Colonization: Ch.2: DESCENT [Mature, IC]

[Arcalane]

Space

The Antygias rumbled ominously as it dropped out of FTL travel, the bridge crew already awake and at their stations. Kaukai loomed in the distance, the view of the planet dominated by oceans and thin, wispy clouds.

As far as ships go, the Antygias wasn't particularly elegant. The underside of the ship was coated in thick ablative panels designed to absorb re-entry heat from a belly-down approach, and the hull itself was long and boxy, with four large engines at the rear. A mottled, rusty-looking paintjob of orange, red and brown made the whole thing look barely spaceworthy, but that was the ConFed's MO, and trying to hide in space was barely practical in the first place. Might as well try and make your ships look ineffective outside of the parade details.

--

The Bridge

"Antygias on final approach, confirm satellite launch readiness?" Irvine spoke clearly and calmly.

"Satellites are green for launch Captain. Ready when you are."

"Roger that SatComm, commence standard launch procedure in five..."

--

Space, Final Approach

Kaukai slowly became clearer. Shorelines and continents resolved. The planet's vast ice caps were clearly visible.

In the orbit of the planet, something... somethings... stirred. Or did they?

--

The Bridge

"Launching weather monitoring satellite... weather monitoring satellite away. Launching FTL Communication and Navigation satellite..." the Satellite Commander intoned, almost as if he'd walked through the procedure a hundred times.

"Commencing final approach. ETA to point of no return is two minutes."

--

Space

The satellites boosted into stable orbits and unfurled from their pill-like deployment pods, beginning their start-up procedures.

Then, the Weather Monitoring Satellite stopped responding.

--

The Bridge

"ETA to point of no return is ten... nine... eight... seven..." The AutoNav chimed, counting down steadily.

"Captain, Weather Monitoring just stopped responding." Sandra frowned at her display. The radar screen was blank. None of the satellites were responding, even.

"What do you mean 'stopped responding'?" Irvine looked understandably displeased and confused.

"Satellite Launch Control confirms satellites no longer responding. Could be a hardware error? Slow boot sequence?"

"No... I can't trace it on the local RADAR. It should still be in range, but there's just... nothing there?"

"We are now at the point of no return. Commencing orbital insertion of First Landing Colony Ship One Nine Five Antygias, Operational Target Kaukai."

"Static?"

"Not even static," Sandra fiddled with the controls, to no avail. "...FTL CommSat is not responding either. Captain..." Sandra let fear creep into her voice.

"Can we launch the backup?"

"Not from here," Satellite Launch Command was clear, "...at this approach we're too low to put the backup into orbit... either they get torn apart by re-entry stress, or smash into the planet. Assuming we survive we'll need to launch it from the ground."

"Final Landing Approach Set, Target: Neumann's Mesa, Commencing Landing Approach."

The sensor screen bleeped angrily. Then again. Three more bleeps. Five more bleeps.

"****!" Sandra doublechecked, but there they were. Five red triangles incoming fast, with another wave dead on their heels. "Incoming! We have incoming from low orbit! I'm tracking multiple incoming missiles!"

She cursed again, mentally this time. How hadn't she spotted them? The sensors should've picked them up miles away if they were launched from the surface.

--

Space/Kaukai Orbit

The first wave of missiles slipped straight past the Antygias as it began to plunge into Kaukai's atmosphere, ablative plating absorbing the intense heat that resulted. Their targets were not the ship - instead, they were aiming for the satellites. Satellites that had no evasive or defensive measures. Satellites that subsequently bloomed into expanding clouds of superheated gas.

--

The Bridge

"The satellites are hit! The missiles took out our satellites!" came from the Satellite Command console. Oh boy...

"Hold on, we have five more incoming! They're headed straight for us!"

All they could do now was hope the missiles didn't do any significant damage to the ablatives, or the entire ship could be torn apart.

Fortunately, they didn't. But they did something else entirely unpleasant, and potentially worse.

