Session 57 - X Gon' Give It To Ya

Previously, Across The Horizon…
The Jozech Raid… did not quite go as planned.
Fortunately, through mysterious means, our brave adventurers have been given a second chance.
With Yves and Linnet serving as the distraction in the mountains to the east, Bast, Orrey, and Isa have taken to the skies aboard the Starfall, aiming to complete the infiltration of the Jozech facility. With a refined version of the initial plan in place, it is merely a matter of execution.
And, as they have discovered through the late afternoon and early evening of this 27th day of Kuganepo, execution is… excellent.
The Ohl Deel flew through Albarea airspace at precisely the same time, at precisely the same angle, with precisely the same dead angles obscuring the Starfall’s approach. The three members of the Keelback’s crew stood in the same positions, offered the same resistance, carried the same items, and disembarked the ship in the same way. The tower requested the same information, and Isa delivered the response in the same way, Orrey and Bast listening to every word.
The ship has docked in the same manner, with the same weather overhead, the same fog drifting along the metal and stone paths of the shipyard, the same moogle with the smokeless flares guiding the Ohl Deel to Landing Pad 4.
We join our brave adventurers right as they prepare to deviate from the script…
**
The Ohl Deel has docked, and for the moment, the three of you on board are alone, in your stolen crew uniforms, one quite well re-tailored.
There are no sirens blaring, and foot traffic outside seems slow; the distraction to the east must be working.
"You are rather quick with that needle, Ba....uh...Balister." Orrey checks out his newly crafted uniform while stumbling over the need for secrecy.
"I never realized how hidden some of your depths were," Isa notes. As someone who probably left the womb wearing a uniform, she looks completely natural in this environment.
"Hopefully no one's getting close enough for a good look. Alright, you two, back in the hold and be ready to take him down," Bast says.
"Him? Or them? How many came in that vision we shared?" Orrey asks.
"Don't rely on that being accurate," Isa says, heading for the hold. "Assume it'll be 'them'"
Orrey checks the time on his pocketwatch and keeps an eye on the doors, nodding at Isa's advice.
"If you hear me mention Yinha, there's more than one. "Tears" means we use Isa's silencer."
"A feast of foes...got it." Orrey says.
A knock comes at the door to the deck, a ramp clearly in place to allow easy disembarking. "Ready to unload," says the voice that sent all this crashing down the first time -- Cosmog the moogle.
Bast glances behind him to make sure Orrey and Isa are out of sight with a "Yeah, yeah, be right there", then walks over to open the door.
Cosmog is wearing one of the gray uniforms marking "labor," just as yours are. She looks bored, mostly, but her eyebrows go up a little when she's not looking up at the person at the door. "The Almas getting a week off?" she asks Bast. The only difference she has from the standard uniform is a bright yellow bandana tied around her head, with plenty of room for her pompom to bob about.
"Someone got sick, I think? Didn't get the whole Anarchist Monthly, they just pulled us from the sleep shift and said we were taking this run." Bast visibly suppresses a yawn.
She shakes her head and puts her hands in her pockets. "Wrong one, I'm afraid. They really should be doing this better. Look, I can cover for the bad password and give you a new one, but in return, you've got to help me haul this stuff. Half the place is spelunking right now."
"Shit, that's stale already?" He blows out a frustrated breath. "Figures, rush job like the rest of this. Yeah, I've got some lifting in me before I fall over - what's the new pass?"
"'Docile Bangaa.' Yeah, good luck working that into conversation, right?" She huffs. "Make us all sound like idiots."
"Someone's running out of words in the dictionary, sounds like." Bast shoulders a satchel and looks down at the docks before turning towards the hold. "Come on, let's get this done so we can get some sleep."
Orrey watches Isa, waiting for her signal.
At the mention of sleep, Cosmog stifles another yawn, and falls in line behind Bast.
Bast pulls the door open and holds it, gesturing for Cosmog to come on through with the cargo carts.
Isa is out of sight of the door, listening carefully and holding a hand of forbearance where Orrey can see it.
She does so, pulling the carts along behind her, relaxed as anything.
Behind her, Bast eases the door closed and puts his hand in the satchel, feeling for the stock of his crossbow.
"Seven boxes of potatoes. So many thrills," Cosmog says, wearily eyeing the large crates.
"Eh, gotta keep people fed somehow. Here, you get this side..." Bast says.
Cosmog moves into position. "They just put you on this ship by yourself? Bit of a skeleton crew, huh?"
Bast moves around to the other side of the crate, bending down. "Never enough help when you need it."
Orrey is ready with his watch in case things go south...
Isa pulls a thick pad from her pocket, remembering Yves's instructions: "It's a binary mixture and the capsules should crush with a good squeeze, but don't have it too close to your face when you do. In fact, you should hold your breath. In fact, so should every one else. Just in case. It'll be fine. Probably."
