Chapter 8: Bringing Down the Hammer

[Ray of Meep]

Co-authored by: Ray of Meep (GM), Acewing, Ikate Keda Studios, PaladinGreco, Piston1937, TheCountryWarrior

23XX A.D, 60 hours after confirmation of weapons facility

Silbern System, Stahl Belt, Fabron Station, aboard GDWS Tours

The GDWS Tours was classified as a marine frigate. Like Daheim One, it used stackable modules present in most GDW frigates, starting with powerful engines at the base of the vessel, then working up to a weapons module with four coilgun PDC's, the command module, another weapons module with two coilgun PDC's and two auto-reloading missile pods, a simple barracks module, then a large carrier module, before finally being topped with a weapons module with four coilgun PDC's and an RCS module. The entire construction was blocky and well armored, especially between the modules.

The ship was currently hovering above the station, hiding its presense from the ground with the station's shadow and maintaining position with its thrusters. Otherwide, the vessel was in zero gravity. Eberhard and Ulrike were currently maglocked to the floor in the ship's bridge, looking at a center console that displayed the asteroid as a 3D hologram, with green dots moving down from the station to the surface. Next to them were Captain Rain of Magnuski station, who cooperated with the Lancers in a hostage rescue mission; and the captain of the Tours, Captain Reda.

"Thanks for answering the call, Captain Reda." Ulrike was in her grey jumpsuit, while her husband was in an IVAS, with his helmet floating in midair.

"The pleasure is all mine... Rhodium." Captain Reda was in a more formal, light grey military uniform. Unlike most people on the frigate, she had a Mediterranean complexity to her skin. Like everyone else though, she was straight-laced and replied to Ulrike with a focus in her eyes. "Our marines should be down on the surface within the half hour. We'll make sure these weapons dealers don't try anything funny while you raid their home."

"And we thank you for that." Eberhard chimed in. "However..." He pulled up a single man's profile on the console. "... Is there a reason why you're leaving one of your own with us?"

"Hmmph." Reda let out an amused smirk. "It wasn't much of a secret, was it now?"

"Not really." Eberhard shrugged, visibly unamused in comparison. "You can't really miss a guy as big as him."

"He does good work, but his seargants have always found him difficult to work with, espeacially in non-combat situations, so he's been bounced around. We're hoping you might be able to make use of him." Reda explained.

"It sounds like that we're just the latest in line to take care of this guy." Eberhard raised an eyebrow.

"He'll get the job done." Reda ignored Eberhard's comment.

"Welp, sounds like we're just spatting over one guy and not doing anything else productive here." Captain Rain pulled his own helmet from midair. "In that case, Cobalt, let's head up and brief our teams."

"Right." Eberhard followed him, but not before first pressing his forehead against Ulrike's. "We'll be back."

Ulrike nodded. "Of course you will. We'll talk more afterwards."

As she watched Eberhard leave the bridge and climb up the stairs, Reda commented. "Strong couple, both being in this line of work."

"It's not without conflict, plenty of conflict." Ulrike made a small smile. "We've been having quite a few arguments around work and personnel treatment to each other."

"Well you seemed pretty lovey dovey." Reda crossed her arms, and noted.

"Talking helps. A bit of alcohol and... intimacy also helps smooth things over." Ulrike tapped her chin slyly.

 

[Ray of Meep]

"Hmmph." Reda again smirked in amusement.

The Lancers: Juan, Joan, Beatrix, and the newest member, Derek were in the barracks module preparing their gear. They were all in Lancaster-class IVAS' with Lancer colors: grey and torquiose. Magnuski law enforcement was there as well, five of them, including the Canine Chongwu, Poodle, donning colors of white and torquiose. Meanwhile, there was a single, lone marine of the frigate seemingly left behind, donnig colors of black and torquiose.

Jamison Butterworth was not having a normal day, then again being placed on a new mission was getting so common it might as well be normal. The major downside and reason behind his negative outlook on this specific deployment, was the fact he was on a ship unlike his more recent ones which were space station and planet based. Jami disliked space ships because he didn't fit in them, being almost seven feet tall without his suit and equipment he hard a hard time fitting through most of the doorways, and he was pretty sure he was going to throw his back out if he had to keep contorting through doorways.

Though in reality he had very little to complain about at this time. The lack of gravity made movement through the ship less back straining if he floated through the doors head first. He managed to find a empty room near where the baracks were, which he tied his crate of stuff down in and reapplied the 'Do Not Touch' stickers. Though the best part was his forthought in asking for a map of the ship beforehand and the shuttle pilots willingness to give the heavy weapons specialist one after dropping him off, of which he was slowly filling out with notes as he tried to find where the briefing was.

Juan was both excited for some backup and nervous about the new people with them. He and the girls had a sort of rapport now, it was always a learning experience adding new individuals. However, he was determined to not be the cause of their troubles just yet, so he met them in turn with a smile. He talked as he worked on his gear, knowing the prep drill better than he knew how to brush his teeth it was so ingrained. Derek he'd met briefly before but didn't really talk to. He figured now was a better time than ever. "Welcome aboard hermano! Glad to have you along."

Derek was just shrugging on some kind of extra vest over his IVAS as Juan looked that way. What little of the interior he glimpsed was covered in straps and pouches that all seemed to be full. It made a heavy clunk against the hard shell suit as the newcomer fastened it into place, and the exterior appeared to be plated with armor. “Gracias,” the demoman began to reply before reaching for his weapon, and the first of two boxes of shells stuffed into a nearby loose item net. He turned back to look at Juan and continued in a friendly manner, “Happy to be here. Looking forward to plying my trade. Name’s Derek.” As the man spoke, the shotgun was quickly strapped to the IVAS, the box trapped under an elbow, and shells began steadily disappearing one after another into the receiver with the help of a free hand.

Joan was busy checking over her rifle. As was her own personal norm, she wore all her armor and maintained a colder demeanor than usual, going through the paces. All her equipment, all her ammo, and her gun was clean and cleared. "Why we 'ave ta go in save dogs o' all fings?" She asked in a quiet mutter. "Why can't we just... destroy da weapons in leave da Chongwu ta figure dere own out?" She added, a nevous frown painting her voice.

"Hey. We're sentient you know, and contrary to popular belief, most of us don't bite." Poodle stood beside her and commented with a slight annoyance, his ears perked up. Joan didn't even twitch in acknowledgment. He too, was checking his gear, grabbing a machine pistol from one of the racks and aimed it at a nearby wall, calibrating its sights digitally through the IVAS interface. Once he was satisfied, he holstered the gun at his hip. "Hopefully there aren't too many of my kind in there anyways. I heard we're anticipating mostly bull-forms conned to do labor for these assholes."

"There's one we know about for sure," Bee said, nodding in agreement as she double checked her own equipment. "Don't really know about total numbers either way. Partly why I'm glad to have all of you guys along."

Juan smiled at Derek, nodding with approval. "Juan's the name, this is my trade." With introductions complete, he kept near to Joan while the dog man, Poodle, was nearby. He knew the man wouldn't do anything, was just a man with a bit more fuzz, but Joan wasn't of the same mindset. So, he kept close to her, just in case he had to either defend Poodle from her, or her from herself. Alongside those two reasons, he greatly preffered when she felt a degree of mental safety. He hoped his presence would supply that.

As the team was talking amongst themselves, Eberhard and Rain walked into the armory and stopped in front of the center table. "Alright, time for the briefing, people..." Eberhard announced. "Where's the man called 'Castle'?"

