It didn't take long for Halys to send through a document to Marius containing more information about the job. Marius forwarded it on to Hunter, who quickly went to work extracting data from the dossier, adding maps and additional information to the information sent over. A few minutes later he was ready, and sent the presentation to the roll-out screen which was stretched across the dining room table.
"So, the bloke we're after is Admiral Nikolay Semenovich Mordvinov, Russian Navy. His flagship is the "Moskva", a Slava II guided missile cruiser based at Sevastopol. The Moskva is the lead of the 30th Surface Ship division, accompanied by four Guided Missile Frigates. I've got their names and some details on them, but I've not included them here because I don't think we want to go anywhere near a small fleet of military warships…" He glanced up and saw firm nods from everyone except Kai – unsurprisingly – but he ignored him and moved on.
"Also based at Sevestapol is the 4th Submarine Brigade and the 197th Assault Ship Brigade, 68th Coastal Defense Ship Brigade and 102nd Anti-Saboteur Squadron. Halys noted that we are 'advised to stay out of the military harbour entirely if possible, and probably steer clear of the harbour area in general due to the military presence.' I can't agree more. Even if some or even most of that lot are actually out in the Black Sea or ranging down to the Bosporus, there's more than enough firepower and sensor capacity there to make our life really difficult. Especially the Anti-Saboteur squadron which seem to be tasked with harbour defence in particular."
"Sevestapol is under military curfew due to the actions of Crimean nationalists and guerrilla action – so we could expect military checkpoints and random street stops in the city. In particular it will arouse suspicion if anyone's ID is not beaconing. But, there's no general issue with foreigners - enough of the mega-corps have facilities here or pipelines that it's not generally a problem."
"Beaconing?" Tads asked, looking a little confused.
"All official IDs have a beacon setting, that transmits some basic information over a few metres. Normal folks – regular people who are part of the system – have these turned on all the time. So when they go to a store, it logs them in. If they hover near the beachwear section, they might start getting discount ads for towels and cool boxes arrive in their mail. Or a sales rep will appear and tell them about the latest beach fashions and clothing combos. Shit like that. We generally have them turned off, because ain't nobody got time for that level of spam and hassle. And the kinds of places we generally go, it's not a problem. If we started to travel commercial a lot, or go into the high class areas of town it might be more of an issue – but enough people have their beacons turned off that it's not an automatic problem. Except here it seems. So, if we're going anywhere on the streets, we'll need to modify the SIN sticks to broadcast the IDs so we don't attract attention."
"Now - Admiral Mordvinov's dacha is set in an eighteen hectare compound on the north side of the harbour, about a kilometre inland. He lives in an old converted Orthodox church, with a small villa off to the side for the staff and several of his captains and ship crews. The dossier had a bunch of psych stuff in, but it boils down to him playing favourites and liking a suckup. If you're a captain who will lick his arse, you get to live in the compound in the nice villa. If you do your job and don't worship the Admiral, then you get to live outside the compound in the housing block just to the east. You get to look at the villa, but not go there. That might help us, because potentially the people nearby are good at sucking up, rather than being the best at their jobs. Depends on how we approach it though."
"Do we have information on the security?" Aswon asked.
"Yup – not as complete as I'd like though. The compound is surrounded by a three metre high block wall, topped with broken glass set into the upper surface. No indication of barbed, razor or monofilament wire. The main entrance is to the south-east, facing the other housing block and there is a small guard shack / gatehouse there, manned 24/7. Retractable anti-ram bollards and a gate. The gate isn't too much of an issue, but there's a permanent guard force there. There are also frequent patrols around the perimeter by pairs of naval ratings armed with automatic weapons, some with dogs – from what I can see these are just honking great Alsatians and Mastiffs rather than Hellhounds or other para-critters. Speaking of voodoo stuff, the magical defences are unknown, but suspected to be warded at the least, with possibly a bound spirit on the site given the senior ranks present."
"That fits with what we know about the Russian military. Remember how outmatched the Brigadier was by even just a couple of shapeshifters and some fairly basic magic? And the lack of magical support over near the lake? They really don't have much magical firepower for general guard duty, so the defences are quite likely to be passive – wards and bound elementals on guard duty. That fits with the general tendency towards hermetic magic rather than shamans."
