Minutes passed, then an hour, until the two Vortians finally made it to the transmitter. Kazak and Tuu scanning various sectors. Tuu was first to see them on a rooftop. "Targets spotted."
"Got it," Kazak responded, "Don't engage yet. Wait for them to get into the transmitter's yard first. We can trap them there."
"Roger that," Tuu's finger slipped over the trigger as he tracked Jur. Vara aimed her sniper rifle, taking down the two Imperial Troopers guarding the transmitter before they went down the roof. "Took out the sentries."
"Small price to pay, Sergeant, keep it tight," Volx replied. Two Troopers now would save thousands of lives on Devastis...and it lured the Vortians into a sense of security. Once the breached far enough into the inner yard, she grinned, "Now!" Alarms blared as a large barrier blocked the entry gate.
A shot rang out from Tuu's rifle, hitting Jur and knocking him down onto his side, immediately draining his shields and denting the power level of the undersuit compensating for the kinetic force. Both started to recharge to some extent before a second shot hit him in the thigh, a certain injury that scorched the armor and flesh underneath. Vara started dragging him to cover, not knowing of the Irken waiting to ambush them.
The preemptive strike with the high-powered rifles on the team did their job. One of them was wounded. Still up and dangerous, but forcing his partner to assist accordingly. Their threat level diminished if only slightly.
As organized prior, the pair desperately pressed deeper in for the transmitter. Right into the waiting jaws of another ambush as Haxx and Rha, on opposite sides of the room, peeled out of cover and opened fire. The PRC spun to life, saturating the pair with sustained plasma fire, their shielding flaring before overloading, forcing the armor plating to withstand the superheated, ionized gas threatening to melt and bubble through. Rha tossed a thermal detonator for insurance, forcing them to scramble for safety under withering fire.
Vara quickly hoisted Jur up and pulled him inside the building, forced to take cover as her shields recharged. She took a few blows with her armor plating scorched, but he fared worse, grenade fragments embedded in his armor. "They were waiting for us…"
"Should we reconfigure?"
"No...trapped here...easier to exfil from above once we send the intel. Come on. Still got a mission to do."
Before the two Vortian operatives could collect themselves and push on against the nearly-overwhelming defenses set up by Kazak and Volx's intuition, the third leg of the gauntlet came into play. Unseen save for the shimmering distortion of light around her profile, Aero deployed her forearm-mounted plasma blade emitters. A pair of magenta-tinged, translucent blades forged of plasma contained in a magnetic field formed immediately with the crackle of super-heated air and the smell of ozone.
Striking from the veil of surprise, she lunged, forcing the female to separate from the male. Splitting them up was the first step to nullifying whatever advantage they held. One was wounded, the other on her back foot.
Forced to step back, Vara drew her railgun revolver, pointing it in Aero's direction and firing. Its loud reports filled the room, before she made a dash for the control room to make the transmission. Jur, on the other hand, moved to another room where he could hunker down and let his suit do its work on his burns while he waited for his commander to make contact...hopefully.
Narrowly avoiding taking a few slugs for her troubles, Aero's false transparency aided in preventing that. Splitting them up successfully, she knew the male was in worse condition. She deactivated her blades, moving swiftly and quietly unseen as she swung her scatter-pattern blaster back around for use.
"Red-3, moving to engage the male," She quietly relayed behind her fully-enclosed helmet. EM scanners were active, searching the area as she moved, muzzle sweeping around every nook, cranny and corner as she sought her prey. "Red-4, watch my six."
"Red-4 copies," Vard assured, catching up to her as he followed behind, watching their wake in case the female attempted to reconnect.
"Where are you…" She muttered under her breath, struggling to remain collected as anger over her workspace and home being violated by these two.
She quickly turned at the end of the corridor, her visor making her squint at the white-hot glow of her target still seeking a swift retreat.
"Contact! Engaging!" She bellowed, cranking off a blast of her weapon, peppering his retreating back with multiple streaks of plasma before sprinting to close the distance, racking the pump and loading another power cell.
"Son of a-" He primed a flashbang and threw it behind him to cover his retreat as he staggered, "As to thialo!" His voice came out through his suit's speakers, moving into an office block and shooting the panel out behind him, taking cover in a cubicle, doing his best to try to hide for now.