Though muffled Jamison did hear his callsign through the wall between the bunkroom he had claimed and the armoury. Trying to keep his normal grumpy look off his face he disabled the magboots on his suit and slowly floated through the doorway head first, re-enabling them and getting orientated on what normaly was the ceiling. "Here." He kept his voice profesional and stood at the closest to parade rest he could while wearing his black and tourquise IVAS suit with attached Juggernaut harness, the barrell of his MG-130 poking out over his shoulder from where it was held on his back.

"Erm..." Eberhard raised an eyebrow, but internally he was already building a possible profile of why this guy was constantly moved between units, as he was forced to look downwards to make contact with Jamison's upside down head, which was at ankle level with the rest of the people in the room. "Please reorient yourself, soldier."

Jamison nodded and procceeded to walk down beside the doorframe he just came through streching out to his full height before slumping back down as he move onto the floor. He returned to his semi slumped parade rest and remained silent watching his assumed superior with his grey green eyes.

"Thank you." Eberhard exhaled, then tapped the console on the table, bringing up a zoomed in shot of Fabron's untethered pole as a hologram. "We are here today to get rid of an illegal weapons facility, once and for all. As we speak, GDW marines are already securing the station itself to prevent any hail mary attempt by these criminals. Our objectives are to eliminate all hostiles within this facility, arrest unarmed laborers, and destroy the facility after we gather all intelligence."

He then pulled up two separate, looping videos. One was the shuttle Beatrix and Juan saw, pulled below ground by a hidden platform. The other were the crates of supplies falling into a large, opened hatch. "There looks to be two ways into the facility. The Grau Lancers and Castle here," Eberhard nodded to Jami, "will go through the large hatch and make as much noise as possible and inflict casualties on hostiles. Captain Rain's team will use the platform during the diversion. We will be using scouting droids to spearhead our advancement. Unfortunatley, from then on out it's going to be improvisation. Our intelligence is very limited. We have no estimate of their numbers or their capabilities. Expect a tubular maze in all three dimensions with randomly placed, large spaces."

Castle nodded at the information as it was given. Though his lips did turn up a bit at the requirements to be loud. He could do loud, and he could do it very well. The improvisation part was less up his alley but from the descritions it sounded like it would be rather easy to accomplish the goal of being a distraction. "Understood."

Derek was quiet as he digested the brief. A sliding partition model. That’ll have to go. And when it does, the enemy are absolutely going to know where the Lancers are. He looked up, raised his hand, and… “Question, sir. Will our point drones be scout models, light combat models, or heavy combat models?”

"Scout models, Vandal. And don't call me sir; Cobalt will suffice." Eberhard replied.

Derek nodded. "Alright, Cobalt. In that case, we need portable cover. I'm unfamiliar with the team, so do we have a Vanguard?"

 

[Ray of Meep]

"Bee usually takes point." Eberhard nodded to Beatrix, then eyed Jami. "Though I suspect Castle is also willing to take that role."

"Helps to have a shield to keep yourself bullet-free," Bee said, tapping the equipment on her back.

Derek smiled, recalling old legends. He then looked to Beatrix and said, “A modern era Shield Maiden, huh?”

She grinned back and replied, "Finally, someone with an interest in history!"

Derek's eyes lit up at that, and he nodded.5

The giant in question nodded to this without argument. Though he winced as his head thunked against the ceiling before glaring at the metal surface and returning to the conversation. In response to the shield maiden's words he grunted and nodded to the door sized folding barricade current lodged in the doorway he recently floated out of.

"Damn," Beatrix said, blinking at the sight of Castle's shield, "wish we had you back when my arm almost got torn off."

Castle grunted in vague agreement to this statement before returning his attention to the display.

"Unfortunatley, given past experience and with what intelligence we have, we anticipate we'll be dealing with canine-form Chongwu, the well-armored kind that we encountered before." Eberhard put up a picture of a canine-form wielding both an assault rifle and a hull cutter, granting Joan mercy by not displaying it in full, animated action. "Last time we fought one of these things Bandit had to blow it up by planting a charge on its back. If they won't hesitate to use bull-forms for labor, they certainly won't hesitate to use canine-forms for security."

"In other words, the thing that almost tore my arm off," Bee said with a frown. "Really don't want to try and patch you guys up after that thing attacks."

Poodle growled. "I'll tear whoever forced them into this, to bits."

"Don't. We need the mastermind alive." His captain admonished.

Juan's eyes widened, not for himself but for Joan. He looked over to her, watching for her reaction.

Joan didn't say anything for a moment, but stood up slowly. "I think I'm going to need a bigger gun..." She muttered, walking over to the armoury to peruse the available selection.

Juan sighed, looking after her as she appraised weaponry for their destructive potential. He didn't say anything though, he couldn't blame her. Maybe this would make her feel more secure.

Joan inevitably grabbed a rifle, a Tavor M7 Marksman, and started collecting magazines and ammo, filling the magazines with said bullets. Some of the magazines, she wrapped a band of tape around the base and was very specific with the pouches she placed them in, joining the rest of the crew again. Her helmet hid any expression she had on her face. "Alright. Let's get this over with I suppose."

Eberhard raised an eyebrow while Poodle shuddered. "Shit, you really do not like us, do you?"

"We had to use a bomb on the last one," Joan stated flatly, the first time she had acknowledged the Chongwu since they got here. "All our normal weapons bounced off, what do you want me to do? Not use a bigger bullet?"

Derek quietly swapped one of his shotgun magazines for something else after hearing that.

-------------------------

 

[Ray of Meep]

1 hour later

The Holsteiner undocked from the Tours' carrier module, followed by a less stealthy transport craft carrying Captain Rain's team. The Grau Lancers, all but Eberhard who was upstairs in the cockpit, were crammed into the storage bay, waiting for deployment. The tight spacing was mostly attributed to Castle, whose large size and his Juggernaut harnass occupied much of the real estate.

Thankfully, the trip wasn't too long. The Holsteiner moved to the opposite pole of Fabron with its cold gas thrusters, settling above the entrances at a short jump distance. The lights in the storage bay lit green and the airlock opened up, exposing the team to vacuum. Eberhard walked down as he talked to the ship's AI. "Blenda, keep Holsteiner in this position. Keep the the PDC warm in case we need it."

"Affirmative, Cobalt. Good hunting, sir." Blenda replied.

Eberhard nodded, then notioned to the team. "Let's roll out, people. Once we finish this mission I'm treating everyone to drinks."

"Can my team join in?" Captain Rain chuckled through the comms.

Derek quietly socketed the solid armor face shield onto the front of his helmet, and got ready to move out.

"Last to the big boss pays?" Bee suggested, her humor strained by the tight quarters of the Holsteiner.

"Just git in front o' da lot," Joan said to Beatrix. "Dey'll be too busy droolin ovah yer bottle," She said, looking down at the asteroid. "So... Ah take it no gravity, as usual," She added dryly. She had added some additional equipment, having second thoughts about the weapon and it's effectiveness against the Juggernaught Chongwu. A very deep thought on whether using a round as powerful as the .308 was okay. So, she added a 40mm grenade launcher to her equipment list, and was quite content after that.

Castle had himself as compact as he feasibly could. Not that he had much choice, being the biggest member as well as carrying the biggest equipent. He had been on serval drop ships with a similar scenario and was greatful when he walked out of the cramped space and out onto the ships hull.

Juan rolled his eyes, as Gravity would not be on their side. It usually wasn't, but the Earth-born Bandit much preferred when the ground was dependable. "Joan has a great point," Juan joked, "Bee's the distraction, we hit them while they think about hitting her, if you know what I mean." He chuckled at his own joke, though the joke itself had an ulterior motive, morale. Just something to keep the spirits up before things got ugly.

"Good job, joker." Eberhard knocked Juan twice on the shoulder as he squeezed past him to the front, facing outwards. While he stayed maglocked to the hull of the ship, his backpack's RCS fired off small bursts to calibrate. "Now let's go make some noise where sound doesn't exist."