"Alright, on three..."
"One, two..."
Isa takes a deep breath, and swings from her hiding place, crushing the pad in her hand as she does. Wisps of a faint pink mist are visible wafting in her wake as she takes three long steps towards Cosmog's rear. Her armored hand comes around to pin the moogle's arms down. Her other hand slaps the pad across Cosmog's face. A knee jabs into the small of her victim's back, to provoke a gasp of surprise.
Cosmog immediately goes limp, Isa's move clearly taking her by surprise. The moogle slumps down just long enough for Orrey to breathe a sigh of relief... and then she tries her best to roll forward to break clear of Isa, using her lower center of gravity to flip the Cardian over.
Isa can play the momentum game as well as the next moogle; she goes forward, tucked around Cosmog like a hedgehog around a strawberry. A kick of her foot keeps the roll going, and when they end Isa is sitting on the floor, now holding Cosmog pinned with arms and legs, pad still firmly in place. "Trust me," she says without inhaling, "this is the easy way."
Another struggle, another aim for leverage, but Cosmog is behind on size, position, and points... and after the amount of time Yves predicted it would take, plus five seconds, the moogle goes limp.
Isa waits another fifteen before letting go.
"Three," Orrey sighs out.
"Nicely done." Bast grabs a coil of rope from a hook on the wall and sets about binding and gagging Cosmog. "Same for the dragoon's girlfriend? Or I could try to talk her away from the ship."
"Did you see her out there?" Isa asks, tucking the pad into a pouch that Yves assured her would almost definitely contain the majority of the fumes.
"Not when we came down."
While securing Cosmog's bonds, Bast does find a few items of interest, one thing being that Cosmog is carrying very non-Cardian weapons -- specifically, a pair of tonfas, securely fastened to her back, hidden beneath tearaway patches on the jumpsuit.
"Bluespirit time, then?" Orrey asks, anxious to get moving.
Isa nods. "Quickly, before she's missed. Bast, you have your toys ready for the other thing?"
"Oho. Someone came prepared." The tonfas get tucked in between crates, out of sight. "I've got my toys, I'm just worried about the girlfriend making a fuss after not finding anyone here. Hold for a few, yeah? And help me get Cosmog out of sight." He looks over to a dark nook behind the crates.
Isa is always available to move bodies, and so does.
As he gets ready to pick her up, something crinkles under his hand. Bast frowns, and pulls a rolled-up parchment out of Cosmog's sleeve, wasting no time in opening it after the prisoner is secured.
Bast unfurls a map of Jozech, showing the pathways through the base and to the buildings. The map itself looks official enough, and it's not marked with mysterious weak points or anything. It does, however, have eight X marks on it.
Bast turns the map toward Isa with an inquisitive look.
As Orrey watches the fog, a pair of soldiers emerge, heading west, both carrying spears. They walk casually, in step with each other, conversing instead of perhaps observing as ardently as they should.
The Ohl Deel is docked to the south. The guard patrol is moving toward the west, toward the warehouses.
"Two guards moving towards the warehouses. Could make things more interesting. Hard as hell to see in this fog, though, so we have a chance at not being discovered." Orrey says as he comes back and looks over the map.
After the map is passed around, all three are certain on one thing -- this is exactly how one would station de-stablizing explosives if one wanted to, perhaps, destroy the entire facility with a chain reaction of powerful explosions.
Isa hmms. "New plan. Wake her up, apologize, and send her on her way."
"Wait, what? I thought we didn't want to completely demolish the place." Orrey says, confused.
"Pretend we were never here? Heh. Let's see if we can keep the casualties down a while longer," Bast says.
Isa blinks. "That was a joke, Orrey."
Orrey looks even more confused at Isa. "You...joke?"
"Famous for it," Isa says, then looks to Bast. "How many of these targets line up with your plans?"
Bast swings the satchel back up on his shoulder. "I'm mostly looking to shake them up and scare them, not to level the place. Unless plans change in a major way."
Orrey eyes the cart and opens the door wide enough to allow it through, then pushes the cart out onto the dock. "Ready when you are. Oh...do you think the explosives could have already been placed? Should we move them or disable them or something? Would we need to take care of all of them?" Orrey asks as he continues to monitor the fog.
Isa nods. "That's my thinking."
Bast grimaces at the thought. "Not if she had to borrow a crate, I think, but I'll check on some of these."
"They'd need to be timed properly, so if it's on a trigger we're good." Isa looks at the still-unconscious moogle. "If they're on a timer, we have a different problem."
The Xs on the map are interspersed pretty evenly throughout the facility. One, Isa notes, is right where the Aranea is currently docked, the Albarea flagship resting just two pads to the west. The next one is about two minutes west of the warehouses, judging by their current pace.
