Catch the Flying Fortress

Log Title: Catch the Flying Fortress Characters: Backblast, Nighthawk, Riposte, Scales, Tonka, Upshot Location: Hidden Rebel Base Date: February 27, 2019 TP: Covert Action Team TP Summary: The CAT knows where the target will be. Now how to get him? As logged by  Scales

Log session starting at 19:13:46 on Wednesday, 27 February 2019.

THREE DAYS LATER:

'''The assault on the Decepticon Firebase had gone successfully, despite some added bumps, and an appearance by the quarry. The Bots had learned some vital intelligence on the assassin, that he had the capacity for holograms and stealth simultaneously, a dangerous combo. The network relay that siphoned off data to the Autobots had poured in three bursts of transmissions before the firebase was scuttled and evacuated, leaving your XO a lot of data to comb over. Resupply is getting low, either a covert raid or a supply drop would be necessary, and horror beyond horror, Scales was down to her last container of energon goodies. As before, the pipe room is filled with the oppressive sound of silence, and a slight hum of machinery and rattling pipes. Off in one corner, Riposte scans data optically. She's a wiz at processing it all, /Prowl/ levels of data analysis....'''

Tonka has found himself a perch and is toying with his handheld computer, doing a bit of research himself, and trying to increase its capabilities.

'''After those two days of analysis, the raw data feed shuts off with a slight dimming in the room. This was surely a signal that something was to unfold. Riposte sits there for several minutes, perhaps pulling her processor out of 'analysis mode', and into 'talk to other sapients mode'. She raises her head, and slowly takes to her feet. "We know his target." She creaks a little as her joints unlock, and approaches the makeshift projector table that the team's been using, "He's moving fast. We've got to catch him before the hit. Too many variables." Riposte's drone hovers up beside her, and takes in the team silently bobbing. Riposte raises a hand as if to mentally steady herself.'''

'''Backblast sniffs "Supplies are a bit low." he says, quietly, his voice seeming to come from nowhere before a patch of shadow opens cold blue optics and the scout-sniper slips out of it. "And I'm getting a feeling I need to upgrade my own stealth capabilities. Sad to say that knowing how to stay really fucking still and pick a good spot doesn't cut it anymore. So if we do run a supply raid, I want to assemble a shopping list."'''

'''Upshot looks up from the cards over to Backblast. "Put together your list and we'll see what's doable."'''

He scans the rest of the team, "In fact, everyone put together a -short- list of what you need. There's no gaurantee of any of it being found, so just stick to the essentials."

Upshot finally turns to Riposte, "If we know his target we can use that to help eliminate some variables, but some we do need to be at our best. Means supplies are a slightly higher priorty right now; unless there's no time at all."

'''Scales uncurls from a nested position, rolling over onto her back for a moment before righting herself. "We haven't had much to fix, so I'm still good on medical parts."'''

'''"I'm still pretty good on supplies myself." Tonka says.'''

'''Riposte taps her digits on the table as she looks aside, glancing at the comatose Delcom. "We may not have time. He's going to be in transit very shortly. If he makes it to Nova Cronum, we've got too high a chance to lose the trail..." She pauses, then reasserts. "Lets start with what we know. Double Tap has been withdrawn from the Firebase that was assaulted. Both Command and I felt that the Firebase was set up in an unusual spot. It is my belief that it was expected to be attacked, given that it had little support. The attack was justification to withdraw the troops....Soundwave hid his troop movements by playing off expected responses...all to move his assassin into place."'''

She lets the words sink in.

"The Operations team is reconvening aboard the flying fortress 'Storm Warden'. There was a transmission that suggests that team will drop off at Nova Cronum, which is still neutrally inclined."

Holograms pop up on the map, detailing the transport, "There's expected to be a large caravan of Neutrals moving from there to Retoris. Which leads me to his theoretical target."

'''The holgram trickles down, and then reforms as the Autobot leader Ultra Magnus. '''

"Magnus is expected to be in Retoris proper at this time frame, doing troop review, a morale booster...such as it is, after the Fallen attack nineteen cycles ago. I believe that we must strike him before he gets to Nova Cronum. His stealth and hologram technology will make it far too easy to lose him in the civilian populace, and he's assuredly going to use them as cover."

'''Upshot looks at the various members of the team before returning his gaze to Riposte. "While I'm fairly certain we could get inside such a place; I have my doubts we would remain undetected for very long. Meaning our chances of reaching our intended target before being incapacitated, captured, or worse would be on the low side of nil."'''