The asteroid's surface was fairly barren, with stark lit up and shadowed surfaces. Far in the void, Silbern glowed ghastly white. There was nothing notable on the surface, save for the two entrances embedded flat in the ground, barely visible only to those who knew where to look. There was also a thermal vent that sprouted out from the ground and curved downward like a faucet.

One of the entrances was a relatively small platform, only large enough to fit a rover. The other was much larger, with a diameter large enough to fit an Earth-based transport helicopter with some good factor of safety. It was closed off by double, sliding doors. Neither had visible interfaces from the outside.

One by one, the team floated out of the Holsteiner with their jetpacks guiding them to the surface. They could see Captain Rain's team doing the same thing. Small puffs of dust flew upward as everyone landed. While the team circled around the large hatch, Captain Rain's team circled around the smaller one. Accompanying team were a pair of dog like droids, equiped of RCS of their own and magnetic feet, along with a generous suite of sensors. Eberhard fell slightly behind this time to coordinate with Rain.

One of Captain Rain's men was carefully cutting out a small square out of the platform they were huddled around, getting access to the electronics and wiring it up to their own interface box. "We're in position, Cobalt." Rain announced. "We'll head down on your signal."

Derek climbed out of the ship, and onto the hull next to the door a few steps away. He used the maglocks on his boots to stand in place and get a good look at the surroundings while more people exited the ship. Once he had taken in enough of the scene, he crouched on the hull, disengaged the maglocks, and, with a grunt of effort, kicked off towards the hatch he was tasked with removing. His gear was damn heavy, after all. Praised be for microgravity.

During the flight down to the rock, Derek looked at the vent, and an idea occurred to him. He started speaking to Eberhard: "Cobalt, Vandal," he began, "Can you have one of the hound drones sniff around the vent over there?"

"Roger that." Eberhard tapped his datapad mounted to his left forearm. One of the scout droids bounced over to the thermal vent using its RCS, then crawled into it using its maglocked feet. Infrared visuals of the ducts came in live, but they grew more static as the scout probed further inward. The atmosphere in the ducts was almost entirely helium gas in composition with an above average amount of radioactivity, most likely the byproduct of a fusion reactor. The ducts themselves were mapped out. Smaller tubes connected to the main duct the scout crawled through, which had no clear end. Rather, it seemed like a line of convergence that simply pushed gas out of the facility. After a few minutes, the scout left the tube once it hit the communication signal's limits.

Once Derek was close to the hatch, he swung his limbs around, and engaged a few tiny puffs of RCS to make contact with the hard metal surface. He engaged his maglocks, and made a crounching landing with another short puff of RCS. He stayed crouched and took a moment to review the footage from the hound's foray into the vent. This all told him a little about what not to expect on the other side of the hatch, but now he needed to learn a little more. And for that, he has this sonar probe, which he pressed against the surface of the door, then turned on. If there was little or no atmospheric pressure on the other side of this door, he'd get a short, sharp, and shallow report. If there was enough gas on the other side to make life interesting when he blew the hatch, there'd be a duller report, and a lot more noise thereafter. Now... which was it gonna be.

 

[Ray of Meep]

The sonar responded with a short, sharp report, implying a vacuum on the other side of the hatch.

Derek turned the probe off, and put it away. He brought his arm up, and tapped commands into his arm mounted datapad, calling up one of the carrier drones. While he waited for it to get here, he started measuring and virtually marking off where he was going to put the combination of chemicals, explosives, and detonators he was going to break through the hatch with.

Derek was just finishing up mapping the demo job when the blocky carrier drone RCS'd gently down on the hatch. He made his way over to the drone, and started unlocking panels on the side of the container to get at the gear inside. "Vandal to team, I'm setting up the site now." And with that, he got to work.

Meanwhile...

Finaly being able to stand up to his full height there was a series of back cracks, that the mic thankfully didn't pick up, as Castle stretched. With his back straightened and a few test jumps, that would have thrown him into orbit if it wasn't for the RCS thrusters, the big guy felt he was ready to start the mission. Raising his right arm and giving it a well practiced thrust from the shoulder his harness' robotic arm moved the heavy weapon around to his front. Grabbing the grip but keeping his finger out of the trigger guard he moved it to a more comfortable carry position as the RCS tried to keep the big hunk of man stable through the action.

Beatrix sighed as she left the Holsteiner, rolling her head around in a vain effort to crack her neck. After looking around for a moment, she hopped over to Castle, using her thrusters to set her down on the asteroid. "Hey, how do you want to handle vanguard duties?" she asked, attaching her shield onto her left arm.

The big man looked down at his team mate eyeing her shield "Too small." He said this and he adjusted the folded baricade on his arm. The metal plates on the left side telescoped downwards and locked into place making a half shield that went down to about his thighs. "You want point?"

"Yeah," she said, pulling out her sub-machine gun and checking its safety. "If there are more of those monsters, I want that gun of yours free to shoot them. I'm assuming that'd be difficult if they're within melee range?"

The mountain of a man nodded and took a step back to let Bee be between him and the direction of the entrance they would use. Then he flicked off the safety and got ready to go.

Joan however had used her thruster pack to remain off the station, floating a few feet away, looking over the group. "'Membah Twists in twirls, Dey 'ave a weapon, shoot dem," Joan said, watching the various groups go through their process of getting them in.

Juan moved alongside the squad, weapon at the ready. He responded to Joan with a smirk. "On one hand I'd hoped that would be a given, on the other I'm not so sure." Talking was a good distraction from the feeling of half floating, which even still made him feel mildly uneasy if he thought too hard on it. "We've got this, with this many guns we have to have some chance right?"

Derek finished setting up the charges, which looked very… thin. To any onlooker, it appeared that he’d glued, and glued was the correct term judging by the presence of a jelly-like substance, some brightly colored power cable to the surface of the door, and then fitted it with what appeared to be a cluster of landmines. The last thing he did, in fact, was to attach another one of these to the door.

Derek stood up, looked at the cargo carrier drone resting on the hatch, and sent it away with a few taps on his arm mounted datapad. Once the drone took off on it’s gimbal mounted thrusters, he walked slowly to join the rest of the team, opting to conserve RCS fuel and just use his maglock boots. As Derek approached, he started talking: “Everything’s all set up, but there’s something I’d like to suggest before we breach.”

Derek paused for a second before continuing. “From what I gather, we have a pretty well rounded team, and we should make the best of it. I’d like to go in right behind Bee as a forward sweeper- her shadow, really- followed by Cowboy and Bandit, and finally with Castle and Cobalt bringing up the rear.” Derek patted the extra layer of armor he was wearing over the IVAS. “I’m better protected than most of you, and unless the bastards have a fusion reactor fed plasma cannon, nothing I’m carrying will explode.” He gave short, low chuckle before continuing in a wry tone. “Though, if they really do have a plasma cannon in there, me exploding is the least of your worries.” That last bit was true. A plasma cannon would totally ruin their collective day.

Derek paused and went back to a more business-like tone before continuing, “I’m shorter than most of you, better armored, and used to this. I can read body language, so I shouldn’t get in our shield maiden’s way. Use me as cover while you two pick off hostiles or just blow the room up. If needed, we can all hunker down, and Castle here can hose the place down with lead while Cobalt watches our backs with the hounds.”

Derek made it safely outside the blast zone by the time he finished talking, and nodded his head at Cowboy: “That’s my opinion, but it’s your call, Cowboy.”

"My only concern is if you can put down enough fire to take down one of those monsters," Bee said, looking between the two new team members. "I think Castle's machine gun could take care of one while I'm holding it down. Do you have similar firepower?"

