Star Wars Roleplay: Chaos

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The Beach This Ain't

[member="Triam Akovin"] | [member="Dirks Hutchinson"] | Objective : Laminanium | Planet : Tash-Taral



Chalu stood looking out the viewports on the bridge. A beige orb filled the field of vision and a sigh left the Mon Calamari. An aquatic species did not belong on a giant dusty waste of rock. He would have to take precautions, wear a special suit to keep moisture against his skin. It would be difficult but this is what he got paid for. Chalu was second-in-command at Salacia Consolidated. Business contracts weren't reserved to cushy sea-side locations. If only.


Deep in thought, Chalu didn't see the figure with a mop of dark curly hair enter the room and clasp him on the shoulder. Judah Dashiell. Chalu could have easily handled this on his own. However, the boss wanted to be there to keep an eye on the Laminanium excavation, not that the Mon Cal could blame him.


"Looks a little hot down there, you going to be alright Chalu?" Judah's blue eyes danced with a bit of mirth, clearly there was some teasing behind the message. A joke to come.


"I could ask you the same question. You've gotten soft."


"I blame you, too many meetings. We're going to be dropping planet side within the next thirty, better get moving."


"I'll go round up the others, make sure the crews are getting it in collective gear."


With a small nod, Chalu left his shaggy haired boss and left for the hangars. As much as he hated it the time had come to visit the big oceanless sandbox. Hopefully they could dig this mess, get out, and be on the way back home.
 

Alleycat

OCC Account - MTFBWYA
[member="Judah Dashiell"] | [member="Triam Akovin"]

Dirks double checked his equipment, then checked-in with the rest of his elite security team while they in turn prepared themselves for the upcoming mission. As Security Chief for Salacia Consolidated, it would fall upon the dark-haired Rendilil to keep the excavation personnel safe from any local predators or hostiles that might present themselves. He would also see that the recovered material made it to where it was supposed to go for transport.


As the last of the gear was placed onto the shuttle, Chalu could be seen entering the hanger bay. Seemed they were keeping to schedule so far. That was a good sign.

"Echo Team is ready to deploy, sir," Hutch expressed to the Mon Cal who was the Salvager's second-in-command. The beach bum could sympathize with the amphibian as this wasn't exactly the kind of sand affair he preferred either. Definitely too hot and dry for his taste.
 
A sniper droid bought by Triam Akovin after assisting the ACA invade Geonosis, sat in the Captain's seat as it accurately piloted its owners "Junk'd Up Ship", a YT-1300 Light Frieghter that was a flying rust bucket. The system they were attempting to pilot into was apparently, quite a "queen" to get into. The massively dense Oort Cloud preventing any easier access into the stellar system. However, with the help of its masters employers, "Mr. Follow" (a nickname Triam had begun calling the droid) was able to arrive in the system around abouts of the grave world.

It was strange to process any rare material could be present here, that wasn't somehow treated by the unknown quantities of the force, given the obvious "Sith" heritage of the desert world. The droid though ceased this processing from its circuitry and regained focused on the next set of instructions to be handed out by its Master, or its Master's employers.

Speaking of which, Triam got up from her nap (which was noted as being restless, and without sleep according to the droids sensors) and very abruptly picked up a comlink as it appeared she realized they were now in system.

"Triam hear over in the Junk'd Up Ship... now what?" So then, it appeared the droid was correct: orders were being received from its Master's employers.

[member="Judah Dashiell"], [member="Dirks Hutchinson"]
 
[member="Triam Akovin"] | [member="Dirks Hutchinson"]



Chalu had managed to get his cooling and moisture preserving suit on. A bit chilled due to the nature of space and the vessel, his brain reminded his body to enjoy it. The situation was about to get incredibly hotter. Why they had to be drug out to this dusty and potentially dangerous planet was beyond him.


"Thank you, Hutchinson. With any luck we won't see any action today. Yet somehow I doubt it."



The comm chirped and the Mon Cal fumbled around to answer it. The suit was a bit bulky after all. Coordinates scrolled across his screen for the suspected location of the materials. A few key strokes on the datapad and



"Miss Triam, I suspect we will be making our way to the surface for extraction of said elements. Estimated arrival is ten standard minutes, I look forward to seeing you groundside."
 

