The Line in the Stars (IC) [PG/14]

[Lisky]

Hallways

Knight just sighed, and walked away, realizing that whatever he tried to say would probably just offend Romulus anyways...

He made his way down the halls and somehow ended up at Aaron's quarters... he had no idea how he even got there...  He checked his appearance first, then knocked on the door, awaiting a reply

[ShadesFox]

Aaron's Room

Aaron turns about and opens the door.  "Ah Knight, you wanted to see me about something?"

[Lisky]

Aaron's Room

Knight nodded, then said "i've got a few concerns about this mission, and if i'm supposed to be on the ground, in the thick of things, i'd like a little bit of intel on what's actually going on... it'd also be nice to know what my responsibilities are actually going to be... another issue is that i had a rather unique weapon in the escape pod with me, and i haven't gotten it back. it's a laser pistol, it's not standard issue, or even close to it..."

[ShadesFox]

Aaron's Room

Aaron nods back, "I... don't recall anyone taking your pistol.  If anyone did it probably would have been Ben.  Anyways come on in and I'll fill you in on the rest of the details of the mission."

Aaron walks in with Knight in tow and sits down.

"So, this mission is primarily scientific.  There is an old Acadian wreck that Lt. Hunnydew's grandmother found and subsequently lost.  Pirates and all that.  So we are looking for it again, this time with the benefit of our Acadian friends.  What we really want to find is a working computer core, it should have extensive data that we can use.  With any luck we can also find some Acadian crew still there."

Aaron intentionally left out his personal reasons, and Nova's personal reasons too.

"As for your role, that is what I'm still deciding.  My preliminary plan is that we go to the planet undetected, then Romulus, his team, Ixiah, Marissa, Richard, and myself checkout the site, make sure that it is okay.  You would stay behind, arranging the rescue of the lot of us should things get into the horribly wrong territory.  Otherwise, you bring Nova, Loki, and Saioko to the site, with Naz on Mother keeping things ready to depart quickly on her end.  This, of course, is the preliminary plan that will be scrapped quickly when things go wrong.  The getting there plan mostly involves breath holding and leaving... will probably be improvised."

[Lisky]

Knight nodded "so, basically, you want me to bodyguard the Non-combatants once the area is clear?" knight asked with wry smile... it was meant to be a bit of a joke, as well as a rhetorical question... "i think i can handle that type of responsibility... though what are we looking at in the way of opposition, and what are our available assets?... if you want some type of diversion, an old special forces trick is to break something in a way that seems was done from standard forces.... it keeps the opposition looking for an outside attacker and they ignore the inside... actually, any chance you've got a display with a full system wide assessment?"  Knight was practically thinking out loud, and to him, this conversation had become just like making an operations plan for a mission, where thinking outside the box wasn't just common, it was encouraged...

[ShadesFox]

"You ask many questions I don't know the answer to.  I don't know what to expect, I think it will be empty, but I want to have fall back plans just in case.  We could run into common pirates or unspeakable horrors from millennia past.  As for assets, I think Mother or Alexis could best explain.  Let's find her.  Maybe she knows where your pistol is too."

Aaron heads off.
((OOC: and stops replying.  I think we just set the record for the most number of posts between Azlan posts X3)).

[Lisky]

Lost in the hallways of Mother

Knight tried to follow, but, after making a wrong turn, found himself alone, and again completely lost and disoriented... he wished oh so desperately that he had paid better attention during his tour... trying to get a mental image of the ship, he went about trying to figuring out where Arron had gone off to yet again... after several tries, and winding up everywhere but where he wanted to be, Knight started thinking to himself... 'this is getting re-god-damn-diculous, if this keeps up, i'm going to just start knocking, or opening random doors until i find someone who can give me some proper freaking directions'

[Azlan]

Lost in the hallways


Knight was lost, he could not understand how such a relatively small ship could be so confusing.  The Cold Fire was definitely much more conventional in layout.

As he rounded he ran smack dab into Saioko who had been about to speak.  Both went tumbling in a twisted mass of surprised fur.  Knight was pressed physically into a door with Saioko up against him. 

