Eat some more wart-hog and get ready to move to build a temporary prison. It'll have: A hidden place for our soldiers to sleep/eat, a prison which should have a some type of way to keep the prisoners inside{ lika ankle balls}, an interrogation space, and dug in pit traps around our little base camp. Maybe we can do it besides some cave since i don't expect actual wall and such to be present in the temporary prison.
Remember this prison is to be abandoned after we've interrogated and coerced the vanguard. Any vanguard who doesn't work with us dies via starvation.
Get ready to move out to start the temporary camp inside a cave or a very well hidden spot ask for info on the others. We need this camp as a prisoner detention center as well as interogation center. Traps will be built around it but ultimately if it's attacked we leave it. Make sure to ask the other Moorey commanders.
As the night draws in, you settle down and eat your fill of the food available around the fire and makeshift kitchen in front of you. As you munch, you start thinking about setting up a temporary prison for any captured Vanguard. A safe place to keep them that would not endanger the main camps.
You call one of your Scouts to you and tell them to find a well hidden and/or easily concealable place that would be suitably larger for a holding area plus space for some of our sisters to sleep and eat in comfort.
Unfortunately, the Scout returns an hour or so later, reporting that there is, within the immediate vicinity, no place suitable for such an endeavour. You tell her to try again. She again returns empty handed.
You thank her for her time. You start to think this plan could be troublesome.
You summon a team of scouts. They all come despite the sun been practically on the horizon. You tell them you want an in depth survey of the surrounding area for an area that fits the following description:
“A hidden place for our soldiers to sleep/eat, an interrogation space, and dug in pit traps around our little base camp.”
They nod and set out. You hope a team would be better suited to this than a single person. They return two hours later, during the early hours of darkness. They report that they have found an area that fits the description a decent enough distance away from the camp to be easily abandoned without attracting attention to the main base, but close enough to be easily accessible by friendlies.
You smile happily. “Good. Thank you for your efforts. Now, get some rest. Dismissed.” They leave after giving you the location of the potential prison.
You make a mental note to visit the scouted location sometime tomorrow after the meeting.
Hmm, it seems that the thing we transfer is not our entire mind, but mainly memories. Possibly goals/motivations as well. We should have asked about if Kaleetra could access her own memories while possessed, and if she can access our memories (trying both the case where we try to communicate them and the case where we try to prevent it). Also, what's the smallest thing we can possess? A very small insect? dust mite? nematode? bacteria?
We should also text how we're affected by our own brain's state while possessing something. Can we still communicate with Talli? If we, after possessing make our body drink alcohol, does the body we're in behave drunk?
If we possess some animal (probly a fast flying one) and fly many kilometers from our body, does that weaken our connection with our *own* body, or with the possessed one?
After the Scouts leave, you yet again go and find Kaleetra. The urge to earn about your new powers is upon you again.
You find her sitting at a camp fire dozing happily in the warmth.
“Hi Kaleetra” You greet her.
She turns to you, smiling.
”Hello again Pandora. What can I do for you?”“Just a few questions regarding when I had possessed you.”
She sits up.
”OK then, shoot.”“Could you access your memories when I was inside you? Could you access mine?”
She is ponderous for a second before answering.
“Yes, I could access my memories. Although I think I could also access yours too, but they weren’t clear. I would not have been able to read your memories had I been an intruding power, I do not think, if that is what you are wondering?”You nod. “That is exactly what I was wondering. Thanks for helping.” You smile in thanks.
You both start to chat about mundane things. You notice around you that the smallest thing you can see with the light above them are tiny insects. It seems that anything smaller is, at least for the moment, impossible for you to do. You aren’t sure whether this is something that comes with time or if you need to train, though.
“Kaleetra, I am going to try something right now that could endanger me. I need you to take care of my body for the moment.”
She looks at you, curious, before nodding the affirmative.
You possess a eagle like bird that had been circling above you. Before you try what you wanted to try, you see if you can contact Talli whilst in this state. You cannot. It feels as if something is blocking your connection to Talli. You hypothesise that this is something to do with your brain structure.
Then you take off, flying as fast as you can in one direction. Strangely, you cannot feel any weakening of the connection, even as you fly miles away from where your body is. Eventually, after what seems like ages flying and been free, you return to where your body is. As you get in a circling pattern again above you body, you return.