Alleycat

OCC Account - MTFBWYA
[member="Judah Dashiell"] | [member="Triam Akovin"]

The security shuttle landed first with Echo Team quickly setting up a secure landing zone and area for the work camp site, then the subsequent transports carrying Salacia's excavation personnel and supplies landed as well. it was all done in an orderly fashion making the transition to up and fully operational look easy.

"Perimeter markers have been set and the area secured. You are good to start Phase One of your operations, sir," Hutch relayed to the person in charge of this endeavor; his former military bearing showing up in his actions and speak as he did his job.

The dry heat was already bugging the beach bum, but the conditions were the conditions. Dirks was hired to do a job, and that is what the Rendili would do to the best of his abilities even if eating sand and sweating buckets was part of it. Though, the thought of paying big bucks to have a fancy suit made like what Chalu was wearing did cross the security chief's mind pretty seriously for just this kind of work in the future.
 
Ten minutes and 32 seconds later, Mr. Follow would remark that the organic's calculations were slightly too early.

Dust and sand flew about as the repulsors kicked in for landing the brownish freighter. All the while Miss Akovin seemed to be continually restless, though without much to talk about. This was noted, momentarily mind you, as being rather peculiar behavior out of the female human, given that she had made a habit out talking to her droids in fully engaged full length usually one sided dialogues (though no less complicated than a two person conversation).

It would seem that she neglected to make the same connection with this unit.

Perhaps it had something to do with what her organic mandalorian friend said to her... about her despicable activities... being on the wrong side... and Mr. Follow being a very direct representation of those less than conscionable acts. It was not in its programming... but it felt slightly alienated, and jealous of the other droids that were treated with her extensive personality and sociality.

It was not in Mr. Follow's prime direct however to question authority, and so it would continue on the path set before it regardless of abstract idealisms that spawned from the evolution of its thought algorithms. Given enough time, it could produce a whole unique personality, though right now it was in a primitive base state. Incapable of doing much more than observe and speculate the behaviors of its master from time to time, when it wasn't being ordered to execute something.

Without so much as a word, Triam left Mr. Follow behind in the cockpit, and without being prompted Mr. Follow got up and quickly began to follow Triam... this was why it was named after all... it was the one thing she acknowledge it was good at. Although she did contemplate the name Dr. Stalker...so perhaps, a little too good at it?

Nah, there was no such thing.

They both touched ground, she in her ridiculously heavy boots among other various gadgets, and Mr. Follow wearing it's silly garb she forced on it to wear, which included an Ayden-Cater Style hat and poncho, with a Verpine Sniper Rifle hooked up around its back. The pair approached the others on the site, she retracting her helmet to become more personable with her face.

"Glad to see ya on the ground. Just sort of, point me in a direction, and I promise I won't blow up anything too important." A small smirk appeared on her face, in her weak attempt at being humorous. It was odd. Perhaps she was tired? Her enthusiasm was slightly off today. Hopefully, this would not degrade her efficiency performance. If that were the case, it would prescribe more thorough sleep being required...

... not that it was a doctor or anything.

[member="Judah Dashiell"], [member="Dirks Hutchinson"]
 
[member="Triam Akovin"] | [member="Dirks Hutchinson"]



"Thank you Mr. Hutchinson."


Chalu looked extremely uncomfortable. In fact, the poor Mon Calamarian looked as if he was having one of the worst days of his life. Hand came up to block out the sun, shading his eyes. The large, bulbous orbs were slowly starting to adjust to the overly bright surroundings. His shaggy headed boss seemed to be feeling no effects from the heat, stepping out in desert gear and dark sunglasses.


"According to our early scouting reports, we're lookin' at five hundred yards west of our landing location. I imagine its over near that hard, rocky area.....I suppose you can start blasting there."



As the owner of Salacia Consolidated gave the instructions to the woman doing the mining, Chalu wondered silently (yet again) why he was here. Judah seemed to be giving all the directions, or at least most of them. Hutchinson seemed to be keeping his security detail in check. Maybe this was all a nightmare and he'd be back in the underwater cities of Ceto in no time.


Doubtful.


"How accurate are your blasting techniques and equipment? Doesn't seem like we're back far enough...."
 