--

Kaukai Atmosphere, Approaching Neumann Mesa

The second wave of missiles indeed had a different purpose compared to the first wave. They were aiming for the Antygias. Four electromagnetic pulse missiles slammed into the underside of the ship, and another explosive struck somewhere near the main cargo ramp. The ablatives absorbed the explosive blast quite well, all things considered.

Electromagnetic pulses, on the other hand, are not mitigated by ablative armour particularly well.

--

Antygias

The entire ship rattled at the impacts. Equipment malfunctioned. Panels exploded for no adequately explained reason. Maintenance robots ground to a halt.

Cryocells, whilst well shielded, were not perfectly protected. Nearly all of them were put out of commission, forced to engage their emergency stasis systems until they could be repaired and their contents dethawed.

Emphasis on nearly. Some of them survived intact.

--

The Bridge

"Crew, report!" Irvine barked into his headset.

No response. Even Sandra was out cold.

"Final approach complete, ETA to Neumann Mesa: five minutes."

The Antygias lurched and thrummed as re-entry completed, her engines barely functional after the EMP strikes.

"Commence thawing all viable cells and monitor for more incoming missiles."

"Affirmative. Cryo thaw in process." the AutoNav beeped again.

Irvine sighed. Sandra groaned and shook her head, waking up.

"Looks like we're still in one piece..." she muttered under her breath and hauled herself out of her seat.

Irvine laughed and stood up as well. "Barely..." he looked around at the others. Some of the consoles were spattered with blood. Not a good sign. "Let's get the others down to medical. Can you walk?"

The lieutenant nodded, "...yeah, I'm good."

--

Antygias

Those "lucky" enough to be in intact cells would experience the delight of the hangover-esque aftereffects that were the result being thawed out from cryosleep.

Meanwhile, it would take several trips to get the injured to the medical bay. The Satellite Commander, Communications Officer and Chief Terraforming Officer were the worst off. Sandra and Irvine were lucky, compared to the rest.

--

Kaukai

Finally, after a nail-biting five minute flight that was thankfully free of any further missile attacks, the battered and overworked Antygias set down on a large sandstone mesa that jutted out of an arid plain like a sore thumb, with several smaller mesas situated around it. As the colony ship set down, the engines sputtered and ground to a halt. Not exactly what they were supposed to do at this point, but they'd gotten the ship down in one piece despite the attack, so one could hardly ask more of them.

A long river ran north to south along it's eastern edge, beyond which was a large, scorching desert. To the west, a sprawling, reddish-toned badlands seemed to stretch on and on before reaching a mountain range that in turn curved around to the south of the badlands and back to the arid plains around mesa, then further east and off into the desert, no doubt the source of the aforementioned river, which itself terminated in a small delta leading out to the northern sea, which also bordered the curving mountains.

Several dusty slopes provided routes towards sea level and to the other mesas, albeit of varying width and precariousness. Some were massive stone stairways that would have to be traversed on foot. Others would be navigable by vehicle, so long as the driver was fairly careful. The latter could be beaten into proper paths, with time.

Neumann Mesa itself was, as already stated, a large, flat expanse largely composed of sandstone, with plenty of room for a base camp even with the Antygias settled in the middle of it.

--

Briefing Room

Not so much a briefing room as a smaller cargo hold cleared out and reappropriated. Only Chief Engineer Isaac, Lieutenant Sandra and Captain Irvine are in attendance, the others in medical under the supervision of the AutoDoc, or for the unlucky three, the morgue. Cargo crates have been placed as impromptu seats and tables.

The survivors - those able to be thawed - are assembled there after they have recovered enough to stand and be coherent. Common quickthaw symptoms are abound; headaches primarily, but also minor loss of balance and slightly blurry vision in some cases.

Irvine addressed the assembled specialists, a ragtag band of men and women who looked barely awake, nevermind fit for recon. Still, they didn't have many other options right now.