Derek pulled a shell out from under his armored vest and held it up. "APFSDS. If this can't punch through their armor, I don't know what will." A small spike stuck out of the front of the square-ish object.

Joan was quiet while Derek spoke, looking at the rest of the team. "I don' see any issues wif dat plan," She said, locking herself to the hull away from the blast. "If fings go sideways, den we'll reorient, but das not a bad start," She said, looking at the rest of the team. "Bee in Vandal will take point, me in Bandit'll old the center as front support, but guarding the sides, in Castle in Cobalt take up da rearfer cover," She said, looking at Derek. "On yer mark, we 'ead in."

Juan smiled, nodding his head. "Oh boy, let's get to work. We have a plan, and a plan for when that plan expires on contact with the enemy." Juan had chosen to stay with Joan anyway, for either her safety or the safety of any unarmed canid chongwu. Mostly their protection, as Joan was a force of nature on her own. "Locked and loaded, let's get to work."

 

[Ray of Meep]

"Looks like we're ready." Eberhard informed Rain. "Vandal with give the signal."

"Alright, blowing the door on 3," Derek said as he turned around and used the RCS to crouch. "3...2...1..." And he pressed the detonator. The lines on the door sparked... in a very unimpressive fashion. Then the 'mines' Derek had put in different spots suddenly burst to life, spewing thrust plumes into space and pushing the now sliced up door segments into the asteroid.

The rest of the team felt a faint rumble at their as the doors were torn off from their attachments. Red lights blared from below as the metal plates descended downwards. Beatrix stepped forward and was the first to get a good look of the space below. It was a large tube, akin to an empty missile silo. At the floor were a few crates that were slightly crushed in by the metal plates that came on top of them, which then bouced off.

As the metal plates fell to the sides, half a dozen figures, some human sized, some large, animal sized, revealed themselves staying close to the crates, using them metal boxes as make shift shields against the falling debris. They immediatley returned fire at Beatrix, who luckily had her shield ready, which glanced away a few rounds. She took a few steps back, firing her machine pistol, while Derek stepped forward, taking a glacing shot to his right arm as he threw a flashbang down the hole.

As the space filled with blinding light, Joan, Juan and Eberhard stepped forward, making sure to minimize their profile as they fired precision rounds downwards. Meanwhile, Jami took a different approach. Taking advantage of the hostiles' blindness, he lept across the hole, getting a clear picture of the floor while in midair, and rained hellfire with his machine gun, before landing on the opposite side of the hole using his RCS. Afterwards, no more fire came upwards.

Juan took a breath, giving a nod. "Clear, gotta keep moving."

"Agreed." Eberhard nodded back while the team descended into the open space by climbing down, maglocked to the walls. "Rain, what's your status?"

There was some white noise before a staticy reply came back. "We're down the elevator shaft now. Looks like no one's here to greet us just yet, but I suspect that's because they're going after you."

"Roger that, Cobalt out." Eberhard then raised his head to look at the rest of the team. They were currently inspecting the dead bodies. Droplets of blood and shrapnel were falling to the floor at a very slow pace. There were four humans, two Chongwu, one canine form, another bull form. All their weapons seem to be knock-offs of military-issued, either the machine pistols or assault rifles that the team were using, though lacking in some of the more advanced electronic features, like aim assist and IVAS uplink. Behind one of the metal plates was an airlock, which presumably led deeper into the facility. The crates themselves were empty, having their contents already emptied.

Joan walked up to one of the dogs, leaning down and ripping the com off it's outfit, standing back up and looking at the rest of the team. "May as well give em a warnin," She said, hooking it into her suit. She waited a moment, presumably accessing the local comm net, looking down the hall. She then cleared her throat. "Attention. This Facility is the site of an illegal weapons manufacturing operation. These activities end today. Surrender immediately, and you will not be harmed," She said, her accent vanishing, her voice over the intercom. "Resist, and you will be killed. This is your warning,"

Before Joan could switch off her comms, there was a reply from the other end. A familiar, female voice came up that visibly ticked up Joan's blood pressure on the HUD's biometrics. "That isn't a possibility for the good, hard working folks here, Ms. Ambrose." The voice reponded coldly in an American-Asian accent. "For they came without independent thought, but we now have given them a livelihood and a tangible path towards normal integration with society. But now you attempt to strip that away from them. Rest assured, they will fight."

"Remember that videah ya tried to slip under our noses? Dat was a shiatsu compared ta wha ah'm gonna do ta ya. Ah fucked ya once," Joan said, her voice pouring with seething hatred. "Ah will fuck ya a second time ya suit wearing cock puppet."

There was no reply from the other side except a sharp click as comms with the unit Joan was hooked up to was permanently cut off.

Castle looked at Joan and while his helmet was opaque the disaproving eyebrow at his squad leaders loss of control was probably felt by most there. He did however shrug it off and didn't take his gun off the only other way into the room.

Juan recognized the voice, but more importanly recognized Joan body langue. he audibly chuckled at Joan's reaction, and the impending doom this blood sucking lawyer faced. "This bitch just signed her death warrant. Let's get moving, I need to see this."

Derek silently grimaced at learning that this just became personal. He hefted his shotgun, confirmed that the selector between scimitar and shock rounds worked properly, and got ready to move. The plan was still to shadow Bee, flash new rooms, and sweep targets with his shotty. True, there had already been a close call, but that just came with the job.

"Need to get there before we can serve justice," Beatrix said, reloading her pistol. "Let's go."

"Agreed." Eberhard got to the front of the group and started cutting away at the panel beside the airlock, attempting to access its controls. "As much as I'd like to get answers from the woman and get rid of anyone in our way, keep in mind our secondary objectives. There are unarmed civillians here who we still might be able convince to accept arrest. There's a bull named Jon in this facility somewhere, and his fiance, Pan, is waiting for him."

After a few minutes at the electronics and wiring, the airlock opened to the team, letting them in without decompression. The pressure readings on everyone's HUDs ticked up to one atmosphere. The corridor they walked through was low, but wide, enough for two men in IVAS' to walk side by side, while three can engage at once. The two scout droids crawled across the ceiling.

The walk through the corridor was silent, until the team encountered a split. Continuing forward in the corridor led to a locked door. Above it was simply labeled, "Hab". To the right was an elevator platform large enough to fit all of the team in at once, albeit with a tight squeeze.

 

[Ray of Meep]

"Cobalt, do you copy?" Rain called over the comms, with clear sounds of gunfire in the background.

"Roger that." Eberhard gave a short reply.

"We're encountering heavy resistance. They got one of our guys in the abdomen, so we're going to pull back a bit. Judging by the arms they were using we got pretty close to the manufacturing assets."

"Affirmative." Eberhard looked at the biometrics Rain sent over, and sighed in relief. "Try to stall them as much as you can, but send a couple guys over. I think we're going to need help with arrests over here. One of these rooms looks to be a habitation module."

"Roger that, Rain out."

Joan just hefted her weapon, looking at the next door in their way. "Right, If they have a gun, shoot them. If you're bound by high morality rules of engagement... Let the adults do their job," She grumbled, finally moving to teamcoms. "Let's get dis ovah wif den," She huffed, jerking her head towards Derek for him to start getting them through the next door. "I dun fink she undahstands, civilians are not soldiers," She said simply. "We 'it em 'ard, in dey'll crumple. So 'it em 'ard."

Derek raised his hand, which had 3 slim stick-type flash-bang grenades for use in microgravity held between his fingers. "If someone else will flash the room, I can shock the inhabitants, rather than just gun them all down." He did a little movement with his gun to emphasize its existance, especially the long magazines that ran across the bottom of the gun. "I've loaded stun rounds. The civvies still crumple when their fellows go down, but we don't kill the lot of them doing it." Derek continued in a more conspiratorial tone: "Just imagine how pissed the evil bitch is going to be when we don't play her game." He frankly had no idea who the woman was; he just knew he didn't like her.