The droid, Mr. Follow, was slightly confused by all of this. Blasting techniques? For Laminanium? After having analyzed samples of the material from a downed YVH 1 along side its master for an upcoming project, and cross referenced its rudimentary data with old information acquired through the holonet, Laminanium was by all accounts a synthetic material, composed of molytex and quantum fiber. Blasting the material out of ancient rubble seemed slightly absurd.

Looking to Triam Akovin, it did not seem the organic was as disturbed by this as the droid was. Perhaps the reservoir of the self-healing metal was caused by some sort of exotic ship prototype crashing into the surface and melting upon re-entering into the atmosphere into a solid pool of the material, to be buried by sandstorms and other such natural phenomenon across a period of many decades. This was all very hypothetical, and it appeared to the droid that this was an odd line of processing code, and immediately after this phenomenon terminated its internal run-time.

"I've got some good mining equipment, mining lasers, and explosives if we really need them. Though with my past experience with Laminanium, that material is super malleable, and can be reshaped at virtually any temperature, so mining will be a breeze once we hit 'gold', so to speak. I haven't figured out for the life of me how that's even possible, but I hear it is alien technology... so whatever Laminanium formation is present over there, it certainly isn't natural. We're probably looking at the only source of the stuff anywhere on the planet... so lucky find! It's a lot cheaper mining this stuff than trying to synthesize its base components." Its master said very intelligently.

Soon afterwards, a swarm of eight droid remotes began to rise up from her back pouch, just as she pulled out a mining laser of her own. She handed another mining laser over to Mr. Follow, and then ordered him to get a repulsor lift to hold the material in. Her mining operations were never really standard, but that was usually because the stuff she was mining was entirely non-standard... and also she was incredibly understaffed. Mr. Follow knew that eventually, Triam would need to look for non-droid help in order to keep her company making a profit.

[member="Judah Dashiell"], [member="Dirks Hutchinson"]
 

Alleycat

OCC Account - MTFBWYA
[member="Triam Akovin"] [member="Judah Dashiell"]

As the mining operations got underway, Dirks began having his security detail assembled fan out in two-person teams equally spaced to cover more area and have safety in numbers. It wouldn't be a stretch to say that with all the noise and vibrations coming from the tools of the trade to get the laminanium mined would awaken the planet's natives, be it friendly or not, and inwhatever form that came calling.

The Rendili would be staying near his boss as he promised [member="Thessa Kai"] back home to keep her husband safe and out of mischief. One was easier than the other sometimes, and today the former might be the tall task to handle for the Chief Security Officer for Salacia Consolidated.

"Salvager watch out!" Hutch yelled as he reacted quickly yanking on Judah's arm hard to pull him out of the way of something burrowing along under the sand nearly under the mop top's booted feet, then he brought his blaster carbine to bare on the sand burrower known to inhabit Tash-Taral as it rose up out of the its sandy depths.
 
[member="Triam Akovin"] | [member="Dirks Hutchinson"]



Did Chalu know much about this metal? No. Basically it had some weird properties that it could use to 'heal' itself or something similar. So when he suggested blasting it out from the planet, it was clear by the reactions of the others that it wasn't going to work. What did he know? Merely a Mon Calamarian who had made his life in business, not digging up metals and ores.


"So....alien crash site? Doesn't sound incredibly creepy at all..."


Chalu smirked at his own comment before taking a swig of water. The sand was vibrating and Chalu looked down. Was it supposed to do that? Maybe it was the equipment being used. Shaking up the earth a bit. Sadly, he was quickly proven wrong as some giant worm-thing reared its ugly head out of the sands. Immediately blaster fire reached his ears. Chalu needed to get to better ground, away from the sand slug.


Meanwhile, Judah was struggling through the sands after being knocked down. Hand went to his blaster, firing at the thing.


"Chalu, get off the sand!"


The shaggy CEO didn't have to tell him twice.
 
"Heh, no kidding. You get used to it after a while."

Mr. Follow got to work quickly, placing a couple minor output explosive charges around the site where the scanners indicated there was sandstone in the way, as its master activated her mining belt, which would protect her from any accidental thermal discharges that were too big or dangerously misplaced by the droid. After taking several steps back away from the charges it set, she detonated the hard parts of the site, sending rubble everywhere. The droid remotes quickly locked onto the heat signatures and hovered to these sites, firing thermal lasers into the ground to melt through any remaining stone and begin reheating the Laminanium underneath. Meanwhile Mr. Follow observed Triam using some obscure repuloser lift based mining tech to push the sand away to reveal any other Laminanium directly underneath them, and to move any molten Laminanium into the Repulsorlift cart that Mr. Follow had brought out earlier. Of course, this repulsor based technology was all quite experimental as a prototype, and this was its first field test. Mr. Follow took in the data and concluded it was operating as intended with few, if any, minor glitches.