"I'm sorry we had to wake you all up so quickly, but the landing turned sour. I'll keep things brief; our engines are dead, our satellites have been taken out by missiles, our main comm array was fried by EMP, we can't launch the backup without a rocket, and most of the cryo cells took EMP damage as well, so you're all we've got. The dorsal - that is, the flight deck - launch doors are jammed, three of the bridge crew are hanging on by a thread and the others are still being cared for by the CMO. I realise this isn't part of the job description, but I need half a dozen volunteers to take a 4x4 and set up some sensor posts on the western approach to the mesa. Everyone else will be helping us set up the basecamp here at the mesa."

He pauses a few seconds to let that sink in, then looks at the assembled crowd of maybe a two or three dozen colonists skeptically.

"So, any volunteers and/or questions?"

((This is where you speak up, people. If you're in the first-post roster in the OOC thread, you're free to post now, and kinda-sorta expected to volunteer. Your belongings have fortunately not been damaged by the blasts, nor have any implants. It's safe to assume you already got all your personal effects sorted out and at hand already. Anyone who signs up between now and the group rolling out is assumed to have been in the crowd all along.))

((If you're disorientated, tired, confused, angry, upset, and/or generally have no idea what the heck is going on: that's the idea! Wait, you say you didn't sign up for this? That's the point! ))

[ShadesFox]

Wolfe raised his hand almost immediately, "Question!  You said missiles?  I was just double checking because I never heard you say missiles before.  Especially the sort that shoot at us.  Who were shooting those missiles anyways?"

Wolfe's even glare could have been mistaken for intensity, though it was really the result of trying really hard to not mind the headache.

[techmaster-glitch]

   The day had not started well for Jaks, such as it were.
  The last thing he remembered was the cryopod sealing up back on the Antygias's launching point, and the next, he was stumbling around with the worst headache he'd ever had. Everything around him seemed to be a chaotic mess.
  He wasn't sure how it happened, but he seemed to have been successfully heared inot a seat in the briefing room, and was getting his bearings back when the commander said what was going on.
  One thing in particular alarmed Jaks.
  "Excuse me..." The cyborg said, his electronic eye focusing on the commander, and in Jak's view, highlighted him with relevant data. "We've reached Kaukai, our destination planet...but we were shot at with missiles? Isn't the whole point of this operation that this planet is supposed to be uninhabited?"
  He sat back, rubbing his forehead. Man, his head hurt, and pulses from his implants weren't helping much.
  "And if we were hit by EMPs, I take that to mean most of our equipment, namely, our primary labor force, is offline? I think I'd be better applied getting all that rebooted, but I can be on the sensor team if it's absolutely necessary."

[Azlan]

Rebecca had considered many elements before she had applied to this mission, an attack was not one of those things.  She had been sitting in silence, applying pressure to the bridge of her nose, a well know pressure point, to alleviate some of her headache. 

She let her glasses drop back into place and half rose from her seated position.

"It would seem that whatever attacked us is incapable or unwilling to pursue an attack at this time.  So setting up those sensors is important.  If no one else will volunteer than I will be the first unless you would think I would be better suited to assisting in medical?"

Pushing her glasses back into a comfortable spot, she added a question, "what do you plan to do if our attackers come to finish the job?"

[Arcalane]

Irvine just nodded. "Yes, missiles. Sandra?"

Suitably cued in, Sandra explained what had happened... "During our final approach, ten missiles were launched. Given how late we spotted them I can only surmise they were launched from low orbit, as planetary launches would've been picked up well in advance even with our sensor suite. The first five were conventional missiles aimed at our satellites. The following wave, four electromagnetic and one conventional, struck our hull. Two impacted Engineering in an attempt to burn out our engines, a third struck the forward sensor array, and the fourth hit just behind the main cargo ramp, damaging some of the auxiliary cryo units and jumping to many of the cells themselves from there. The conventional explosive hit the cargo ramp itself, but our ablative heatshields absorbed the impact without issue."

Again, a pause to let things sink in, before she continued, "To be blunt, we got lucky. Having to push through the intense heat just prior to impact probably weakened the missiles considerably, and let us land in one piece. Fortunately the pulses didn't reach too far so your personal effects and implants should be fine, and most of our heavy machinery is robust enough that it should only need minor repairs if it was damaged. The maintenance robots are low priority, as the current contingent are enough to start repairing the sensor array and cryocells since we don't need the engines... trying to go anywhere would probably just draw more missiles after us."