Vara, meanwhile, kept moving, thinking Jur was drawing their attention. She almost made it to the transmitter, just one more room...as she stepped in, she looked around briefly before hearing a loud whirring noise...and then four electrical bolts shooting into her. Her suit seized up, her weapon falling to the ground as her HUD displayed the message SUIT FAILURE before the jolt ceased. The Commander fell to her knees and then forward onto her face, slipping in and out of consciousness.
Rha got on the radio, "Purple Six here, one down, got the female."
Aero rushed to catch up, seeing the device tossed behind him in desperation. She recognized it, a VDF standard-issue concussive grenade. Growling in agitation she put the brakes on, skidding as she tucked her head into her shoulder as best she could as it went off. The ringing in her antenna was the worst of it. She didn't need to hear. She had her prey on the run.
Recovering quickly, if not stumbling a few disoriented steps forward, she caught up about the time he shot the panel out, locking the door behind him. Another growl of agitation at his persistence to avoid them as she slammed a fist into the wall adjacent. Keying up her radio forcefully, she stormed back and forth before the door.
"Purple-Six, Red-Three, I have the male cornered. He blew out the control panel to the door and I lack the ordnance to "unlock" it. Regroup on me and let's get this bastrado."
She switched her mic off, opening up her vox caster to speak audibly outside of her helmet.
"You hear that? I'm comin' for you! Burn MY hangar! I'll burn YOU!"
"Heading there now," Rha replied over the radio as Rem secured Vara. Once there, he withdrew a few sticks, planting them on the door, then pulled and twisted a pair of pins in the detonator, moving off to the side as the breaching charges blew the doors off. As Aero and Rha came inside, they split off to clear the room. She stopped when she looked down and saw the Vortian's rifle just laying on the ground.
That's when Jur sprang out, redirecting her shotgun up as she pulled the trigger, then ripped it out of her hands, spinning it around...as she placed one of Vard's mines on his abdomen. Right as he drew the pump back, it activated, indicating a suit failure on his HUD and he found all of his critical systems offline...and his suit seized up. "...Ah shit…"
Aero, adrenaline surging, trembling as she stared down the muzzle of her own weapon a split-second away from becoming a head shorter after being taken by surprise. She attempted to wretch it out of his locked hands, even planting a foot on his abdomen for leverage but to no avail.
"Jerk...gimme...my...gun...back!" She grunted with effort before huffing, releasing. "That's alright." She maliciously grinned behind her helmet, activating one of her blades. "I'll just cut your hands off!"
"Aero!" Vard caught up, skidding into the room. "Stop! Don't."
"Why not?! This guy and his friend wrecked our home, Vard!"
"Don't be cruel...please. We'd have done the same thing if the roles were reversed. They had orders. So do we."
Reluctantly, she deactivated her melee weapon that would have easily carved through him like a hot knife through butter before thrusting a finger in his helmet-covered face. "You're lucky….real lucky."
Composing herself as she glared behind her visor at him, she keyed her mic.
"Red-Two, Red-Three, male's secured. Vard's gadget did the trick."
Kazak heaved an audible sigh of relief over the comms. "Copy that. Pack it up, guys. Troopers and Elites can clean up the mess. Time to RTB." Vara was limp, fully unconscious, dragged out to the vehicles and placed in the back of one. Jur, however, was stiff as a board; the EMP device from Vard's mine fried everything in the moment as his suit tried to reset. Rha sat in the back with him, keeping one hand on the shotgun. The Lieutenant hovered over him. "Hey, buddy, just so you know, if that suit of yours resets, you do nothing stupid. I got my guy Haxx sitting right behind you with a gun pointed right at the back of your head. You try anything, he's gonna blow it clean off. Clear?"
"Fine…" Jur responded.
"Good." Once they arrived at the ship, his suit systems rebooted, allowing him to move freely again. Knowing he was outnumbered and outgunned, he released the shotgun. While movement was still fine, his other systems were disabled. Fighting would be pointless. He was led back inside their ship at gunpoint, Vara still had to be dragged as she was still out cold from earlier.
Hesa looked up, helping around the ship wearing the lower half of her armor after Sula looked her over for internal injuries and cleared her, she looked at Jur and his armor. "I gotta get me one of those…" She signaled for the others to follow, leading them to where Vult set up in the interim with the briefing room destroyed.
