6013 Void Rangers Chapter 1 - For Want of a Strawberry [IC]

[Chevaleresse]

Everyone currently on the comms was treated to a gutteral roaring with the occasional loud chittering intermixed, a masked, roaring alien taking up his allotted portion of their viewscreens as Sigurdr opined on the new arrival. Loosely translated, the alien's statement in Basic would sound as follows: "You pathetic [Derogatory reference toward a Ganglari who has lost their arms in a ritual amputation], you dare to threaten our force with your pathetic excuse for a vessel? I have seen children that made more convincing pirates than you! You insult my entire species with your flimsy display! Power down all of your non-life support systems or be slagged!"

[Hal Henderics]

"Zzz... Zzzz..."  Sojie snores, still sleeping in some oft forgotten bunk.

[rustytengo]

Scrag made his way back to where they stored his mech technically he was a pilot even if his was really only suited for ground combat, but maybe he could jump on the other ship at some point or at least smack any enemy who came in here. Yeah that would be fun. With these thoughts in his mind Scrag got into Smasher and opened the com "Hrr, Scrag in Smasher waiting commands Capt'en." he said waiting.

[kj1225]

Roberts sighed before trying to think of if he's EVER heard of anyone like... this.

[Yours Truly]

Giocomo almost laughed out loud after he heard his colleague's incoherent screeching. It was just so damn loud and irate and... and he quietly wondered if there would be a way to defuse this situation peacefully if the pirate actually managed to understand whatever that was...But of course he quickly realized that he was in fact a vaguely threatening looking human male with elite commando training, and that right now he is piloting an extremely well armed mecha that he may or may not have...ahem 'convinced' the quartermaster to provide additional weaponry for in exchange for certain goods and services.

 

(Although to be brutally honest what sort of idiot would decide that it would be a good idea to give a man who is literally code named "Firefight" and marked as a ranged weapons specialist a fucking broadsword and warhammer anyway?.)

 

But anyway that was besides the point he was trying to think make, and of course that point would be that Giocomo was a soldier first and a diplomat sometime after the (thankfully not nuclear) fallout had settled, and that this would be a great time for him to not laugh and instead make damn sure to surreptitiously get the pirate's destroyer in his sights and mark it as a potential target for his ARTEMIS missile system.

 

In short he was as ready for the inevitable ass reaming that one would expect from going against the wishes of an enemy craft that just might be backed up by a dozen just like it for all he knew about the situation.

[Strider]

Quote

"Attention all crew members, this is the Captain speaking. Ready the Eclipse EMP Blasters. Pilots, prepare for battle."

 

Ciara shut off her iPad, jumped up, and hurried down the halls to an elevator, taking her one deck lower. She passed by one of the doors, that cannon was already manned. The next was not, so she stepped in to the box, before entering the startup code. She made sure not to move the barrel of the weapon, since that would might be seen as too aggressive, and the monitors showed no hostilities as of yet. Once the cannon she had manned was online, Ciara turned on the intercom to listen to the chatter going on through the ship. ". . .[Incomprehensible Roaring]". Well. Sounded like negotiations were expiring.

Edited October 8, 2017 by Strider

[LucidRain]

Regi sighed in exasperation. So a few things happened just then.

Firstly, some cheap knock-off pirate decided to attack them. From the transmission he had just received, it was obvious that this new ship wasn't even trying to be a real pirate. Regi guessed it was either some brass' cheap knock-off tactic to test their new JTF toy, or it was real pirates' cheap knock-off attempt to distract them from maybe another contingent waiting to ambush them. Either way, it was probably best to hit up a scan of the surrounding areas, just to make sure. He stopped his security program optimisation (with a groan that it probably will never get done at this rate), and started up a full scan of the ship's surroundings again.

Then, some idiot decided to transmit and open channel taunt over to the pirates in some garbled bug-a-nese. At least when Regi used vanian, it was quite clear at least half of it was swear words. Added upon that, Regi was pretty sure that the ability to transmit messages to the a potential enemy was probably reserved for the captain ONLY. Hopefully, whoever decided to hurl insults whom no-one understood would probably get kicked out of this JTF group. "And they call ME the unprofessional one. Bosh'tet." As he boarded the Rogue Entity, he opened the crazy bug's report, and added to the end 'Staggeringly stupid.'

 

He brought the ship online, and dragged it out of the ship's hangar. "Wake up, Felix." He said, pulling out a micro-disk and inserting it into a hidden compartment. After a few moments, his ship's well... technically 'AI' flickered to life. Its icon was simplistic, a green circle with two smaller white circles to serve as rudimentary eyes. Regi had salvaged 'Felix' from an old industrial tech-dump, a degrading Superintendent-class AI which was abandoned after it had run well out of its lifetime and began to decay. It had been a little side-project he had been working on, to try to repurpose Felix into a much more sized-down version of a ship's dumb AI.