"As for the launches themselves and who fired them, we don't know. It's possible that somebody knew we'd come to colonize this planet, and set up a trap for us. Alternatively they could be setting up a trap for the high-speed marine detachment that will arrive in several months to investigate why we haven't reported in despite the low risk classification of the planet. If they came from low orbit that means they probably came from satellites, unless they were boosted into orbit from the surface... and those satellites either evaded the initial recon/survey sweep, or they were deployed some time after that - but prior to our arrival. We can't afford to launch our backup commsatellite if those defenses are still running either, as it's our only means of FTL communication. The nearest colony is several dozen lightyears from here, maybe more, so STL is a no go."

That said and done, Sandra took a chance to breathe easy as Irvine took over again.

"Our long-term priority is to figure out where those missiles came from and who was responsible for them, but first we need to get ourselves situated here on the mesa, in case whoever did this has ground forces that decide to come welcome us."

He nodded to Rebecca.

"Exactly. My guess is that they don't have any ground forces or installations, but we can't be sure what we're dealing with. 'Ancient ruins' have only been found in a single binary system on the other side of the Secure Zone from here, and it's unlikely that anything left behind would stay operational long enough to target us if that was the case. We're probably looking at isolated encampments, at least one of which is responsible for those theoretical satellites. Could be mercenaries, these guys seem too well organised for bandits or pirates."

"As for a defense plan... the Antygias might not be armed per se, but she has several standard-issue anti-asteroid defense guns that have good coverage and can be operated manually. It's not much but those things pack a pretty mean punch given their intended usage. For any that get in closer, we have several mining walkers, if they still work. The big ones are slow and the small ones over no driver protection worth mentioning, but the Mesa doesn't offer much room to maneuver and until we have a basecamp there's no cover worth talking about. The only ways up are gravel slopes and stone stairways, unless they come in from the air. There are several high-powered rifles and other weapons in the Armoury as well... the ConFed might not have given us a marine escort but they weren't about to let us wander off without a decent weapon cache handy. I know it's not much of a defense, but it's the best we can do until we're able to set up the sensor posts and some sentry guns."

Irvine finishes up, but it seems Isaac isn't going to be mute all day either. His voice is gravelly, compared to Irvine's practiced and clear command tones, and Sandra's clear - if slightly quick and breathless - manner of speech. Also, unlike the officers, the so-called Chief Engineer is definitely from one of the rougher colonies, dressed in shabby-looking overalls and not caring much for appearances compared to their neat civilian uniforms.

"Irvine is right. Whoever these guys are, either they did the job badly, or they wanted us to survive for some reason. Call me paranoid, but my money's on the latter."

[AmberCross]

As the world faded into reality, Ari took stock of what he knew should be going on. No headache; surprisingly good. Everything was blurry; to be expected since he wasn't wearing his glasses. He winced as his cyro unit hissed open and the unnaturally loud sound pierced his eardrums; that might become a problem if every sound felt like a stab to the ears. He exited the cyro unit and went in search of his belongings. They were fairly close so he found them quickly and pulled out his glasses which he put on. Everything was less blurry, but still blurry; crap. He then made his way to the bridge in the process walking into one or two doorsills; ow.

Arriving somewhat later than most of the others, he stood at the back as Irvine and Sandra explained the situation. As others asked their questions, he found himself continually trying to push his glasses up his nose to fix his vision in futility. If that didn't fix itself soon he'd have to get stronger glasses because this was getting annoying. After a brief pause after the first two speakers, he rose a hand somewhat uncertainly into the air to call attention to himself at the back of the group. "I-" he stopped, wincing before continuing with a somewhat quieter voice for the sake of his ears, "I have some experience with remote equipment. Maybe I can try to identify any orbiting satellites or find a way to boost a signal from the ground without launching the FTL communications satellite? If that's a low priority I could help with something else instead..."

[ShadesFox]

Wolfe sighed.  This was a bit more adventure then he was intending to sign up for.  Still, no matter how they survived the whole sensor thing seemed a great deal more critical then any other concern.