"The only other note in the dossier was that there's some unusual plants suspected to be inside, so there could be guardian vines or other alarm plants that would potentially pick up on magical presences. But beyond that, there's nothing else about the magical defences, so we're probably going to have to scout when we get onsite."
"With the naval base only just over a klick away, if we go for a noisy entry then it will likely lead to an armed response in less than two minutes from the ready response force down at the harbour. That's likely to be military police in lightly armoured jeeps, maybe a small squad or two. But, unless it gets sorted out quickly, then serious reinforcements will likely arrive in less than ten minutes from an alarm, consisting of shipboard marines, scout helicopters and fast-response hovercraft. If there's gunfire or explosions, they're going to sound general quarters and a lot of very pissed-off Ruskies will come boiling out of that base, let alone what the local police will do."
"Armed helicopters are probably the most dangerous part of this response – that and the hugely powerful radar and sensor systems on the warship. Dodging around them on passive systems should be possible – we are very stealthy after all. But if they go to full power and start doing active scans, evading them will be very hard indeed." Marius pinched the bridge of his nose for a moment, examining the map. "The hills are quite steep around the edge of the bay, but look like they are covered in mostly light vegetation. Very little cover in general. And if they get fighter coverage launched from the local airbase, we will have even less chance of escape and evasion."
"Yup – don't disagree. There's also the barracks or living quarters just outside the compound. The officers and crew stationed there are at least all military personnel, so likely to be trained to react well in a crisis, have at least basic hand to hand training and may well be armed. So there could be a lot of additional lightly armed responders in close proximity. Individually we can take them no bother – probably in small to medium groups even. But if the whole lot come to investigate noise, we could be quickly overwhelmed."
"What about the church? Any info on that?"
"Not enough to make us happy, Aswon. It's a really unusual design." Hunter keyed his terminal and the map was replaced with an image of a steep sided stone pyramid. "Very unusual design, dating back to the eighteenth century, I think. Maybe a bit later – but it was an Orthodox church and in use until about thirty years ago when it was taken over by the military. I've only got very rough information on it, and a few trid-pics from before it was seized. Nothing new – only some gross information on the basic construction and décor." Hunter flicked through a couple of low-resolution images showing the finely-carved stone walls and sweeping ceilings, marble floors and religious statues and paraphernalia dotted around. "The notes are that the security system is known to include pressure pads on the floor, motion sensors, modern and high-tech ID scanners and a thermal monitoring system."
"Well, the pressure pads are likely to be the easiest to avoid – if that marble floor is still there, then pressure pads are likely to be just under any carpeted areas and furniture – so we just have to be careful where we walk. Motion sensors are tougher – if we move slowly enough they can be fooled, but it makes for a very slow job. Mind you – if people are in there, then they'll be disabled for sure, or they'd be going off all the time. The thermals are likely to be the biggest challenge technologically." Aswon sighed, then sat back, deep in thought.
"The dossier also indicates that following some assassination attempts by Crimean guerrillas that the Admiral is likely to have some marine bodyguards working close protection – so much more heavily-armed and armoured, with better training than the standard naval ratings working the outer perimeter."
"Can you zoom out on the map please, Hunter? Thanks. And a bit more. And again. Ok – think I have it. I'm just going for a look – I'll be back in a few minutes." Tads shot out of her body, letting it slump over the table and shot out to the north-east, heading towards some of the nasty polluted areas in Russia they'd discovered in their previous travels, using the zones of filth and despair both as navigational waypoints and also to disguise her travels – turning abruptly in them to travel in a dogleg and mask her origin points.
It took her only ten minutes to reach the Crimea, and she had a good but careful look around, before returning with equal care and effort to disguise her route. Settling back into her body, she was about to speak when she noticed that Rusudan was bobbing up and down at the end of the table, trying to catch Kai's attention.
"I'm sorry to disturb you, but there is something I think you should see. On the trid. I don't know if it will affect you." He gestured towards the large trid-unit in the living area, and the team headed over, spotting a mountainous area being portrayed in a shaky view. Rusudan raised the volume, and the voice-over became audible.
"The military have been attacking the hills for the last few hours, using a variety of towed guns and aerial units to systematically cover the higher slopes." A number of loud explosions rocked the mountains, and a few seconds later the low rumbling of explosions rolled towards the camera viewpoint, the sound taking some time to cover the distance. The camera swung over to the impact point, revealing a torrent of earth raining down from the impact site before gradually fading from view as a dense brown cloud spread out from the impact site. The shells or bombs had struck in a line, and the clouds spread and merged before being driven along the mountain slope by the prevailing wind.