The female being dragged by Haxx and Rha was unceremoniously dumped on her face once more at the center of the floor. Vult, Sula, and Corr finally got a good look at the pair responsible for the damage to the ship and injuries sustained by members of the team.
"What's her status?" Vult queried of the returning members of the team.
"Unconscious, Sir," Haxx informed, nudging her body with his boot. "Lieutenant Kazak had us lay a trap with some spare power cells and emitters. Walked right into our Vort Zapper. Worked like a charm." He snickered.
"And him?"
"Motivated compliance, Sir," Aero answered, reminding Jur with a firm push of her muzzle of the shotgun into his back.
The Commander nodded approvingly. "Good work, all of you...first things first. The armor. I want it off of them. Now."
Vard cleared his throat awkwardly.
"About that, Sir...I...haven't quite figured out how to release it from the outside."
The blue-eyed Irken turned his attention to the standing male.
"Shed the plates. Now. Release her suit too."
Jur went through the process of decoupling the armor plating, setting it down on a table nearby, leaving him with the synthetic muscle suit underneath the armor. He then set to work on Vara's plating, setting her's aside as well. He then lifted the visor of his muscle suit's helmet and removed the mask, exposing his face. "The combat oriented systems are still offline. I don't know what your man did, but they're still fried...and I'm not stupid enough to fight you...but I'm also not keen on getting naked in front of a bunch of Irken."
"Aww, he's shy," Haxx chuckled, earning a smack on the shoulder from Volx to zip it.
"His job," Vult answered him cryptically. "He did it well enough. You're smart to cooperate. Continue to do so and this whole situation will be less...stressful for everyone involved. You two did a number the last time you were in this vessel uninvited. I'm not taking any chances."
"Well, you guys did take out one of our factories back on Vort that was pumping out our tanks. Not to mention that arctic station you hit where we thought you killed everyone inside, save for some small group of scientists who said they managed to escape in the commotion." Jur shot a look at Haxx for his earlier comment before looking back at Vult. "Though, I'm guessing whatever you guys are up to...you definitely didn't want it getting out if you were so quick to intercept us. Figures, we now know what you do, and you know what we do."
"Despite our best efforts, it seems our reputation precedes us." Vult admitted with a reluctant sigh. "No matter. Until it is seen fit otherwise, you are going to be in our custody. At the very least you won't be alone and keep our other "guests" company in the brig."
He then took another glance behind him to Haxx once more, "No, not shy. Doubt you'd want to be naked in front of a bunch of Vortians if the roles were reversed, especially if they're bigger than you. If you catch my drift."
Haxx's expression soured, making a purposeful step forward to their captured Vortian before Rha's arm crossed in front of him, a hand to his chest to hold him back.
"Hey, easy." He insisted casually despite being subordinate to the big man. "He's just trying to get under your skin. Don't let 'em."
"Kazak, Volx," Vult addressed as the tensions simmered. "Escort them below and get them acquainted with their new accommodations."
"Right, boss," as he said that, Vara finally woke up with a groan, slowly shaking her head and looking around, face still covered with the visor and mask of her undersuit. "Ah, good, you're awake."
"W-What?" She stopped and looked around, seeing the bunch of Irken, and Jur stripped of his armor plating.
"It's over, Commander, they hosed us after we hosed them."
"So...we're not dead?"
"No. We'll be stuck joining General Zharic and her father, it seems."
She slowly pushed herself up to her feet. Kazak looking her over, "Can you walk? You did take a pretty big jolt back there."
"Yeah...I'm fine." She tried to take a step and stumbled, Kazak stepping in to stop her fall. "Well...maybe not yet."
"Come on. Volx, make sure he doesn't run off." He moved one of Vara's arms over his shoulder to walk her to the brig as Jur followed with Volx right behind him. Once they were out of the room, Hesa heaved a sigh of relief.
"I was worried for a second...so, what now?"
Aero and her squadmates remained glared at the pair as they were escorted with the aid of their commanding officers. For someone that possessed the softest pink eyes imaginable, it was concerning at the seething anger that was boiling behind them. Maybe not in the same sense as the infamous Captain Saro, but the feeling of being personally attacked and slighted by these two. To invade their home. To hurt her friends so severely. To be the source of the damage throughout the ship and a gross invasion of privacy.
Such did not go overlooked by the Commander.