"I'll go with the lady to help set up the sensors."

[techmaster-glitch]

   Jaks absorbed the new information. Okay, so most of the robots were still functional, and the broken ones weren't critical.
   "Okay...I guess I can help the sensor team." Jaks said, still rubbing his head.

[SquirrelWizard]

Letting what had transpired sink in, Marcus massaged the bridge of his nose; he had developed a mild headache from the defrosting process. "I'll help with the sensors as well. Considering we're erecting a giant beacon for them to home in on us, might I suggest we use some sort of survellience equipment?"

[Arcalane]

Isaac looks skeptical at Ari. "Ev'n if we quickcharged it with Anty's reactor, FTL comm signals can't breach atmos, 'specially not a breathable one like this. If anything got through it'd just be a burst of static, even more likely to bring them charging into whatever trap we landed in. I ain't much a fan of the marines but I don't like seein' good people die for no good reason."

Meanwhile, Sandra seems to be collecting a bunch of... poles? They look to be about five or six foot long, the bottom end terminating in a spike, and the top in some kind of camera dome. Several other antennae and attachments are part of the device as well, and she holds one up for the volunteers to examine, "That's exactly what you're doing. These sensor posts will act as an early warning system and let us know if anything's coming out of the badlands. They're not very subtle..." she taps the dome for emphasis "...but if you place enough of them, have some overlapping coverage and find good vantage points, we should be able to stand losing some of them, whether it's to bad weather or enemy action. They're light as well, so you shouldn't have any trouble carrying them. They passively monitor for unknown transmission sources in the vicinity, four motion sensors give them a sixth sense for detecting anyone trying to sneak up on them, and the camera itself is capable of thermal imaging. Even if one of these sensors gets taken out somehow... we'll know, and we'll probably see who did it to boot."

"As for making a beacon... there's no way they couldn't have seen us coming anyway. Neumann Mesa is about the only decently flat landing site on this continent for a ship of this scale. It'd be trivial to figure out where we were going from our landing vector... and regarding the satellites that attacked us... honestly, if they can evade our sensors in space, and they can potentially evade the sensors of a ConFed Survey/Scout ship, then there's no way in hell we'll pick them up from the ground. Our best bet is to find a control site. There's a slim chance it's located on one of Kaukai's two moons but our dropshuttle should be light and fast enough to get past the satellites."

Sandra goes back to sorting out the posts, and Irvine takes over again...

"That is, of course, assuming we can fix the dorsal launch bay doors--"

...before being cut off by Isaac.

"'course we can fix the bloody dorsal launch bay doors. It might take a while though."

Sandra doesn't look up from her box to reply, "Even if that's the case, we need to figure out if they have any local SAM sites. They wouldn't have had the firepower to take down a colony ship and likely wouldn't have wanted to reveal themselves, but they could easily trash a dropshuttle or one of the scouts."

"Now, if there are any more volunteers, help me shift these crates down to the vehicle hangar and load them into one of the 4x4s. The sooner you get these things placed, the sooner we'll know if there's anything else out there."

The crates are long cases, really, each containing four of the sensor posts. Light enough for one person to carry, but fairly bulky.

[AmberCross]

Ari flushed and muttered something about relay signals or making a copy of the FTL satellite with shaked down capabilities, good for just the one signal and stripped of anything else in order to make it small/unnoticeable enough to get past any missiles. It was somewhat lost to anyone not next to him and listening (which at this point was no-one), but he said it anyway to make himself sound less of an idiot to at least himself. Still, he realized no matter how you shook the idea around, it was going to take time an be a long-term project which wasn't really feasible to start just yet. So blushing, he headed over to help the sensory team which seemed like it would be more immediately productive.

[ShadesFox]

"Well, no time like now I suppose."

Wolfe gets up and grabs a crate and looks for anyone else who will be coming along.