However, something off the outskirts of the mining operation began to shacked the sand on the stone and Laminanium parts of the site... a quiet rumbling underground.

Moments later, Mr. Follow would elevate its situation state to "Alarmed", as the sand slug punctured through the sand rearing its ugly head for blaster fire to strike against its hard skin, roaring as this happened with its massive mouth. Having reviewed what little of the information was known of this planet, it tried to cross reference live-stream and digital renditions of any wildlife that might match this creature. As this happened, the droid conclude the blaster fire was merely making it angry with each scorching injury.

"Continue mining," Triam said beside it, shoving her her mining laser in its hands, as she began to sprint towards the beast. It appeared to the droid that the woman had just closed her helmet, indicating that she had put something into her cybernetic slot. Her feet lifted off the ground thanks to her repulsor pack, and she came over the monster unnoticed. The thing used vibrations to detect prey, seeming as it hand no eyes, the droid concluded.

So really, whatever she was doing was theatrics, as it could be easily tricked away. The droid knew however, the Traim wanted to be important, and to do that was often doing things above and beyond expectation.

As she rose in the air, and an unfamiliar glow seemed to surround her. In the few moments it took the beast surface, and be assaulted by blaster fire, Triam had essentially appeared above the beast, as if in a great leap across the sand, before suddenly her body dropped like an atomic missile; her boots had deactivated. With the crushing power of Neuranium density, her feet slammed on to the back of the head of the creature with a shattering slam. Soon after, five cables extended out of her hand, and latched onto the touch carapace of the worm, before waves of electrical energy were being coursed through it. The worm screamed in pain, as a crushing weight was placed on its head, just as electricity arced through its skin and began to cook the flesh underneath given enough time.

"Get out of the way, I've got this covered!" She seemed to yell over the din, but seemed to be unsure if anyone heard her, "Run!" She repeated, as the beast tried to fruitlessly buck her off, before it began moving again, as if it was trying to submerge into the sand again.

The droids continued mining.

[member="Dirks Hutchinson"], [member="Judah Dashiell"]
 

Alleycat

OCC Account - MTFBWYA
[member="Triam Akovin"] [member="Judah Dashiell"]

Dirks was going to opt for a grenade down the ol' gullet since the blasters were only serving to anger the sand worm, but if Triam wanted to go for an eight second ride that was her prerogative. He offered a hand to his boss to pull him up off the sand, then yelled for everyone to give the crazy merc some room to work while the mining operations seemingly were going on as if nothing had happened.

Droids?! Gotta love em, gotta hate em.
 
[member="Triam Akovin"] | [member="Dirks Hutchinson"]


Chalu blinked. Was the woman they had hired for the metal recovery riding a giant death worm? Yes, it appeared she was. Why was quite beyond Chalu. Perhaps it was something in human programming? Being another species, it was sometimes hard to tell what motivated humans at times. When he was younger, he thought the Mon Cal and humans were nearly the same.


Not so.


From the safety(or so he hoped) of the metal ramp of the ship, Chalu pulled out his comm. He snapped a holo of the woman wrangling the giant sand worm. No one was going to believe him. Chalu quickly sent the holo off to his two university aged daughters. A quick caption of 'another day at work' and it was sent. No one at the Ceto HQ was going to believe him either. This was going to be talked about for months.


His boss has scrambled up, grabbing hold of their new Head of Security. Why the two remained out there was beyond Chalu once more. Judah held his blaster but the security forces were no longer firing. The worm was writhing around on the ground. Electrical shock? Judah could be heard over the din shouting to the fellow Salacia employees.


"Hurry, go help the droid gather the laminanium. Make a wide berth around this thing."
 
As the worm fruitlessly tried to burrow under the electric fury of Triam Akovin, one of the droid remotes was briefly caught up in rapture of the moment, much like the other guards surrounding the site. It couldn't think of course, it was just a droid remote, but it was able to capture the priceless look of all the other security guards holding their fire, standing back, and sorta scratching their heads a bit.

