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RP [Die Screaming] Pick A Place And Die There.

Molotra spent far too long in the frigid stairwell, having to come from the very bottom of the facility since Lupin had called her down to the workshop. It wasn't the first time she had considered just putting some kind of small cargo winch on the roof, and getting up that way... Anyway, it made sense for them to go last, since they'd be blocking the only escape route if some kind of firefight was going on up there.

<"Plasma containment works using electromagnetism, I wouldn't recommend cutting the power to the base. It might discharge on its own."> She reported to Tobias though mindware, grasping at straws with the situation. She was only able to glimpse what was happening by accessing the security camera feeds. The auto-turret she'd installed outside of the server room was beginning to feel like a third eye right now... <"Can you access the targeting scope directly? Even if it's infra-red, you should be able to see what the battery is aiming at.">

<"This isn't some kind of coup, is it? Who the hell is ordering the gun around? We aren't about to start one, are we? What did Francis do?">

Finally breaching the top of the stairs and lumbering in through the door, Molo darted their head left and right with an exhausted look. Trying to parse ten different screens worth of obscure information at once.

Was it even possible to operate the cannon remotely? She'd been assuming it was heavily encrypted the entire time, but there wasn't anything like a carrier wave emanating from the facility... Was it an aether system? Having a system that automatously, passively followed commands with no feedback was a crazy bad idea...

Senses darting around in not just the physical but also the digital, the tank tried to find the operations controls, and anything that suggested an emergency shutdown apparatus like Tobias suggested- But she also accessed the communications system through the ship tracker console, getting ship address information along the way.

<"Feast of the Stars, please report your status and state your intentions."> She transmitted with authority, trying not to let the stress of the situation come across. <"We are tracking several disruptions from our location.">

<"Starbase, our weapon systems are on standby."> Another routed transmission. Benefits of not having to physically speak. <"Please report the situation. Please issue command authority.">
 
Tobias desperately worked to try to worm his way into the cannon's systems, searching for emergency controls. Even if he couldn't power down the gun totally, he hoped to abort the firing sequence. Then Molotra's suggestion gave the hacker a spark of inspiration. He changed his route, instead working towards infiltrating the cannon's gunsight and targeting controls.

Utilizing the control station in the tower, he made inroads into the relevant subsystems, eventually reaching the gunsight and, if he was right, the aiming control systems. "I'm going to try to see what it's aiming at, and see if I can't knock it off target if it's friendly." He said aloud in response to Molotra's mental message, in order to keep the rest of the squad in the loop.
 
There was a brief glare back at the drunk mess formerly carrying the title of commissar, the anger and knitted brow passing as Lupin brought his attention back to the more immediate situation, his jacket's weatherproofing protected him from the worst of Francis' last meal as it slopped onto the floor.

"There's... so fucking many signatures, it's like they're dropping an asteroid belt on us, that can't be right~" Lupin muttered under his breath, something he was sure the others were also coming to terms with. Who and what were definitely questions floating through the sniper's greymatter as he started bringing up any documentation he could find on the plasma battery, flitting through files on his HUD as he searched schematics and instructional diagrams for some kind of way to safely discharge the weapon if they needed to.

One hand reached into his jacket to produce a steenplast-coated autoinjector with the security sticker still fixed to the cap, handing it off to Carina with a little nod.

"Galactic Horizon medical nanites, same ones I use, should help clean her blood and get Francis sober again~" he briefly spoke before turning back to the console the others were hunched over.

"If it's targeting a friendly, if the skies aren't full of targets, is there some way we could force the plasma to vent instead of firing it?" Lupin started, vision filled with a transparent overlay of manuals and patents related to the plasma battery, anything and everything he could scrape from the base's servers at a moments notice.

"If not and if objects start falling from the skies... we should maybe consider getting downstairs with the supplies, that area has thick walls and a good few meters of frozen dirt above it, it's the next best thing we have to a bunker," Lupin proposed in a low, grim tone befitting the potential situation the team found themselves in, eyes erratically moving between the others working at the console and the overwhelming amount of information flooding his eyes.

"Sergeant?"
 
Command Center

While information was parsed there was little of actual understood value to any of it regarding the anti-ship battery. Jargon only understood by the fact that it was in Trade was mixed with terms and charts and diagrams all referencing more and more books and papers and information manuals outside of any of their expertise.

It was staffed by NSN specialists and techs from NAM in a perfect scenario who spoke space-gun. It was all gibberish.

What they knew from context clues is that is was on standby. It was armed and pointing voidwards. But had no target and was simply deployed because procedure demanded it and whoever was incharge of the billet and the navy rats would do the rest of the magic that made ships no longer exist when it looked at them. The fact that it was still a steady ominous glowing pylon of death instead of a pylon of death that was growing increasingly brighter was a good sign that it wasnt going to explode if most of their marine brains used to hitting objects with rocks and wearing womens underwear was any cohesive understanding.