"I'm so..." was all the feline could manage before the door opened.  Knight tumbled backwards with Saioko again landing on top of him. 

Knight landed on his tail, causing him to almost yelp in pain if it not for Saioko's mouth surrounding his in an unintentional bit of tongue wrestling, as she was stuck mid-word in an apology.

Everyone in the command center had ceased what they were doing and were intently staring at the pair.

Both Loki and Ixiah were giggling conspiratorially.  Both had stopped pestering Nazareth about ten seconds prior to the two felines tumbling through the doorway.

Mother and Alexis were both around a holographic table which displayed the solar system in realtime holographics.  Both seemed mildly amused.

Barely keeping from laughing, Loki calls out to both of them, "get a room you too."

Disengaging from the unintentional kiss, Saioko was fiery red of blush under her fur.  She did not understand the reference Loki was making and thought logically, "We already have one and we put it to very good use!"  She replied.



A few moments earlier in the command center


Aaron had just managed to arrive sans Knight, he could have sworn the feline was behind him.  The projection of Mother and Alexis were examining the solar system using a holographic map, while Saioko looked on.  The young captain seemed fascinated by the vixen AIs and she spent a lot of time chatting with them.

"Why yes, Eric does stand at attention for me and frequently salutes me... why?"  Was the only bit that Aaron managed to catch as he entered.

Saioko turned to see who had entered, "I thought you would be bringing Eric..."

"He might of gotten lost, he wasn't paying much attention during the tour, he seemed pretty wore out."  ventured Ixiah.

Saioko nodded, "yes, I was quite rough with him the poor guy.  I'd better go find him."  she exited the command center, the door closing behind her.

Alexis gestured Aaron over, as well as Nazareth, "thought you both would want to see this.  Our opposition has quite a fleet, four of what your ISF database considers to be Sovereign class battleships.  They are old for your standards."

     

[ShadesFox]

Command Center, just before Knight and Saioko enter

Aaron nods, "Yes, Nazareth told me about that.  I would prefer that we avoid the shooting match, even if the ships are old.  They still have the fact that they are battleships going for them.  Unless someone has a convincing argument against sneaky and discreet I would prefer that rout."

At was at this point that the impromptu make out session entered the command center.  After a moment of being amused he said, "Your arguments regarding the crew's distinct lack of experience in the area of sneaky and discreet are noted."

[Azlan]

ooc: I don't specifically have a response for Romulus, he was left at an awkward spot so to speak.  If Daimien posts him to a location or action I will get a response up.  I forgot one for Nova, must remedy... and PBH really must upgrade Engrish to English if you please.



Command Center after Saioko and Knight



"I believe it is a good time to finalize strategy, as Naz requested my input earlier, but I held it off until Alexis finished her intelligence gathering."  Mother added, "I have a wide array of systems for stealthy operations.  As some of you may remember, I possess optical and sensor cloaking technologies."

Alexis nodded, "our cloaking is important, more from a visual standpoint then sensors.  The sensor equipment in use by these pirates would be thwarted by the passive stealth due to the material construction of mom." 

The younger orange vixen tapped the air in the upper left of holographic field, bright red circles stretched out from each ship in the system.  The battleships had a scanning range that reached the sixth planet from their Lagrange position around the fourth planet.  Each cruiser had approximately the same scanning range and none of them were particularly close to their position.  There were also a number of sensor posts that kept a reasonable amount of coverage in system, but there were also obvious holes in the coverage.



Engineering


The lone feline wandering in a restricted area only remained alone for a few moments before a paw was placed on her shoulder.  The golden fur and bespectacled face of Rebecka beamed out at Nova, "so you finally snuck over here to steal a look at super-advanced alien technology?"

The most prominent structure in the engineering area is a two stage core much more advanced than what was found in Matron.  The first unit is a quantum singularity reactor and the second is an antimatter reactor.  The whole of the system is very much like the external of the ship, mottled gray organic systems.  The drives look more like they were grown as opposed to built.

