Episode 4: Seeds of Dissent

[Callowmoryne]

Logar listened to the whirlwind of idealism around him. He was moved by there words, a strange feeling for him. Logar had had been fighting for two decades, but never for a better reason than staying alive, or a few credits. He needed this, more than he could ever explain. And who would he tell, how would this crew take knowing the things hed done to get by. The easy road of not asking questions, just point and shoot when told to. Well he was determined to make a better life for himself. One his mother would be proud of. If he closed his eyes he could see her face, freshly bruised from a recent beating. The defiance in her eyes as she came to the decision to sneak back into the kitchens to steal food for her starving son. He needed this, the whole damn galaxy needed this. " Well like i said, im in. Either way, free them all or take the time and see which ones deserve to be there. The decision is up to you all. Im the new guy. And if we cant trick the comps then im more than ready to come hard and heavy." He smiled and waited to see who would make the final call.

[Telcontar]

"What justice was there in the old Republic that it was so sick as to need to become an Empire to the rejoicing of most of the core worlds? I will freely admit that in the begining I thought the Empire was an improvement so was it the Republic that was hijacked or was it the spirit of the Empire that left the path of justice first?
  We wont have time to cull the prisoner manifest and then sit in judgement on their crimes, even if the information that imprisoned them was accurate. Are you not, in the eyes of some, an assasin of an Imperial Senator Brim? This is an out of the way prison for people that are to be forgotten, not a pit to put rapists smugglers and thieves. We have already started down the path of passing life and death judgement when we shoot a soldier for the uniform he wears not the pesonal ideals he may have, so if we are to be judges I say in this case, freedom. Will it be in all cases right? No i dont think it will be, but if we have the opportunity to break some others out of there and still accomplish our mission than i think we should. It will also serve a tacical purpose of giving us more help to take the prison, as well as strategic to confuse the empire on what our actual goal here was."

Britton smiled, "Its going to be hard and heavy either way, the computer stuff is to add to the chaos. we dont have to hack the system, so much as screw it up. If we can get in and take out the cannons and comms, then the ship can come up and support us with the gun turrets and get us and anyone with us out of there. "

[tomcat]

I have some really cool visions in my head of the upcoming events! The Aegis hovering over the imperial prison with laser cannons flaring! While inside, freedom fighters kick some ass.



Brim sighed. There would be a constant break in their ranks due to idealism. He was not sure that Britton was wrong. It came down to a decision, and who was to make that final decision? They were a loose band of fringers, but would need to organize into a coherent unit if they were to survive. To do that required a leader, but who had enough clout and charisma to take up that status? The captain? It was obvious that Caden did not want such authority. The noble? She was used to leading, wasn't she? At least used to ruling over others, but that was not always the same. Still, she had been good at taking command in their last few skirmishes. The last question was, would they all follow her lead? Brim regretted the loss of Ulric. He could have been the one to fill that position.

"We could ruminate our positions forever, and in the end, neither be completely right, or wrong. T'is something that makes me think what the senate floor must have been like... and that takes a kind of person and a kind of patience that I neither have, nor the time. That said, I agree with your plan, Britton. It is well thought out and we should be able to see it through. The decision of freeing the prisoners will come down to someone else's judgment, but for myself, I am only entering this prison to rescue the engineer Antar Danjapa. I will not hinder your efforts, unless I see that one amongst them to be freed is truly despicable, but nor will I help." The Rodian closed that chapter of the debate in his brain. "So, we have Sam entering the maintenance corridor with our team and he will try to disrupt the prison's computerized infrastructure. We also have the Aegis ready as aerial support and pickup. Britton and Brim will also be on the raiding team, as will I. Who else goes in and who stays with the Aegis?"

[Telcontar]

Britton recognized that having said his thoughts and planted the seeds, the situation on the ground would ultimately shape the events to come. Rescuing one or many was all the same as far as the plan went. Britton looked to the Captain to see if he should shut up or continue,

"I don't know the internal lay out of this place so it will somewhat fall to chance and contingency. I would say we break down into three groups, one the assault element, the second a reserve to exploit opportunity and conduct secondary objectives, and the third the ship itself. I think Logar, Sam and myself should be the assault force to force our entry and deal with the immediate armed garrison, the second group of Brim and Kaira will support us or break off if that should prove necessary. The third group, the Captain on the ships guns, and Kara standing by for either a comm signal to fly in and open with the guns, to pick us up, or load us up at the assault position when we return. Our priorities inside will be to attempt to confuse the garrison through use of the maintenance area, storm the control room to find out where our prisoner is, breach the prison proper and retrieve our target, suppressing or destroying the garrison as we go. The second group can hold the control room and attempt to immobilize the communications and external weapons systems while holding the withdrawal route open for the whole group. Loss or capture of the assault team will abort the mission, loss of group two will require the ship to blast a hole out for the assault group, and loss of the ship means we pick out the cells we like best and get our names written on the wall before we are summarily shot and dumped in a ditch. Best time of attack is half way through one of the night shifts if we can determine when they change over, mostly likely if it's a 12 or 8 hour shift 2-3 am would be the best attack time either way.
  How am I doing Sam?"

