Ask [Anoat] No Alarm if They're All Dead

[Casany Praxor]

Spoiler: Music IC

“Screw you, Rawl.” Cas was rather explicit in her expression. “If I want to start my day by barking at you then it is what it is.”

“No doubt, Cap, just that maybe you should have started today with your hot cup of coffee?”

“Coffee?” Cas chortled. “You know what...eh...good point...”

The droid had a point. People were di'kuts, quite simply put, especially when it came to starting their day without coffee; as though this were an excuse to be a di'kut.

Shaking her head, Cas settled for settling in the cockpit of her Winged Pike, pinging the communication array toward one companion of an ally who had proven his iron and his steel and his blood and bone many times over again.

“Laren, this is Cas,” Cas began, rolling her eyes behind her viewscreen. “Seems like we do this dance every day… Well, come dance with me at these coordinates. I’m above Pujool at the edge of the Anoat sector. The Crypt awaits. As does my blaster.”

@Scoobert

 

[Laren Vano]

Sitting in the cockpit of The Unforced, Laren was flying to Pujool for the sake of a mission given by Kotii Solus. It was for the betterment of the Mandalorian race. So of course, Laren accepted this task for the sake of bringing strength to the Mandalorians. Plus, how could he pass up a mission with the great Cas? She had called to Laren through her comm link in the ship,

"Ahh. If it isn't Cas Praxor. It's been a long time.. Alright I'm on my way, ETA like a minute or so."

Laren was right outside the atmosphere as he gave his ETA. Bringing The Unforced in for landing next to the Winged Pike. He didn't say anything over the comms when he landed. He simply just left the cockpit and then his ship. He stood outside on the landing pad waiting for the other Mandalorian to come out. Laren was clad in his signature purple and black. He was eager to see the red and gold exit from the Winged Pike. It had been a long time since he had seen his friend, and he was ready to her again.

"Come on out now. We got work to do!"

@Die Shize

 

[Casany Praxor]

Spoiler: Music OOC

‘Like a minute or so.’

Cas blew the words through her lips before they met the rim of a flask. “So...an hour or so?”

Would that Laren Vano could see her grin. Soon enough… The woman took a much more hearty swig that time. Be reunited with my vod...soon enough…

Like a minute or so later—maybe an hour or so, timekeeping not presently one of Casany’s strong suits—the ramp of the Winged Pike lowered and a strong suit stepped out.

Red-gold beskar, a golden sagum draping down, the black anvil of Anvil and the gold star of Praxor on either pauldron. One might write a song about Clan Praxor, a poem about Casany Praxor, but as bloody beautiful and beautifully bloody either would be she had just then squared up against Laren Vano.

Oh, they had ‘squared up’ before, back in a certain cage fight, but here the two Mandalorians were standing face to face. It’s been a long time… It had indeed, though so undeniable was the purple-black armor erected from earth like a stalwart statue come to life.

“Laren Vano…” Cas called casually, halting her walk some feet in front of the man. She looked down, looked up. “Still alive, huh?”

@Scoobert

 

[Laren Vano]

There she was. She had finally come out of that dreaded ship. The Mandalorian duo of Laren and Cas were finally reunited. At long last. She was in her signature red and gold, he was just enjoying seeing her come out in her beskar before she decided to hit him with a quip real quick. It was amusing to see she hadn't lost her since of humor. The younger of two Vano's would scoff as he would sarcastically respond,

"I could say the same for you. You disappeared on me. We could use your talent's on Mandalore. We are coming so close to reclaiming our home world."

The two Mandalorians would stand face to face, well helmet to helmet that is. The faces would remain under beskar as they were on mission. A mission that Laren was eager to start but somethings took priority. Like trying to convince his old friend to fight for a just cause. The cause.

"I don't care where you've been hiding.. but we need you. At home. I'd be lying if I said I don't miss you being around. My brother could attest to that as well. I hope you come around."

@Die Shize

 

[Casany Praxor]

Spoiler: Music OOC [Recurring]

Disappeared… The word was salty, sour; the kind of sensation that did not settle well on the lips or the tongue and might induce vomit if swallowed. Is that what...happened to me? Was I gone for that long..?

Dismissing the musings, glad in her vulnerability that Laren could not see her expression, Cas gave her old friend the glare that only a Mandalorian’s visor could give. Cause… What cause did I have for disappearing?

