Durgama Takeover

The Raveneye Complex crept slowly through its geosynchronous orbit, falling slowly through the partial vacuum of near space, but always around, in sync with the spin of its parent planet, Concilium Prima. The members of Tiger Squad could not feel the spin, were not pensive about this constant motion, but that’s not to say there wasn’t a certain sense of tension in the atmosphere of the Comms Room aboard the Raveneye. Below, the Durgama Peninsula too was teeming with the wrath of countless conflicts, but from this height, neither the pangs of battle were heard nor the flames of war seen.
Lt. Kwon, wearing a newly refitted Daoying medium infantry suit, was on the hunt. Not only had high command sent the Tigers and her here to collect any intel the infernal aliens might have left behind from their previous attack, but since their arrival, their Pangguling EVO Hacker drone hasn’t stopped chirping about the alleged presence of a Rogue AI in a nearby server. Of course, it was SOP to capture and/or eliminate such aspects immediately, with extreme prejudice. Nevertheless, we had our mission.

Lt. Kwon disconnected from the console, suddenly, coming back to full awareness once more.
“Did you detect any anomalies, Lieutenant?” Corporal Than mused. The Tiger Hacker seemed inordinately eager about finding and eliminating this Rogue AI.
Kwon just nodded towards the far end of the Comms Room, and before she could even give the command, Than set off in that direction.
“I believe it's in one of those servers on the far…” Kwon trailed off suddenly.
Had she just seen a ripple in the air, near that line of servers? A strange feeling of uneasiness came over her. There was plenty of damage already in this location from various firefights. It was probably just heat exhaust from some broken pipe or sparking electrical equipment creating a haze effect. But still, she couldn’t quite let it go.
She switched back to comms, keeping her orders silent to the world that existed outside Tiger Squad’s own ears. “Do not react to what I’m about to say at all, Than. But I believe we have thermoptic camo threats near those servers.”
Than barefly stutter stepped, but continued on, with a nearly imperceptible increase in his level of caution.
Kwon began barking orders, almost instinctively, “Xing unit, take to the ceiling stealthily. I want you prepared to strike if you spot any target, on my mark. Tiger Lin, take your spitfire, and get an optimal targeting zone established to cover that side of the AO. I want to blanket this area with our zone of control, and if you see anything strange, report in immediately.”
A brief clangor of “affirm’s” rang out on comms before total silence set in once more. Kwon activated her own TO camo and took up position near a console, watching both the Tiger Soldier Hacker, Than, as he crept nearer and nearer the possible targets, and Tiger Lin, as she took up overwatch from the Comms Center command post’s elevated location above and just behind her.

Was it just a glitch with her helmet visor? Or had she really seen something? She was beginning to think it was just this place, the silent hulk of this semi-operational space station that was starting to wear on her. The squad would walk corridors, without any signs of life, for minutes, even hours, and then suddenly, as if there’d never been any lull in the action, an exchange of bursts with Araidna troops would spring up, before they disappeared down another branched tunnel, or Nomad hacker chatter would come across the net, only to dissipate. There was the constant threat of combat, but for the most part, they had arrived at their target area of operation unscathed. Was the responsibility of command simply weighing on her now that their goals were nearly achieved? Or had she actually seen–

“Contacts confirmed,” the Liu Xing Hacker whispered, though the comms were on an isolated channel. “10 o’clock from your position, L.T. Permission to engage?”
Kwon held her breath for but a moment. “Lin, do you have eyes on?”
“Affirm, Lt.,” came back quickly. “Multiple targets.”
“Than, prepare for assault,” Kwon watched as the Tiger Hacker thumbed the switch on his light flamethrower, the tip suddenly glowing dimly with a tiny blue flame.
“On my mark…” She glanced upward, locating Xing, hanging somehow like a spider from the various mechanisms that lined this hi-tech comm room.
And then it was finally time for first contact with the enemy.
“Mark!”

Lt. Kwon watched from her hidden alcove, between console and wall, as the Xing bulleted towards the floor like a rocket. The conflagration he unleashed sent the remains of some alien mechanoid flying into the nearby wall. And suddenly, there were gunshots everywhere. Tiger Lin began spraying down at the right side of the room, opposite Xing’s position. And though Kwon couldn’t see her target, she did catch the blur of a missile coming from the hidden foe, streaking across the room, sending Xing’s body too flying into that same wall. His suit of armor crumbled to the floor, motionless.
Tiger Hacker, Than, lunged out of sight, in Xing’s general direction, and Kwon could see the heat exhaust from his flamethrower, followed by smoke and screams, rising up towards the ceiling. A clank near the base of the command post’s base and a burst of smoke rising. Kwon turned just in time to see a Morat charging towards Lin’s location before the Tiger’s spitfire silenced the brutal creature, ultimately.
A moment of silence enveloped the room; then two, three.
“Report,” Kwon barked into the comms.
“One contact down, sir,” Lin, always quick on the draw.
“Two here, L.T.,” Than began. “Going to check on Xing now–”
Suddenly he broke off from comms, with a muffled gasp for air.
“Than? Corporal Than, check in?!” Kwon could barely keep the panic from her voice. Had they heard a shot? Seen any movement? And what about that TO camoed foe?
She clutched her sidearm, before remembering her quatronics hacking device. “Lin,” she whispered, “do you have eyes on Than or whatever just hit him?”
“On the move, Lt.” She paused. “No, sir. I’ve got nothing here. No sign of him or any targets now.”

