Sure, that works. I went back and reread, and I can find where they got in the gravsled, but that particular post doesn't read real clear to me, so I'm not surprised I missed that bit.

Yeah, we mangled the timeline and went back and rewound a little bit and had three or four conflicting accounts of what was going on all at once.

I say grab the dead guy's hovercar.

We need to get ahold of One-Ton and have him get the Morningstar in the air before word gets out of Gran's Hope that, well, we're a bunch of rebels and killers and such.

Also, and I'm sorry for not mentioning this earlier, but in regards to Fourth Claw: Holy. Shit. Add him to the list of people not to fuck with.

(Edit: Screw it, I'll just do it myself.)

Well, I needed an NPC on the ship who could give Semo a good fight if it came to that. Luckily, it didn't and now you have a Wookiee General Maximus running around with you.

I also watched Rambo and my first UFC on Saturday. It was my day of violence.

Sorry about the grenade thing, but Davis' already ran away and screwed them over once so far, and he's not going to do it again.

Here's the plan for the plaza. We go for Fourth Claw first, roll up in the traffic and blow the skimmer with an AT4 or rifle fire from above, and pick him up. From there, we move to Angel and Max or Arketta, whoever's closer.

Get a consensus. Bello will go along with whatever the people in the gravsled (that's Luis, Hugh, Davis, and Semo for those of you just tuning in) decide. He has a handful of port-thug-quality mooks that can draw fire in either case.

Here's my proposal: Max and Angel jack the hovercar that was in their area, and either use it to get Arketta or get out. If we managed to stash any heavy weapons on us, we might be able to help get Swims. If not, we'd just be risking ourselves unnecesarily, in my opinion. If it comes to it, he should suicide. Live free or die and all, plus I don't think the jellyfsh can read the minds of the dead. Plus, if he has to die, I think this is how he'd want it: defying the Imperium to the last and doing his best to bring about their downfall. This contact could let us do that.

I'm with e...but can the Morningstar land somewhere close to Swims and Arketta for a pickup? I'd hate to leave them for capture, but maybe we can do a little field evac, Firefly style.

Gatac

If the quality of Bello's men matches that of the security team from the hangar on Jang-xur, they'll last all of five seconds against the Kansat and that skimmer. As for the Morningstar evac, it's a good idea, but the Morningstar is unarmed, and if that skimmer can blow big holes in the concourse, it can most likely blow big holes in the Morningstar, and it will have to be stationary to do the pickup, making it a big fat target. No matter what we do, we need to have people from our team on the ground there, providing covering fire if we want to get them out.

(Edit: Also, it took us 40 minutes to get from the port to Gran's Hope. The Morningstar might as well be in orbit. Even if it's four or five times as fast, that still gives us more than eight minutes for it to get here.)

On a RP-related note, I find it hard to believe that the men of Delta Force would advocate turning and running, leaving their teammates behind. This is an organization that is culled from the best of the best of the US Army, and one of the mottos they live and die by is "Never Leave A Man Behind." This is an organization that, during the Battle of Mogadishu, didn't hesitate for an instant to head out and put their lives on the line to save their fellow soldiers. During that battle, two snipers asked repeatedly to be inserted and protect one of the downed chopper pilots until help could arrive, knowing full well that the odds were that they would never make it out of there alive, and they held their ground against hundreds of armed Somali militia for hours until they were killed. I'm not saying that everyone else should change their positions, but I'm surprised that the rest of the team didn't draw down with Davis the instant Bello said they weren't going back.

(Edit, Part Deux: A question was raised about why I went to grenade instead of putting it to a vote. Well, first, I hate to reiterate this, but it's my character's choices, and I believe we've already been over the whole "individual character's actions don't need to be put to a vote" debate before. Secondly, it's the only weapon available that he couldn't take away from me without consequence. He could take a gun away, and nothing would happen. Grenade, on the other hand, you can't just yank out of someone's hand. I'm not blackmailing the rest of you, as evidenced by the fact that Davis isn't going on about how they're all joining in anyway, no matter what the rest of them say. They can just drop him off a few streets away and fly off. The threat is aimed squarely at Bello, no one else. If they still decide not to drop him off, he'll put the grenade down, no problems.)

Just to play a little devil's advocate; Angel's the only Delta still out there and of all of them he's voted most likely to survive.