The camera zoomed out slightly and swung sharply to the side, losing focus and a dark blur shot across the field of view. The operator frantically adjusted their settings and the bomber suddenly swam into focus as it rocketed across the valley, pulling up and they saw a pair of bombs detaching from the fuselage before exploding into thousands of tiny fragments which plummeted down to the ground. Bright flashes sparked and jumped across thousands of metres as the cluster warheads immolated multiple hectares of the slopes, driving trees into matchwood and stripping bushes and plants from the earth. The bomber banked over sharply, disappearing behind a mountain peak. A moment later the image went dark as something was placed over the lens, and an angry voice rattled off some rapid-fire Turkish.
"Stop filming or you'll be arrested," Hunter translated. He studied the text crawl on the bottom of the screen which was still being overlaid by whichever studio was broadcasting the feed. Oh – it's in the eastern hills of Turkey. Pretty near that place we saw on the way back from Constantinople."
"With all the vegetation gone and no life left?" Aswon shuddered. "I guess that answers what might have been in those artillery shells or bombs then."
"Well, thanks for letting us know, Rusudan." Kai clapped him on the shoulder. "That would have been bad news to fly into or try to travel through. We'll look at the route we're flying and work out how it's going to affect us. But for now – let's get back to planning out this first job." He waited for everyone to be seated again and then waved to Tads to reveal what she'd found.
"The site was pretty easy to find. The port and the surrounding area are nasty, lots of background clutter and filth – I'm guessing from spills in the water from the naval base and the local industry. Once you get away from the port, though, it tends to get better, and up in the hills it's nice and natural. The church building is very distinctive, and the area around it is clean and well cared for – it's not going to inhibit spell casting or summoning at all from what I could see. No spirits on patrol, or para-critters or other weird stuff anywhere in the grounds. I did see some of the dogs, and they do all look normal – though pretty big." She leant over the table a bit and traced around the church displayed on the overhead map.
"This though – very heavily constructed building – big solid stonework and doors. Looks fairly old, but in good repair. It's also strongly aspected towards a particular strain of magic. At a guess, I'd say Orthodox Christians… enough that it's going to slow down my powers inside a fair bit, but provide extra power for any local priests. It's also warded – pretty strongly, too. Doesn't look like anything special, no masks or alarms attached to it – but it's strong enough to stop anyone dead that hasn't got considerable power of their own. I didn't try it, just in case I set the alarm off, or bumped into something inside." She steepled her fingers in front of her for a moment, considering her next words.
"Outside we're fine, full magical support available. We'll have to drop all spells and tricks to get in through the doors, though, and inside I'll be functional, but at a lower level than normal. But there's no sign of anything that would really alarm me or make me doubt our ability to get in and get the job done."
"Ok, that's good to know, Tads, thanks. Right – so the way I see it, we've got a couple of options. First of all, we can come flying in overhead, blow the doors open with heavy machine gun fire, then we rope slide down and in, shoot anyone that gets in the way, grab the stuff, then run out, get back aboard and fuck off sharpish."
"That sounds like an awful plan, Kai!"
"I never said it wasn't Aswon. But it's plan A. It would probably work to some degree, and it's really simple. But let's look at other options. Plan B involves a stealth approach and finding somewhere quiet to land, then sneaking in to the compound by evading the patrols, picking the lock on the door or bypassing the electronics, and doing it as a pure stealth mission. But, if we get spotted, that quickly reverts back to plan A, except the bird is further away and we have a slower get-away."
"That sounds better, but I agree it's much slower. And also if we have electronics to bypass, that's going to need Marius on site to do that – so he's not in the pilot's seat."
"Exactly, Aswon. But again, it's a possible – just laying them out and we can work out what we like and what we don't. Next option would be to try and infiltrate in disguise – maybe getting in dressed up as Russian Military Police? We've got an example of how they act, after those guys turned up at the Brigadier's."
"I see where you're going – but I don't like it. There's a good chance all of our details are in the Russian database, possibly along with some details on the tilt-wing. I don't think we want to risk being seen or having a link crop up. Or to the guy we had to deal with at the power plant at the dam. Too much chance of bringing a lot of heat down on us."