And then, out of nowhere, there it was again. That shimmering in the air. It wasn’t just in her imagination, and it was suddenly poised, just opposite her, on the other side of the console she crouched next to.
“Lt.?” Lin called.
Kwon activated her hacking device and prepared herself for quatronic combat.
The creature slowly materialized out of nothingness and haze–glowing green eyes, and iridescent armor plates, seething with pulses of glowing light. Two tentacles with spiked ends floated up around the monster’s head. And the creature reached out a clawed ligament and simply touched the console. There was an illumination there, at the point of contact, but only momentarily, and then it dissipated and the alien arm withdrew. But not completely. No. The claw started towards her position, in an agonizingly slow arc downwards, as though the beast had not a care in the world. As though this aspect of the EI, itself, wasn’t concerned about the troops it had just lost under its direct command. As though there hadn’t even been an exchange of bullets at all. It stretched out its sinuous arm towards Kwon as though it were investigating something strange, like a scientist brushing the tips of her fingers across some odd newly discovered fauna. Perhaps it too had only just noticed a shimmering to the air around her.
“L.T.?!” Lin repeated frantically.

At that, Kwon erupted from her concealed position and thrust her own hacking device mounted arm towards the otherworldly behemoth, and the real world ceased to exist.
Quatronics battle took mere milliseconds, but time always seemed to slow down for Kwon in these moments, and this experience was little different. It was as if her very mind, her essence, was striking out toward the creature’s very soul, attempting to banish it to oblivion. And just as she could feel the heat of it growing, as her grasp began to seize in around it, the green pulsing light at the heart of her target suddenly emitted a blinding brilliance, like a small star going supernova. And from the whiteness of the noise, four piercing beams of light lanced out towards her. She had just enough time to suck in the air to scream–

“L.T.?!” Lin kept pleading into comms. “L.T.!?” As she watched the Lieutenant’s body rise briefly into the air and then simply fold in upon itself, like a paper doll crushed in an invisible fist, before floating, elegantly, to the floor below.
Tiger Lin snapped her spitfire up into her shoulder and took aim, automatically. And that’s when she noticed, as she sighted the thing through her scope, that it too stared silently and stoically back at her–directly into her single open eye with those green glowing slits in its helmet, vibrating. And in its other hand, it held a strange projectile-like device, aimed right back up at her, the point aligned perfectly with the barrel of her spitfire.
Her mouth fell open, briefly, in shock, as she pulled the trigger, only to dissipate from this dimension forever in a discharge of superheated plasma.

Mission 4 (Mission 1 of Phase 2?)
Phase 2
Raveneye Bow
Comms Room
Mindwipe

Order 1
Evo Hacker activates Controlled jump.

Order 2
Explosion Xing tries Combat Jump, successfully!
Bit and Kiss both fail dodges at PH-3.
Bit passes armor, but Kiss goes unconscious.

T-drone ARO crits Xing with a missile, causing 3 wounds. Xing perishes.

Order 3
Tiger Hacker parachutes in. Takes shot from Bit. Goes down to shock ammo. :facepalm:

Lt. Order 1
Hacks console successfully.
Server B (middle) on the CA side has the Rogue AI.

Lt. Order 2
Daoying camos again.

At this point, I realized we forgot to draw our single Classified cards. :facepalm:

Knowing even with the - 6, he's discovering on 13, Daoying opts to attack back in ARO, leaving camo. I don't know if we did this right, but I declared Trinity since I already knew he was a Hacker since he'd rolled two dice to activate the console. We discussed that Casey could pick to hack back and make it a face to face roll. Is that correct? He could also blast me with a shotgun, but Anathemtic has decent armor and cover. He opted for the face to face roll, him needing 14 on one die, my Anathemtic needing 19's on 4 dice.
Unfortunately, he rolled a 1 and all four of my Trinity rolls hit (17, 14, 8, 2). He failed 2 of the four saves with his Daoying who perished.

Order 2
Anathemtic moves 4 inches toward Yu Jing zone, spotlights the smoked Tiger, who resets on a 9.

Order 3
Anathemtic spotlights again, moves again.
Tiger resets on a 12.

Order 4
Last try. Tied on 5's. Not getting my classified turn 1.

Anathemtic ends up just outside Yu Jing deployment zone, near Server C, hidden behind a building.

It's safe to say we're both getting better at the game now that we've played a few N4 games, though I'm sure we're missing tons and making tons of mistakes still.
Nevertheless, Casey is in a tough spot here, with two Irregular orders.
He opts for defense.

Impetuous:
Daturazi moves forward, throws smoke. Takes spitfire shot. Crits. Daturazi goes unconscious. Question: does throwing smoke and a regular BS ARO count as a face to face? If so, the smoke doesn't go off because of the crit. Probably won't matter in the game…

Irregular order & Lt. Order
Anathematic kills the server. Takes two goes with the Data Erasure program, causing 1 structure loss with the first attack, 2 more with the second. Rogue AI destroyed.

Havlok 10
Casey 1

Casey points remaining 0
Havlok 118