For Molotra tho, she had more and less progress. The Feast of the stars was radio-silent. Its course unchanged at its current course and speed her freespacer-born instincts told her it would either sheer off of the atmosphere at its current speed, disintegrate before making it through, or break apart in orbit and rain debris down planetside. But there was no clear indicator of where it would end up in any scenario.

And a small chance it would somehow make it through and the impact planetside would be the equivalent of a several megaton bomb...

Regardless it answered no hail.

The starbase was more forthcoming but less cohesive as encoded messages meant for likely other installations either planetside or in orbit where sent to the base with useless information and numerical commands.

A military installation run by civilian contractors had clearly gone cats-up on procedure, protocol, and professionalism.

Francis, clearly feeling better after having expelled the impurities of her drink and medicine combo glared at Lupin like she hadn't just hurled all over him and retrieved her HHG to slide it into her waistband and stagger over towards the windows.

"No need to hide bellow." She admonished like he was an Idiot as she looked out and peered up towards the sky. "City has a shield for this kind of thing for a reason, you know?"

She stared off into the night for over a minute as the descending icons on the screen drew closer and closer despite being unseen in the dark night skies. Which was just as concerning about what else could not be seen.

"You can see shields, right?" Francis asked out loud, her tone implying she was unsure if shields worked the same as in her day.

Any of them could see that the pylons on the hive city's walls remained dormant and inactive as the dinnerplate-shaped shield that should be active above the city was nowhere to be seen.

"Right?"

Armory

Bellow the command center and firing room the ceiling and space between the levels was reinforced to survive certain starship weapons below a certain threshold. Relocating, or closer to having retreated there became the optimal choice as the hastily acquired gear was traded out for fuller kit as primary weapons were aquired and Golem armor was fitted.

Having learned the hard way first-hand suits and armor were thoroughly insulated and padded against the cold and even Quilly had the limbs of her wings rubbed down with a thermal solution that while making them uncomfortably warm in the base would keep her wings from getting frostbitten or frozen from condensation if she didnt stay out too long.

Francis, of course, opted for the lighter Golem configuration; Discarding more armor for lighter mass and maneuverability. And also so she could wear her old beaten commissars' coat over it. For weapons she had both of her HHGs in shoulder holsters, a 12mm RPB pistol on one hip, a styrling Easy submachinegun on the other, her riot shotgun, combat axe, and an assortment of bulges and protrusions that implied that the extra weight and mass she got rid of from her armor had found other ways to balance the tradeoff.

Still unclear as to if asteroids were falling, the ship itself, or if the Kuvexians were invading the sector again no marine would think twice about arming up if it was needed or not. Above them the plasma gun still hummed and softly vibrated the base around them like a soft shiver.

And while none of them were in the command center anymore some of them at least had the ability and foresight to remotely connect to the equipment. There was some interference, possibly the energy falloff of the plasma gun. But the connection was tedious and for some reason as seemed often whenever bad things were going down Molotra felt a very thin grasp on the Polysentience.

As the descending objects fell further it was clear Stenkagorad would not go unharmed as their hemisphere and region seemed to be right in the crossfire. One by one the proverbial rain of targets fell on the planet and likely the city as well but inside the base not a single sound was heard or anything felt.

Waiting in tense silence, staring at the ceiling expecting the worse they all waited expectantly for the other shoe to drop. When it didn't and those like Tobias and Mootra still in the system saw the last icons fall below the radar horizon it just seemed to... End...

Marines, however, are a superstitious lot for good reason. As if sensing it was about to happen Francis opened her mouth.

Before anyone could react in time to stop her, she tempted fate.

"Is that all? I was expecting-"

The whole building began to shake as somewhere nearby heavenly bodies impacted the starport.

Within thirty seconds and what felt like a douzen impacts near the base it finally stopped and marines were able to stand from where they either fell or took cover.

When Francis opened her mouth again it was unclear who threw a stray, empty magazine at her to shut her up.
 
Carina motioned to Francis conspiratorially while they outfitted themselves in the armory. As the woman opted to tempt fate, and a second before fate decided to answer her by showing its middle finger, the Medic struck hard and fast. An auto-injector loaded with a Nepleslian alcoholic's worst nightmare. Something to cure a hangover, to clear the system, and to prevent more of the sickly-looking woman's projectile vomiting. A liquified variant of Emrys Industries' Contraveisalgia medication. For someone of her size that single dose was enough to put her right.

The spent single-use injector flew from her hand as the ground shook, dust sprinkling down on her armored form. The Golem suit helped to keep her steady. Grounded. And thank fuck someone threw an empty mag at the Commissar to stop her from bringing the middle finger of fate down on their heads again.

"Fuck's sake, Franny, y'tryin' to bring'tha wrath of the Burning Black Hand," mentioning the niche', ancient Nepleslian religion up, "Down on our heads... again?" she hissed with a solid thump to her skinnier counterpart's armored shoulder. While a blow from her could very well crack bone if she tried, she'd held back enough to simply get her point across. Fate was a fickle bastard. No need to tempt him further.

