067-1104 – Redrock Rebel Base Magen
The Travellers had landed at the embattled Redrock rebel base on the ash-covered, volcanic world of Orsasch and immediately found themselves pinned-down by Senlis Foederate assault troopers. The centre of the base was dominated by two huge boreholes, around which were built a variety of prefab, concrete buildings. The rebels had been driven back to their last redoubt – the command node and its associated computer core – while a dozen, armoured Foederate soldiers were attacking from the south, from the armoury buildings which they had taken first, cutting the rebels off from most of their weapons. To the east, two more Senlis specialists guarded the radio jammers that had stopped the rebels broadcasting for help. And soon, from the north, the crew of a crashed bomber started pouring flamking fire into the Traveller’s position, beneath the Serendipity as she stood before the entrance to the Command Node.
Travis Drevil, armed with a laser sniper rifle, started picking off targets of opportunity to the north and east, suppressing the crew of the bomber to stop them flanking the party’s position.
Zhana and Marcus took advantage of the suppressive fire to push east along the causeway to the jammers, taking out the Foederate soldiers there before returning to defend against the main assault.
Dr Bilal and Ferric entered the command node and calmed the civilians inside while coordinating with the remaining rebel soldiers. Ferric organised the rebels to retreat to the open cargo ramp of the waiting Serendipity, but the fire of the asault troopers to the south made the crossing dangerous. In the meantime, Dr Bilal found Section Leader Tibious in the computer core room, struggling to delete the records stored on the computer. Tibious knew that the deletion would take too long, and volunteered to seal herself into the building and oversee the deletion while the others escaped. However, Dr Bilal had other ideas: with his mastery of computer software engineering, he short-cutted the process and corrupted the entire system’s storage in a matter of minutes, allowing Tibious to follow to the entrance of the building.
At this point, the assault troopers charged. Maddened by Senlisian combat drugs which provoked animal aggression and utter fearlessness, howling and roaring loud enough to be heard by the waiting Serendipity, the soldiers were driven on by their commander, Captain Esrick, who had given up trying to negotiate the rebels’ surrender. Ferric had pushed forward, and was caught, exposed in the open as the violent assault began. However, for Rosa perre, waiting in the turret of the Serendipity, this was a golden opportunity. Even in an atmosphere, the huddled group of recklessly charging troopers, by now only fifty yards away, presented the target of every turret gunner’s dreams. Swivelling to aim at the centre of the group, she fired a single sandcaster into the centre of the group: 200kg of sand moving at near-supersonic speeds in an expanding cone of death. God’s shotgun tore through the group’s armour and removed the front two inches of flesh from eveyone in the group.
With the vanguard removed, and the main body of the assault on the way, the Travellers loaded up their terrified passengers and took off in the Serendipity, the atmospheric conditions combining with the stealthy hull of the smuggling craft to prevent detection by their lower-tech opponents.
During the jump to Orsasch, the huddled rebel refugees experienced division and schism, with different families arguing as to which should have better sleeping arrangements (despite most being consigned to the holds of the Serendipity and the Aurora’s Fortune, such were the numbers involved). The strict caste systems on Magen, essential to ordering life on such an inhospitable world, divided them and lead to arguments as to who had precedence, which the party had to defuse.
In addition, the life support systems of both ships were straining to support the extra numbers, leading to uncomfortable humidity and heat, as the ship’s engineers worked to try and retreive the situation.
076-1104 – Orsasch: The Sighlands
Arriving at the base of another rebel cell, in the so-called Sighlands of Orsasch (named for the sound of the oxygen venting from fissures in the rock on this hyperoxic world), the party were able to take a couple of days to rest and recuperate, joining the rebels in their base, in reclaimed aquifers secretly occupied without the knowledge of the Senlis Boyars who run the planet. It was not long, however, before Lady Ada Wishart approached them with another task…
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