“Well…” She began, gingerly, as though saying the wrong thing could make her vanish from thin air all over again. “...Suffice to say that I have indeed been away but...but I am here now…”

WIth that, she crept closer, enough steps until she could reach an arm out and slap Laren across the helmet if so inclined. Of course, that went both ways. Just like old times.

Even at this distance, their faces were naught but black mirrors, and that was enough. For us, for you and me, it always has been.

“I am home.”

@Scoobert

 

[Laren Vano]

She knew she was gone for a while, it was obvious. She had accepted it and now she was ready to move on. Cas had finally come back and now it was just like old times. Laren was ready to begin moving forward with his friend by his side. He would look at her through his beskar helmet's visor, and with a nod say

"Well god, I am glad. Now it is time for us to get the show on the road.. What do you suggest? Climbing up or sneaking through? The option is yours."

Laren would turn his attention to the building they were outside of. It was time to successfully enter the prison and complete their mission. The younger of two Vano's stood by the last Praxor and prepared for the first step in their infiltration. Stealth was definitely the better option, though if she knew Laren well enough, she would know he was fine with going in guns blazing with a full force assault. The job is inside, so standing outside was not doing anything for them.

@Die Shize

 

[Casany Praxor]

Spoiler: Music OOC

The two warriors had caught each other, had caught up, and it wasn’t much but it was enough. They could catch up properly after the job and share shots between drinking and punching (perhaps).

Right now their reason for coming together was to free some prisoners. And clobber some di’kuts.

As Laren turned to face the building, Cas came to stand beside him and follow his gaze. She studied the facility with all the assets of her visor, trusting that her partner was doing the same.

They were two more than formidable warriors, Mandalorians and all, but two would not be enough to storm a prison complex like that one.

“Guns blazing sounds like the kind of fun we’re used to having...but it won’t work against a fort like this. That said, see those guards on the walls? Not many and they’re spread far enough apart. Solid sign that they don’t have the numbers to cover every square inch.”

That was key intel. Lack of personnel was already in the Mandalorians’ favor, and that advantage was amplified by the facility being vast so offering plenty of room to navigate without being seen.

“We sneak in, take out targets, release the inmates and be back in home in time for whiskey. Sound good?”

Cas would wait for Laren’s response before making any moves. Now was his only chance to offer input, questions or alternative suggestions, before the pair would head in.

@Scoobert

 

[Arthos Vizsla]

Sneaking into a prison felt like something that was being done in reverse by someone who knew the location but didn't actually know their part in a scripted holodrama. Speaking of badly scripted holodramas, Arthos had landed shortly after Casany and shortly before Laren, which meant he got to stand off to one side and feel like a third wheel as they kind of just... flirted with each other.

Badly.

He didn't have enough personal experience to say he could do better but even he would be hardpressed to say that he could do worse. So he didn't say anything, instead just moving toward the compound itself. As secure as places like this were, there were some areas and ways of access that even the most secure could not truly guard against. Did Arthos have the skills required to scale the sheer walls? Absolutely not.

But he didn't need to be able to scale a sheer wall when the facility had a pipe that exited through the wall. The pipe was nothing as pleasant as a water pipe or even a sewage pipe - it was a pipe for expelling gas. Specifically, the types of gas breathed and exhaled by creatures and aliens that could not breathe oxygen, which meant it was toxic to him and it came out at speed.

Cutting through the grating with his vibroknives, he dodged to the side as it was propelled violently by the force of the gas. Gritting his teeth, he pulled himself in, clinging on for dear life... before activating his mag boots. Now unable to be blown clean out of the pipe, he began to slowly advance deeper through the pipe with the advantage of his mag-boots.

On the com-link inside his helmet he reported.

"This is Vizsla - I'm moving in."

@Darasuum @Die Shize @Scoobert

 

[Kotii Solus]

Kotii wasn't wearing his flightsuit anymore. Instead he was clad in his bounty hunter layered armor. The lictor class dungeon ship had been captured and the air support dismantled. Jamming their communications would at most put them on alert but would prevent them from calling out to other systems for more aid or even reaching the edge of the system without a significant boost to their signal. That wasn't going to happen though.

Over three thousand prisoners onboard were healthy and eager to take the fight to the Zann Consortium. There was not a lot to outfit them with accept for the equipment the slavers had. Those that did not have anything were still fine with fisticuffs, especially the wookiees.

