Only Static

[Azog Vang]

In a spot of thick brush Azog knelt, gazing through the lenses of his helmet at the communication facility that sat around twenty meters from the vegetation line. In their current position - Azog and his two Sith compatriots, that is - were entirely hidden from the view from the potential prying eyes of the building.

The squad's task was to disable the facility and therefore render any attempt by its occupants to warn of their coming. It was a simple task, or at least it seemed so to Azog, though he didn't entirely approve of the tactic. Should it have been him leading the army, Azog would have marched all of his troops straight to the doorstep of his enemies - daring them to throw their lives away in an attempt to stop him.

As it sat though, Azog was not the ruling of the Old Empire. He was but a single cog in a massive machine, and for now he would do his part to see that OE ventures saw success. "The facility is likely not heavily guarded." Azog said to his partners, his eyes still on the building. "I see two ways. Group through the front and take it by force or split up, two serving as a distraction while the third navigates through the shadows to disable the facility alone."

Azog didn't care either way, but for the mission to succeed it was better to have everyone on the same page. If he had learned anything about the aliens of this part of the galaxy, it was that many of them relied on "teamwork" to succeed.

"We have only a short time. Decide."

@Critas @Tundra

 

[CrVoss]

They stood at the door step of liberation. The coming assault by the Old Empire depended on the success of their mission. He regarded Azog as an equal when he spoke, one of the three Sith stationed amid the foliage.

There is great power in numbers, he said. Indicating towards the front door of the station. Though seemingly unguarded, the key role the station played meant that there was great stake involved. It would not be surprising if they encountered a skilled warrior. We should take the facility by force, I don't want to waste any time. If one of us is cut off it may fail us all.

@Critas @Logan

 

[Artarion Sekt]

Artarion was not a fan of this planet already. He didn’t like the feel of it, but it really didn’t matter to this mission at all. It was an assault, not his forte generally but it would certainly not be the first time that he carried out a mission that he was not perfectly suited to. It would not be his first assault either, but he could see the need for a bit of stealth at the beginning of this operation. He looked over to the two acolytes, his helmeted head turning back and forth between them. Neither of them appeared to be especially suited to stealth.

“I would direct caution acolytes, a direct assault this may indeed be but there is nothing saying we should give up one of our main assets. Surprise.” Gesturing towards the facility he continued. “You see how they have not trimmed back the foliage there, near the gate? That is a mistake we can take advantage of. It allows us to get close to the outer perimeter and possibly across the fence there without being detected. Guards are generally trained to defend from without and not from within.”

Raising slightly, he looked at the chosen entry point quickly and then dropped back into concealment. “Climb that large tree to one side. Move out across the limb and drop into the encampment. Take the guards by surprise and then move on the facility.” He turned to look at the two acolytes, his eyes watching their body language for reactions to go with their words. His hand itched for the feel of his twin lightsabers, he could feel his body starting to pump endorphins into his system in anticipation of the coming action.

Artarion was wearing his usual Sith Marauder Armor with his Strill blaster pistol on his hip. He had twin light sabers attached to his belt and a bandoleer of grenades that went from his left shoulder to his right hip. He had been fighting with these weapons for years and they were as much a part of him as his own arms and legs. Looking at the snake creature, his eyebrows rose at his lack of weapons. He looked forward to seeing the creature in combat. Perhaps he could learn something from such a novel creature.

@Logan
@Tundra

 

[Dax Rau (TL8)]

Dax was on his belly atop of a rock outcropping shadowed by heavy trees at the edge of the forest. The Rau scout had taken an over watch position as he and several other Mandalorians were running a recon op and a Sith communications hub. The mission, as Dax understood it was simple, recon the hub and gather intel. Then kill any Imperial in the area.

The scout powered the scope of his rifle to triple magnification and sized up the outpost and the guards around it. However it was not the simply equipped guards that raised the hairs on his arm as his scope danced over them. It was the figure twenty or so yards from them, approximately forty five from Dax's raised position.