"Hunter – can you find out how old the church is?" Marius asked. "I wonder if it dates back to an early enough period, if we might find something like escape tunnels or secret passages built into it, dating back to a repressive period?"
"I can have a look." He jacked in and they saw his eyes glaze over a little as he started to scan through the matrix, looking for any information on the location that wasn't locked down to a corporate host or hidden behind some pay-wall. While he was searching the team brainstormed ideas, moving from Plan D through to Plan M (in which it was suggested that Kai was sacrificed in a bloody ritual to bring good fortune to the rest of the team, which went down surprisingly well with everyone but him), which were mostly variations of the first three, adding some particular twist or variable that they might be able to leverage.
"Ok, that didn't go as well as I'd hoped. Not a lot of information out there. Think the church is late eighteenth or early nineteenth century, so possibly a bit too modern to have the kind of features we were looking for. I can't find any blueprints of the place either – found a bunch of references to stuff like that, but they all seemed to have been purged or wiped during the crash. On the other hand, the place is of a modern enough construction that there's one way we might be able to get in – through the roof. It's likely to be of a light enough construction we can cut our way through fairly quietly and make a big enough hole to sneak in. Oh – and I got some general information on the harbour showing the layout of the civilian and military side, as well as a bit of digging on the Admiral. Turns out he's pure military, not a political appointee – so no speeches or public appearances to look at. We'd need to dig into the military files if we wanted to find any real dirt on him, or get some samples for trying to impersonate him."
"Through the roof, huh? Interesting."
"Yeah, Kai – think about it. We've not actually parachuted since the training course. We could try it here. What could go wrong?" Hunter managed to keep his face serious for a few more moments before his grin escaped and Kai frowned at him, realising he was being wound up.
"If the building is somewhat modern, that might open up new possibilities for things like gas. It's likely to have well-fitted windows and doors, and that might let us deliver something like Neurostun in there. Have we got any left?"
"Nope, Aswon." Hunter shook his head. "Used the last of back in Sioux when we were trying to stop all them zombiefied folks."
"You say he's not one for public speaking or appearances, Hunter?" Kai waited for the ork to nod in confirmation. "That might mean he's not commonly seen out of his quarters, or off his flag bridge and things. If we can get some visuals on him and some samples, I might be able to impersonate him. Maybe if I can infiltrate and make out that there's something going on, some major alert that I know about – I could lead away all the guards and defenders to clear the way for you all?"
"Is your Russian up to that? I mean, that's not worked out well for us in the past…" Tads muttered, and Marius scowled as he remembered the awful communications blunder back in the mountains that had led to him having to try and dodge shoulder-launched missiles fired at his truck.
"I was thinking I could try and use hand signals. Maybe make them think they were under surveillance or something – keep it on the down-low. Might work. Might not." He looked around and saw a healthy dose of scepticism from the rest of the team.
"I think we just send Shimazu in ahead, he's the quietest." Hunter offered.
"No. Well, yes, he is." Aswon corrected himself. "But still no. Because when you have an incredibly sharp sword, every problem looks like it needs to be sliced into chunks. If we send just Shimazu in, it's going to get messy and violent, and lead to a lot of bloodshed. Probably none of it his, but they'll definitely know we've been there."
"Oh… so you want a quiet job. Well, we should probably also scope the place out for sensors seeded through the woods as well then, and check the perimeter thoroughly before we go in."
"I can help with that. Give me thirty minutes or so." Tads made herself comfortable again and vaulted skywards to do some more recon, knowing that the sensor pods would likely show up as dark, dead spots in astral while she checked through the trees.
"Well, if we've got thirty minutes, let's start packing then – get the bird prepped, supplies loaded, nappies changed – that kinda thing." He grinned at Marius who scowled back at him, but took the opportunity to go and see Nadia and the baby again whilst he could. The rest of the team grabbed gear and loaded the tilt-wing up, making sure they were prepared to depart later.
They met up back at the table when Tads returned, and she caught up on some of the plans they'd hatched while she was away – including Kai's idea of just swinging a tow line through the window and grabbing whatever display cabinet it was in and just yanking it out of the side of the building. Surprisingly it was Hunter that was most set against that one, with him being determined to not damage the structure of the church as much as possible. Once caught up, she filled them in on her second reconnaissance of the area.