[Inumo]

Resting her callused elbows on the knees of a pair of sturdy cargo pants, Marianne was downing enough water to quench a desert at the talk. Ah haven't had a headache like this since my twenty-first birthday, she thought. Setting the bottle down next to her foot, she brushed her fiery red hair back with a tanned hand and drawled out, "Ah think Ah c'n prob'ly get some testin' while we're out." Patting her left side pocket she continued, "Steve needs to be put through his paces. Sho', Ah'll come with y'all t' go set up some o' those sensor posts. S'gonna be a while 'til Ah can set up a proper fahm out heah." With that, she picked up the water bottle, slid it into her right side pocket, and smoothed out the front of her forest green t-shirt. Picking up a crate, she walked over to the tall burly guy. Extending a hand, she introduced herself. "Th' name's Marianne. Marianne Doflik. How d'you do?"

[Azlan]

With volunteers apparently settled, all that was left for the time being was the doing part for this first task.  Rebecca moves away from the conference table and retrieves a crate.  It was not especially heavy, but bulky for her, nothing unexpected though. 

She took a spot over near Wolfe and stated, "now is always the best time."

[SquirrelWizard]

Marcus reached down and picked up a crate for himself, "Unless it drops in our laps, I'm thinking research is a lower priority for us, at least for the time being." Leaning the crate against a wall, he opened up a long thin metallic case. Inside, nestled in the cases cushioning, were the two guns he had packed for the trip. He slung the CT3 rifle's strap over his shoulder, and buckled the pistol to his thigh. "I'm Marcus by the way," he said as he pocketed a packet of darts from the case.

[Malakin]

Having been ushered into the briefing room just before they started, Alix lent against the wall by the door arms folded and looking grim. He hated waking sickness, sure he has experienced it before a few times, but its not one of those things that you get used to.

His expression grew harder as he listend to the news but refrained from making comment. What has happend has happend, its not the first time he has ever been in a bad situation, although the closest he has come to being attacked by another group of humans was a long time ago, and all that happend was a flurry of coms traffic and a single missile launched over the horizon. He never even saw who was attacking.

He expected to feel something, anger, maybe fear of what might come in the next few hours or days, but all he was aware of was the headache and the slight blurring of his vision.
Upon the mention of a job involving setting up some sensors he perked up, the opportunity to get out of the ship, stretching his legs and getting a breath of, well, whatever atmosphere was out there was incredibly appealing to him.

As the other volunteers stood up, he followed suit. "Count me in, if theres nothing to fly, I might as well make myself useful some other way."
He swings his pack containing his personal belongings and unloaded rifle over his shoulder before grabbing a crate and approaching the group.
Putting on a slightly forced smile he mumbles an introduction to them. "Hi there, names Alix Gault..."

[techmaster-glitch]

   With little else to do, Jaks does his best to shake off the headache and heads over to the sensor crates. The cyborg lifts one up, mainly with his bulky and rugged metal arm, and starts carrying it out to the vehicles, not stopping to talk to anyone for the moment.

[ShadesFox]

Wolfe suddenly felt quite popular.  He took Marianne's hand, "I'm Wolfe, Wolfe York.  I was supposed to fill out the communications and sensors grid.  I suppose I'm still doing something like that after a fashion."  After a firm shake he lets go.

He then looked over to Rebecca, "I suppose now is a good time for many things."  He wasn't about to make mention of a few things he could think of where 'now' was not best for.  Though he did look into her eyes a bit, wondering if her eyes were also an accident.

[Arcalane]

Isaac hauls himself up, picks a couple of the mechanically-minded techs out of the remaining crowd, and heads off to fix the dorsals. Irvine leads the rest out to set up the basecamp.

As for the volunteers... once everyone has a crate, Sandra gets their attention.

"Alright... hm, looks like we might need to trucks. Eh, no matter. If you work quickly and efficiently you should have no trouble getting these set up. Come on."

She leads everyone down to the vehicle hangar, the ramp already lowered. The hangar itself is vast, packed with cargo trucks, vans, pickups, even a small contingent of ConFed staff cars and scout cars, perhaps even a pair of armoured personnel carriers. Lurking at the back are the mining walkers mentioned earlier, half a dozen hulking brutes designed to smash through rock face with sheer power, and at least twice as many faster units for working in confined areas or in mountainous places where the larger units cannot venture due to ground stability concerns or narrow pathways.