"While everyone is present," Vult began, garnering their attention by stepping in front of their departing backs as the door slid shut behind him. His piercing blue gaze transitioned around the room from soldier-to-soldier. "I so much as catch wind of a single horn being harmed on their heads for the duration of their stay with us, there will be Irk to pay. You will be begging to clean latrines for the rest of your natural lives after what I will do to you if you do. You're all angry. I get it. I'm mad too...but we're professionals. Professionals don't let emotions control them. We all learned a valuable lesson from all of this. Not even we are invulnerable or this vessel impregnable. We were fortunate Sula and Corr are going to fully recover from their wounds and Hesa's armor stopped what could have been a potentially lethal round. Professionals learn from their mistakes and remain humble."
"Permission to speak freely, Commander?" Aero responded, biting her tongue as best she could not immediately retaliate.
"Granted, Aero." Vult sighed, briefly considering telling her to stow it.
The tall, willowy female lifted her shotgun to rest on her shoulder casually. "Would we still be havin' this conversation if Corr, Sula, or Hesa was dead? This…" She searched for the word mentally with a gesture of her hand. "...mercy to our very dangerous enemies?"
The Commander did not immediately respond as he contemplated his answer. A possibility he hadn't considered having taken the outcome as a fortunate aftermath of probability and fate. Would he be so respectful and willing to take them as prisoners or had taken his wrath out on them through execution? Torture? Were they better than that or would they have given in after such a personal slight? A lot of questions he lacked answers for.
"...I don't know, First Sergeant." He finally admitted with honesty. "I want to believe I would have maintained my composure...but after what I did on Vort...none of us are free of losing control."
Aero looked at her commanding officer for a moment before nodding slightly. A sufficient answer for what she sought. One that elicited additional queries from around the room as Tuu was next to speak.
"The floor still open for speaking, Commander?"
"It's yours, Sergeant." Vult gestured, seeking to get this out of the way sooner rather than later.
"I'm having trouble understanding our...approach to all of this, Sir. It may not be my place to understand, but I've never questioned orders...only now I am not certain of your...intentions, Commander. First, we countermand orders at Sub Zero Station and take the scientist and his daughter as POWs. You called off my shot on our HVT on Irk when I had him dead to rights and let him keep speaking about his treacherous following. Now the two VDF operatives we were sent to neutralize are in our brig instead of a body bag. Why are we not following orders given to us by the Almighty Tallest as they were passed down?"
"Yeah, and if you had followed orders you'd have shot me in the head same as any Vortian," Hesa butted in.
"I'm not the one that wrote the SOPs, Corporal." Tuu fired back at her. "We're soldiers. We follow orders."
"Enough," Vult interjected, looking between the pair. "Tuu, I can understand your confusion, but I assure you my intentions are in line with our mission."
"Sir, our mission is to conduct ourselves becoming of the Almighty Tallests' decree. There is no greater authority in the Empire with the exception of the Control Brains...and you are countermanding those orders." The marksman, in rare form than his usual reserved self, was speaking so openly on the verge of defiance of his commanding officer.
Vult feared this conversation was going to happen sooner or later. The others watched in silence, but behind several sets of eyes, he saw an agreement with Tuu's "concerns" and all but calling him a traitor in the word itself.
"I do not get to decide the parameters of the assignment. We react accordingly. An authority I do not take lightly. The Zharics are HVTs and were targets of opportunity. The Vortians' arguably most brilliant mind and a Brigadier General, both of whom have provided a mountain of intelligence to see a quickened end to the campaign on Vort."
"And the two VDF speckies you just sent below?" He challenged with a hint of defiance. About that time is when the door slid open with the unit's two Lieutenants returning to join the rest of group.
"That's enough," Volx barked. "Sergeant Tuu, you are way out of line."
Vult held a hand out to the arriving Lieutenant as the tension grew in the room. His worst fears were starting to be made manifest before his eyes despite doing his best to avoid them. A portion of the team understood his activity and why, the opposite half were beginning to question his motives. A schism nearly down the middle and the first cracks were beginning to form.
"At ease, Lieutenant," He calmly addressed. "Sergeant Tuu requested permission to speak freely and it was granted. He has done no wrong."
"Speaking freely does not permit openly questioning his superior officer in an accusatory fashion, Commander." She reminded, never removing her sight from Tuu.