"So, I looked through the wooded area that surrounded the church pretty carefully, and I couldn't see any kind of tech – no cameras, no sensors, no detectors, no wires or dishes, nothing. It looks like a quiet tranquil woodland with some paths through it and a bunch of old graves and suchlike – pretty natural. I gave the main building another check over, and couldn't find any obvious flaws in the ward, and I also checked over the building off to the side – that one has a less powerful ward covering the outside that I should be able to penetrate if needed. The block across the road, outside the compound where all the other officers and crew are quartered was even less powerfully warded – enough to keep children and trickster spirits out perhaps, but not much more." She took a quick drink of water, then continued.
"The wall around the compound however does have some tech fixed on it, at regular intervals, on the thicker parts. I hid in a tree and manifested, and they look like some kind of light and sensor arrangement."
"Probably infra-red scanners then at a guess." Aswon noted.
"But again, other than those, and a bunch of cameras watching over the gate, they seem to rely on the patrols and the physical wall to keep people out."
"Well, that's good news, I think – that should be easy to look for and work around. A lot easier than a high tech sensor system anyway." Kai thought for a moment, then pointed at Tads again. "So, how do you feel about your spells for making us stealthy and silent?"
"Well, I can't make the bird too stealthy – at least not with a spell. It's too big. I can change the appearance and disguise the noise as something else, but I can't muffle it. People – no problem."
"Not with a spell? Ah – of course. So you can with a spirit?"
"Yes, if I summon a large enough spirit it should be able to disguise the aircraft and make us almost silent."
"Ok, and what about temperature. We think they've got thermal sensors inside – is there anything you can do with those?"
"Depending on just how hostile the atmosphere is in there to my magic will affect this – but I should be able to. The spell I got from the native shaman up in Tsimshin was pretty powerful, so with a bit of time to prepare and focus, I can make a fairly big change in temperature."
"How big?"
"Um. Perhaps enough to take it from freezing to being an average day in the desert? I think so anyway."
"Oh – wow. Ok. That's pretty significant. That should certainly fox the sensors. Now, if we do get you to go in first, Shimazu, can you get past the maglocks and stuff ok?"
"Not really. Marius is the one you need for that, or maybe Hunter. I can pick the physical locks, but electronics is not my strong point. I should be able to cut through just about any lock going – but that'll probably set it off, and then we're on a tight clock."
"I really don't like any of the options that end up with a smash and grab approach. I just think the naval base is too close, and there are too many assets in the area. We're all aware that Marius is an excellent pilot and the tilt-wing is very stealthy – but there are limits. A couple of those warships light up their radar and turn up the power, and we ARE blown. Let alone air-search radars launching from the ships or the airbase."
"I wonder if there is perhaps still an undercroft or sepulcher, or some other kind of underground access for the church?" Marius reached over and manipulated the map slightly, trying to get a better view.
"That sounds better. Or maybe grab the Admiral while he's travelling somewhere and tranq him, then get Tads to probe his mind for the information we need – access codes and the like."
"I like the sound of underground tunnels. Could be a nice stealthy way to get in. How likely are they?"
"Well Kai, that depends on the Church and the history of the area. Some places it was very common, due to suppression of the church or organised religion. But we can look…"
"I have an alternative. We could make a tunnel." Tads gestured to Hunter to zoom back out a bit, showing more of the overall grounds and estate. "If we can establish a good starting point somewhere outside, I can use my spell to move and shape the earth, dig down a couple of metres and then just create a passage towards the church basement, and dig up later?"
"Ohh – I like that as an idea. Much stealthier. And unless they have seismic sensors in there, very hard to detect. We may come up UNDER some of the pressure pads, which would be…novel. But I think we could work around that."
"I would be pretty certain that the floor of the church will feature either a basement or some form of sub-floor, just based on the construction methods normally used for stone buildings. So if we tunnel up into that, we then can move around and choose where to emerge internally. Or just use whatever access point there is into the below-ground area." Marius looked at the map and then worked out the distances involved. "If we went from these houses over here, say from one of the back gardens – we would be talking about a half kilometre tunnel. Can you do that?"
"Pretty easily – it would just take a bit of time. Let's see… about a metre wide, two metres high, assuming dense and heavy clay soils or scattered rocks…" Tads stared up at the roof for a moment, and they saw her lips moving as she mentally estimated how long it would take to case each spell and how much earth she could move. "I think about four or five hours should do it, assuming that I'd need a couple of rests and drinks and such like."
"That is most excellent. That would give us time to dig into the area and then do some covert surveillance, and await the best time to strike!" Marius exclaimed.