'''Backblast sniffs. "Sometimes." he comments, to the room in general. "It's a shame we've moved on past ripping upgrades from the still-warm corpses of our enemies. I'd love to get my hands on his stealth tech..."'''

'''Riposte nods softly, though whether its at Upshot or Backblast, its hard to tell. "Command has seen fit to collaborate with the 15th assembly of the Wreckers, still active after the Pars Machina event offworld. Command feels that their contribution, to at the very least cause a distraction, will allow us a more subtle means of entry. The maintenance tunnels are a possibility, but they're most likely surveyed as well as anywhere, as they're an old trick to work with...We need to figure out a way to either lure him, or locate him. I doubt we'll be able to bring the ship itself down without a similarly sized ship. However, we should be able to enlist the Suicide Jockeys to do a combat drop for the Wreckers to deal some damage. We just need to decide how to do it."'''

'''Scales hmms. "Vents an' maintenance tunnels are trapped on those big ships. Nothing that can't be worked around, but it slows things down."'''

'''"Thing wouldn't happen to have a thermal exhaust port we could shove a missile down, would it?" Tonka says with a slight grin.'''

'''Backblast nods in agreement "Mm. I'm really not rigged for shipboard work. I'm a sniper... I don't do much close-in." He sniffs. "I'm no slouch, but..."'''

'''Riposte nods, "I'd say that the smallest vents are still doable with yourself and Tonka, Scales, but they're undoubtably expecting Cassettebot incursion, but it'd be doable." She considers Tonka's sabotage thoughts, " Unlikely but not impossible. Most of the largest flying fortresses have redundant systems to help minimize reactor explosions. The 'Almas Hammer' fortress once managed to stay aloft for 63 cycles after losing two reactors. It is possible, but we'd need to verify the kill either way." She looks to Upshot, "Is that doable? With the Wreckers providing support, and some covert demo, its possible to force it down, it'd just take a lot of tech work and scattered charges."'''

'''Backblast scowls "And in the meantime our target slips away in the confusion,and all we've done is save Magnus." He shakes his head. "Our best bet is to isolate him and channel him into a killzone."'''

Upshot side optics Backblast and offers a good natured jab, "You can always stand behind me if you're not up for the rough and tumble, hand to hand work."

'''"The Wreckers would certainly keep the Decepticons attentions away from us, but if Double Tap really is as prepared as he seems to be that could set him running off to another hole to hide." He shrugs, "Just another chance we'll have to take."'''

'''Scales hmms. "So long's he's in the ship, he's contained. We'd need t'stop him from jumpin' off. Or have a coupla people watching the only safe exit." '''

Backblast smirks and taps his khukri "THis one ain't just for show."

Riposte agrees, "Verification of kill or capture is integral, but we'd need some neutron level explosives scattered about to send the entire ship up instead of having it crash."

Upshot says, "We don't even have to be stationed at a single exit to the outside. So long as we can force him down a path of our choosing our odds of success are much higher."

[CAT] Nighthawk says, "Couldn't help but over hear... but maybe I could lend a hand. Nighthawk's the name, sneaky is my game. I'm at your disposal if you think getting on the inside to mess up the works would be helpful."

'''Backblast nods in agreement with Upshot. "If we have more paths it gives us more chance to confirm the kill."'''

[CAT] Backblast says, "Do you have clearance to be on this channel?"

[CAT] Riposte says, "mmh Nighthawk is channel accepted, yes. An earlier operative that I requested for the mission"

[CAT] Backblast says, "Shiny. Nice to meet you."

'''Scales hmms. "If he's layin' low, he'd probably stay away from fightin'. Try t'get off in the confusion, maybe.. but if we could pick the exit.."'''

[CAT] Nighthawk says, "Stealth flying is my speciality, if I can sneak in under the radar and get aboard, you'd have someone working on the inside."

Riposte explains to the room, "Nighthawk had been incommunicado for a while now, but was on the short list to join the team."

'''Backblast nods a little, sipping tea from a flask. "Shiny." He nods to scales. "We'd want to try and channel him into a particular set of lifeboats or something like that. I can do some of that with IEDs." He grin.'''

Riposte questions, "Flushing him out is probably the right move, so the idea is to do it by way of bringing down the fortress? There's a lot of fliers and variables there still. Hmmm, detonating the shuttle is an interesting choice, even if a Decepticon can fly naturally, there's always greater speed in the shuttle. I like this idea."