"We have company. I count at least one maybe two Sith, one nearly in the open maybe twenty meters from the hub just the other side of my position. A Sluissi, I think (@Tundra). I can make out something next to him, maybe a Trando ? (@Logan) kark it I can't tell. Both at approx twenty from the camp. Something moving behind them as well."

Dax didn't have a good view of the third figure from his position. Instead he focused his scope on the taller of the two he could see (@Tundra ) and waited for orders. For his own part Dax had on his heavy armor and his standard gear he always carried with him into battle. His C-1 carbine, a couple of pistols and a couple of grenades.


@Darasuum @vamp

 

[Burkhart Kelborn]

____________

THEME​

The planet was nice enough. Too bad it was under Imperial rule, for the moment. But that would hopefully change soon. The Rally master breathed deeply underneath his helmet, the fresh Jaig Eyes emlazoned on his black helmet motivating him to continue to be worthy of them. He was the Alor of his clan and was here to see to it that the mission went according to plan. The communications station was their target but there had not been a great deal of recon, not in his opinion. The large Morling liked to know just what he was up against, there could be guards and patrols. Sometimes sites were meant to appear like simple service stations when actually they could be intelligence black sites. But usually those were not even marked on the map.

He looked to his two fellow mandalorian, Drace Solus ( @vamp ). Dax Rau was already somewhere on the ground. The Rau clan was growing and Drace was another member of the clan that lead the house. Hopefully the badger would do his House proud. The canine leader knew they would all do their best either way. Drace would be riding with him on his war droid for the duration of the drop. He could barely remember a time when he did not have a jet pack or all the toys and tricks he had gained over time.

Flexing his right hand he thought of the cybernetic arm underneath it. He had earned it, as well as the vambraces and associated lightsabers on Nar Shaddaa but that had been some time. Taking the fight to the Empire was always a pleasure. His ship, the Effervescent had his Basilisk War Droid in the cargo hold. He mounted it and had the pilot droid and another two mandalorians dressed as normal civilians man the stations. His ship would just appear like a normal merchant vessel on a course to the local township for resupply. His knowledge of smuggling routes, trade and his host of personal ships allowed him to deal with moving in and out of systems with the appearance of belonging there.

The droid would take a few steps and be out of the open cargo hatch and plummet towards the surface of the planet. His ship becoming smaller by the second as it continued on its path above them towards the city. He would radio to it when the mission was over which could easily be done from the communications station once they got there. They would fall roughly a hundred meters away from the tree line. The droid would slow their descent at the minimum safe distance so they did not alert any potential patrols. Since Dax was already in position he would be feeding them information he had found as they had dropped. He had his deck sweeper craddled on the front of his droid and the head pointed in the direction of the possible sith position. <"Keep tracking them."> He said in mando'a. The trees were thick enough and they were far enough away that the trees and vegetation made it so they could not see the enemies.

@Taz @vamp @Tundra @Critas @Logan​

 

[Drace Solus]

.

Drace had never ridden in a droid before—technology had advanced so much over the years, and sometimes it was hard to keep up, mostly because of the absurd prices put on weapons nowadays.

He was pretty excited for the mission—one of his first so deep in Sith space. It would have made him nervous if he didn't have a good crew with him, but he knew his companions were perfectly capable of backing him up. Hell, one of them had Jaig Eyes.

As soon as the droid hit ground and he hopped out, Drace had his rifle in his arms. This was shaping up to be a fight in the forest, and the brand new thermal scope he had gotten would certainly better his odds. So would the riot grenades he'd brought, hidden behind his black cloak. It was pulled over his white armor so they could preserve any semblance of stealth.

The Mandalorian could hear his companions speaking over the comms, but he remained silent, walking toward the general area he knew would serve as their battlefield.

@Taz @Darasuum @Tundra @Critas @Logan

 

[Ben Drake]

Drake came to an upstairs window of the facility. As he looked out he saw something falling to the planet's surface.

He did not know what this meant, but turned to the other senior operatives in the facility. "I think we may have company."