She'd have to find the person who'd used the magazine as an impromptu method of shutting her up and thank them later on.
 
Caffran listened as pieces of information became clearer. But for every 'clearer' detail, more questions came. Finally looking at the sky itself as if that would give him the answer Caffran said, "We move down to the armory. Everyone suit up. If nothing else, we practice getting our gear together."

Down in the Armory, everyone started suiting up. While most were going for the Golem Armor, Caffran pulled out his M10 Raider light Armor. A little something he had held onto from his brief stint with the IPG commandos. While it might seem a little bit on the heavy handed side, Caffran had no idea what might be about to happen and wanted to be ready for anything. To the extent that he was also packing his LAC, Light Coil Autocannon. As always, he had his Svafnir, the double barrel sawed off shotgun, 50 cal revolver. For blades, he had his trademark Straight Silver. This one engraved with a lightning bolt from his fiancé. He was also packing a secondary blade attached to his left forearm, a VBCS Vibrosaw. Over all this he draped his camo-cloak. Sure his Raider had great stealth capabilities, but Caff wanted to save that for when he really needed to go invisible. He was good enough with simple things that he didn't always have to rely on high tech stuff.

There was little chatter as the soldiers geared up. It was after they were all geared up that the silence started getting to people. That and each soldier's mind beginning to think of every possible way that things could get worse. Francis' comment couldn't have been worse timed. Caffran was on the verge of telling her to shut up when the whole building began to shake. There was nothing Caffran hated more than flying, but being underground while a barrage was going on was definitely on the list.

Then it stopped and there was just silence. Caffran was listening intently. He could hear Francis begin to breath in, most likely to make another ill timed comment. Caffran was a superstitious soldier. He didn't want the commissar to bring more bad luck onto them. He hefted an empty mag and discreetly flicked it at Francis.

"Alright troops. I want a damage report of our base and make sure it is still secure. After that, I want to know what the hell just happened. I don't care who you have to ask or how you find it out just do it."
 
Haisely hadn't said much since the shitshow kicked off, mostly on account of trying to stay out of everyone's way while they yelled about a ship falling on them.

For a small street-girl who was still barely used to rolling with the cops a few months back this kind of conflict, scenario, whatever they would call it in reports later. It was way out of her league and she was terrified, on the edge of bolting with every part of her body saying to run. Down in the armoury she put on her Photon suit, offense and defense were meaningless to her, all that counted was stealth and agility and this afforded her both. She could always fall back on her skills, unlike people, though the ones she was with now seemed competent, even interesting.

When the first impacts hit she threw on her helmet and huddled in the server room, trying to pack as much of the critical info drives as she could get her hands on into her toughest carry case. But before long like many others she was knocked down to the floor, closing the case and scrambling along the floor, Haisely put her back against one of the many racks now humming in protest from all the vibrations, warning indicators illuminating on several servers and storage banks as they desperately tried to halt critical operations before file corruption would occur.

And then she closed her eyes and waiting for it to stop.



When Haisely next opened them she could hear Caffran in her ear, looking around at the small data-center she'd lovingly curated it seemed to have survived the worst of the impacts but she wouldn't know the extent of damage without doing a full inspection later.

"Goenkof, data-center seems intact, I-I think I managed to keep the important stuff safe... What the fuck just happened."

As usual she tried to play off how shaken she was from the whole ordeal, just hoping no one else had seen her huddled in the corner for the last few minutes.
 
Armoury -> Outside Perimeter

"We should have shot it down ourselves." Molotra made the observation long before they left the armoury. It was technically the job of the emplaced weapon, even if they didn't have the authority or training to fire it. "I knew that vector was rotten..."

This thought was interrupted by Carina injecting Francis, a moment that gave them pause whilst they waited for the apparent effects to take place. The situation reminded them how scary the petite medic could be when they wanted to. It was best not to question what somebody with knowledge and skill like that could do with a knife...

As for power armour, it was rather obvious Molotra had been assigned no such thing, seeing as they lacked the certifications, and the correct body shape to put it lightly. They'd constructed a newer version of their crude full body shell, layered from armoured jackets, voidsuit components, and apparently appliqué durandium armour plates from the Na-J3 robot- After simply shoving their organic arm into the giant metal seashell type pile, they snapped it in place under their right armpit, attached the helmet, and then simply ejected and replaced their right arm with the double M3/axehead arm that seemed to be their favoured tool of war. The backpack was from the courier robot too- Well, a weird amalgamation of a Na-J3SD-300 Brainspammer ECM suite, with a tech pack and pod with three DART mini-missiles.

They barely fit back out the door. Or could gain enough traction to get back up the stairs. Or really bend their left arm more than fifteen degrees...

Lupin helped her build it and didn't tell her it was a weird idea to become a human technical. Blame him.

"...I'll check the outer parameter, Sergeant." The register of this new machine creature was disturbingly low now, under the wash of environmental fans. "Please access base terminal 188347 for my sensor readouts... Don't worry about the number station on frequency RD8 442F."