“Soooo.... What were you doing? You’ve been doing it for half an hour now.” Kaleetra asks.
“Just testing the limits, or the lack thereof, of my psychic possession abilities. I flew for miles, Kaleetra, and I felt no weakening of my connection. It was wonderful”.
Kaleetra smiles.
“I bet it was.”The both of you return to your friendly chatting.
Stands to reason that the vanguard are better at this than we are. Possibly that is part of the Warbreed's ridiculous resilience, perhaps they could shift our perception of their position or something. Some of their number are psychic, and could most probably detect our intrusion, and we seriously need to look into defending ourselves from such intrusions. It seems that there is a limited duration, so quarantining sensitive information would provide some protection, and locating other telepaths and training yourselves to detect possession would be invaluable. Also training the community to perceive possession, it is quite possible that they would disregard it if they did not know what it was. We are largely dependant upon secrecy, the Vanguard can get by fairly well on heavy armour and massive firepower, so we should probably focus on mental defences...
The real question is how do we train ourselves against psychic assault? Also we could use b net to somewhat detect I think. We'll have them call out a designated inner every 5 mins and if they fail there to be challenged. We should see though if we can control a sister brood member and use b net then, see of this even COULD work.
You have an idea whilst talking to Kaleetra. Whilst still chatting, you contact Ari and Ankara. You tell them about your mental escapades and about your idea.
You decide that, to protect against possession infiltration, every vat-born shall be teamed up into teams of 5, who will ping their earth names, which they all remember, to each other every half an hour minutes as a safeguard against possession.
If someone does not send in their ping, they will be challenged.
Also, before any conversation either of the battle net or face to face begins, everyone shall say their names, just to make sure that there are no possessed people among them.
See if we use our psychic powers on a fire to mold it a bit, if possible.
Finally, after you said that, you turn your full attention back to Kaleetra, who has stopped talking and is back to lying sleepily by the fire.
Feeling tired yourself, you try one more thing before turning in for the night. You decide to try and psychically manipulate the fire, turning it into different shapes or sizes. You only have moderate success.
You seem to be able to change the way it burns. Brighter or dimmer, higher flames or smaller flames and also how fast it burns its fuel. You don’t seem to be able to do anything more intricate....yet.
Speaking of mold, try it on a slime mold as well and then try to crawl in different directions splitting into two.
Intrigued, you decide to try something else, further putting off rest. You spot a slime mould on the forest floor between two trees. You concentrate hard, trying to get it to move. You don’t have any effect on it, as far as you can see.
You try again and this time you get it to split in two. Further concentration and manipulation allowed you to make the slime move and grow. Pleased with yourself, you bit Kaleetra good night and return to your sleeping platform made up of a suspended wooden platform with a ten on top of it.
***
*look around and see if there are any unfamiliar faces/ non commanders here.*
"Before i make this decision i'd like to be reminded if there is anything of note that the vanguard has been doing lately? Anything that could mean a change of plans or anything anyone here finds intriguing when they battled with the vanguard on this campaign?" {{basically i'm asking for what important battles have taken place}}
"Whatever the case, i'll take my brood on tour tomorrow night {{lie but i honestly think were being watched}} since this is an important decision and i need to time, perhaps i'll tell you all tomorrow."
The next morning, you make your way to where the meeting is set to be re-established. You are the first one there. The others trickle in over the following hour or so. Once they were all present and accounted for, you start the meeting.
You first look around to see if there are any unfamiliar faces, and you find none. You stay vigilant however, as you still don’t know what you saw the other day.
“Before I make my decision, I would like to be reminded if there has been anything of note happening recently regarding the Vanguard? Anything that could mean a change of plans? Or anything has noticed about the Vanguard on this planet?”
Ari speaks up. “It is very surprising, but the Vanguard have not been doing much except patrolling and defending against out raids for the past few weeks. We do not know what they are up to. There have been no battles of any size other than raids and even the ruins they were combing for data and who knows what else have been abandoned.”
“Could it be that they are pulling out?”
“It’s possible” Tirl-Kha says. “Although unlikely. They have lost too many troops to just give up. Of the Vanguard troops who attacked in the first wave one galactic year ago, the assault force lost approximately one quarter of their troops. Ever since, they have lost troops thanks to our campaign against them.”
“Can anyone speculate as to why the Vanguard have suddenly stopped?”