He looked down from the gantry at the operators on the ground floor, still working away at the terminals. They would need to secure the data and send whatever protocols it was the security people did. That wasn't his concern, however.

@Brick @Rogue Navigator

 

[Burkhart Kelborn]

____________

Atop his steed Burkhart would hunch low. Only his upper half would be visible atop the Basilisk war droid as it moved through the tree covered surface of the planet. His droid had been on a few missions with him so far and knew that in an environment like this to attack anyone that was not clearly mandalorian. So far, the only friendlies the semi-sentient machine knew of was Drace and Dax. Dax was somewhere in the distance, and Drace was beside him for the time being and that meant everything else was fair game.

Thanks to the call outs of the scouting mandalorian Burkhart knew approximatly where the sith presence was ahead of him. would wait until either he saw the Sith or until he gauged the distance to the tree line from where he had landed was fifty meters. Whether there were trees in the way or not he would fire into the flora that was possibly hiding their location. They could be Imperial assassins or cover operatives using some space magick to mess with his senses. Either way he was not going to be stealthy for long, if he had not already given up his position. The war droid would fire its twin rockets, dual laser cannons and hose the area with its plasma cannon cluster (@Logan , @Critas , @Tundra ).

Burkhart would hold back on firing his light repeater and only fire it if one of the infiltrators showed themselves. The weapon was partially craddled and allowed for easy continious fire if necessary. He kept his vision slightly tilted up. HWho knew if they would try something from the trees or not. He knew wookiees would. Ideally he would find some smoldering corpses in the next few moments but until that time he would keep his guard up. There were also still those inside the Republica structure to deal with as well.

@Taz @vamp @Tundra @Critas @Logan @Ulysses​

 

[Dax Rau (TL8)]

Suddenly the treeline across from the camp was an explosion for blasma, rock and dirt.

"Kark me, warn a guy." Dax exclaimed over the com.

The Rau scout waited for the dust to clear a little, keeping a his scope trained on the man-snake thing that was the most poorly hidden of the group. Seeing only a figure of the alien due to Burk's droid attack. Dax would aim where he assumed the chest of the creature was and fired two shots from his rifle. Then use the chaos to slip off the rock and land on the forest floor ten feet below.

 

[Drace Solus]

.

The Sith either hadn't detected them or just didn't care, because no one came out to fight the Mandalorians. He walked alongside Burkhart until the concussive missiles flew out of his droid, and then branched off, taking the right flank. The Mandalorian crouched as he charged through the vegetation, rifle in his arms.

He raised it and peered through its thermal scope, firing three bolts on the orange silhouette of a hooded man (@Critas) immediately after the explosions stopped. One of them would hit his lower back, another his upper back, and the last would strike the back of its head, Drace's shots tracking the wizard if he were to move. All three shots came from the man's right side, about 15 meters away, The thermal scope gave away any hope of stealth that the Sith had—day or night, hidden or not, the thermal scope was able to detect them no matter what.

"I call dibs on the edgy hooded guy," he declared into the comms, mind already set on the vambraces that awaited him at home.

@Logan @Tundra @Critas @Darasuum @Taz @Ulysses

 

[Ben Drake]

"This is not a drill, people!" Drake had more urgency in his voice as he saw a missile shoot from one of the objects that had fallen from space.

"We need to make the facility secure; move away from the door; create a welcoming committee." There were not enough people to go out to meet the threat in the open, but they could hold the building while signals were sent. The walls were thick and strong. There was only one way in or out - the front door. In any event, the invaders seemed to have a dispute amongst themselves (Ben had not yet identified the distinct groups) and that was fine by him.

Stood with a view out the window towards the enemy and rifle pointed at the door, he put his helmet on and readied himself.

 

[Artarion Sekt]

Artarion heard the heavy footsteps of the Basilisk war droid before the barrage from its armament happened. Calmly he gave an alarm to his two compatriots as he was already moving, his lightsabers coming to his hands without thought as he pulled them from his belt. He was running around the facility, to the North, keeping in the dense foliage to mask his signature.