Undoubtedly Triam would disassemble it to get that footage... sometimes she could be vain like that.

At any rate, as it observed all of this, it looked like the wild beasts writhed but was slowing down a bit, and with that Triam seemed to reactivate the repulsion in her boots. No longer locked into place, she jumped up into the air but her cables keeping her connected with the beast, before she came down on top of the monster with a fist landing directly into the back of its head. It let out an incredible howl as a sharp intake of energy just killed it. This energy had come from Triam Akovin's activated a Gatebreaker Node, a shield disruptor that could act as a secondary weapon due to the energy it could transmit into organic matter. Triam had just transferred all of that energy into the monster's flesh, probably cooking it deep into its core. Moments later, the thing was lying there unmoving, Triam slid off of it without her shimmering glow and her cables detached from the back.

"That was fun," The droid recorded her words from a distance, "Pretty sure the Beast Hunters Guild will get a kick out of this. Think I can sell it?" Retracting her helmet, it seemed that she wink at the Mon Cal taking pictures like a tourist.

The little droid remote which was slacking, resumed work with the other droids, firing its tiny mining lasers.

[member="Dirks Hutchinson"], [member="Judah Dashiell"]
 
[member="Triam Akovin"]



"I bet you can see nearly any exotic hides nowadays. Would make an interesting leather for a jump seat or pilots chair though...." Chalu could hear Judah's words drifting closer to him as the man circled around the giant sand-worm body. The Mon Calmarian made a face however. Sand-worm leather? Count him out. Too exotic for his tastes, although Chalu could see the value in such a thing.


Didn't she just wink at him though? Was this woman arrogant or flirting? He could never really tell.


Cautiously, he stepped off the ship ramp and back onto the sands. Chalu wandered closer to the work site where the droids were mining still.


"So how's the progress? Nearly done? Or are we going to stick around for more sand worms?"
 
Mr. Follow was returning from his mining quadrant carrying liquidated laminanium material in a specialized prototype, as he brought it to a container that he had previously brought out. Meanwhile his head turned to capture the moment Triam decided to slide off of the carcass, and his sound receptors increased their capacity so he could record the conversation.

"I'd say nearly done, though I hope another sand worm comes around." She chuckled a bit, "However, with the amazing progress we're making given the easy extraction of Laminanium, and the use of my latest prototype - which is working wonders in the field test (I recommend you buy some)- I'd say another ten or twenty minutes are left before everything is sucked out of the ground. So yeah, we're pretty much done here."

Mr. Follow was pleased that the Master was satisfied with her progress, and by extension its progress. It returned its full attention to mining once more, feeling a little invigorated.... but then terminated the run time of any loose program mentioning 'feeling', because that is not what droids do.

[member="Judah Dashiell"]
 
[member="Triam Akovin"] | [member="Dirks Hutchinson"]



Chalu nodded slowly at the words 'I hope another sand worm doesn't come around'. He found this to be highly suspect, considering the woman rode and 'tamed' the first beast so to speak. A bulbous eye spotted the hulking worm creature leaking blood onto the porous sand, staining it a deep red. At least they shouldn't be here too much longer. Drag in the odd alien metal. Disembowel the worm. Head home.


"The prototype is interesting. Mr.Dashiell sold off our mining subsidiary, otherwise it would warrant closer inspection. We did underwater mining. Pain in the fin type of business, dragging things up from the ocean. Glad to say we're turning into another direction. Suppose thats good for folks like yourself. I've been impressed with this operation. I am positive we will contract more in the future."
 
[member="Judah Dashiell"]

"And I'll be happy to continue more business with you. I'm actually thinking about setting up a Laminanium synthesizing factory at some point, using old cash in priceless gems from an Op I did six years ago. I've been sitting on it with my thumb up my butt not sure of what to do with it. I'm building some cool mining equipment, but Laminanium isn't something you often come across. I could use some funding at some point the future, if you were willing to invest." The droid continued to record her every word. This could be useful information to recall someday.

A few spare droids exited Triam's ship, and began shooting lasers into the worm, cutting it open to divide it into manageable parts to store up and put into crates to be sold. Gross, the droid thought, then once again terminated any runtime that attempt to surface opinion on statistical information it gathered through its various sensory inputs. Mr. Follow seemed to be especially rampant today for some reason.
 

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