Kazak interjected with his own opinion. "After what I saw in all this? I'd want to get a look at their armor," he stopped not far behind Vult, keeping an eye on Tuu, and the others as well. "In my perspective from being a Scout Sniper? I'd have wanted to not only reverse engineered whatever it is they have, but get their insight on it. They've spent the better part of a month wearing those, using it to great effect. Like I heard Hesa say when we came in, I'd also want a set of it."
"That was the initial plan, Lieutenant," Vult acknowledged.
"We have the armor, why keep the occupants alive? They are the users, not the designers." Tuu challenged much to Volx's annoyance.
"One more word out of your noise tube questioning the Commander and you and I are going to have problems, Sergeant. You read me?"
Suppressing his frustrations, Tuu went to at-ease with a grinding of his teeth. "Loud and clear, Ma'am."
"They're still wearing part of it, Tuu. From what I can tell, that's the base-layer they have on. What if the armor is biometrically locked? We might need them to study it with greater ease. Vard's good, but did you see how long it took to crack Turb's encryptions?" Kazak provided an explanation after the further exchange between Volx and the Sergeant. "The armor plating alone won't give us much aside from maybe what they have as supplementary protection. Not to mention, if there's two...there's probably more. I don't think we've seen the end of them yet."
Hesa, meanwhile, seemed a bit concerned, the hand gripping Corr's rifle tightened as Tuu spoke, worried something like what happened with Volx was going to pop off again. Though, with so few of the squad left connected to the Control Brains, there was at least less of a concern and figuring some of them would come to Vult's defense.
"If the roles were reversed, how do you think they would react?" Kazak continued on, "Would they follow orders or save their comrade? If they had a chance to capture Grimm alive, wouldn't they take it? What about us? Get a chance to interrogate people who wounded them so grievously? I know I would."
Tuu said nothing at the risk of incurring Volx's wrath. His superior had warned him twice to mind his place, a third strike would surely push that patience over the edge. He remained at-ease, only adjusting the angle of his head with a slight tipping of his chin.
"Not my wheelhouse, Sir," He answered in response to the technical aspects of the Vortian's advanced suits. "I leave the reverse-engineering and tinkering to the experts on this team. Mine is extreme range target acquisition."
A brief, awkward silence fell over the gathering of special forces soldiers before Vult opted to speak again.
"If anyone else has any other concerns they wish to voice, now's the time to do it. A lot has happened today and we have our hands full in the immediate future with getting this vessel back to 100% and moving forward."
Rem's ocular implants adjusted ever-so-slightly before stepping forward with a glance to Tuu at her left before addressing Vult.
"Practically speaking, Sir." She opened with, not missing some of the looks she was getting from her squadmates. The tension remained ever-present. "We are maintaining a prison population in the brig now. Four Vortians. Four Vortians that are supposed to be dead. How is that going to appear coming back on us when we requisition more supplies to maintain that population. They eat food we do not have. They wear clothing we do not have. You speak of mercy towards them when we lack the ability to provide it. How is this to be explained to the Tallest? To the Control Brains?"
"That is my concern and not your burden to carry, Sergeant," Vult responded much to her annoyance. A very ambiguous, commanding officer response for her to "mind her own business".
"It is my burden, Commander," She responded with emphasis. "These...freedoms or ability to openly operate are not infinite. We are still held to the same standards as the Imperial Troopers, Irken Elite, and other Imperial personnel across the known universe. You are quite literally playing with fire and will get all of us burned...Sir."
Kazak had his own concerns with what happened on Irk, but he wasn't going to bring that up in front of the others. Hesa, meanwhile, seemed a bit more tense...she knew things Rem didn't. She wanted to speak, but kept quiet. She knew Vult wouldn't do anything he wasn't sure of...she trusted him, probably more so than anyone in the squad. Though she was definitely invested now.
Volx stepped closer, taller than Rem now than she was previously thanks to the earlier procedure. "He wouldn't take a risk without thinking it through, Sergeant. I know he wouldn't. We're in a more dangerous line of work than even I was in with spec ops. He knows what he's doing. The Commander doesn't want you needlessly carrying his burdens so we can do our jobs."
Vult's patience about ran its course. The stress from the earlier engagements, tasking their response accordingly, and the worry about what information they had access to and decrypted before their capture. The only saving grace is they never transmitted off-world. It still remained with the two VDF operatives. Nevertheless, the situation was beginning to spiral out of control as more than one of his subordinates was now openly questioning his orders and the reasons behind them.