As the barrage started, he smiled, knowing that the fire and explosions would mask his progress even better as the flames and heat would drown out his signature on any sort of thermal device or tracker. As a result of this move, he was no where near the area when the shots rang out from Drace, his thermal signature lost in the explosions from the basilisk’s armament.

Artarion continued to move, running North through the thick forest and foliage, the Force augmenting his fully defensive movements and mentality as he ran. It was one thing to infiltrate an Imperial Fortress, it was completely another to be ambushed. Rule number one when ambushed, break away from the ambush and regroup. Artarion was attempting to do just that at this moment as he ran, keeping low and moving fast to put the facility itself between him and the ambushers.

Keeping preservation and defense completely in his mind at this point, he completed his move with the area where he heard the basilisk moving to his south east. The facility was partially between he and that area as he turned and found cover and concealment behind a rocky outcropping within the forest. The area would give him both cover and concealment, hiding his presence once more and he attempted to see what had happened to his compatriots and perhaps the identity of their attackers.

@vamp
@Darasuum
@Logan
@Tundra
@Taz
@Ulysses

 

[Azog Vang]

The massive, hulking behemoth of technology hadn't gone unnoticed by Azog either. Despite his incredible confidence in his ability to take on just about any enemy, even Azog knew that technology like that vastly changed the landscape of the battle.

As Artarion was moving and issuing his warning, Azog was already following. For now his weapons remained at his side, the young Grysk focusing more on making sure he was able to escape than fighting at the moment. Keeping close proximity to Artarion, Azog crouched low behind the rocky outcropping with his compatriot.

"An unexpected level of resistance," Azog said plainly, unsure of just who it was that had shown up with such firepower. "Unlikely to be Republica." The smart move now would be to regroup and assess the situation without the potential of laser-fire melting them into slag. Azog was unsure if their snakey friend had made it, if he didn't show soon the Grysk would assume him dead.

Azog, for now, retrieved his lightsaber and held it in his right hand ignited. He began to channel the force, readying himself for the battle that was to come.

 

[Drace Solus]

.

Drace clucked his tongue as the shots missed, but it was to be expected--it was nighttime, and the target was moving already. He saw the man running toward an outcropping, but wouldn't allow that. Drace shot 3 more times--one shot a meter in front of the man, which would slam into his right side, another a meter in front of his feet, and the third behind him by a meter. To dodge, the man would somehow have to stop completely without skidding, which would be impossible considering the speed at which he'd been running.

The explosion passed, and the smoke slowly cleared to reveal the damage. A crater had been dug into the forest, and fire had sparked in some places. The form of the snake man (@Tundra) was gone, though he suspected they would find its charred corpse later. He switched comms on.

"I no longer have visual on the snake, but he might be down. Overwatch please confirm."

From his position, Dax should be able to see better than him. Drace kept moving nevertheless, slinking through the woods toward the prison, his eyes set on the Sith man he'd been shooting at (@Critas).

OOC: Tundra has timed out, so Dara's attack is an autohit.

@Logan @Tundra @Critas @Darasuum @Taz @Ulysses

 

[Dax Rau (TL8)]

Burk's attack and Dax's own two shots had managed to rid the galaxy of one more Sith. Sadly Dax was on the ground, attempting to change position when the other two moved. So he did not have a good line of sight to see where the other two had moved two while they were moving. However there was no disguising the familiar snapping snake hissing sound of at least one plasma stick being activated.

Though he couldn't see them cowering behind the second outcropping just 30 meters from him and to the south. One or more of them were closing the distance to his position. The comms building and it's little tower were still between him and the Sith though. Dax could do little more then call a target area and slink south and round, or go for the com hub.

Rather then risk adding more imps to the fight Dax decided to go for the devil he knew and use the trees and underbrush to cover his move north. "Burk (@Darasuum , look north of your first attack. I don't have visual but I know i heart a saber. Open'er up when you see the red rod." He told the field marshal over the comlink as he tried to close the distance, slow and cautiously. Rifle ready.