“We haven’t made any large assaults on them for a while, they could be getting complacent.” Elianna says, annoyance in her voice at having to talk about the Vanguard.
“That is certainly a possibility” You agree. Especially with the super-soldiers around, the Vanguard have been almost unassailable. The last assault launched on a Vanguard installation a couple of weeks ago was a disaster, mostly thanks to a mixture of Vanguard Marines and the ASOG WarBreed who were there at the same time.
You get lost in thought about why the Vanguard have been inactive, but then you remember the reason for this meeting.
“Right, lets get back to business. I have decided that stalking the vanguard patrols would be the best idea, especially in light of the information here. If the Vanguard are spending little time in the ruins, the chances of grabbing ourselves a few Vanguard troops is very low.
Attacking bases of any size is out due to the chance it could be filled with troops.
So that leaves stalking the patrols, which will be hard enough, I think.”
The others nod, especially the ones who supported this idea in the first place. The meeting is dismissed and due to the lack of those unexpected visitors you saw previously, you get everyone to set about preparing to attack and capture some Vanguard patrols. Your mind drifts towards the comms disrupter, but you still don’t have the parts you need. It would be really helpful in this situation.
Ask Kal about the Slinkar officers and also about the possibility of her federations shapeshifter intelligence force infiltrating our meetings causing "more people to be here".
As you prepare, you head over to Kaleetra once more.
“Hey, Kal. Can I talk to you about something? It’s a bit important.”
She smiles whilst checking her weapons.
“Sure. Always a pleasure speaking to you.”You lean in close to her ear, making sure you could not be heard by anyone else. “Is it possible that those shape shifters from the Slinkar could be here? A day or two ago, I thought I saw a few...unwanted visitors...at the meeting. They weren’t here today, but I would still like to know.”
Kaleetra scowls.
“I am glad you mentioned it. I thought I was going a bit crazy. Things kept moving about, moving away from places I had left them, as if someone had been looking at them or checking through them. Especially my bags and storage. I had a look around and many Morey, Vat-Born and other Slinkar have been experiencing the same thing.”Now it is your turn to scowl. “Kaleetra, as much as I would like you to come on this patrol raid, I need you to stay here as someone I can trust to get to the bottom of this. Try and get the Slinkar’s help with this, especially if they are been affected by this unknown phenomenon as well.”
Kaleetra nods. You both part, you heading back to get your equipment and Kaleetra heading to the Slinkar part of the camp, assumedly to try and get some support.
-*-*-*-
You get ready for the mission. You tie your long hair back and hide it under a camo net which you secure using the four ties that tie under your chin. You then use a mixture of natural dyes to paint camo patterns on your face. This is something all Morey and Vat-Born troops have adopted to help the blend in.
Your armour (now just the under-armour section as it is missing its armour plating) has already been camouflaged. It was years ago back during the early part of the campaign.
You check your weapons and their camouflaging, which both check out fine. Putting your pistol in its holster, you grab your battle rifle and, using the makeshift sling due to the magnetic holders breaking due to wear and tear and the loss of the armour plates, put it over your shoulder, where you secure it so it does not flap about making noise or getting caught on things.
You then attach the double cross-chest bandoliers in which you hold the mass-driver ammo for your battle rifle.
Finally, you grab your plasma pulse rifle.
As you are getting ready, Ari relays the details of the mission over the Battle-Net. There are going to be four teams of twenty troops. Two made up of Morey regulars, one made up of Morey commandoes and one made up of Vat-Born.
In the Vat-Born platoon, which will be led by you and Ari, will be one combat engineer, two snipers, two medics, seven infiltrators and eight scouts. The rest of your troops will stay at the camp led by Elianna and Ankara. They will provide base defence alongside the Slinkar.
Your objective will be to try and capture one of the Vanguards five to seven man patrols.
-*-*-*-
Is there anything else you want to do before you set out on this mission?
-*-*-*-
Status:1. Demeanor/Status: Calm.
