engine? Shivit, I miss Swoop Racing, these days..." Rale grins aside to Ora, commiserating on their love of high-speed hijinks as they round that last corner and plow right through a series of carefully-cultivated flora shaped like statuesque women. Good riddance, as he aims for a small picnic area, filled with delightful benches and flowers. So pretty. So fragile. <<"Roger, Boss. Everyone brace, I am mostly bluffing with this thing.">> Indeed, the car is spitting sparks, half of the repulsors are sputtering, and something in the engine is smoking.
WwwwwWWHHHHIIIRCRRUUUNCH
In a skidding, screaming slide, the momvan takes out a half dozen benches, but at least doesn't quite flip as it finally stops in a massive flower bed. "Perfect. Thank you for choosing Thorn Taxi Services." He turns and bumps an armored fist with Ora if she allows, then rips off his driving stilts and grabs his carbine, ready to boogy out.
[22:00:11|Ora]
Ora totally allows that fistbump, only after she slid back in to buckle up and brace for impact, gun still held aloft in her hand as she pressed it against the dash, letting out a hootering hollar of sound, smile broad, "Hahaha, //yyesss//." Bump, there goes her fist in against his, belt unclipped and Ora sliding up and out that window, her door busted and not opening any time soon. Before she completely hops out the woman leans back in to grab Kaavenns' sword as her other hand re-holsters her gun, "You decide not to die, Kaav?" Asked as she sits on the door frame, looking over the rooftop to the Shista, "Or am I goin' on the lamest shoppin' spree ever." Eyes all aglimmer she grins and holds she sword up for the man to take.
[22:04:16|Kaavenn]
<<"Hey, uh guys?">> Kaavenn croaks into comms. <<"We just saw Jynell and Company, right?">> Kaavenn may be concerned he was hallucinating. Not so bad if it is the drug cocktail, terrible if it is the blood loss. So he is distracted again to turn into a Shistava-pinball inside the confines of the sunroof. He slumps down inside the vehicle once it's stopped moving. Physically at least. For him, everything is spinny, and he cradles the rifle trying to drag over the case with his right boot.
The rifle is put home, he can do that blindfolded, so he can do it potentially dying. <<"Not dead yet.">> He quips back at Ora. <<"Good job... driver... critter... thingie.">> Kaavenn is in rough shape from being beaten up by a momvan. He's climbing out of the van slowly. <<"Where did Fearless Leader go, he needs to take the damned thing to the Devil Woman.">> He looks at the sword, all three of them. Blinks glowing red eyes, tongues another tab... and then another from in the helmet. He takes the sword back with a tight grip. <<"Thanks.>> There's a glance for Sapphira and Liz <<"Don't stick around too long.">> Instructions, he had them.
[22:05:15|Sapphira]
"Brace? Brace for-" Sapphira starts to ask, but then there's skidding and crashing and the petite woman is thrown about the backseat and slammed against the side door, causing her to groan in displeasure. "What's wrong with just stopping?!" She demands, rather rhetorically, of Rale's driving. The tone of the question makes it clear that nothing needs be answered; she's just bishing. And now she's moving, lifting her legs to climb out the smashed-out window on the fountain-side of the car. She manages it, and even manages it almost gracefully. Once on her feet, she gives Kaavenn a two-fingered salute before turning down some alley or another.
[22:09:54|Zhu Yan]
And like that they were done. The smoking ruins of Thy Noble Steed, having graced (IE: ruined) Star-sea Park, stood as a monument to the death and destruction that the Skunkworks Team had brought about today. The group wisely scattered into the sunset, as authorities would be around in any moment.
Sapphira would go on to be a world-class stage musician, capable of escaping tiny spaces. Rale served as a getaway driver for many heists, raking in millions of credits and spending it all on overpriced jewelry and prize-fighters. Liz'diot was arrested promptly, and sent many love letters in prison. Yan rode off into the deep blue on his jetpack, with his beloved Bryar. Ora made a name for herself performing trick-shots at noble estates, and robbing them blind. Ryo bled out in the car. And Kaavenn, well, no one really knew what happened to Kaavenn. And that's how the story ends.
Except not really, because we're definitely not finished on this planet. Not yet.