Under the Alor's direction, he delegated lieutenants to have these, neo-liberators, to also have communications. The plan was for some of the prisoners, disguised as the former dungeon ship crew, would lead the other prisoners into the other parts of the prison. Approximatly five hundred of the neo-liberators were equiped with armor scavanged from the crew in decent enough condition to not warrant suspicion. About twice as many had blasters which would be kept hidden until the signal was given.

The words of Arthos were heard inside the badger's helmet but he was not too far from the young Mandalorian. Aden and Atin were going to see to towards directing the others while he and Arthos unlocked the rest of the prisoners together. <"Right behind you."> The Alor may have caught his fellow Mandalorians off guard, but that would teach them to stay on their toes. His old man tended to do the same to him even when he was out hunting as a kid. He used his armor's grapple launcher to follow Arthos and then the ascension gun attachment on his R-799.

On the Mandalorian's back he had a holster for his micro-missile pistol for later. The relatively silent weapon was still fairly large for what technically counted as a sidearm at over half a meter in length. But the Mandalorian loved the weapon all the same. On either hip he had his personal pair of westar-35 blaster pistols. They had built in flash suppressors making them harder to spot even once the fighting got loud. Their magnetic grips coupled with Kotii's magna-gloves would keep them from ever leaving his grip. Not to mention their short length and light weight allowed for fast and easy draw with either hand. Further more he could gush about their accuracy for hours if given the chance. It even eclipsed one of his favored blasters made by Blackwell. Despite being left hand dominant, the now cybernetic limb had led the Alor to become begrudgingly more ambidextrous. It was a clear weakness he had but was now getting up to being faster and steadier with his right.

@Nefieslab

 

[Arthos Vizsla]

The Solus Alor was so good at sneaking around that it was almost the most frightening thing about the other man.

Almost only because there were any number of other, equally viable, reasons to be frightened of the other Mandalorian when you thought about it for longer than a few moments. Glancing over his shoulder, Arthos confirmed that, yes, Kotii was making his way up on his Six and he had mostly been ignorant of it until he confirmed it.

Mostly because there had been a niggling sensation at the back of his neck but he had mostly chalked that up to his own nerves. He supposed sometimes those nerves were right to warn him about danger coming up on him from behind. Nodding in acknowledgement to Kotii, Arthos continued his trek down the entrance he had picked until he reached an emergency maintenance valve.

The kind of thing that was designed to never actually open from the inside.

Raising his blaster pistol in one hand, he readied a vibroknife in the other before taking careful aim and squeezing the trigger. The heavy blaster shot of the pistol gouged a chunk out of the metal of both the hatch and the metal it was built into, giving him enough of an angle to jam his knife up into the gap. With that angle, he was able to build up enough momentum to cut through the lock that held the hatch closed without breaking the entire hatch.

Anything bigger might have spoiled the element of surprise they had before they were ready so Arthos was able to quickly open the hatch. With the hatch in the ceiling of the pipe open, he immediately waved Kotii over as he laced both of his hands together and braced himself to give the other Mandalorian a boost up and through the hatch that would allow him to exit with at least one weapon in hand immediately.

@Darasuum

 

[Kotii Solus]

Kotii winced at the loud sound of Arthos's blaster. His helmet turned to look back the way they had come but likely the sound had not been heard by anyone. If it had, it was only a single shot that echoed away from the base. Kotii was wishing he had a fusioncutter in that moment but Arthos made due with his vibroblade and pistol combo.

Getting ready, he turned and saw the Vizsla was ready. Nodding he placed one foot in the gloved grip before pushing up and past the lip of the hatch. Using a free hand to help guide himself up, the Alor came into the hall in a crouched position. Bringing his right hand over to his left forearm, the guard with his back to Kotii several meters away was struck a heartbeat later by a knee-mounted dart launcher.

Ahead there was the security center off on a short side corridor that had another entrance on the far side of it. But that room itself held the controls they were needing to access. There did not seem to be anybody else ahead of the badger so he began making his way closer to the security center. The loading of the prisoners would be under way by this point which would be drawing some attention.

Inside the security center were two guards, one of them was a trandoshan while the other was a burly looking weequay. Behind them were two droidekas. Three astromech units of different models and modifications moved about on the terminals with restraining bolts affixed to them. The droidekas even had their shields active and were as alert as ever. Thermal detonator was out of the question and so was ionizing shots if there was any expectation for the terminals to work. Kotii relayed this information to the fellow Mandalorian quietly.