Before he could shut it down, Corr of all people, lucid despite being seated with his splint leg on an infirmary gurney, had met his limits for insubordination.
"ENOUGH!" He bellowed, hoarsely from his screams of agony earlier. "All of you! Permission granted or otherwise, you are toeing a very dangerous line I highly recommend you step back from."
He had everyone's undivided attention now.
"Everyone is exhausted. Everyone is tired. Everyone is fatigued. Everyone is hungry. Everyone feels personally attacked by all of this. I should feel that most of all...but what we feel does NOT matter. You question the Commander and his motivations because you want a target of opportunity for your frustrations. He is not your enemy. Your squadmates are not your enemy. This derision and taking your anger out on one another will NOT be tolerated. The fight came to our doorstep, but we evicted it. The fight stays out there, against our enemies...not each other."
Only the hum of the ship's remaining functional electrical systems could be heard in the room as several pairs of eyes drifted to the floor near their feet in shame.
"I am shocked...no...disappointed I even need to address all of you on this matter like this." Corr continued with vitriol, shifting his posture only to elicit another sharp jolt of pain from his splinted thigh. "You have a problem with the Commander and how he conducts this unit's affairs? Take it up with the Tallest personally and see what happens. You all volunteered for this unit at his request, start acting like you want to be here...am I clear?"
Hesa heaved a sigh of relief as Corr seemed to kill the tension in the room. Volx spoke up next, "Well, you heard the Captain. Time to get back to work. Corporal Hesa, first watch over the prisoners. I know you're half armored, but it's a short shift for now. Sergeant Vard, need you to get access back to the bridge back up ASAP. Everyone else, get out of your borrowed uniforms and get them turned in, then get to work cleaning up this mess we made. First Sergeant Aero, you'll coordinate with the yard crews getting any repairs needed done in the hangar bay and the briefing room."
Hesa nodded, "Well what are you two going to do?"
"Simple, I'm going out searching with Kazak."
"Wait, what?" He shot her a look.
"They obviously came here somehow. We're going to go find their ship."
"Oh. Well, yeah, we can do that."
Corr's diffusion and Volx's itemizing of tasks to be delegated served their purpose to neutralize the tension culminating into someone doing something they'd soon regret. The familiarity of clear, concise orders to tend to the laundry list of problems they now faced in the wake of the intrusion into the vessel and the damage wrought. Those tasked obediently went about fulfilling those orders while the others either assisted or started the rotation of cleaning up, mess, and a fresh change of uniform.
Evening graced Devastis with the tasked crews assisting with the vessel's repairs departing for the day. The team's SiR Unit was moved to Vard's workbench. Another lengthy, complex repair job on top of unlocking the bridge and repairing the damage done to the briefing room. A watch rotation was established. Until further notice, the ship was to be treated as potential hostile territory. Patrols throughout the vessel at all hours were standard. Everyone was to be on high alert at all times.
Vult took the lift down to the lower deck where the brig resided. Familiar territory for most of the team taking watch rotations. Hesa's stint was nearing its end, he came to relieve her.
She seemed happy to see Vult coming down. Standing up from her seat, she walked over and greeted him with a tight hug rather than with usual formalities. "I'm glad you're fine. I was worried earlier." After a few moments of embracing him, she remembered they were in the open and backed off. "The Doctor nodded off a few minutes ago. The other three are still up. Not a problem with any of them."
Vult, conflicted about the display of affection, allowed her to fulfill it and release him. Maybe next time he'll gently remind her they need to be discreet. The prisoners would have no qualms about sharing with anyone taking watch about what they saw, let alone their fellow squadmates. Nevertheless, he nodded at her brief, informal report as his gaze drifted to the cell they were held in. The three of them appeared to be playing some sort of card game, seated at the center of the floor to pass the time.
"Now you're beginning to understand why I look older than I am," He lightly teased in comment to her observation of the tense situation from earlier. "...optimistically, that will be the last of it. Just need to stay focused and moving forward for the time being. I'll take over down here. Go get some chow, a shower, and some rest before your patrol rotation."
Hesa nodded in response, "Right...and don't join their game, not unless you want to lose money."