Sh-KRUNK- Sh-KRUNK- Sh-SKRUNK-Clak Clack Clak

Electronic feelers out, a wall of frosty breeze hit their goggles as they exited through the vehicle ramp, out into the bustling snow.

She'd leave out the fact she volunteered to go out first, primarily to get geiger counter readings.

The secondary objective was to disguise the residents of the base from a potential invasion force, and let them think whatever dilapidated state the facility had been in was still in effect...
 
Barracks

There was little that could be seen from the base few windows through the armored shutters that had descended over them when the alert came in and required a more manual inspection. Through an unspoken agreement, it was safer to check from the base hatch than to go up to the firing deck if there were rocks or something falling from the sky.

Under Haisleys watchful gaze on the interior cameras as the lower and ground level of the base were inspected and found fine there was little outside for her to see in the still raging snowstorm as whoever built the place clearly went prefab and had no actual measures to work the exterior optics in the snow. FLIR offered no aid either as the all-consuming cold simply snuffed its range.

So out the front, it was.

Francis, not due to any punishment for her antics but more through unspoken agreement that with her shotgun she was the best pointman took the door much slower than prefered as she fought against the wind trying to force it back closed. Seconds later it swung open on its own as the electrical assist took over and she turned a stumble into a rather impressive manuever as one boot hit the deck and slid in the snow, carrying her momentum she let her body slide out and forwards with her shotgun ready.

The rest behind her following her out they were greeted with a scene if no other word to describe it.

There were lights pocked around the flight deck of the starport as vehicles moved about, and clusters more as workers moved about and inspected... Things... That had impacted on the flight deck.

Large enough to fill a swimming pool there were at least two douzen objects flattened against the flight deck where they had landed. Looking rather smooth from a distance and rather deformed the best way to describe them would be if a giant sky cow had taken offense to the starport and dropped its cowflops all over the place with each one a large mound almost twenty foot across on average and half again as tall the massive sky turds had rained down seemingly all over the starport, outside the settlement if the black objects dotting the white snow in the distance was any indication, and likely all over the city.

The three deck workers who had been scaling the barracks steps likely to check on the marines if for some sort of answer they might had froze and the end of Francis' barrel and looked from it to the starport and its new backdoor decorations.

"We. uh," One of them started, likely looking wide eyed under his goggles if they could be seen as he swapped between putting his hands up and down in surrender.

"The fuck are those?!" Francis demanded, taking a few more steps ahead and standing at the base of the steps as she pulled one of the many pistols from her coat and looked to Caffran for confirmation. With some ascent, she fired the flare pistol into the sky and within moments a dim-yellow diffuse glow illuminated a hundred meters or so around. Before it was blown away or snuffed by the storm they got a better look at the nearest one some fifty foot away from the bottom of the barracks steps.

It looked exactly what everyone thought it was.

And was even brown.

The three deck workers floundered for an answer, clearly as unsure as they were. The only saving grace was that it seemed nothing else had fallen from the skies. Following the next logical course of action, Francis once again took the lead down the steps with her shotgun a little less at the ready at the non-emergency it had seemed as she reloaded her flaregun and held it. The three deck workers, clearly uncertain floudered with the rest of the group, their looks between the marines and the open hatch a not so open secret where they would prefer to be.


"CO." Francis began, Pronouncing Caffrans temporary title as "Koh" through the comms as she pronounced the sound of the letters as she descended the stairs. Not immedietly following up with a statement she fired another flare up as the first was snuffed. Of the many cowflops smacked down on the flight deck none had hit the Anemone, and seemed rather spaced apart with only a few landing near one another. There was at least ten other migrations of workers spread about if the congregations of lights were any indicator as silhouettes of men gestures or moved about around the space... Debris... and some even lit longer lasting hazard flares to mark perimiters as no doubt they tried to worry about how they were going to move likely several thousand tons combined of space awful and get the flight deck back up and running in the fastest amount of time before they froze and became as hard as concrete.

Turning about and using the light of the flare Francis appraised the barracks from bellow.

"Nothing landed on us." She declared before looking off to the side.

"Almost." She looked off at something unseen until any of them looked over the railing below. One of the cowflops had landed right next to the billet and had narrowly missed it with seeming feet to spare as the likely source of the near-impact shaking they had all felt. "Yeah I aint cleaning dat." She remarked before looking back up at the group.

"So... That's it then? Was expecting more." She followed a trend that seemed impossible that she didnt know the effects of what she was tempting. Luckily nothing happened.

"So what now, CO?" She asked, her voice tinged with annoyance that she had gotten armed and suited up for no reason. "We can recce the starport. Make sure none of the civies got smooshed and pick up some of those hot mocha with some of the swill the locals sell along the way, ye? The statement was a clear joke as she took a few more steps out, saw nothing of any interest, and turned around clearly expecting to either be called back or for them to join her down below.