Jamison nodded to Vandal, "I can." He let go of his gun which floated just a bit out of the way and then was held in place by the suporting system. He held that hand out for the flash bangs. "If needed you can push in behind me to get to anyone that doesn't poke out."

Juan nodded, weapon locked and loaded. "Then let's stop yapping and get moving!"

"Ready to breach," Bee said, floating over to the hab door, shield and machine pistol held at the ready. "I'll start cuffing people once we're not getting shot at."

"Do it," Joan ordered.

"Affirmative." Eberhard nodded. "I'll wait here as rear guard. You guys go in and clear it."

The door to the habitation module was busted open like a popcorn kernel. There was another small length of hallway that ended with a rotating axial the forked in opposite directions, like the spokes of a Ferris Wheel that led to the compartments at the ends. Beatrix walked forward carefully with her shield raised. Jami was right besides her with the sticks of flashbangs that Derek gave him, who was behind between the two of them with his stun launcher ready. Joan and Juan were in the back with their rifles ready, in case they had to shoot to kill. This new environmental was much older than the rest of the facility, with worn down paint and even some signs of rust. A few syringes and needles littered the hallway.

It was an eerie silence, until Beatrix and Jami approached the axial. Then suddenly, they were flanked from both sides in the fork by Chongwu in jumpsuits, their eyes bloodshot, and while unarmed convetionally, three or four from each side swung at the first two intruders with pipes or their bare arms. One of them, a bull, was swinging with a whole frame of a bunk bed.

Derek reacted quickly, aimed around Bee, and just started unloading shock rounds at the... seemingly berzerk Chongwu. "We need to back up. Let them come to us at a choke point or something." He started moving back to give Bee room to retreat but kept her covered.

Castle pulled the pins on two of the flashs and let them fly at one per before raising his shield and looking away while the blinding flash and not quite deafening bang shot through the hallway. "Move back." He said this while moving backwards into the hallway they came from at a brisk pace.

"Ahh, shit," Bee said, firing her RCS to move out of the way of the bull's swing. Checking behind her to make sure she wasn't going to run into Vandal, she kicked off the wall and triggered the lights on her shield, adding to the disorienting display.

Derek saw Bee start to move, and weaved out of her way while firing another stun round at a nearby Chongwu. He then endeavored to stay out of Jamie's way as well. He did not want to trip up the heavy in any way, either. As soon as the hostiles on Bee's side were down, he'd whirl around and start stunning the ones on Castle's side.

Juan needed only a breath to tell something was off. "Back up! Don't kill them, something's wrong with them." He moved back, weapon at the ready. He'd prefer if these advanced doggos didn't have to die, but the team came first.

The big man with a shield wanted to say 'no shit' but he took an opening and sheild bashed the bull before pulling back with Bee.

 

[Ray of Meep]

While the rest of the team were trying to be as non-lethal as possible, with stun rounds and flash bangs and the like, the hallway was filled with the thunderous roar of Joan's rifle. While she was indescriminate about which got shot first, she ignored any target already on the ground, in favor for the ones actively charging them.

Between the flashbangs, the stun rounds, and the blinding lights, three of the seven Chongwu were falling towards the ground within a few seconds, mostly covering their hyper sensitive ears and eyes. Still the last four followed the backing Lancers into the hallway, three bull forms, one canine form, trying to tear the shields out of Beatrix's and Jami's grip while bashing them with their makeshift weaponry.

The came the roaring gunfire from Joan. Two falling bubbles of blood, splintered bone, and tissue replaced the heads of the frontmost assailants. The two in the back paused at the gore, before getting their shoulders torn off as she threaded the needle between the three teammates in front of her. Unfortunatley, between more erratic breathing and attempts to avoid friendly fire, two stray shots of the high caliber rifle found their way into the back end of the axial, poking two holes in it, revealing the underlying machinery that kept the habitation module spinning... and the vacuum in the chasm of this asteroid.

The lights in the hallway blared red with as pressure was slowly but surely decreasing, air escaping through the two holes in the wall. Before the team were two dead dog Chongwu, a bull and a dog that were passing out due to blood loss, and two bulls and a dog on the ground unconscious.

Joan lowered her rifle, as casually walked over to the wall, pulling a couple plastic disks out of one of her pouches, and setting them over the bullet holes, the suction keeping them in place.

Juan stared in dissapointment, sighing deeply. "Check them. Bee, make sure the bulls aren't... our mutual friend." Juan walked briskly towards Joan, moving close into her helmeted face. He spoke quickly and quietly. "Cowboy, these are civilians."

""Hostiles, actually," Joan said pointedly.

"No!" Juan glared at her, pointing to them. "Something's wrong here, they've been affected by something. You think that bitch on the intercom wouldn't do something to make them act up?"

"Ah don' fink ya undahstand 'ow dangerous dey were," Joan said, squaring up a little.

"No, I fully understand, but we cannot execute with impunity here. These aren't soldiers, they're people forced against their will." Juan gritted his teeth, and looked back at the bodies. "At the very least the bulls. Give the bulls a chance, we're looking for one." He turned around, weapon gripped firmly in hand, standing over the bodies. He kneeled down, and checked their descriptions, hoping to God they hadn't killed the bull's beloved. Fortunatley, the name "Jon" didn't show up on the corpses. In fact, they are none of the Chongwu present, dead or alive.

Joan looked at the bodies, and the ones being tended to, then back at Juan. "As ah am coun'in, Ah did give 'em a chance," She said, starting to walk off. "We 'ave work ta do. Stabalize 'em, in call 'em in. We're si'in duck 'ere."

Jami lowered his shield and moved to the two that were bleeding out motioning for Bee to tend to the smaller of the pair while he approached the bull. He pulled out a small roll of gauss and bandages which he used to attempt to stem the bleeding. He wasn't the best combat medic but a life of patching gunshots and shrapnel wounds on himself and others had taught him a thing or two.

Derek moved swiftly to cuff the stunned Chongwu with the large, durable cable ties he normally used for demo work. He had plenty, and they worked just fine for this task.

The big guy ignored the fighting words being spoken over the comms and probably would have just turned the thing off if they weren't audible through the helmet. Castle looked to Bee and tossed a thumb at the two shouting squad members in the unspoken quesiton 'They always like this?'

Bee sighed and shrugged in response as she stowed her shield, before turning her attention to the injured dog Chongwu. Opening her medbag, she wrapped the dog's wounds in bandages, then put a couple of tourniquets on the limbs with the worst injuries. "Sorry," she said, mostly to herself, "I'd give you some morphine, but I have no idea what it'd do while you're hopped on whatever they gave you."

Derek, meanwhile, finished tying up the Chongwu, looked back to see two of his team members arguing, and two more trying to render medical assistance to the wounded civilians. His eyes passed over the two dead, and he closed them for a moment. He fought down the rush of emotions, took a deep breath, and forced himself to think about what needed to be done in the moment before opening them again. Derek looked at the T-intersection, raised his gun, and moved to cover the group in case more of the berserk civvies charged. That was something.

As Derek took up a good firing position, he contacted Ulrike. "Rhodium, Vandal," he began, "These civvies were mindlessly berserk. Kind of reminds me of... let's call them combat stimulants, but without the near total resistance to pain. Any idea what the Hell is going on? And is there any chance we can get someone back on the ship to load more AC-10s and a stack or two of red and blue taped mags into the last carrier drone, and kick it out the airlock? I feel like we need them, very badly."