[donimator]

Sam considered the plan. Tactically it was sound but there was no room for error. If one element got bogged down there may not be enough support to push ahead with objectives. So many things had to go well to pull this off, but surprise was a valuable ally. That would be key. "With our available resources, Britton, it seems the best we can do. Stealth and freedom of movement will be key. We should acquire some breaching charges in case our path gets blocked. I've never been one to believe in only following the path presented."

[tomcat]

The serious decisions that Caden will make, I am going to leave for him to reply. But this I can do...



Caden shook his head a moment for not bringing up the schematics. "Amateur," he told himself as he hit a button. Well, it was true... this was his first attack on a facility. He hoped they would all live to see it through.

The second table that had shown the three-dimensional image of Tantau II disappeared, and a series of two-dimensional architectural blueprints spread across. They were lit in orange and the projector table darkened behind them making it easy to see what was what.

Republic Blueprints: Tantau Prison Facility - Hangar

Republic Blueprints: Tantau Prison Facility - Administration/Control (first floor)

Republic Blueprints: Tantau Prison Facility - Administration/Control (second floor)

Republic Blueprints: Tantau Prison Facility - Barracks / Medical (first floor, second story of facility is storage) - also includes portion of power station.

Republic Blueprints: Tantau Prison Facility - Prison floor layout (3 floors, 2 bunks per cell)

Republic Blueprints: Tantau Prison Facility - Maintenance shack (1 floor)

[Telcontar]

  Map 1 are the circled T's turbo lifts?
There are no underground levels so the prison is all above ground right?
Is there only one gun turret?
Where does one enter the barracks level? It appears like the stairs go up to the second storage level, and so does the lift,but how does one enter and exit this level?

I am somewhat spacial confused on how these different levels stack on one another and fit together.

[tomcat]

First let me explain that I do not have really nice map making software... most of this stuff I do with Microsoft Paint and the rest I grab from other sources. Point is, I had a patchwork of maps that I wanted to use for this prison so I drew the outside of the prison to mirror the shapes of the maps. It doesn't work perfectly, but it's close enough for government work.

Anyway Tom, I have posted my overhead drawing with where the inner maps would be, and how they would orient to help with your confusion - it is below.

As to your questions:

• The circled T's are part of the reactor - what they do is not relevant, unless you need me to define them.
• There is an underground conduit for waste that leads out to the river shown on the external map. It is a maintenance tunnel so it either connects to the maintenance shack, or the power plant... you guys will have to figure that out.
• There are three external manned turrest on the prison's face, and one on the back over the hangar.
• I will link the different sections of the building with obvious locations for doors. While the sections of the prison can be locked down from one another, it is not during normal operations.
• I would use the maps as mirrors for each floor, but obviously it would make no sense. The only one that does is the actual prison layout (3 floors of it).
• Above the admin area is a control room. Off it will be a passage that leads to the outer turret on that face of the building.
• Above the medical/barracks area will be storage, maybe some more bunk rooms and passages to the turrets on that face.
• I will put it all together cleaner for you once you guys are in there - remember... things may have changed inside. It kind of works though, because it seems easy engineering for far away planetoids to have things modular and put it together once at its location.

Anything else, give me a shout.

[watanabe]

Kara didn't have any issues of the plan of her standing by on the ship ready to move, she wondered if Caden would really trust her under fire to not run and leave them there.  He had to know that Kara had the ability to run and have the ship sold off on the black market in less than a week.  She wondered if the soldier knew of her past, in the previous mission she had held tight, but then there was not as much worry of being shot at by Imperial TIE fighters.  Kara stood there thinking as they discussed the plan.

"I have no issues with the plan, but I think soldier or not, that everyone should have their say."  Kara looked at Kaida then the Captain.  "Captain, this is going to be a mission where people might not come back alive.  No need to sugar coat it."  Kara wanted to say more, but was worried after her previous run in with Kaida of making her even more of an enemy. 



Some of these maps are familiar to me. 

[tomcat]

"Well, start collecting the things you all will need," Caden muttered. He didn't like to hear Sam's candid version of their operation, after hearing the upbeat confidence from Britton. "Most of us are going to have to rely on our own personal weapons as there is not a huge arsenal on board. Sam, if you need breaching charges, then maybe you can find a way to fabricate some. Organa asked us to do this, but he didn't really give us a lot to work with."

"Perhaps that was the reason for Ulric accompanying us to the ship, on Jovan," said Brim. "Maybe he had gear stowed in the space station's hangar for us. We'll never know."