 

[Burkhart Kelborn]

____________

Burkhart saw the explosion bloom and the destroyed trees fall around where he had fired. He judged based off of where Drace had fired and followed with his barrel which direction the sith had moved and faced that direction. A moment later he resumed his steady pace while Dax spoke to him. Just as he said he could see the glow of the red saber in the distance. "Show'em what ya spit girl." He said to the mount who complied by firing it twin laser cannons towards the glowing saber, one spaced on either side of the crimson column so at least one of the shots would be placed at the weapon's wielder. It would also fire its cluster of plasma shots towards where perhaps the person's feet would be. Burkhart did not know which sith he was firing at but he did not care.(@Logan )

@Taz @vamp @Tundra @Critas @Logan @Ulysses​

 

[Burkhart Kelborn]

____________

From atop his basilisk war droid he saw the laser cannon shots streak through the forest and strike something on one side of the lightsaber. No amount of infantry armor was going to stand up to a laser cannon shot from a basilisk war droid. Whatever kind of sith agent had had just taken down he was surely dead and would not be getting up. (@Logan )

"Dax, where's tha last one?" He asked, keeping his eyes pealed for the last agent that remained nearby. He did not see if Drace's shots had hit him, too focused on his own target. The Field Marshal waited with his light repeating blaster ready for any sign of the enemy infiltrators and would fire on him if he showed himself. "Let's geet the bluudy hell outta here." He said to Drace as he called in for the extraction. They did not have the element of surprise. The mandalorian would collect the lightsabers from the man, or whatever he was, and head away from the listening post.

//Exit Thread

OOC: Logan has timed out so my attack counts as an auto hit. @Taz @vamp @Tundra @Critas @Logan @Ulysses​

 

[Drace Solus]

.

His eyes were locked on the man from the moment Drace's shots burst out of his rifle, and he got to watch as they hit—one in the man's right side, burning through his armor, and then another in the same spot as his body kept coursing through the air. Satisfaction flowed through him as the corpse fell like a bag of potatoes, soaring through the air for a few meters from the momentum. The Mandalorian ran toward it, keeping his rifle in his hands just in case, but he doubted anyone else would attack—they were still a little under 100 meters away from the base, and search parties hadn't been sent yet. He sprinted through the woods, steps light and nimble.

He slowed down as he approached the corpse of the fallen Sith (@Critas) and stopped when he reached it. Drace shot into the man's back once more to make sure he was dead, then reached down and grabbed his lightsaber, which was a few meters away. Upon closer inspection, the Marauder found another, clipped to the Sith's belt. From the looks of it, Drace had just killed a Sith Crusader. Wait till Percy hears about this, he thought as he stashed the two hilts on his belt. The man also had an Imperial standard-issue blaster, but Drace had no use for it.

"No need for us to press on," he said into the comms, then turned to head toward Burkhart, who'd carry them both away in his Basilisk. "Alarm's already raised, and we're outnumbered. Besides, this is a useless base to take, strategically speaking. Let's head back."

OOC: Since Critas failed to reply, he's timed out and the attack is an auto-hit

@Logan @Tundra @Critas @Darasuum @Taz @Ulysses

 

[Dax Rau (TL8)]

Dax just around the corner when the basilisk opened up on the Sith holding the red saber. He slowly came around the outcropping with his rifle up. More shots came. Dax hugged the rock and leaned around, only to see Drace putting a shot into a Sith's back.

"Drace got him, we're all clear." he replied to Burk over the comms in his helmet. "Did you find two....damn it." he said laughingly at his friend, "You two warm up the ship. I'm right behind you."

While Drace loaded up with Burk, Dax ran full tilt to where he knew the snake man should of been. Finding what was left of him in a blown out trench. Dax kicked around the bits and pieces, tossing an arm aside. "Bralov!" he exclaimed, then quickly snatched up the lightsaber hilt. With his prize in hand Dax ran back to where Burk's ship would be waiting.

//Exit - End thread.