Looking out of the hangar, the team can see that several prefab buildings are already being put together, mostly housing and hydroponic facilities - seeing as Kaukai is rather... lacking in edible native plants - along with plenty of solar panels for power. Automated bulldozers smooth out the mesa top where necessary, and a couple can be seen in the distance clearing up a sub-mesa, no doubt the intended location of the launch platform.

The vans themselves are pretty robust, and in a fairly distinctive yellow-and-black colour scheme, four doors (driver and three passengers) plus a rear double door for cargo. Loading them up is easy enough - the cargo area is also covered, and has crude benches facing the center that could accomodate more passengers if not for the secured crates taking up the center. Two semi-automatic rifles and spare magazines are mounted on netting behind the rear passenger seats as well.

"The vans can keep track of each other over a short distance as well as the location of the ship. Just use the navigation panel in the dashboard. It's a touchscreen, just tap once to set a destination, or hold and drag to pan. Since we don't have a navigation satellite online your range is going to be rather limited by what the vans can actually 'see'," she gestures to several points that look like cameras, "...but they memorize that and can upload the data to the main array when you get back. The more ground you cover and the more posts you put up, the better our coverage. There's a loose gravel ramp down to the badlands on the southwest side of the plaza, out that way," another gesture in the direction of the ramp, "...now get going... and try not to take too long. The vans are fitted with emergency beacons if something goes wrong, don't be afraid to hit them. Just keep in mind we might not be able to get help to you for several minutes depending on the situation up here. Any more questions?"

[Azlan]

Before leaving, she pondered Wolfe's response for a moment, "well indeed it is, such as introductions.  I am Doctor Rebecca Sonada, but Becky is just fine unless you are seeing me for a checkup or I'm studying soil samples for microbes."  Pausing, she spoke to Wolfe directly, "teenage mistake, I've grown to like them though.  Let us be on our way."

Following Sandra while carrying her case.  She loaded her case and took an appropriate passenger seat, "I don't have any specific questions as long as our communications and sensor engineer knows where we need to place these and the best spacing.  If you have advice on that, I'd find it useful, otherwise I'll defer to Wolfe and figure out the rest."

Rebecca smiled pleasantly waiting for the others to be ready and for their inevitable, insightful questions they would ask of Sandra.

[Malakin]

Alix followed the group down to the cargo bay, and after loading his crate into the back of the lead vehicle he takes the front passenger seat.

When Sandra asks for questions he speaks up, "So I know we should be setting these up as fast as possible, but is there any kind of limit to our time out there, potential storms kicking up or anything of that nature? Also with these things helping to map the area out, is there any where you need specifically checked out on the way to setting the cameras up?"

[techmaster-glitch]

   Jaks follows Sandra and the others out to the vans, loading up his own sensor crate when they get there and walks around to the front of it. He spots the automated dozers off in the distance and looks forlornly at them, before shaking his head and looking over the group piling into the van. His cybernetic eye visibly sweeps over them, zooming in on each in turn. Man, that's creepy.
  He then gives a jaunty wave with the bulky metal arm. "Hi there! Name's Jaks. Robotics specialist. I'm cleared for most vehicles, and I don't see anyone jumping for it, so anyone mind if I drive?"

[Inumo]

Setting down her sensor crate for a moment, she leaned on it and asked, "Uh, ma'am, wheah exactly ah we s'posed to put these posts? 'Round the mesa? Down the ramp? At the base? 'S far out's we can?"

[Arcalane]

Sandra shrugs. "I could tell you that if the weather satellite was online, but I don't think there's much chance of figuring the weather out from down here. Timewise I think we still have plenty of daylight left. For the posts... the more ground you cover the better. We're mostly concerned with anything that might be coming out of the badlands... we can see anything coming up the ramps and in the plains immediately around the mesa easily enough, but the terrain in the badlands itself is rough, and it'd be easy to evade the eyes of only one or two sentries. That's why you're putting out on the order of two dozen."