"Since you are not supposed to be here, I must ask what are you doing here?"  the golden vixen inquired.   

[Lushin]

Wondering around
Romulus went for a walk when Knight headed off to find Aaron. He had no destination in mind he was just walking.

[Lisky]

Command Center after Saioko and Knight Enter

Knight untangled himself from the female, and was in the process of coming up with an even vaguely appropriate response when Saioko spoke first... He just smiled politely, shrugged, and said "what can i say, sometimes subtlety is over-rater..."

After taking a few moments to let things settle down, Knight went about studying the display carefully, paying particular close attention to the space station.  Looking around, he had already started to formulate something that could be used as a distraction either to get to the marked objective, or a way to leave the system while attention was diverted.  Asking no one in particular "i've got a few questions about the opposition, firstly, do we know anything about that space station? Is it being used by civilians or is it a military target?, also, how quickly would you estimate they'd be to respond to a celestial body heading towards one of those ships"  He had a devious grin as he went about trying to visualize how best to go about what he had started proposing.

[ShadesFox]

Command Center

"I still don't understand the unconditional urge people seem to have with blowing up everything in sight.  Let's leave the space station alone, it isn't like it will come after us.  Right now the plan includes finding Matron on the 3rd planet and investigate the site.  No part of this plan includes 'own pirate space stations fixed in orbit around the 4th planet in the face'.  A much greater threat is going to be pirates on the ground on the 3rd planet. "

[Lisky]

Command Center

Knight started to look almost hurt by Aaron's little outburst, but his smile came back as quickly as it had left "before you assume i say we attack the space station, what i'm thinking is we tow an asteroid up to some velocity, that where we release it, it is in the path of the space station, perhaps do it for an escape plan... even with relativistic speeds, we release it out here it'll take a few days to actually slam into the station... so, we plan on trying to leave the planet when the asteroid is close enough to cause concern..." he paused, raised an eyebrow, then said "what, you thought i was going to suggest something less subtle?"

[techmaster-glitch]