Jur, seemingly more relaxed now, spoke up before Hesa walked off, "Yeah, you owe me seven hundred fifty credits."
"Don't remind me," She rolled her eyes and headed off, even seeming to chuckle a bit.
Vara since took off her visor and mask, both resting on her bed, the card deck belonged to her, something she kept for some personal enjoyment to pass the time with Jur while they weren't busy sabotaging things. Kiara looked over at Vult, "Ah, Commander, maybe you can join us? At least it'll once again even out the ratio between ground pounders and Navy. Idea's not to get above twenty three."
Eyeing them all briefly, he moved the chair closer to the bars, wary to leave his rifle leaning against the opposite wall, well out of their reach.
"Sure. Deal me in." He agreed, accepting cards dealt to him as they made their way around the gathering of four. "Make it interesting. Every hand I win, you answer one of my questions. Sound fair?"
Jur took the cards back to shuffle them and dealt them back out, effectively starting a new game. "Sure, suppose that seems fair. Though do we get to figure out something about you and your team if either of us wins a hand?"
"Where's that leave me, Chief?" Kiara spoke up from her end.
"Simple, General, we'll just owe you a drink down the line."
"I doubt I'll even see a single beer at the rate I've been going...but sure." Kiara looked to Vult, explaining the game "Total of seventy six cards, sixty of them divided into four suites numbered one through eleven. There's then face cards numbering twelve to fourteen, and the ace can either be a one or fifteen. There's also another sixteen cards that have negative values. The closer you are to twenty three, either positive or negative, you win." Jur seemed to smirk, he knew this game playing it a fair bit during his college days.
Vult started out with an 11 and a 5 from the cards dealt to him by Jur, face down. Kiara continued her explanation, "Since we're betting information and not money like we were with Hesa, everything goes around from Jur's left, you can either take a card, draw, or fold." Vara took a card, as did Kiara.
"Sounds simple enough," he reasoned casually, taking up his dealt cards. Sixteen. A game of probability and chance. Closest to 23 wins the hand. Calculated risk. Smeet's play compared to his daily job. "Draw."
Jur tossed Vult another card, a 7. He took another himself. Vara did as well, then groaned as she put her cards down. "You bomb out, Commander?"
"Ugh!"
Jur laughed, "General?"
"I'll hold."
The Commander laid his hand down on the deck for them to view.
"Twenty-Three. Means I win, right?"
Jur looked down at his own hand, Kiara threw her's down in frustration. The armored Chief Petty Officer smirked, "Lucky, a pure win on your first hand." He set down his cards, "So what's your question?"
Vult pushed the cards back through the bars to be shuffled and dealt again.
"How many others are there like you and what is your team composition like?" He started with the basics to draw conclusions from.
"On Devastis? You're looking at them." Jur's answer was brief. He left Vult's cards in the center, now effectively out of play as he dealt another hand. "We otherwise have three squads, and I know Zharic was working on a fourth, said he needed to recruit a couple people first."
"Probably making Grimm pay dearly back on Vort for all we know." Vara added, "We may have heard about you, but I suppose we didn't know enough about your team to come in and counter you at the time. Since you stopped us? They still don't, but they can make an educated guess at least."
Vult received a 6 and 7 in his new hand.
The Commander appreciated the intel, but naturally they were cagey and sharing only the bare minimum. Hopefully his luck would continue and elicit more evidence from a seemingly innocent game of cards.
"Draw," He spoke on review. Another low pair. Surely he could get close to the magical number again.
Vult received an eight this time. Vara drew another with a smirk, Kiara took another two as the passes went by. Jur kept an absolutely straight face. When the cards finally went down, Vara had a 20 with one of the negative cards, Kiara the same, but Jur layed down a zero, a two, and a three. The other two Vortians just looked at him dumbfounded.
"You son of a bitch!" Vara yelled out as Jur finally burst out laughing.
Kiara couldn't help but shake her head as she looked at Vult. "He won...that's...actually one of the ways to win, it's called an Idiot Array. He formed twenty three doing that."
Jur smirked as he moved the cards to the center. Though Vara looked to Vult, "So, Commander, I suppose we get to ask a question? What's this Control Brain disconnect I noticed from the files I recovered while we were in here?"