Ulrike replied back through a lot of white noise. "Give me some names or numbers and I can see what's up. I'll see if I can resupply you. It'll take a few minutes at least."

Derek commed Beatrix. "Hear that, Bee? The civvies have something on them. If you find it, let Rhodium know."

"I'll keep an eye out," she said, finishing her ministrations and patting down the erstwhile civilian.

 

[Ray of Meep]

Once his patient was at least not bleeding through the increasing ammount of bandages Jami had put around the wound he returned the pitiful roll to one of his pouches. "Bee, mind checking this guy?" He said this while moving to join vandal at the T section and his heavy weapon moved into it's active position.

"Gotcha," Bee replied, kicking off the nearby wall and floating over to the injured Bull. "Here's hoping this isn't[/] the civilian we're kinda here to rescue or hope you just got winged," she said, double checking Vandal's work.

The Chongwu were uncooperative as Beatrix treated their wounds, but couldn't muster up any real resistance. While she was practicing her medical skills, she'd find some empty bottles with the names of the drugs left on them.

"Oh, this stuff's pretty nasty. It looks like a cocktail of drugs that keeps bone and muscle from degrading under zero-g..." Ulrike started streaming data into the team's IVAS databanks. "... at the cost of sanity, self-preservation, among other things. Whoever's running this place is keeping these Chongwu as sociopaths."

Derek sounded VERY unhappy at this news. "So we have some kind of evil son of a bitch keeping these civvies hopped up on a bad batch of spacewalker steroids?"

"I shouldn't be surprised that there's inhumane drug injections on top of unauthorized firearm production." Ulrike replied disappointed.

"Put like that," Derek began in only a mildly grumpy tone, "I can't say I should be surprised either. I'm just pissed off instead. If we find the leader in here, how undamaged do you want them?"

"If she is who I think she is..." Ulrike paused. "I'm not authorized to say that. You know Cowboy's stance on the matter. That is all."

"Affirmative, Rhodium," Derek managed in a more normal tone, "Vandal out." Still, he wondered if said ring leader would like to spend an evening tied to a chair, pumped with an adrenaline shot, and shocked a few times. He banished the thought, resisting the urge to sink to her level, and noted Castle quietly joining him. "You sure you can step away from the injured?"

"She's a better medic than I am." Castle said as he checked both corridors for himself, more out of habit than an actual fear of enemies. "Any idea what's going on between those two?"

"Yep, and we should absolutely not get in the middle of it," Derek said, but not elaborating beyond that. "Sorry I don't have another shotty to hand you. We obviously needed more of them if we're planning to engage more civvies."

Castle looked at the shotgun in question then down to his own weapon. "Would my fingers even fit in that?" He asked letting go of his foreward grip and wiggling the oversized sticks of meat he called fingers.

Derek spared a glance, and laughed. "Yeah, not a problem. Lots of finger room. The heavy weapon config of this thing is just feeding shells in by chain." He quickly turned his gaze back towards the hall he was covering.

Jamison followed his gaze then turned to look down the other hallway. "You hear something?"

"Not yet, just being cautious," Derek replied.

Castle nodded with a short "Uh-huh." in reply but didn't take his eyes off the corridor. He had a bad feeling and he had learned to trust those over the last twenty so years.

The instinct was confirmed quickly as Eberhard appeared over the comms. "Guys, we have a problem."

As the team returned to the fork in the hallway where a side path led to the elevator platform, they could hear the sound of screeching and bending metal. When they turned the corner, they saw Eberhard the two of the Magnuski Speacial Force operators aiming at a few holes in the platform. On it was the remains of half a scout droid. Suddenly, a large, metallic fist punched through the metal, followed by another that griped the platform through the holes.

Eberhard nodded to the MSF operators, who went in the direction of the hab module, leaving him and the team to deal with the apparent threat. "We're looking at at least two juggernauts here. Rain's men managed to lock the platform, but it looks like the boggies are going to force their way up."

Derek looked back down the hallway as he heard the ungodly rending of metal just in time to see another huge armored fist punch through the platform. "...Oh shit." He turned towards the new threat, and kicked off down the hall and towards the ceiling.

 

[Ray of Meep]

Juan backed up, weapon aimed at the point of contact. "Aim for the fleshy bits, Demoman if Joan's Skullfucker isn't cutting it, we'll need you."

"Got it." Derek replied as he took out a fist full of APFSDS rounds, and stuffed the first of them into the receiver. Contrary to Bandit's advice, Derek needed to aim for the armored bits for the hyper velocity tungsten rod to do the most damage. And oh boy, what damage it would be. If there were any 'fleshy bits', he could just fire some Scimitar rounds into them. With that last thought, he remembered to flip the magazine selector back to Scimitar, then got the rest of the APFSDS clenched between his knucles right by the receiver... just in case he needed more of them. Derek braced himself at the corner near the ceiling, and used the structure as cover as he took aim and waited.

"You're supposed to let the people with shields go in front!" Bee said, annoyed as she reattached her shield and flew towards the elevator.

Castle was glad that his instincts were confirmed to be still useful. He took one look at the hallway and extended the other half of his deployable barricade. While it did take up about half the hallway he didn't mind as it disconnected from his arm and mag locked the massive piece of metal down at the junction in front of the elevator. With his defences ready he steadied his weapon, checked the ammo and got ready to turn the hallway into swiss cheese. "Please clear the way so I don't shread you all." there was plenty of room to either side of the giant behind the barricade.

Joan looked at the holes in the platform and slowly switched the magazine from her weapon out for one of the taped magazines. "Ah've got dis," She said dryly, walking up to the hole, past Jami's barricade.

Eberhard watched in astonishment as he gave a look at Juan and gave a hand motion, then went over to grab Joan by the arm while keeping his rifle trained on the steadily degrading platform.

Juan moved up, pulling Joan back with Eberhard's help, his weapon trained at the point of entry. "Back up Cowboy, or you'll be firing from the after---"

Before Juan could finish, three Chongwu juggernauts completely tore apart the platform. In each of their hands was a light machine gun, and bullets soon filled the hallway.

"Son of a--" Eberhard planted himself on the floor and pushed Juan and and Joan back behind the barricade and cut his comms. There was a deeply muffled cry of pain drowned out by the gunfire, as he tumbled forward past the cover, three streaks of blood coming from his shoulder, abdomen, and chest.

The Lancers dutifully returned fire. Jami poured machine gun fire into every square centimeter of one of the juggernauts while Beatrix shielded his weak spots while throwing a flashbang to blind the adversaries. Derek, meanwhile, fired his armor piercing rounds into the other juggernaut as he took a glancing shot to the helmet. The results were immediate: the front two juggernauts were torn to pieces, metal shrapnel and blood clouding the hallway. However, the third juggernaut behind them took their corpses as cover and continued firing.

Juan's eyes widened as he fired into the juggernauts, filled with concern for his friend/boss. He pulled Eberhard back, knowing he could fire from here even as he pulled his brother away.

Derek pulled back around the corner as a bullet glanced off his helmet. He put away the remaining APFSDS shells, and pointed his gun around the corner without looking around it himself. He switched on the camera sight, and a small window appeared on the hud inside his helmet, showing everything in front of where his gun was aimed. Derek used the rangefinder to measure how far he was away from the wall behind the elevator, and reached for a concussion grenade. He lowered his weapon, switched the grenade to his now free hand, pulled the pin, and sent it sailing down the corridor with a carefully measured throw that would have it exploding just as it arrived right over the last Juggernaut. Wasn't microgravity fun? As the explosive left his hand, Derek informed his teammates: "Grenade outgoing. Stay low, stay back."