2. Mental Condition: Mentally fit and stable.
3. Physical Condition: Extensive Scarring. Plasma lower stomach wound (healed) , Hyper Laser knee wound (healed).
4. Clear thoughts and currently inactive mental factions.
Inventory:1. Mark 3 Vat-Born Engineer Armoured Powered Exoskeleton Suit (Wearing) ( Extremely Damaged)
2. Mark 3 Engineer Armoured Powered Exoskeleton Helmet (Lost)
3. Advanced White Cooled Skin Tight Full Body Under-suit (Wearing) (Damaged)
4. Mk5 Mass-Driver pistol (sidearm) (Holstered)
5. Arishok Plasma pulse rifle (In Hands)
6. Dikari Plasma shotgun (Holstered on Back)
7. Warrisk Mass-Driver Battle Rifle (Holstered on Back)
8. Combat Engineering Equipment and explosives. (In Backpack)
Available Equipment (Everything not equipped is unavailable at the moment): 1. Mark 3 Vat-Born Engineer Armoured Powered Exoskeleton Suit (Extremely Damaged)
2. Mark 3 Engineer Armoured Powered Exoskeleton Helmet (Lost)
3. Basic White Skin Tight full Body Under-suit x 4
4. Advanced White Cooled Skin Tight Full Body Under-suit x 2 (One of which is Damaged)
5. Mk5 Mass-Driver pistol (sidearm)
6. Arishok Plasma pulse rifle
7. Dikari Plasma shotgun
8. Warrisk Mass-Driver Battle Rifle
9. Combat Engineering Equipment and explosives.
10. Stun/Concussion rifle
11. Casual clothes x10 (White skin tight suit, Gloves, Boots)
12. Ceremonial robes
13. Royal Guard Armoured Powered Exoskeleton suit
Implants and Augmentations:1. 2x Loyalty probe in the Striatum part of the brain.
2. Multi-range optics (Thermal, magnetic, IR, UV, multi-stage magnification etc) implant on eyes.
3. Command and Control (C&C) nano-module implanted in head.
4. Communications array nano-module implanted in head.
5. Fortified 7th Generation reverse engineered biological nano-machines in blood stream, bones, muscles, tendons and organs.
6. Nano-memory modules in the Cerebrum, holding all relevant non-personal data.
Brood Composition: 1. Forward Command and communications: 10 Vat-born.
2. Field Combat Medic: 37 Vat Born
3. Long Range Specialists (Snipers): 48 Vat-Born
4. Heavy assault: 148 Vat-Born
5. Light Assault: 127 Vat-Born
6. Infiltrators: 27
7. Heavy Support: 77
8. Combat Engineers: 69
9. Scouts: 80
Patrol Attack Squad Composition:1. Combat Engineer: 1
2. Long Range Specialists: 2
3. Field Combat Medic: 2
4. Infiltrators: 7
5. Scouts: 8
Allied Characters: 1. Ala-Shar
2. Ankara
3. Ari
4. Elianna
5. Kaleetra
6. Talli
7. Dornishi, Morey regular Commander
8. Tirl-kha, Morey Commando Commander
9. Quish-ka, Morey Regular Commander
Enemy Characters: 1. Presidentess Karista
2. Kirish, the Presidentess's assitant.
3. The Senatorium
4. New Guard Generals
5. Multiple Unknowns
6. Brigadier Xander Berginstaff
((((( These quotes will be in the next update:
have our most stealthy sisters sneak up on a Vanguard patrol, and use the stun guns/combat knives to max effect.
*
speak to the prisoners in a friendly voice and threaten to give them to Elianna, who will be instructed to show as much hatred and brutality as possible in front of all the prisoners, and gruesomely torture the prisoners given to her until you order her to stop.
find out if you can access the memories of the ones possessed by you, if so, then screw everything, mindrape Berginstaff and be done with it
*
do vanguard patrols have locators? if so remove them.
once we have them, we shall use them for vehicle opening, information, and hostages.
If we can communicate with superiors, ask for scientists, so as to be able to create loyalty probes to turn any captured elite vanguard (Please tell me it is possible to capture ASOG Warbreed)
oh almost forgot. In the event that we get a vanguard {doesn't matter if he/she/it is hurt or not} they are to be stripped down of everything. Weapons, armor, clothes, radio, and checked completely once over to make sure they don't have under their buttocks like in papers please. We can't take chances.
*
do vanguard patrols have locators? if so remove them.
once we have them, we shall use them for vehicle opening, information, and hostages.
If we can communicate with superiors, ask for scientists, so as to be able to create loyalty probes to turn any captured elite vanguard (Please tell me it is possible to capture ASOG Warbreed)
)))))
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Topic: (SG) Starfire: War and Politics - Enemies Old and New - UPDATE 03/07/2014 (Read 87518 times)