"The navigation panels in the van should be able to pick up the feeds from the sensors too, and display the coverage area if you're unsure about positioning. You can pick them up and redeploy them for better cover if you find they're badly placed, but make sure it's not too sparse or too heavy. I'm not sure of the exact model, but if we're lucky they might be able to blend into their surroundings and fool any casual observation."

[ShadesFox]

Wolfe chimes in after Sandra speaks, "As long as we can get multiple routes back to the ship we can make the sensors fairly sparse."

Wolfe loads up his box and takes a seat next to Rebecca, "Well, I've not quite done anything like this before.  Usually the sats aren't destroyed by missile fire and I'm just filling in the gaps.  I guess in this case the gap is 'everything.'"

Wolfe pokes his head out the window and waves to Jaks, "Nope, the driving is all you!"

[techmaster-glitch]

   Jaks nods to Wolfe with a "Cool" and hops into the driver's seat. He starts up the vehicle and begins using the touchscreen and switches, though he then glances around for a cyber-neruo link. Finding one, he pulls an extension cable out of his metal arm and plugs it in, with a few whirring sounds coming from his eye as van feeds into it. As the vehicle warms up, he casts his cybernetic eye over everyone again. Anyone who said their name aloud now had it floating over their heads in Jaks' augmented reality overlay, in addition to any information they had given about themselves in smaller text floating next to them.
  "So, we ready to go? Everyone piled in and buckled up, or someone got any more questions?" He asks as the engine revs softly.

[Inumo]

Marianne loaded up her crate into a separate truck and gestured at the remaining volunteers. "Come on, no need to waste hay. Want me to drive this heah truck?"

((Rather hard to fit a bad Texan accent into rather universal words. <.<)

[SquirrelWizard]

Marcus hopped into the van, his gaze lingered, with a hint of disgust, on the cyborg's attachment to the vehicle. As he sat down and strapped himself in, he muttered to himself, "It'll be your own damn fault if something important gets ripped out."

[AmberCross]

Ari quietly grabbed what he could carry that needed carrying and climbed into the back of the van with it. He winced a little as Marianne talked with that heavy accent of hers. He'd grown up in what his mother liked to call 'a cultured environment', and people her that were very clearly not from a similar upbringing tended to grate on him. Of the rest of the people present, he recognized one or two that he had seen before going into cyro, but he didn't really know anything about them. So far he was neutral about most of them. He'd probably make more informed judgements once he knew them better. By now his ears no longer hurt when people talked and he could see properly.

[Arcalane]

IC:
The group would have plenty of time to get used to and learn to tolerate one another... and they'd need to, after all, if they were going to survive.

The drive to the Badlands is uneventful and fairly easy despite the rough terrain. It's most distinctive features are the rusty red sand, and the prevalence of tower-like rock formations.

There is little else in the way of notable features. A few scrubbish plants and small cacti-like growths cling to the loose soil, mostly around the base of the rock formations... no other life in sight though. Not a bird in the sky, no lizards, no insects... the lack of noise is almost oppressive. Well, not quite a complete lack of noise; as the wind whips through the passes and columns, it creates a rather solemn, haunting effect that only adds to a distinct feeling of being watched. Not by the sensor posts, but by something else.

If there's anything there, the sensors certainly aren't seeing it.

Placing the sensor posts is easy enough, and fortunately, it seems you were lucky; these are the self-disguising models Sandra mentioned. The effect is unconvincing up close, but from a distance it's quite difficult to spot where you left them. It takes a good couple of hours to get the net well placed, especially with the rock towers occasionally restricting line of sight quite badly, but things go well apart from that.

Speaking of fortunes, the skies seem to be nice and clear today. No dust storms or anything of that nature.



GM:
If anyone did anything particular during the trip or whilst out in the Badlands, now would be the time to declare it, and I'll post results before you head back. Naturally if you want to do something in secret then PM me and we will resolve it there. I apologise if I'm squashing opportunities for smalltalk, but I like to keep things rolling.