Command Center

   Nazareth stood and saluted to the arrival of Aaron, but paid little attention to the projection of Alexis, the new female rescued from the escape pod, and the two little alien foxes who Nazareth gathered were important to the mission, though he personally paid them no attention at all. Mother, however, brough him over to a holomap of the star system as well as readouts of the pirate fleet.
   However, that was when the other pickup from the escape pod crashed through the door, and engaged in...a public display of "affection". The only reaction from Nazareth was for his eyes to get dangerously narrow.
   Such scandalous lack of discipline.
   The newcome then had the audacity to come over to try to discuss "strategy" with Aaron. Although his "strategy" seemed to consist of trying to attack targets that they had absolutely nothing to do with. Nazareth finally interjected at this point.
   "We have absolutely no reason to be anywhere near the fourth planet, so there is no reason for any designs on the station orbiting it. Destroying it is completely out of the question." Nazareth said, with his loud, deep boom of a voice at Knight, making him sound extremely forceful. He then turned to Aaron, ignoring Knight.
   "This is an overview of the system layout, as it is the basis for the plan I have formulated, sir." Nazareth settled himself into Mother's mindlink, and began preparing the map. "The fourth planet, where the pirate's main colony and their spaceforce is concentrated, is here. This is the range of their primary sensors from their position on the fourth planet. The also have a few sensor posts; the primary posts are here, here, here, here, here, and here, with more minor ones scattered about. And the third planet, your target, is here. We are at the edge of the system , out of range from nearly all their detection." As he spoke, Nazareth was also tagging points on the holomap with large red dots to indicate the two pirate planets, a red square to represent the pirate fleet, and red triangles to represent sensor posts, with transparent red circles to indicate ranges. Finally, he tagged their position with a green dot. "This is my proposal; First, we close to the lowest heliocentric orbit possible while remaining reasonably out of range of as many of their sensor abilities as possible. Then, we follow the orbit, circumnavigating any sensor outposts where possible, remaining with Mother's stealth systems fully engaged, until we reach this point."  Nazareth then drew a green line around the system, ending it with a green X. "Here, the third planet is interposed between us and the fourth. Now, due to these pirate's startling lack or planning or organization, their sensor posts have quite a few gaps, though, even using them, a conventional ship would still have a high probability of being detected. Of course, we are not in a conventional ship. With speed and stealth, we should be able to fall right through all their sensor gaps as we make a relatively straight line to the third planet from this point I mentioned, and we might even be able to simply jump all the way there in one go." Nazareth then drew a line from the green X to the red planet, changing the large red circle to a flashing green one. "Assuming the sensor posts do not detect us prematurely, once we reach the third planet, it will effectively serve as a barrier in all ways between us and the fourth, both hiding us and providing a near-impenetrable shield should the fleet be notified of our presence by that time. We should also have located whatever it is your looking for by then, so we slip into the atmosphere, fly to it, retrieve it, and remove ourselves as quickly as possible. It is, in fact, possible that we may even be there and gone without the pirates ever knowing we existed."
   Nazareth then minimized the map, bringing up holograms and specifications of the pirate ships, and other estimated forces. "Combat analysis. I respectfully disagree with your assessment that the pirate ground forces will be our greatest threat, sir. The only thing that would demand serious consideration would be fighters and LAMs, which, while I do not doubt they do have, I am confident that I and my men can handle them. However, it seems nearly all of the pirate forces, space, air, ground, and civilian settlement, are all mostly concentrated on the fourth planet, which further minimizes that particular threat. I believe our biggest possible threat would be the fleet itself. Four Sovereign battleships, with six support cruisers." Nazareth paused for a moment. "This is not inconsequential opposition. This is why my proposed plan is centered around avoiding any possible confrontation with them. While aging, pirate equipment is notorious for not dying when it is supposed to, due to the fact they make many extensive personal modifications. While I do not believe them invincible, I am most concerned about the worst-case scenario of a direct confrontation, and all four turn their main weapons on us simultaneously. Especially if the cruisers pitch in." Nazareth turned to Mother. " You might be able to withstand the first volley, but I have my doubts if even you can withstand sustained punishment of that magnitude, should you receive it."
   Nazareth turned back to Aaron. "What is your evaluation, sir?"

[ShadesFox]

"My evaluation is that we are alone, in pirate space, on a ship that we can't easily service.  I'm somewhat afraid that in a shooting match Mother may come out the worse and need a long time to be repaired.  On the subject of shooting matches, between the ships the pirates have here I would have to agree that there would be far more damage done in a space based shooting match.  However, my 'greater threat' assessment was factoring in the fact that it seem that we can evade space battle rather effectively while evading ground combat is going to depend highly on if there is someone on the planet already or not."

Aaron turns to Knight, "As for your plan, I'm really was not expecting something less subtle.  Mostly because I am having a very hard time envisioning a plan that could possibly be less subtle.  I suppose we could fly up to the space station and make rude hand gestures, but that plan is more clearly in the suicide territory then the unsubtle territory."

Aaron shakes his head.  Since when was he supposed to make combat plans?

"Anyways, baring some details Alexis or Mother caught that we didn't, Naz's plan sounds good.  If we really need to take something out subtly, perhaps the pirate equipment could be hacked?  Mother seemed to have no trouble getting into ISF networks, and computer glitches that temporarily take down listening posts seem far more common then asteroids heading right for space based assets."

[Lisky]

Command Center

Knight looked a little shocked, either they hadn't listened, or didn't have the visualization skills that would be needed for space combat.  He looked over at Arron, then Naz, and decided to drop the idea altogether.  He felt he'd already earned enough ire from this crew, no point in trying to press a point that they obviously didn't agree with.

Knight went back to studying the map, and for reason, some his mind started drifting back to the escape pod.  Asking in a polite tone, Knight inquired "actually, if you think the lack of subtlety in the asteroid wouldn't work, do you think we could strip the escape pod i arrived on of anything useful, then rig up some kind of remote, and activate the distress beacon when we're ready to leave?"