Secondly, the Kansatai are the Imperium's port thugs. Mooks vs. mooks isn't quite so bad as mooks vs. armored mooks with combat upgrades.

But seriously, I think Punkey has a good point. You guys don't have to rush in headlong, but do consider that going back would be the decision ingrained into everyone's mind. The final decision is yours, of course.

As for landing sites for a space freighter... well, I mentioned there was a large shallow lake dotted with islands behind the monument. The Morningstar couldn't touch down, but it could scoop people up maybe. An aircar/gravsled should hover on water to boot. Swims' (pardon the pun) plan, assuming he survives a few more rounds, was originally to dive into the lake, get naked, and use his natural camouflage to disappear. If there's a ship waiting for him, all the better.

Tangent: I realized that Imperials would never actually refer to their spaceships as "ships". I mean, what kind of naval history do they have? I'd say they're just about to the Mayan's level of sailing - when have they ever needed boats? Most of 'em are probably shitty swimmers. Sorry, it's just one of those things that I thought was neat to think about.

Re: Max, Angel, and Arketta. You can confirm/deny/change this Dieter, but over IM he informed me his general plan is to GTA the dead hunters' gravcar ASAP and try to meet Arketta at the top of the concourse (or wherever she might exit the maze of alleys).

How about this: Dieter and Crazy pull their thing, get Arketta, and either head for the Morningstar or try to blend in with local traffic. We stay in the area, moving with the "herd" of rubberneckers (there would be some in the US, if there aren't we'll deal with it) and try to get into a position over the lake. If we can use the altitude we have to act as aerial recon/guidance for Swims or Arketta, good there too.

If we get away clean, we stick with the contact long enough to get a one-time Cortex code or a Gateway only they know about or something, and scram. If not, ditto, but with pursuers. Also, recall that if the Morningstar gets too far out of the regular lines of traffic, it'll tip our hand before we want it too.

I think that, at this stage, doubling back is more trouble than it's worth. If we were still in town, I'd try to set up an ambush and let our struggling guys lead the baddies there, but atm I think we need to swallow our pride a little bit and get on with it.

I'm gonna order the Morningstar to pick up Swims at the lake, if there's no further objections.

Gatac

e's plan is pretty good, actually. I like the "blend in with the crowd" bit. Davis would still want to get dropped off, though.

Cool, two questions first. Would the Gatecrasher from Botane still work, and what weapons do Ngawai and Davis have?

The gatecrasher should still work assuming it's not going up against any serious kind of encryption. As for weapons, Ngawai would likely have a beamer and up to two stingers (unless you wouldn't allow her two weapons or wanted her to carry more or something). Davis, however, has:

SCAR-H
1 mag prototype 7.62mm AP
6 mags 7.62mm FMJ
HK45 .45 ACP sidearm + 2 mags 27/30 rounds remain
Toughbook wired for Turai interface
Belt knife
Garrote in watch
Bug-sweeping/superspy stuff

The plan was for Swims/Claw to carry the bigger Imperial weapons for you guys, so other than Ngawai noone has a beamer or anything. Hugh and Semo have the two remaining AT-4s. Luis has 3 frags and 2 Claymores, Hugh and Semo each have two frags left. Those are your explosives. The prototype AP rounds can deal damage to skimmers, but the AT-4 - if you hit - would be an insta-kill.

I just want a radio for her, and that's about it, since I doubt they'll let me have more grenades or an AT4, although I'll take either if they'd let me. Also, Ngawai still has that stealth armor, right?

Edit: To annoy Gatac with this plot twist even more, cue Wolfmother - Joker and the Thief. Hey, it fits!

admiralducksauce wrote:

Re: Max, Angel, and Arketta. You can confirm/deny/change this Dieter, but over IM he informed me his general plan is to GTA the dead hunters' gravcar ASAP and try to meet Arketta at the top of the concourse (or wherever she might exit the maze of alleys).

That's my plan and I'm sticking with it. I'll figure the rest out once we pick up Arketta.

My webs were down and I gotta go to the office today. I will try to throw all this stuff in the blender tomorrow.

I guess Gatty's not a fan of the Wolfmother then?

I'm just saying that there's gonna be words about this when we get back to Earth.

Gatac