[CAT] Riposte says, "Nighthawk, I'm opening room communication to you."

[CAT] Riposte says, "A stealth flier is perfect for our arrival on scene. I'm glad you /finally/ responded to hails."

'''Upshot taps his forearm, "We're not going to get a lot of time to prepare a setup ahead of time..." He looks to Riposte, "You wouldn't happen to have the layout of this fortress would you? It would make putting some sort of plan together much simpler."'''

[CAT] Nighthawk says, "Sorry... classified mission and all that, had to go radio silence."

'''Riposte raises her head, "They don't make F-Fs anymore. Each one had a unique design to prevent exactly this sort of situation....One moment." She pauses, accessing trillions of bits of data, all locked away in her head. "Partial scan...done by Cypher and Intrigue...5th eon." A partial map starts to slowly form out of the hologram, as the little drone zips in to look closer at it. "We can extrapolate some basics here...." The hologram fills out a bit more, showing mostly one side of the ship, the 'guessed at' parts being colored differently.'''

'''Backblast studies the plan, rolling himself one of his nasty cheap lithium-based enercigs. He stares at the map for a few minutes before remembering to light it. "Hm."'''

Riposte muses, "At high altitude, we could force the airlocks open and shunt him out. Most flight capable Decepticons will still be at something of a loss at that altitude.....forge work orders for Payday?"

'''Upshot walks over to study the map. "Forcing him out is all well and good, but most of our forces can't fly so we'd be at a disadvantage there."'''

'''The mech cants his head a bit as he looks things over. "I'd much rather get him in an out of the way section where we can control the field."'''

[CAT] Nighthawk says, "Hmm... if I can manage to get in there, I could play sheep herder, and get him to where we want him. Shut bulkheads, corner him in."

Riposte suggests, "Creative welding on the habitation slabs area. Drop the entire section while the Wreckers do their work nearby?"

[CAT] Riposte says, "That is doable, yes, of course we'd be in the beast's belly as it were. The real quandry is how to lure him."

'''Scales brightens. "Welding, I c'n do. No need fer extra tools. I got 'em built in."'''

'''Backblast nods in agreement with Upshot, puffing from his smoke. "Possibly. Although I'd personally much rather kill him with a shot."'''

[CAT] Riposte says, "we know he's endlessly patient, and he's good at his job, and unfortunately since he's good at his job, we don't know much more about him. No quirks to go off of..."

[CAT] Riposte says, "hmmm"

[CAT] Riposte says, "most cloakers have some sort of weakness to electricity and EMP, we could do an EMP flood of the area and force him to flee"

[CAT] Riposte says, "since the cloaking systems are delicate"

Upshot nods, "Welding is an option, but most of these kinds of installations should have some kind of reinforced emergency doors. If we could get control of those we could funnel him around, or just lock him down in place. Not to mention it would give our tech experts something to do."

Backblast grins "I might be able to help with that. I'm good with crypto."

Upshot says, "You're better at shooting."

'''"I could do that no problemo." Tonka says. "If I can just get close enough or on board, I can wire in some bypasses."'''

Riposte muses, "So it seems that our best course of action is a campaign inside the ship, during the Wrecker assault, to single him out. Simple systems can be hacked, harder systems can be rewired. We'll need control of the security room for this, and then we can deal with him on our own terms.....plausible."

Backblast nod to Upshot "True enough. But I'm good with software bypasses. Modern security systems are good against analogue /or/ binary-based attacks. Doing both messes with the logic circuits."

'''Scales hmmmmmms. "We could also... get some accellerant and start some fires. That'd funnel most people away from 'em."'''

Backblast nods "I can make up some incendiary devices for us all to carry in the meantime. There's a primitive energon spring nearby right?"

Riposte Frowns, "Under heavy surveillance, but the Wreckers will have demo too. We'll see what we can work out. Nighthawk could carry payload for us as well. Alright, I think we have a concept. I'll see what else I can crunch in the meantime."

'''Scales hehs. "And I know Dust Devil can whip up winds, if we need to push flames around. Or if we get control a'the environmental, c'n do it with the vents on th'ship."'''

Backblast nods "While we prepare I'll go topside and find us a basic energon spring. Doesn't need to be potable... I know a few tricks to refine it down into a sticky incendiary compound... we'll probably only 'ave one or two each."

Upshot says, "Alright, so that leaves Backblast and myself to deal with our quarry proper. Maybe with one or two of you as backup; if needed."

Log session ending at 20:47:49 on Wednesday, 27 February 2019.