[Lushin]

Command Center
"I say go with Nazareth's plan. No need to tell the pirates 'Hey we're over here if you wanna come kill us'"
Romulus was leaning on the doorway when he spoke. It seems he's feeling sneaky at the moment.

[Lisky]

Command Center

knight started to look a bit exasperated "it's all well and good sneaking in, but the idea is to get both in and out of this system alive, everything i've been suggesting does not involved getting to the planet or getting whatever artifacts we are supposed to be recovering... what i'm trying to do is come up with an egress route that doesn't involve taking the full broadside of a battleship or two.  Even assuming that we make it to the planet completely undetected, if the opposition on the planet gets any kind of signal off, we'll have the entire pirate fleet to worry about.  Even if we have no opposition at all, If we don't time the egress perfectly, without some type of diversion, then we will end up in the bore sights  of 1 or more warships."

Kight paused, look over his shoulder at the wolverine who'd appeared as if out of no where, "Sargent, for a special forces ground pounder, i would have expected you to pick up on the distinct lack of an exit plan... i know in the LAM wing, it's a rather high priority to not just complete the objectives, but to also live long enough beyond completion of the objective to get to a formal debriefing... what has been suggested so far constitutes wishful thinking with zero margin for error..."

[Lushin]

Command Center
Romulus glares at Knight.
"Why make plans when it's better to figure what the hell is going on when we get there. I only make plans to get in not out. Cause if one makes plans to get out, something will go wrong and screw up all the plans one has come up with"
Romulus looked at  Knight.
"You must not have been battling much. You sound just like one of those newbies fresh out of an academy"
Romulus looks to Aaron and Nazareth.
"I think our best bet is sneaking in and sneaking out. Best to not let the pirates know we weren't even here"

[techmaster-glitch]

   "Thank you, Sergeant Romulus." Nazareth said. "Lieutenant Whitehaven, I am in agreement. You do not seem to have a complete grasp of the situation, nor Mother's capabilities, nor do you seem to have experience with strategic and tactical planning. I recommend you leave this business to us."
   Nazareth turned to Aaron. "Do you have anything to add, sir?"

[ShadesFox]

"Nothing particular to add.  Knight, the asteroid plan has been throughly vetoed, you are not to bring it up again.  The current thinking favors not giving away that something is up.  I would prefer simple plans."  Aaron my be exceeding his authority as far as military planning goes, but this detour needs to die.

"The exit plan is to get to mother and run like hell.  It is a simple plan, which is why it is the most likely plan to work.  More details will be worked out once we have a better assessment of what the planet looks like up close."

[Lisky]

Command Center

Knight just sighed and shouldered his way past Rom, he muttered under his breath "i hope your right" ... normally he'd have been angry, but his emotional state had been shattered to the point of apathy after the constant up and down cycle he'd been going through since the loss of the Cold Fire... he headed for his quarters and figured he'd get a little time to himself before anything else could go wrong

[ShadesFox]

Aaron rubbed his head.  Perhaps this was what Captain Summers felt like when dealing with Aaron?  Still, not a whole lot of time for that.

"Rather then this haphazard planning session, maybe we should actually formalize it."

Aaron gives Knight a few moments then sends him a message telepathically, "Let's give planning a second try shall we?  Please come back to the command center."

[Azlan]

Command Center


Throughout the discussion, Ixiah and Loki attempted to pay close attention to what was being discussed.  It was not very easy for either of them, as strategy meetings are very boring if you are not participating.  Both had managed to nod off somewhere in the middle.

Both Mother and Alexis stood by patiently waiting for everyone to come to an appropriate consensus on a course of action.  Alexis did make a few comments, "I recommend sticking to stealth and using reconnaissance drones planetside to search for pirate activity and to investigate the crash site.  We should also have an plan to evacuate the planet and escape the system in case of discovery and attack.  Also, identify your definite command structure, in case Aaron is indisposed for whatever reason, you have second and third in command to take charge.  Otherwise I'll take over."  Alexis smiled evilly.