To be perfectly honest, it wasn't quite worth it. Felix took up quite a lot of processing drag, so she was limited to a ship. And her only function currently was to vocally inform him of dangers and give useless advice. She was a little annoying, and she took passive-aggressive pot-shots at him every so often, but Regi enjoyed the small amount of company in an otherwise solitary work of a hacker.

 

"Registering pilot. Welcome back, Phantom." The eyes turned into upper green half-circles to represent a happy 'hello'. Regi simply nodded in response. Hopefully, this thing will run more than a few cycles. He steered the ship to face their newest offender and activated the ship's cloaking unit. "Detecting a possible hostile entity. Recommendation: Activate Phase Cloak." Felix chirped, completely oblivious to what he had just done.

"Try to process that faster next time." Regi grumbled.

"Command acknowledged. Diverting power to optimise hostile detection subroutine." With that, the entire ship started to shut down of its own accord, supposedly diverting ALL power to its processing.

Regi sighed. "Limit optimisation to marginal power reserves, and make that the default setting."

The ship regained power again, Felix chirping again, "Command acknowledged. Recommendation: provide more information next time."

 

Regi squinted, not knowing if the AI had just mocked him intentionally or not. Nah, too dumb to. He switched to to silent mode and readied the hacking probe launcher, in case the 'pirate ship' decided to do something hostile.

 

 

Edited October 8, 2017 by PigeonOfAstora

[Cool Girl]

Norma is annoyed at herself Great! I'm with these buffoons. Nonetheless she does her best to chime in with her team-mates.

[DragonRage]

Regi's second scan bears fruit!  It looks like a bunch of assault shuttles (and civilian shuttles with snazzy paint jobs) have drifted in close to the Crescent while the pirate was blustering.  The clever bastard put them on a ballistic intercept course before he revealed himself and started talking!

 

Ciara reaches and powers up the Eclipse cannon without incident.

 

Giocomo achieves a target lock on the pirate's Vanguard Destroyer.

 

Roberts makes a Knowledge: Space Pirates check!  23!  Roberts doesn't recognize these guys specifically, which means they're either new or not very successful.  However, he does notice that the pirate vessel seems to be modified to look a lot shabbier than it actually is, a common trick in less safe regions of the galaxy.

 

A grizzled sergeant slams open the door to Sojie's bunk.  "Get up you swabs," he yells, "We're under attack!  Stand by to repel boarders!"

 

Scrag enters his mecha and asks for orders.   The flight lieutenant orders him to go out and check the hull for hacking probes, boarding shuttles, etc.  Scrag exits the hanger, turns left, and loses some paint to a drab assault shuttle heading for the hanger he just left!  The shuttle is clearly not one of the Crescent's.

 

Sigurdr's rage and La Lune's reasonable suggestions don't seem to daunt the pirate captain.  "Yarr.  I'd suggest you control yer pet, lest I make y'all walk the plank when I take your shiny ship instead o' maroonin' ya somewhere!  Yar!"

[Yours Truly]

Giocomo found his right hand naturally wandering towards the firing controls of the mecha once more before moved to mute his voice from the pirate captain's conference call. He would then aim the rest of his weapons at the pirate captain's destroyer and put his fingers directly on the button that would fire his ARTEMIS missiles. And he continued to wait for the good captain La Lune to finally tell everyone to open fire.

[IntSys]

And there it is.

"Eclipse EMP Blasters, fire at the enemy ship's front! Pilots and all other units, fire at will! We'll smash this damned joke of a pirate! And, of course, feel free to verbally assault your enemies." La Lune made another broadcast, rallying the crew into combat. Then, she stood up from her seat and quickly left for the hull by taking the elevator down.


Captain's Rally (12): You may attempt to increase every crew member on board's morale, increasing PCs' damage and improving NPCs' efficiency, by making a [Charisma Bonus] + [Knowledge] check. Difficulty and effectiveness decided by the GM.

[LucidRain]

"Bosh'tet. If you want to create a diversion then don't half-ass it."

Obviously, this pirate was a very arrogant bastard, or he was just starting. Either way, he would care less.

Regi reacted swiftly, compiling the data of the scan, coordinates and vessel types, and sent it to his data bank on the Crescent where it would automatically distribute the data to all relevant personnel. He personally pushed a message to Lil' Lulu to get her attention. "Cap', this guy's packin more than he's showing." To be perfectly honest, Regi didn't even know why HE was the one who was scanning and detecting other hostile entities. Was everyone ELSE too incompetent to see through this half-assed tactic? Regi desperately hoped not, lest he felt like his life was probably going to end very, very soon.