"All this and I was expectin, I dunno; An invasion or somthin!"
 
"Yeesh, I'm glad it's too cold to smell. Think that's all the waste from our godforsaken trip out to here?" Quilly's chattery voice carried well over the wind, trying to offset the stress of the sudden presumed attack. It was hard to tell if she was shivering because of the cold alone, or if her nerves had somehow caught up to her.

Internally, she really wanted to poke the space poop. She really, really wanted to do it, to see what would happen. It was still probably soft enough from atmospheric reentry that she could break it up with a stick or something. After a moment, the temptation proved too much, and the Quail took a locally-sourced globule of ice and chucked it at the pile of matter that had come so close to defiling the exterior of the Ruthless Rider's current hideaway, fully expecting it to splatter brown stuff on impact.
 
Haisely made an annoyed clicking sound with her tongue when all attempts at external visual surveillance were met with crappy cameras clearly chosen by someone who had no idea what to do with the budget thinking saving money was a smart choice.

"I can't see anything outside, cameras are shit, do you want me to come up to the surface?" She said over the radio, not to anyone in particular but somewhat directed towards people above her in rank.

Secretly she was hoping not to have to go up, down amongst her tech is where she preferred to be but just in-case the cyber-cat drew her pistol and made sure it was loaded, even though she knew they would be Haisely also extended her claws to make sure they were working and sharp. With how this day is going, the nepcat was also kind of itching to stab someone.
 
Caffran responded to Molotra first. "I'll head out with you. I want to speak with some of the locals and get their take what just happened. I think also a showing would be good for them to see that we are still here and are not going anywhere. The rest of you, get the base back up and running."

With his M10 Raider armor on, Caff could hardly feel the cold. He was only aware of the wind by the way it was pulling at the camo-cloak he had over it. Not that the suit needed a camo cloak with its already refined stealth systems but Caffran wanted to keep some element of surprise. People would see he had some kind of exo suit on, but not realize that it was military grade PA. The Sargent moved around to where the perimeter cameras that Haisely was complaining about. They were standard military grade cameras, but they looked pretty wore out. Obviously someone hadn't done much matenince on them in a while.

Caffran radioed Haisely. "Cameras need some matenicne. They might be salvageable. When we get back, you and Molotra can work on getting them back up and running."
 
Tobias had stayed behind in the base briefly, half to keep an eye on Haisley and half to have a higher bandwidth connection to the base while he interfaced with its systems. Despite the massive disruption that had been caused by the hailstorm of fecal matter, the tech specialist continued his efforts to uncover the mysteries of the current events, searching the installation's radar and sensor records to see if he could piece together the series of events that had lead to the situation the team now found themselves in.

Satisfied once he had downloaded the files he wanted, and that the remainder could be transferred easily even when further from the base's network node, he followed the rest outside. "I'm checking our sensor records, Caff, I'll see if I can't figure out what the hell caused this stuff to rain down on us." Tobias said, with the tone of someone speaking to a peer rather than a superior, "What's the deal out here so far?" The ex-operative asked, cinching the fur-lined cloak he'd thrown on over his ballistic vest tighter closed against the cold.
 
Lupin's Golem was very visibly modified, nothing that couldn't be reversed, but the lad had spent more than a bit of his downtime optimizing the armour to better suit his needs. The chest was now a mess of webbing and pouches appropriated from various bits of surplus equipment he'd grabbed from the local flea market, hints of tough leather and treated fur poking out from any glaring gaps in the plating to both insulate the him a little further and provide some extra protection without weighing it down significantly. Most notably was the heavy-set collar taken from some oversized canine he'd brought back last week, mimicking the beast's natural defenses. As the team's marksman he was loaded up with his usual short-barrelled carbine across his chest, standard-enough sidearm in a drop holster mimicking his actual service pistol and his favourite anti-materiel rifle collapsed on his back with it's very expensive computerized scope.

There was a sense of dread and unease Lupin couldn't quite explain as he began removing a service panel to check on one of the prefab's many maintenance terminals embedded in its walls, and as much as he tried to suppress it the feeling continued to grow even as Lupin logged in with the admin password. The hairs on the back of Lupin's neck stood bolt upright as a chill ran down his spine, causing the lad to mistype and generate a security log for Haisley to look at later, but that was the last thing the was currently worrying about.

The sniper's mind took him back a few years, the scent of burnt propellant and blood making the hairs in his nostrils curl, an unknown amount of gore and naturally armoured limbs mixing with the mud squelching beneath his boots, far too many streaks of light burning across the inky sky of that night of his first conflict...

The nanites in his blood did their best to modulate the overwhelming amount chemicals currently rushing through his system, Lupin's ethereal pupils dilating beneath his Golem's mask, he just hoped his paranoia was misplaced~

"Get the defenses up~" was all Lupin said as he took off towards the others, sending an office chair and the toolbox that'd been sitting on it tumbling across the floor as his suit's respiration loop sealed itself off, boots thundering up the stairs.