Saioko had been standing by patiently, even though she outranked everyone except Aaron, she was not involved in the strategy meeting.  She had little combat and tactics experience as either Saioko or as a ship's computer, perhaps that was why she was so easily ambushed by an unknown assailant.  She did move to stand next to Aaron, pending most of her time staring at his head.

For the most part, the Acadians waiting patiently for the ISF crew to make their plan of action.

[Lisky]

Just Outside Command Center

Knight received the message as he was rounding yet another corner hoping to make it back to his room. these aimless wanderings or going to have to stop... now if only i had a point of re his thoughts stopped as he received the message.  taking 4 more steps, the door to the command center was sitting right there in front of him...

how the hell does that happen?! he thought to himself. taking a few moments to relax, Knight used controlled breathing and a slow pace to give him the time he needed to clear his mind before trying a planning session again. As he entered, Knight address Aaron with curt nod and a "sir" then proceeds to ignore Rom and Naz, still hoping that they've done something better with the time he's been gone than think happy thoughts, and expect to just run away without careful planning.

[ShadesFox]

"Very good then.  Let's try this, AGAIN."

The fact that Saioko was staring at his head had Aaron a bit nervous.  Nothing good came from people staring at his head.

"So, step one is pretty much done and in it's final form.  We slip in by the long route, keeping the 3rd planet between us and them.  This provides a handy escape path, since they need to go the long way around to get to us and that should give us time to make ourselves gone before they can get anywhere close."

The display highlights the path Naz pointed out, keeping them away from sensor posts and ships.  Then the display zooms in on the 3rd planet.

"Once we are at the planet we can use Mother's recon drones to scout things out.  We will be looking for pirates and Matron.  Hopefully we find Matron and no pirates, but should there be pirates we need to evaluate how far away they are.  No matter what, we are going to have another planning session after we have details about the planet.  If there are too many pirates we may have to scrap the whole plan and see if we can't get a more substantial fleet to clear out the pirates.  If all goes right we can land Mother near Matron and get what we need.  Either way, we can't know until we are at the planet."

[Lisky]

Command Center

Focusing again on the overall plan that had been outlined by Arron, Knight turned to the Acadians and asked "i'm curious about the sensor capabilities this ship has.  once we're behind the planet, would we still have information on what the pirates are doing?... if not, we'll need to have drones in a position to get that information.  The idea of running around the back only works if we've got enough of an idea of what the pirates are doing that our acceleration can overcome their advantage in initial velocity."

Feeling a little more confident once his thoughts were back in order, Knight continued, "another question i'd like answered before we go further, i noticed on my tour that we have orbital drop assault pods, are they drop and ditch, or do they retain enough power to make it back to the ship?"

looking around, Knight then added "as for the actual egress plan, we really should set something up to act as a distraction, even if it only draws attention for a matter of minutes... i know... through experience" glaring at Naz and Rom "what happens when you rely on just luck, and the hope that your stealth is better than their sensors... i'll admit, by the confidence you all seem to have in this ship, i might be acting little paranoid... but i've always been told to error on the side of caution while in the planning stages of a mission"

[Lushin]

Command Center
Romulus glares back at Knight.
"Oh yes get the pirates on alert and actively looking for things. So that way they have a better chance of finding us. You seem to think to know for sure the pirates will go to the beacon. They might send a ship to see what it is but they will more than likely start putting ships into orbit and lower our chances of not being spotted"

[techmaster-glitch]

   Nazareth stepped up at this point, his booming voice instantly capturing everyone's attention. "I can personally assure that, so long as we are not in a planet's atmosphere, escape will be no problem. Mother has proven capable of making intersystem jumps within seconds. In fact, we practiced a variant maneuver getting from our fleet to the very system we found you in, Lieutenant. And even if the pirate fleet were to somehow find itself in orbit of the third plant while we are still in it, I am fully confident that I can outrun and outfly them enough to extract ourselves from the atmosphere without taking fire. One of my squad's sub-specialties is antipiracy, after all. The only place where extraction will be an issue is if the ground team encounters trouble in their collecting mission, and that I have no control over."