<"You take the far guard after I draw his fire. Then focus on the far droideka." He said. Without waiting for the relative neophyte to respond, the Alor of House Solus dashed into the room. The nearst was the weequay. His wrinky eqpression was one of surprise as Kotii brought his vibroblade across his neck, leaving him clutching it as he fell to the floor.

The Mandalorian did not slow down and was running straight towards the closest droideka at the back of the room. It's twin dual-blaster cannons primed to fire before he ducked and rolled to the droideka's right. It's partner fired similarly, trying to track the evasive attacker. But their shooting was poor so suddenly at such short range. Soon the remaining guard and droideka would find themselves aiming at the bubbleshield of the one Kotii had charged. It's tripod like construction made its slow turn radius a weaknesss. Pings of blaster fire impacting and weakening the droid's shield continued as Kotii drew the attention of the main guard. If Arthos dispatched the trandoshan and the other droideka, then the Solus could kill the one he was practically grinding against with his vibroblade.

@Nefieslab to make it interesting, success

 

[Arthos Vizsla]

The blaster bolt was loud but a lot less loud than the gas rushing past them at speed – he was just glad he had checked to make sure none of said gases were actually combustible. Otherwise their stealth mission would have ended quickly in a massive explosion that the guards likely would have thought was a more dangerous type of gas leak.

With Kotii up and through the hatch, Arthos waited two seconds for the Mandalorian to clear the area before climbing up and through the hatch himself. Thankfully he was skinny as well as tall so it was fairly easy for him to get his lanky frame out of the gas tunnel.

And he was very glad to have been able to pull himself out of the tunnel – he had been beginning to get rather cramped in the tunnel.

Following Kotii’s lead, Arthos didn’t hesitate to throw himself into danger once Kotii had engaged to draw fire. Sprinting into the room, he fired once with his blaster pistol, bringing the surprised Trandoshan down to one knee as his left knee gave out on him. Rushing forward, Arthos pressed the barrel of his pistol right up against the downed guard’s right eye before blasting twice, splattering the brains of said guard across the wall.

Discarding his pistol for speed, he drew his knife as he rolled forward until he was within the shield bubble of the droideka across from Kotii. Jamming his knife into it’s spine-like back, he twisted with his entire body, dragging the droid’s fire onto it’s fellow droid until it was dashed to pieces by the powerful blasters. Twisting and yanking his knife from side to side, Arthos cut the power supply of the droideka he had been grappling with and it slumped, powered down.

Arthos took a deep breath before muttering a curse in Mando’a as he rushed over to pick up his blaster pistol from where he had dropped it on the ground.

“The clan’ll kill me if I’ve dented it… shrak!” he muttered before turning back to Kotii, “S-sorry. Got distracted by my blaster for a moment – should we decommission the astromech too?”

@Darasuum Nat 20 baby

 

[Kotii Solus]

Things went better than planned. Before the shield of the droideka near Kotii dropped, Arthos was pressing his blaster pistol against the side of the Trandoshan's head and executing him in quick and brutal fashion. Bringing his blade around and into power supply of the war machine like Arthos, he twisted the vibrating weapon and pulled it sideways out off, drawing black oily fluid with the wrenching motion. The remaining shield flickered then dropped and so too collapsed the combat droid.

Kotii looked around, double checking the bodies. A pool of blood still expanded around where the weequay lay. Steadying his heartbeat and breathing, the Alor made his way closer to the controls and the astromech droids. "Let's see if we can get them to help first? See if there's a handheld control for them on one of the guards." The machines had restraining bolts. Kotii cleaned off his vibroknife against his pant leg and resheathed it before patting down the corpses.

Sure enough, the weequay had a small control device. Using that, he commanded the droids to open up access to the rest of the Crypt. Interfering with communications would prevent the internal security forces from cooridnating with one another. Opening up his channel to the other Mandalorian force the signal would be relayed to the disguised troops. "All Mandalorian brothers and sisters, let's free our kin and take everything from the slaving bastards. Oya!"

With that said, the defenses of the fortress prison of Pojuul, known as the Crypt, would be the last resting place of many Zann Consortium. Turning back to Arthos, a smile came across Kotii's face and clearly shown through his tone. "I know that blaster still shoots. Let's hunt." The duo weren't just going to sit back and watch the rest of the raid either.

End Thread​

@Nefieslab