"Don't touch them!" Lupin barked over comms, making no attempt to mask his heavy breathing as he ascended three-stairs at a time, bursting through the doorway after what felt like forever for him, skidding to a halt and barely not-toppling over as his boots dug into the small bit of snow that'd gathered on the deck.

"A- The~" he huffed, taking a moment to suck in some oxygen before trying again.

"BUGS! GET THE DECKHANDS BACK!" Lupin barked almost manically, bringing his carbine and it's quad-stacked magazine up as his helmet's absorbent lining began wicking panicked sweat away from the marksman's face, suppressed muzzle pointed at the nearest pile of steaming biomass.
 
Barracks

Fighting against the chill Tobias came up on Francis as he casually checked the sensor data. The feed was siphoned straight from the starbase in orbit of both its passive and active reccords and there was a lot to go over as he did but at least he had a few places to start with.

The two small "fleets" for lack of a better word had responded to the Feast in system and while he was no trafic controller there was something that Duece had once remarked to him on their entry into the Freemud system when she divulged some of the finer points of tradecraft.

"Never be exciting when you enter a system." She had remarked as their Malchik frigate moved almost painfully slow through, of all things, the basic transil lanes through the Oort cloud and in-system just hundreds of kilomiters from civilian vessels. "You go slow. You blend in with the traffic." She had enunciated each statement by walking two dingers across his lap before pausing at his stomach, a teasing smile on what he would learn was the social mask she wore burning with fabricated intensity.

"The mundanes are the ones who watch the lanes. Cops, controllers, hired contractors, maybe even mercs; But not military or professionals. No, when you get excited; When you go too fast, ignore any warnings, leave the lanes, and stand out you get that kind of attention. The kind of attention that gets starships with big guns and cats with teleporters real interested in where you're going and what you're doing."

The Feast of the Stars had done just that. Even in a very low-traffic system even Tobias could tell the speed it was travelling and outside the unmarked space lanes had lit it up like a beacon and while he didnt have the exact logs he could surmise that once the Starbase had reached a communications threshold vessels had been diverted towards it.

Why the others followed was a mystery and why some of them had gone sensor-dark and others chose to burn past the Feast even more.

Fidgeting around on his armor for where he kept the tin of his cigars Tobias put the info to the side as Francis stiffened upon noticing his arrival. Still messing around with her flaregun and clearly eager to mess around with the handful of flares in one hand she loaded one up and despite the Golems mask stared Tobias down.

"What?" She demanded, as he frantically kept patting himself down not sure where he put the damn tin. The licorish flavored longs had been a gift from General Rockenhaowl after the fighting on Novus and despite the damn things tasting like smoking rubber through a hot leather hose Tobias had come to savor the damn things.

"Looking for my smokes." Tobias grinned under his mask at the grunt and then paused, seemingly as confused all of a sudden as Francis did by her next statement.

"Since when do you smoke anything other than what comes out of your own ass, Kilgee?" She continued the trend of responding to him in that name that she had met him with. That connection to Duece and whatever conspiracies real or fake that part of his life had dragged him through just to get here.

"Whatever, freak." She turned and this time shot the nearby mound of space awful with the flaregun and then winced as if without thinking she expected it to suddenly explode. Instead the flare did not embed but instead hit the mound and then fell off from an indent that reformed like a leather bag filled with water might. The blue flare sank instantly into the couple inches of snow where it glowed blue under the surface for a moment before the heath melted it all away and the light erupted back out illuminating their surroundings.

Against the side of the base they were sheltered enough from the wind to hear when Quillys ice hit the cowflop with a thwump like a bat at against a bag of leather before it too fell off. Notcing this first Francis prodded the cowflop with the end of her flare pistol and then stared as it deformed slightly and then reformed in the same spot.

"Its like a bag of gas, or water or somthin?" She remarked to herself but it carried over the proximity radio to the others. Ever so daringly she placed a boot on the base of the stellar object and then almost fell off as it deformed and then reformed. almost knocking her off like it was some kind of water bed.

drawing her knife clearly with the intent to pop or otherwise cut into what was evidently not something out of the backside of a giant space monster Francis paused and whirred about as Lupin came screaming down like a madman about bugs as he ran out into the snow.

"You- YOU!" She screamed loud enough into the radio that it cut off for a moment reaching the decibel limit. "Gave me a fucking heart attack I swear on blackmans balls i'm going to..." She began describing obscenities in considerable detail about what would go into each orifice despite the contortionism required while gesturing wildly before he was out of sight and running after Caffran and Molotra and she naturally turned her ire to the next best thing.

"Goddamnit, What?!" She screamed at Tobias, the blinking icon of the Feast still in the system nagging him as it continued to burn at full speed unmolested.

Flight Deck

The nearest group of deckhands was maybe a hundred meters away as they set up light poles around one of the cowflops. Five men, basking it and their surrounding in slowly pulsing orange lights to both alert surface vehicles and aircraft to the obstacle as well as illuminate their temporary working area walked between it and a local variant of an offroad vehicle that replaced all four wheels with four separate triangular-shaped tread-systems for the snow as they pulled out various work belts filled with tools and set up small pieces of equipment.