Joan ignored the warning as the grenade flew across No Man's Land. She braced herself against the opposite wall to the juggernaut, trained her sights at exposed areas not covered by the two corpses, and fired an accurate burst of armor piercing ammunition. The juggernaut's left leg was shredded, just as the grenade met and bounced off the wall behind it, blowing out the back of its head. Within less than a minute, all three of the heavily armored Chongwu were dead, reduced to shredded messes of blood and metal.

Eberhard, meanwhile, laid on his chest on the ground and struggled to turn himself over. He didn't have his comms on, but with silence in the air the team could hear him gurgling and gasping behind his helmet. The torrent of machine gun fire, explosives, and armor piercing rounds also poked multiple holes in the two opposite walls in the hallway, exposing the cavernous walls of the asteroid behind them, and venting atmosphere at the same time. The room was again filled with blaring, red lights.

"Shit shit shit shit," Bee said, dropping her shield and flying over to Eberhard. She detached the ruined jetback and groaned when she saw where the bullets had hit. "He got shot in the lung," she continued, digging through her medbag and pulling out a large syringe. "We need to get him back to the ship, ASAP."

"*Hack*," Eberhard coughed, and a splat sound came from under his helmet. "Rhodium, I'm so sorry that I'm about to rack up the medical bill." He remarked weakly.

"Eb... Cobalt, I'm going to kill you once you get your bloodied ass back on my prestine ship." Ulrike replied back through the comms, feigning frustration, but there was a clear quiver in her voice.

"Cobalt, stop talking before you flood your lungs with blood." Derek said in his best low key commanding voice, the same one he'd used to focus recruits back when he was an instructor, as he floated over to where Bee was tending to the man. "Bee, we need to stabilize him enough before we move him. You're a medic, you have the training." He switched over to that tone you use when you're quizzing someone to get them to remember. "His lung is punctured, and he's bleeding into it. What do you do first?" Derek arrived at the scene as he talked, maglocked himself to the floor, and started holding Eberhard in place so Beatrix could work.

"This is a 'stabilize and get to an actual hospital' job," Beatrix said, taking a pair of forceps and moving the suit material out of the way. "If you could check his helmet for any cracks, that'd be a great next step," she continued, sticking the syringe into the wound and depressing the plunger, injecting it's contents.

Derek did as he was instructed, and checked Eberhard's helmet for leaks while keeping the man's body stable for Bee to work. He smiled, happy the medic's head had cleared up. Derek remembered being in a position like hers, one where stress from pressure could understandably lead to moments of panic, many times when he was younger. That was all natural. Thankfully, a tough old Bosun or other senoir Noncom had been on hand to do the same thing for him that he'd just done for her. Funny how the universe worked, and Derek had lived long enough now to participate in the process from this end. As an afterthought, he was glad he'd socketed on the solid armor faceplate onto his helmet, so the young woman couldn't see him grinning to himself.

 

[Ray of Meep]

Castle ignored the thing he would be no help with, the fact his teamate got shot. Instead he picked up his barricade and collapsed it back down and moved in the direction of the gentle sucking from the many holes in the station walls. Being the heavy weapons expert he was very used to punching holes in things, this included space ship hulls. As he approached the holes he pulled out some patch sheets and duct tape.

Joan reloaded, looking down the Hallway. "ey' I fink 'ah've 'ad bout nuff o' dis shit," She grumbled. "Ah told'cha all dese fuckers aren't ta be messed wif," She added.

The two MSF operators returned from the hab. Behind them were unconscious bodies of Chongwu, hastily strapped onto two scout droids. They gave a look at Eberhard, who seems to have partially stabalized his breathing with Beatrix's first aid.

"We'll get Cobalt out of here." One of them remarked, stowing away his rifle and lifting Eberhard up with his two arms.

"Wait!" Eberhard coughed out, then waved at Joan. "You don't look like you're in the best mental state. Are you going to be alright?"

"Stop talkin," Joan responded curtly. "Git 'im outta 'ere, we needs ta keep going or else wha's da point o' all dis?"

Derek chimed in. "Oh, when you get to the airlock, you mind letting in the drones waiting on the other side of it?"

"Roger that." Eberhard nodded. He then opened his lips to say something to Joan, but then Rain came through the comms. "Lancers, we're getting pinned down here, we could really use a flank from behind right about now!"

"Get going then." Eberhard called out as the MSF operators carried him out. Rushing past them over to Derek was the drone carrying the supplies he requested.

Derek walked up to the drone, flipped the latch on the container it was carrying, and started taking out combat shotguns and attaching magazines to them. "New toys here, compliments of Rhodium." He hands one to Juan, already loaded, with a couple of extra mags, and a bandoleer of APFSDS shells.

Once he finished looking over his patch job of plastic sheets and duct tape, some air was probably leaking but it wouldn't vent the station, he walked over to Vandal and looked over these fabled shotguns he had been told about. "Got something a bit bigger?" The big man said this with as much sarcasm as he could fit into the five words and held his hands out for one.

After getting one of the boomsticks he fitted the ammo onto the empty spaces on his belt.

The rest the Lancers moved down the elevator shaft and came upon another hallway. At the end of the hallway was a large door from which the team could hear gunfire through. Before that though, there was also a door that led to whereabouts unknown to the right.

"Alrigh', le's git moving," Joan ordered, waving everyone up the hall, taking a stop at the door on the right. She didn't want the team to get flanked themselves, so she opened it up. The room was in an eerie, silent darkness before Joan's helmet lights lit up, allowing her to scan the room. It seemed to be a long, dilapedated cafeteria room with a low ceiling, with a long table that went most of the length. Segments of pipes rested on the ground, waiting to be used for repairs. In the far corner were huddled a few Chongwu, foaming from the mouth, with syringes and bottles laid around them.

"Well fuck," Joan whispered, taking a quick step in and giving the room another quick sweep to make sure no one was standing. She couldn't see anyone else, but still this warranted an immediate investigation. Rain needed help though. "Right," Joan said over the team COM. "Everyone continue to assist Rain. Bee, you're wif me. We've got some chongwu 'ere dat are looking a 'ittle rough. I wanna clear em, in bind em up for we leave dis room to 'elp out," She ordered.

"Roger," Beatrix said, taking a moment to look at the Chongwu. "How do you want to deal with them? Might be on the same drug cocktail as the last batch."

"Dey don't seem ta be in a state ta do nuffin," Joan said, slowly taking another step into the room, sweeping it with her rifle. "Dey woulda attacked by now if dey were," She said, taking another few steps into the room. "Ah just doin' like a few possible enemies bein be'ind us wifout bein tied up."

 

[Ray of Meep]

-----Meanwhile....-----

Juan moved with the 'away' team, moving to reinforce Rain. With a flanking move they should be able to get the drop on the enemy. He just hoped there'd be minimal casualties.

Jami took this order and didn't like it. This didn't mean he didn't follow them but he added a notch to the bad ideas collumn for the mission. He moved up and watched the door with his new shotgun propped up on his shield.

Derek moved up to the door, heard the gunfire on the other side, and took out a spider breaching charge. “Get ready.” He chucked the thing at the door. A moment later, it made contact, and the lines trailing behind it flipped out to form a smaller door frame shape with an X that met the small found body in the center. Derek raised his gun arm towards the door, and tapped a button on the minicomp on his forearm, causing the charge to slice through the door with a sudden spark, then blow it into the room with the center concussion charge.

The exposed room was much larger and taller than the rest. There were aisles of manufacturing equipment, robotic arms that molded alloy stock into barrels, receivers, and grips with little scrap waste. The rumbling of a fusion engine behind the left wall was masked by machine gun fire, with Chongwu and human alike firing into a hallway at the opposite side of the room. Their targets where MSF operators in the white IVAS', which were now covered in metal dust and scattered drops of blood. A few of the bad guys noticed the Lancers busting in, and turned around to meet them. It seemed only a couple of them were wearing the heavy juggernaut armor; the rest were in simple jumpsuits.