 

"Alright, time to pop some pimples." He quipped, locking on the closest shuttles with the drone and LE cannons.

"Recommendation: seek assistance from infirmary for facial pustules" Felix offered.

Regi heaved a sigh. Please tell me this is not one of those overused 'I do not understand humor' tropes.

"It's a saying. Now shut up and highlight the targets on my HUD."

No response from Felix, though some shuttles were painted with blaring red. "...Felix?"

"The command 'shut up' was recognised as a command to mute the audio module."

If she used half her subroutines in actual processing instead of sassing me, then she'd probably be much more of a help.

"Don't shut up, then. And next time we're back on the laxer, import a 'humor' database."

Now that was sorted, (honestly, Regi didn't know why he still bothered), he turned his attention back to the shuttles. The Rogue Entity was still cloaked, and firing the LE cannons would blow it out of its cover. Rather than put himself into such a position, it would better if he practiced flash-hacking the shuttles.

 

Quick Reflexes grants Regi extra action the first turn.

Fire 1 hacking drone to nearest shuttle. If successful, initiate a Flash Hack.

Flash Hack - Pilfer on-board database and take over navigation systems. Make a check of [23+14] against a GM determined difficulty

 

Edited October 26, 2017 by PigeonOfAstora

[kj1225]

Roberts switches to a channel just for the team.

"Be careful guys, his ship isn't as shitty as it looks. Pretty common for pirates in these kinds of... uh nevermind."

Roberts fires his 60MM cannon at the pirate.

[Yours Truly]

Giocomo had a queer smile on his face when he shouted out "Euthaniasia missile launched!"....right after the container jutting out of his mecha's left shoulder swiftly popped open with a burst of previously contained atmosphere. And a single ARTEMIS missile flew out to seek it's target. (ARTEMIS MISSILE launched at the Pirate)

He would then perform a flurry of movements inside of his cockpit to maneuver his mecha's hand held 20mm cannon towards it's new target before he fired an eight round burst at them. (20mm cannon fired at an eight round burst at the Pirate. Also Giocomo would try and dodge the shots fired at his mecha, and not try to block them).

Edited October 27, 2017 by Cronos5010

[rustytengo]

"Err ship heading towards the hanger. Smashing time." Scrag said over the coms and then proceeds to attempt to smack the assault ship with his mechs hammer. 

attempts to smash said assault ship with hammer.

Edited October 27, 2017 by rustytengo

[IntSys]

"Shuttles?" La Lune took a look at the scan. "Figures. About as much as a pirate could muster. Still well within prediction," she said to herself. She then replied "Glad to see you being useful, though it's nothing beyond our abilities."

Truth was, it didn't matter much to the captain's strategy. There was no reason not to take the first strike, as whatever counterattack the pirate's forces could muster wouldn't strike swiftly enough in order to perform an effective ambush. The alternative was to wait and see, which, would just present the initiative to the attackers.

Of course, she omitted all that in her message. Might as well as to boost the lil' Vanian's confidence somewhat, right?


Hopefully, the pilots did not need her to teach them how to do their jobs.

[Strider]

"Copy that, Captain La Lune." Ciara responded crisply to the captain's orders, reaching up to tap in the firing sequence to the EMP cannon. A few keystrokes, and the aiming reticle appeared. She carefully scanned the main enemy ship, and fired a pulse at it. "Firing at the primary pirate target."

 

Possibly relevant.

Spoiler

 

Crippling Aim: After landing a hit on an enemy, reduce their evasion by  [Char Level] for a turn. Triggers once per turn.

Impending Violence: Ciara has a talent for telling when violence will break out, and acting quickly. Gets an extra [level/4] (rounded up) actions on the first turn of combat, split between party members. Cannot give more than one extra action to a single person.

 

[LucidRain]

But apparently, it's beyond your level of intelligence.

"Well, Cap', some of the vessels look pretty civilian. Depending on how many tricks this pony has, we might be looking at hostages, pirate tactics and all. If your strategy involved destroying everything with flak, well, just to let you know, may be a bad idea". Regi painted the re-furbished civilian vessels purple. He didn't know for sure, of course. Only after his hacking probe hit would he be able to tell the vessels' inside situation. He just had a hunch, if he was a pirate pulling stuff like this, he'd probably do the same sort of thing.

 

"Energy signatures from friendly vessels detected." Felix informed as Regi looked disapprovingly at the general direction of the captain deck.

It was a pretty obvious observation, if the white-hot pulses from the ships were not evidence enough. But he might as well test out Felix's capabilities a bit more. If she was only capable of visible observations, then he had no use for her on board the ship. "Yeah? Calculate potential trajectories and determine target."