"Cant be more than eighty thousand pounds give or take!" One of the Kuznyetski workers in his jumpsuit and orange vest despite the near-freezing tempetures shouted to his fellows.

"Mover can push it over the edge of the flight deck then, Call the deck boss?"

"Yeah, Lukyils team already got there ahead of us. Boss man says cordon off until Blyat!"

The man screamed as he suddenly saw Caffran in his black armor and cloak, and molotra in her psuedo-armor and recoiled slightly, one hand over his heart and another grasping for a blowtorch at his side of all things before he settled.

"You nearly made me-" The man cursed before pausing and patting the backside of his trousers for a moment inquisitively before continuing. "Nearly made me ruin my clothes you bastard." The tone of his voice calmed and even sounded joking despite the bandana/goggles/ ushanka combo he wore bleeding through the Kuzynetski optimism as the four others came around and joined first nervously and then relaxed as if two nearly powered-armored individuals was no cause of alarm.

"Marines I take it." One of the men nodded, sitting on the back of the open vehicle to shield himself from the falling snow. "Ever gonna move that ship of yours? They say the terminal master promised that cradle to one of the govenors ships weeks ago!" There was laughter at some inside joke.

"So you come to help with this thing?" Another asked.

"Why didnt the shield come on?" Another, feminine voice asked despite her build being stockier than the others.

"What's it anyhow?" The fifth continued all at the same time.

There was a lot of smalltalk from the exceptionally extroverted Kuzynetski workers even as Molotra patrolled around, her connection to the Polysentiece coming and going with peaks and drops unreliably still even as Lupin started shouting and could just be seen in their optics by a blue-outline denoting a friendly running their way fifty meters out of so but too far to be heard or seen by the Kuzynetski.

Looking at the illuminated mound surrounded by lights it stayed stalwart and defiantly there on the deck, still steaming slightly in the frigid temperatures.

In response to the entire ordeal some noticeable hazard lights began to flash as spotlights in a nearby cradle illuminated the black and blue colors of a distant NPF Cobra gunship as small, bulky armored figures of likely one or more of one of the cities precincts DTR teams just barely distinguishable by their IFF icons and seperate encrypted but detectable communication channels in their Golem armor loitered at the base of the ship as the ship's elevator lowered for them likely in response in some way to the rain of objects from above.
 
Flight Deck

Molotra fell inline with Caffran and seemed intent on following their orders, though this kind of situation always came with the paranoia that his armour could have been stolen as some sort of subterfuge. Started to fall behind once they were in range to talk to the actual maintenance crew- The flight deck was way too slippy, and her tracks gripped the open snow better- You could thank Nepleslian standard construction templates for that.

<"Lupin, what are you yelling?... I can't hear you over-"> A pause, lumbering tracks skidding to a halt, overly armoured torso swivelling awkwardly. A spherical Vila sensor drone popped out of their Tech-pack and flew towards him... Still couldn't tell what he was saying, but the intensity of his body language was making the hair on the back of her neck stand up.

The second standard issue drone detached and hovered over the cordoned off blob more closely, unintentionally giving the hefty lady a wee glance, since it was their personality controlling it...

"Why aren't the planetary shields operating?... Sir, permission to board the ship and activate the point defence turrets?" Since the radio wasn't working well, the Kuzynetskis were treated to her diminutive real voice squeaking from the armoured bucket-helm. "This... This reeks of a bio-weapon attack... This stuff is kind of similar to Liquid Ally..."

Molotra's voice got kind of gruff towards the end, engine idling impatiently, as she considered the fact that it was probably her job to keep Caffran alive, too. But he was running outside of the compound with just her as support... Did he even have authority to fire the cannon? Did anyone? Why did nobody seem to know what was going on at all? If there were spooks sniffing around, that meant there was definitely something going on, right? This wasn't just one big accident?

Shit. At least if there was an obvious guilty party, they could give the cannon a virus and blame it on them. Tobias would totally do it, she reckoned.
 
Basement

Haisely made a sort of, affirmative noise at Caffran’s comment about the cameras. The cyber cat doubted they could do much without straight up replacing them all, this shit was out of date.

Upon watching what she could of the outside and hearing various things over the comms the nepcat once again thanked her tech skills for keeping her inside.

“So, want me to order some big shovels, maybe a few billion plastic bags?” She said to herself, and also accidentally anyone else who happened to be paying close attention to the comms as she barely whispered the sarcastic comment into her desk mic while tapping away and continuing to reboot and check over their servers.
 
In My Head, Rent Free

Tobias almost stared past Francis as she vented her anger in his direction following Lupin's bug-centric outburst before shaking his head and putting the cigar that he had absent-mindedly pulled out of his coat back into the tin it had come from. Had Hargraves taken the wheel again? No time to worry about that, the ex-operative decided as he squinted up into the sky, where the sensor signature of the Feast of the Stars accelerated towards Stenkagorad. The city's projector towers stood dormant in the cold air, he now knew thanks to the rain of excrement, and there was a very large starship barreling towards the planet.