"Maybe," sighed Caden. "Nothing we can do about it now, but try and see this done. We have one more day until we will enter the Tantis system. I will leave it up to you to finalize the mission plans."

[Callowmoryne]

Logar interjected again. "Ive got to take stock of my equipment, but im sure i have a few grenades to spare for you Britton and maybe a few for our back up team. Also ill be using my rifle, which leaves me a few sidearms for distribution, a heavy and a regular sized blaster pistol. If that'll help?"

[Telcontar]

  Roger that, thanks Tomcat the overlay image helps. The only other is how are the sections connected to one another? The prison is broken down into functional areas which makes sense, but they way they are connected to each other will tell us how to isolate them from each other, which will be important.

Britton looked closer at the new maps, "this is actually good, I was expecting a prison with 100-150 people, this is more managable than I thought. we can do this. The key thing will be isolating the off duty soldiers to their barracks area. The on duty guard I think we can deal with, they are desgined to respond to internal threats, not external ones. Idealy if we could take over the prison the supplies alone would free us from some of our material constraints if we could load them up. Sam, with this information, what do you think the chances are that if the assualt team's focus is to take out the comms and gun turrets that the ship could then come in and breach the prison walls and evac the prisoners instead of having to clear the levels with the assualt team?"

[tomcat]

Roger that, thanks Tomcat the overlay image helps. The only other is how are the sections connected to one another? The prison is broken down into functional areas which makes sense, but they way they are connected to each other will tell us how to isolate them from each other, which will be important.

Cool, Tom. I will make a cleaner combined map tomorrow. I will also re-dress the second story of the Barracks and Admin. It will be clearer.

Because you guys can't see each others PC's (at least I don't think you can), write down weapons or gear that might be useful and that you are offering up to the mission. Also give me a heads up on how your PC will be armed upon entry into the prison. Lastly, tell me your wish list and I will consider if it might be stowed somewhere on the Aegis.

Again, I am kind of waiting for Shawn to get back to play Caden - I don't want to do all the talking for him while he is on vacation. So, don't think I am ignoring you if you don't get an immediate response from Caden.

[Jingo]

Wow lots of posts in a day and half!

Kaida was pleasantly amazed and a bit nervous as the planning commenced. Things were happening. Instead of running away, they were running towards something, for once.

The debate between Britton and Brim on the ethics of the situation was stimulating. She agreed with many of their points on both sides. At least they were a thinking bunch...well some of them were anyway. She looked at Logar'dan. She wasn't sure about their newest addition. He had a rather unhealthy habit of talking to his weapons. Given Kara's warning, she wasn't sure if they could really trust him yet, but at this point the ball was rolling, and they had little choice but to try and trust each other

And Britton. It was like a change had come over him. He had often been reserved--true a pleasant enough fellow--but she hadn't really thought of him as much of a thinker. But this...? After observing Britton poring over the tactical maps and hearing his comments for several minutes, she smiled and patted Britton's shoulder. "Where have you been keeping all this? You've been holding out on us. I've studied tactics, but you're a natural."

The plan was a good one. Well thought out and as good as could be expected with limited planning time and not enough resources. Of course it all could blow up in their faces too.

She stood and cleared her throat and spoke to everyone. "I've been doing a lot of thinking lately. Britton is right. Many of you are going to be crossing a line today. I have already crossed that line. Simply by being me. My planet, Commenor, tried to stand up to the Empire to not cave in and cower. But such individualism was brutally subjugated. The empire came with their ships and their guns. My own father and brother were killed defending their homes and their way of life. The rest of my family I have not heard from. I suspect they are either dead or in slavery somewhere or running even now from the Empire's agents." She was amazed at how calm she felt. But whatever it was, it felt right. "This is just a taste of what this New Order will force-feed the rest of the galaxy if they are not stopped."

She paused and motioned to the tactical the tactical display. "It may not seem like what we are about to do matters very much. Afterall, rescuing some backwater prisoner probably wasn't on your top-ten list of life-time accomplishments. But one thing my father taught me, is that by these small and simple beginnings, great things can roll forth. Even one spark falling into a tinderbox desiring freedom from oppression can ignite an inferno that the Empire will be hard pressed to put out. Yes it is idealistic. But what are we without ideals to strive towards?" She glanced at Sam for just a moment and gave a small smile. She had been about to say 'mindless robots'.

"I just want to say thank you for the opportunity to fight beside you. I hope we can all make it back safely aboard the ship. To this end, I suggest we give tactical command to Britton for this mission. I've been around a lot of soldiers and have even studied tactics myself, and he's got a good head on his shoulders. He's obviously had experience with this sort of thing in the past. Any objections?"

[Callowmoryne]

  Logar will be taking his rifle and bayonet, 2 frag grenades, spare ammo and med pacs.
For party use. 3 frag grenades 3 ion grenades, heavy blaster pistol, blaster pistol, field kit if anything is needed from within, it's full of goodies