The green avatar narrowed its 'eyes' to indicate her processors. He took a sip from the suit's emergency induction port as he waited a little for the AI to spout out an answer. "Most trajectories seem to indicate the target of the main hostile vessel."

"Good job." He said dryly, looking even more disapprovingly at the Crescent.

 

Because the word ''ballistic intercept trajectory' doesn't mean a thing to them.

Regi shook his head. 'Prediction' and 'action' should come hand in hand. If the captain had these sorts of situation in her 'prediction', then it was also her job to dictate their next 'action' accordingly to best have a reaction ready to such a circumstance. Obviously, right now their 'action' was to act as if there was no vessels in intercept range and fire blindly at a literal decoy, and 'prediction' proved 'true' had been pushed to second priorities. For now, he'd have to wait and see how first contact will pan out. Hopefully, flak will take care of the most hazardous ones, and the captain had the smarts to hold fire on the civilian vessels...

 

[IntSys]

"Were they to use hostages as bargaining chips, they would've come along with the pirate's ship first, rather than later. Negotiating with hostages would be done before actually engaging, no? Sending shuttles with hostages as reinforcements would at best make it seem like they have the numerical advantage, which, at that point, they might as well as just use the real deal by attaching a few cannon modules," La Lune responded again. It felt strange that a Petty Officer was actively discussing with her, and she, for some reasons, decided to take her time to respond.

"You should also realize that if there are hostage shuttles, they're most likely going to be either unmanned and set on a course for collision, or manned and hostile. Should we put our energy to preserving these hostage shuttles, we would be severely handicapped with our firepower held back - exactly what the pirates would want."

"Let's say if there are hostages. The best course of action would still be knocking out their ship. The flagship and the captain of a band of pirates are what hold the band of pirates together. Its front shield displays that it is at least trying to preserve itself, so we can tell that it's not merely fodder. They'd need the ship to carry the haul, too. Once the pirates start to disperse, we can then attempt to reel the hostage shuttles into the hangar safely."

"The flak may shoot down hostile shuttles, which may very well have hostages in them. However, at the same time, the flak also provides covering fire for our pilots, who risk their lives in the front. You may hold the lives of the possible hostages above the pilots', but I don't, and they probably don't, as well, seeing how they aren't greenhorns."

"Anything else?"

[Chevaleresse]

Sigurdr's voice rumbled across the comms systems again, thankfully with less roaring and more Galactic Basic. "Attempting to intercept hostile boarding parties," he stated simply - if gruffly, and punched his engines, his fighter on a trajectory that would give him proper firing angles on the shuttles closest to the ship. 

 

Try to shoot out the engines of the assault shuttles closest to the ship with my machine gun.

[LucidRain]

Regi was a little creeped out by her detailed response. He was pretty sure he only thought out the whole "don't only shoot the main pirate ship" part.

So she can read minds? She either has a processor powerful enough to read voice signatures, or she's psychic.

Regi grunted. Well, psychic or not, she did have a point. A pirate would most likely not put precious cargo in a collision course. Regi was annoyed that a yana had just schooled him, but then again, he was a least a little bit relieved that the captain knew her stuff. Or he was being an idiot. Either way, he had nothing better to do, so he may as well just keep talking. The captain, as he saw from her profile, was perfectly capable of chatter along with her other tasks.

"So by 'don't preserve hostage shuttles', you mean 'feel free to blow up hostages'? I mean, yeah sure, that doesn't inconvenience me. I just thought it would make a bad first impression for a JTF, and I don't know how brass is gonna react to that.

And besides, if it isn't hostages, I reckon it's probably explosives. If it's a one-man stand this guy's doing, he probably cleared out civilian shuttles, chocked it full of bombs and send it over our way. If I was a pirate, that's probably how I'd handle being against superior firepower. Sure - we can kill the shoddy-ass boshtet, but we have paint scratched, you know?"

 

[IntSys]

"By that, I don't mean intentionally blowing up hostages, but rather not putting extra effort to rescue them or filtering them out from shuttles without hostages during an engagement. Once the pirates are defeated, we will be in a better position to rescue hostages. Until then, moderate casualties are unavoidable and necessary for the success of the mission as a whole."

"As for suicide shuttles, we have interceptor missiles that will set them off mid-flight should they prove to be heading straight at us. Speaking of that, you'll have to make yourself useful again for that." La Lune noted. While it was easy to chat while monitoring the battlefield for her, she couldn't say the same for Regi. Actually discussing with a lower officer on nearly equal grounds had soften her slightly, but she was quick to realize the fact and attempted to push the Vanian back to duty, instead of him trying to be a tactical adviser out of nowhere.

[Swampellow]

Upon hearing the chatter on the comms, Shi'fan began to move towards the nearest hanger, pulling out her crossbow. If they were going to attempt to board them for whatever reason, she was going to be ready for them.