"Caff, the Feast is still coming. I don't think I need to explain what'll happen if it manages to hit anywhere near here at full force. I think that we might want to see about getting the turret ready after all." He said to Caffran, glancing sideways at the Sergeant.

<Molotra, where are you at? We might need you to try and get the gun ready, just in case. The Feast is still on its way here, not slowing down either.> He sent over the private comms-net that he shared with Molotra and Carina.
 
Outside and Oblivious to it all

Quilly's head tilted to a curious angle as her projectile made an unexpected reaction to the pile of matter. Before she had the chance to comment on her discovery, Lupin burst out screaming, triggering a reaction from Francis based on the yelling in response.

"Easy, Eyeball! If they're bugs they'd a' woke up already!" She fired back towards the sniper, only breaking focus from the space matter for a moment as she did so. With a grunt, she jumped off and flapped twice, breaking her own fall safely to investigate the objects more closely. A knife came out, and much like Francis was about to do, Quilly gingerly cut into the mass - the flesh?

"Anybody got bags? A sample of this stuff oughta get checked for... Whatever. Better yet, Oi Tobias!" Quilly inquired, "You got fancy eye implants, wanna gimme a look before you get yourself stabbed?" The tail of this comment was made lightly, referencing Francis's.... Tendencies...
 
Starport - Barracks

As Tobias mimed putting away some imaginary object into his coat Francis perked up at the mention of the ship as the hampster wheel in her brain started turning.

"Hey, quills! I dont-" There was the sound of a boot splashing a puddle as she took a step forwards and, even over the wind it was audible enough to take her attention as Francis lifted the toe of her boot and plapped down a few times where a small pool of water was traveling through the light coating on snow and turning it into mush.

Looking up at the sky, Tobias couldnt so much see the stars with all the light pollution but he could almost imagine one of the few noticeable dots was a kilometer-long starship with nuclear devastation capabilities if it managed to land planetside. With their hemisphere still facing the Feasts' flight path the chances were not zero.

Expecting Hargraves to pop up at any point with some nonsequitur statement or quote or anything Tobias was just as surprised as the nearby quilly when the almost easy to miss peripheral azure-blue of the outline of his HUD turned instantly an ominous red as non-critical HUD icons disapeared first and some new ones took their place relevant to a combat scenario.

"Slowly, Kilgee." Francis' Tone was an ice-cold warning in the proximity net. Unsure if she finally snapped or what was going on the safety on Tobias weapon was already off as he turned his head.

Francis was in the same spot as before just off to his side and behind him but standing stock still. One hand was against her wrist where a finger was still pressed to the datajockey on her wrist where she had sounded the distress function putting the simplistic functions of the device to everyone on the net from the standby to alert status.

The one hand still held the flaregun pointed towards the ground as her free hand pulled away intensely slow and towards her belt. Behind francis and in the almost extinguished light of the most recent flare Tobias saw distorted by the lights interfearence in his low-light filters what she had as a silhouette on the other side of the cowflop and was clearly watching them.

"Quills. Kilgee. Haise" Francis spoke over the net just as quietly and intensely as she shared her feed to the rest of the squad. From her slightly closer point of view it was humanoid shaped by slightly off with the rounder and squared protrusions of armor instead of the smooth cut of fabrics any of the deck workers might be wearing. In the dark and not showing an IFF signature while it watched from a blindspot hackles began to rise as it slipped smoothly back behind the cowflop and out of sight.

Starport - Flight Deck

Still conversing with each other and the deck workers both Molotra and Caffran stiffened as the silent alarm went out. It wasnt but a few seconds even as calls for status were to be made when Francis feed reached them. As lupin ran up his boots made an audible squelching noise as they splashed the slush that before their senses went on high alert went mostly unnoticed.

It was one of the deck workers who noticed it first. How the cowflop had begun to bleed from underneath its base as clear water-appearing fluid that neither turned to steam not froze in the near-zero chill seeped out from under it and into the surrounding snow as the cowflop imperceptibly deflated and turned the snow into slush.

"Hey, Soldier!" The worker shouted several times trying to get Caffrans attention in vaine as he focussed on the feed as the form Francis had noticed and tried not to show she had slipped away.

"Marine!" A registered gesture of a drawn weapon drew Caffran back to reality as the dock worker drew a pistol from inside his coveralls and his men followed suit. Not aiming at him however the three marines followed the barrel to past the cowflop where lines of light passed rapidly by as the identifiable lines of tracers with their sounds muffled by the wind were skipping off the deck somwhere further down in the dark.

But the worker had not been pointing at those Lupin noticed first as one of the folds of the cowflop lifted up slightly and fluid began to bleed as a black armored hand and arm reached out and began pulling itself out.
 
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