"Suppose that makes me the idiot then," Vult played along, knowing if they were kept at-ease and relaxed, they'd be more willing to share sensitive information with a false sense of trust built with their captors. "...the doctor over there was working on a superweapon...Project Silent Night. I'm no expert on PAK technology, but the way he described it, your people were developing a remote, far-reaching electronic impulse delivery of the same signal the Control Brains send to deactivate an Irken PAK remotely...suppose you could imagine mass deactivate of entire regiments falling over dead with a snap of your fingers to best describe it if deployed. That same understanding of the PAK could be used to, hypothetically, unplug an Irken from the system. A false, recurring loop to trick the Control Brains into thinking the deactivation signal was successfully sent and received. A dead man switch, if you will."
"Interesting," Vara nodded as Jur dealt yet another hand. "Suppose that means if you were to be disconnected you'd be a truly independent individual not bound to the whims of your overlords. Well..if the threat of being shot didn't exist, I should say."
The cards went around again, Vult getting a -17 and a -8, though he could bring his hand up to break the threshold. Rem came down in the meantime, taking one long look at the assembled Vortians and whispering in Vult's antenna that Kazak and Volx found something in a long deactivated processing center before leaving once again.
Vult paused from the game momentarily to listen to Rem out of hearing of their prisoners. Finally, a bit of good news after the stressful day had. He nodded, addressing her.
"Good work. Go with whoever is tasked to investigate. Their means of transportation may be present. Bring it back for study."
Rem snapped a salute of understanding before about-facing and leaving the blue-eyed Irken to his game of cards with the prisoners.
"Draw." He chanced. Positive or negative, so long as he met the threshold.
Jur threw him another card, a 3, which would leave Vult solidly at a -22. Though he did shoot a glance at Vara, wondering what was said between the Commander and his subordinate.
"Beginner's luck came through again, looks like." He made light, tossing the cards for them to shuffle and deal again. "Said four teams earlier, excluding yourselves. How many per team?"
Jur smirked, putting down his cards, he got the opposite of Vult, a positive 22. A tie, it seemed, though, fair is fair, and he wondered what was said. "Two of six, one of five. I have no idea how large the fourth team is going to be."
"Can't be too large, though. Maybe a good trio with the production suits," Vara mentioned back.
"Though there's also the two prototypes of this as well if they're really desperate for bodies." At least it gave Vult a number of how many there were solidly as well as potentially. "So, given we're in here...if you still have people out there. You're still looking for our ride, yes?"
Vara looked at Jur then back to Vult, "If you care about their lives...I suggest you tell them to back off." She tried not to make it sound like a threat, but a warning.
"We've wisened up to your tricks. My Demolitions Expert will handle any party favors you've left behind in your wake." Vult reasoned with them. Lessons were learned the hard way sometimes. Today had been one difficult lesson in humility to swallow.
"Well if you want to bury an empty casket, or whatever you Irken do, go right ahead." She continued anyhow, "It's wired to blow, but not like you think. Your team even so much as opens that door, and one of us at the very least isn't nearby? Well, that's going to be quite the fireworks show."
"We have our ways." Vult left hang as he took up his dealt cards. Between the bright minds in his unit, they wouldn't so foolishly spring a blatant trap. Not after dealing with the two before him for the better part of several hours and experiencing their ingenuity first-hand. At the very least he was getting actionable intel. Multiple teams, smaller in the 4 to 6 member range, possibility of 24 or more, including them.
She threw up her hands in frustration. Corr came over the radio. "Commander, I heard that Rem, Aero, Rha, and Vard are heading out to meet Kazak and Volx at Processing Center Zero Seven. There's some...disturbing information on this disc I started going through." He had a terminal set up next to his bed in the infirmary for the time being. "Based on what you gave me...this facility was one of the earlier buildings on Devastis and hasn't been used for the better part of a century. It's just been...mothballed. Power's off, locked up, boarded up, but curiously no guards. Though with how strict the Empire is, I don't think anyone would get the bright idea to go...exploring." He stopped to take a breath, "Commander, this building is a former processing center for Defectives before a kill switch was instituted inside PAKs."
"A mass execution facility." Vult summarized in realization through his communications link. "...have them roll footage and record everything, pull any information possible. There must be a reason why it is unguarded, even if it is derelict."
Vara knew exactly what he was talking about now. "I don't know if you believe in anything supernatural, but there's something...evil in that place. I didn't see anyone, but it still lingers...I hope they're careful."