"And maybe we could try and do something clever like shutting down the power once I've dug the tunnel? I'm sure a spirit could use its powers to create some kind of accident."
"That I am not so sure on. Most locks and security systems are planned around such things – they will either include a battery internally to maintain the system while the main power is out, or they are designed to fail-secure. That is, you need the power to operate the lock or device into the open or insecure state. Cut the power and the device is dead-locked shut."
"Oh." Tads filed the knowledge away for the future. "Maybe that's not a good idea, then."
"It may still be useful in a general sense. Cutting the power and turning all the lights off in areas nearby for instance may be a benefit. Or cutting the power near the docks may send the ships to alert in a defensive sense. Hmmm…. "Marius zoomed out on the map and looked lost in thought. The rest waited for him to speak again, but he just waved his hand at them as he considered whatever it was that was crossing his mind.
"Well, if the tunnel gets us in there without being seen, I would very much like it not to turn into a 'smash and grab' as Aswon calls it. Ideally I would like to close the tunnel up behind us – at least partially – on the way out. If we can hide it, they won't know who hit them or how, and there's much less chance of finding my magical signature anywhere in the tunnel. Either that or we need to wait half a day or so after the last spell is cast to ensure the magic has had time to dissipate." She suddenly looked over to Hunter. "Hey – do we have a picture of the thing we're here to steal?" Hunter nodded, and flashed up a picture of the Colt 1911 from the auction house catalogue. "And is there anything distinctive about it?"
"Well, it was the first one – so the serial number is a big give-away!"
"I can't see that on the picture. Where is it?"
"Oh, it's pretty small – but it doesn't take much to look at it and spot that it's anything other than number one!"
"I think I see where Tads is going with this." Aswon interrupted. "If we got another 1911, and tried to duplicate how this one looks, we could leave a dummy in place. And if we do a clean job, until someone has reason to look and check the serial number, they'd be none the wiser?"
"Exactly!"
"Ahh, I see. Ok, that makes sense. And in that case – yeah, we can find a 1911 I'm sure. They're not super common, but there were millions of the buggers made. It can't be that hard to find one we can get hold of.
"Small creatures. Maybe rats?"
"Sorry Kai?"
"Could you turn us into small creatures, something small enough to get through any air vents and things like that? In the church?"
"Oh, I see. Probably not. It gets harder and harder to do, the bigger the difference between what you start as, and what you finish as. That's why when we were doing the flying practice you were all things like a giant albatross. Easiest to change your form when your overall size and mass didn't change as much."
"Ahh – so tricky. But possible. I wonder how many rats it would take to chew through the security system cables."
"Not many – it can be a common problem in some situations. But it is also sometimes a problem for the rats and mice. If the lines carry power, you can get electrocuted remarkably easily. And it would raise an alarm, just the same as cutting the power."
"Ahh – but it would raise AN alarm, not an attack alarm. It might be something we could do over a few days to systematically wear them down and make them think they're getting unreliable equipment issues. I mean – do we know what we're looking at in terms of equipment?"
"I did a run earlier, while Tads was looking, and I found a solid matrix connection from the Church, the villa next to it, and the building across the road down towards the naval base. All three of them were well protected through, with good quality military firewalls. I would consider that an approach of last resort – they're too well protected."
"Ok, and if we did get you in a position to touch or get line of sight to the Admiral – do you think you could influence him or control his mind to do what we wanted?" Kai asked, turning back to Tads.
"Maybe. It would be hard – I expect a man in his position to be fairly firm in his convictions and strong-minded." A snort came from Hunter, who looked to disagree, and that in turn sparked a whole conversation about the Admiral and just how resilient he might be to their efforts to control his mind, as various factors were discussed trying to determine if this was possible. Eventually they agreed that he was likely to be somewhat robust, being a military appointee not a political one, and having had to climb his way through the ranks over the years was probably used to a good fight. Aswon pointed out that not only had he been targeted for assassination by the 'Free Crimea' movement, but that he'd evaded death several times over, which was not the mark of a stupid or weak-willed man.
"Ok – last question I think, for me. Can we create a natural disaster?" The table went quiet as everyone looked at Kai in alarm, wondering what was going through his head. This time.
"What the actual fuck, Kai?" Marius asked, going for the direct approach. "Why do you always try to escalate things to an over-complicated level? A disaster?"