Castle moved his shield up and pressed forward into the room being the vanguard for this group. Being the big meatshield as he moved up through the tables firing off a few barrels at the more heavily armored combatants.

Derek moved into the room with Castle, flinging stun rounds at the unarmored targets, and flipping to scimitar rounds if any armored boys decided to get especially rude.

"We've got Jon, fings are lookin clear 'ere, we'll be wif ya soon" Joan's voice said over the Team COMs.

Juan raised his rifle to the enemy, eyes gazing at them like a hawk on a mouse, and pulled the trigger, once for each head that wasn't covered in armor. He was starting with the ones that turned to them, as they had already noticed and were in turn aiming towards them. As he shot, he moved to the nearest cover, keeping Eber in mind.

"Fire in the hole!" Rain shouted through the comms upon seeing the Lancers arrive, he made a timed, microgravity throw of a grenade into the middle of one of the groups between the aisles, forcing them to jump out of cover into the waiting arms of the Lancers' wall of lead. As the suppressive fire died down in front of them, Poodle lept out behind cover and gave a burst of fire, before dashing into close quarters and slashing at the nearest human in a jumpsuit with a dagger. With the distractive Chongwu operator drawing the waning fire, the Lancers managed to make clear shots on even the juggernauts in the room, turning them into a red mist.

Just as room started to clear of active hostiles, Beatrix cried through the comms. "Hostile back here with us!" In the background, the team could hear a mix of heavy caliber gun fire and Joan screaming in agony.

Derek back pedaled, and burned RCS to get back to where the other team was located.

Juan's eyes widened in horror, beginning to move as fast as he could back to Joan's location.

It was a gruesome sight. On top of Joan was a mess of a giant feline Chongwu, dismembered by high caliber rounds, wearing armor that was covered in optics; some sort of active camoflouge system. Joan herself had her visor shattered, her face bruised, and long, metal pipe skewered into her stomach. One of her feet was twitching erratically. Her screaming had died down to a desperate whimper as she tried to get up.

"Stay the fuck down," Beatrix said, pushing Joan back down to the deck before looking underneath the other woman. "Shit, she's pinned to the floor," she said, taking another look at the wound as she dug through her bag. "Good news is that the pipe is plugging the wound, so there's that."

Juan had made it there as fast as humanly possible, weapon at the ready. The sight caused his arms to droop, and he moved closer to Bee with haste. "What can we do? We need to get her back to base, ASAP." He paused as he worked over his next words. "Can we cut the pole jammed into the floor? That will free her, but it will be agony. Other option is to pull it out of the floor, but that cat seems a mite strong." His breathing was quickened, heart beating rapid fire, mind racing with every thought concievable.

“Bee, have you got another can of biofoam on you?” Derek asked suddenly as he took out two very small lengths of neon orange cable. "And a syrret of painkiller."

"Here's the biofoam," she said, pulling out the large syringe, followed by it's smaller counterpart. "And here's the painkiller," she added, before pulling off the cap and sticking it into Joan's arm.

Derek wrapped the tiny length of orange cable around the pipe above Joan's body, and another below it, then spoke in a calming tone. "There will be a pop. Juan, pull the pipe out when you hear it. You'll know when it happens. And Bee? Be ready with the foam."

Joan was sweating profusely, her already pale skin was sheet white as she panted shallowly. She whimpered again, knocking her head on the floor in frustration. "Ah kin't feel ma legs," She whimpered, covering her face with her arm.

Juan's eyes widened, dread gripping his heart. "No, it'll be alright, we're gonna take care of this. We can fix this!" Juan made himself ready, for this insane plan. This was going to hurt his fucking soul.

"Oh," Bee said, looking at where the pipe had penetrated. "Shit. Yeah, we're not going to want to move the pipe if we can help it. Just in case it's up against her spine. Any chance we have an angle grinder or something?"

Derek nodded. "Skip the pulling part. What I'm about to do will be quicker, and less traumatic than cutting the pipe with a grinder. Relax, I've done this many times before." He then made a hand sign out of Joan's line of sight fingers held out.... 3... 2... 1... There was a small spark in a ring around the pipe where everyone could see it, and a loud pop, then another spark and a pop below. The pipe that had been sticking out of Joan started to float away, and her body didn't seem to be stuck to the floor any longer. Thankfully, Joan had passed out from the shock.

 

[Ray of Meep]

"Alright," Beatrix said, taking out an extendable stretcher and another package from her bag, "Someone set the stretcher to her height while I get her neck stablized." Juan didn't speak, doing as the medic said. She pulled a tab on the package, which slowly inflated into a cervical collar. "This is both easier and harder in micro gravity," she said, taking a moment to turn on her mag boots so she was stuck to the deck, line up Joan's neck with her spine, and wrap the collar around the neck, immobilizing it.

"Okay, now let's tie her down to the stretcher," Bee said, pulling out some more zip ties. Derek went to work helping Bee.

As the Lancers were busy treating Joan, Jami slowly walked around the large room, scanning the aisles with the MSF operators, making sure the corpses were truly corpses. For once during this entire mission, Jami could stand up fully straight, a silver lining. Scout droids were already scanning the room as well to keep a 3D model of the aftermath. Besides the entrance into the fusion engine's compartment, there was also another door, a sleak design in comparison to the rest of the more egalalitarian station, with a gold plated plaque next to it. On it was written "Britney Robert".

"The name 'Britney Robert' mean anything to all of you?" Castle asked the comms in genral as he readied his shotgun with stun ammo, and his armored shoulder for the above average door.

"Sounds familiar," Bee said, finishing off tying down Joan. "Wait, wasn't she the person that hired Jon and tried to hire Pan?"

Juan's eyes narrowed, utterly enraged. "She's also the bitch that tried to yank Cowboy's kids from her, Cowboy recognized her voice. One of her names is fake, maybe both. Doesn't matter. Castle, she better thank her lucky stars I'm not there. Check the room as usual, she's coming with us. Maybe she'll get lucky and go to prison, maybe I'll see her on the way. Whichever happens first."

Jami listened to the chatter decided that meant this person was the person they were looking for and pulled the last flash bang that Derek had given him. Getting the banger ready he tried the door. The lack of movement from said thing made the big guy move to plan B. The door failed to come up with a suitable argument against seven feet of armoreded human busting through. As soon as the door gave Castle threw the flash into the room and raised his shotgun.

Unlike in the rest of the station, the flashbang actually fell in a parabolic arc as if it was in Earth gravity. Jami felt it too, the sudden change in weight of his shotgun throwing off his aim. Not that it mattered, as the man in a business suit who raised a pistol at Jami got a full serving of stun rounds to his abdomen, falling to the ground. Behind him was a middle aged, Asian American woman in business attire as well, dazed and blinded, with a pistol dropped to the ground next to her. Next to the woman was a console, displaying a progress bar of sorts.

"Hands up, get on the ground." Castle bellowed as he pointed the shotgun at her and moved foreward.

"Given all that's happened, you might as well kill me now." The woman reached down for her pistol and attempted to point it at her own temple, before Castle put her down with another stun round to the chest. Meanwhile, the progress bar on the console showed completion of a file deletion process.

Castle moved over to the overly dramatic female and put a knee into here back as he ziptied her hands behind her back, then ziptied her ankles together to be sure. He put another stun round into the man in the suit before just tying his arms behind his back. "Right. Can we get a techy in here to do their magic to these computers." He said while tossing the lawyer lady over his shoulder like a bag of flour and walking out the door to the rest of the team.