"Just answer the question, will you?"
"A small one – maybe." Aswon replied. "We've got some scientific knowledge we can put to use, explosives, and Tads can throw some significant forces around if required. But do we have 'Ghost-Dance' levels of mojo? No, not even close. But I'm with Marius on this one – why?"
"Well, again it would set off an alarm, but it wouldn't be an attack. I was thinking about that tidal wave that came down the lake near the dam in Russia see. If something happened in the port, that could provide a really big distraction…"
"I see where you are heading – but I still think you are over complicating things. And besides, I have been thinking of something for a while. I think this would serve your purpose much better." Marius grinned, then turned towards Tads. "Your spell for hiding the vehicle – it just creates a three-dimensional illusion, does it not?"
"Yes, I can change the form, shape, sound and other things."
"Good. And as I understand it, you can do it anywhere you can see. That is, you don't have to be touching the thing you want to hide or change."
"Yes, if I can see it, I can change it. With the binoculars I can probably cover things twenty kilometres away or so."
"Excellent. Well, I have a plan for a distraction down in the naval base, should we need one. If we are in the woods near the church, we actually have uninterrupted lines of sight down to the harbour, both civilian and military. So, imagine what would happen if Tads created an illusion of a submarine periscope slicing through the water, patrolling outside the harbour. And when the anti-submarine forces reacted, if that periscope dropped down into the water and disappeared?"
"They'd go nuts, thinking they were about to be attacked – and the boats would go crazy patrolling the water."
"Yes, they would, Hunter. But they would not find anything to confirm their visual sighting. And would probably be convinced that they are being attacked by a very skilled, sneaky and cunning opponent. One that is playing the game of hide and seek incredibly well."
"They'd be at it for hours, trying to hunt down the sighting. Especially if you kept putting up vague twitches of a sighting elsewhere. Or come to think of it – it's a full senses illusion. All you need is for Tads to make a mechanical noise somewhere that could be a submarine loading a torpedo tube or scraping the bottom, and they'll go mental." Aswon grinned, imagining the confusion amongst the military forces as they tried to hunt down a phantom. "Great idea!"
"Not bad at all, Marius. Not bad. Well – I think we've got the good beginnings of a plan, and we can work on it in the air. But for now, I've been getting a list of stuff together based on what we've discussed so far. We need a 1911 to use as a replica, some digging implements and stuff to use on the entry and exit of the tunnels or to help move rocks around and stuff, cordless drills and some kind of camera on a flexible hose for scoping out the basement of this church."
"We should be able to get all of that stuff up in Baku," Aswon noted.
"Yep – so let's go get in the bird, and that's our first stop – then onwards and we'll do the rest of the planning on the journey over and once we've got some physical recon done." Kai looked over at Tads. "No offence, and I appreciate the magical scouting and the intel so far – but I think some direct sensor readings and a few different points of view might help, or notice things in a different way." Tads didn't seem offended and just nodded along with him.
As they took off, Kai had another sudden thought and called out to the team.
"Say, once we've stolen the gun – can it be tracked? Magically I mean? Like we did with Harley?"
"Of course. It's an item of significance and unique. And it's possible it may have links to something – like a certificate of authenticity, or an antique case. Those would all help form a link between the things. But, on the other hand, it would be moving, and it could be anywhere – making them search potentially across the whole world for it. And, while it's in the tilt-wing, it's behind a very powerful ward. So the chances are very, very low that someone could find it. Not impossible, but tough without a very competent magical team. And if they had that, it'd be a lot better defended magically…"
Kai nodded to Aswon as he listened to the explanation, and then relaxed a little. It didn't sound like much of a concern, as long as they were careful.
The journey to Baku was swift, and they set down to the north of the city, hiding the aircraft behind some large warehouses and then catching a cab into town to get the supplies they needed. Soon enough they were in the air, flying up and through the mountains to the north, slipping into Russian territory through the high passes and then descending down into the lowlands. Marius called ahead, and their contact at Sochi was waiting for them with fuel, topping off the tanks and replacing the fuel used so far. Marius confirmed that they had more than enough to make it to Sevestapol and back now, and if they tanked on the way back here, they could fly up into the mountains and around for several hours to find the right area to hide out in and talismonger for a week while the heat died down.
With the refuelling complete, they took off once more and Marius aimed out over the Black Sea, heading for Crimea and their target.