"Let's get loaded quickly, then, just in case." Orrey pushes the cart towards the warehouses.
Isa nods. "Good luck," she offers to Bast, then follows Orrey on their half of the plan.
Bast brings up the rear with the rest of the carts Cosmog prepared for unloading the ship, and pushes them into the warehouse as soon as he gets the door open. He quickly rejects one crate after another, and finally settles on one to attach a compact metal case with a trailing fuse to. "This one stays. Load up as many as you can before you start moving, if things get noisy and you need to bail this fuse is good for ten minutes." He takes one more look outside and slips out, closing the door behind him.
Loading the crates is tiresome work, but rewarding, potentially, in its own way. Whether or not those loading the crates find this sort of activity character-building is entirely up to them.
The Aranea is a beautiful marvel of engineering, a spear of a ship designed for incredible firepower at great speed, the multiple engines on the back taking it free of any reprisal as it prepares another pass.
Bast looks up at it with a hungry smile as he approaches.
A group of four workmen -- gray jumpsuits with black and red armbands matching the ship -- are walking away from the flagship as Bast approaches, vanishing into the fog as they head for the barracks. What conversation Bast can hear is centered on food.
"Isa, do you think Bast has some sort of dark and mysterious past? I mean, he knows an awful lot about explosives." Orrey grunts as he pushes the cart back towards the Ohl Deel.
"Certain of it. I'm still trying to figure out if he was a criminal, a terrorist, or both." Isa doesn't seem particularly perturbed by either option.
Bast gives the departing group a wide berth and slips around the prow of the ship, away from the lights of the shipyard buildings, one incendiary bomb already in his hand within the satchel.
The fog drifts along Bast's ankles, further hiding him from view.
One sticks quite nicely to the keel under the prow; one goes amidships, opposite the ramp that the workers can use to escape; two more are easy enough to hide in the nooks of the engine housing. Once all the fuses are braided together, Bast purses his lips and pulls out a tube of something that looks like a mostly-solid clear gel from his bag, writing "Didn't Watch The Skies" on the side of the ship in large letters that remain near-invisible in the foggy night. He checks the map again, trying to see where Cosmog's X might be in relation to the actual ship.
The first two crates of bluespirit are loaded up on the Ohl Deel, Isa and Orrey heading back for the next wave.
The X on the map is just in mid-air where the ship would be docked; perhaps it's onboard?
Bast shrugs, putting the map away, and mouths "Not my circus" silently as he moves on. The smoke from a length of slow match, tucked out of view between several barrels, mixes in with the fog of the night behind him.
The generators are behind fencing on the east side of the Jozech facility, the tan boxes humming with the potential for flashy danger, wires running to the barracks and then from there to the rest of the facility. It has been simple work to dodge the two guards.
Another two boxes of bluespirit go onto the Ohl Deel. All is well so far.
With every trip back to the transport, Isa spares a quick second to make sure their prisoner is in the same place and condition they left her.
Every trip has had the same result.
"So," she muses to Orrey as they head back to the warehouse, "do we let her go here, or take her off-site? She may thank us for the escape route."
Bast sizes up the fencing, eyes narrowed. It's not that it would be difficult to get across, but doing that completely unnoticed...well. This could get interesting.
"Take her with us," Orrey says without hesitation. "Either she was intending to blow this place up, which we can't let her do, or she was trying to stop it from happening, which means we did her job for her."
Isa nods. "But we drop her before the rendezvous. And ideally before she wakes up."
"Makes sense. We don't need to reveal who we are. Should we ask her what she was doing first?" Orrey asks.
"Not really sure how helpful the answer would be," Isa says.
"How many more of these should we grab before we call it good?" Orrey asks, eyeing the remaining crates in the warehouse.
Bast glances around, then grabs the top of the fence, pushes off the ground and flips over the fence in one smooth motion. He stumbles slightly on the landing as something occurs to him, and his eyes go wide as he frantically digs through his satchel to check his inventory of prepared fuses.
He dashes for the generators, the bombs he prepared for these already in hand.
"Until the captain comes back or the explosions start," Isa answers.
Orrey shrugs, sighs, and helps lift up the next crate.
One goes around each cable going out to the buildings - these are more collars than bombs, the charge on each designed to fire inward. To cut. He'd normally recheck the fuse lengths he measured out for these ahead of time, but right now there are more pressing things on his mind.
In between Generators 3 and 4, Bast finds where X marks the spot. X, in this case, being a nondescript gray box that, when opened, reveals just enough bluespirit ore to be a real problem, plus a blasting cap nestled inside.
"Motherfucker." Bast carefully pulls the blasting cap out of the mass of ore, holding his breath.
The blasting cap comes clear of the canister of bluespirit.
The Aranea bursts into flames.
Orrey flinches at the explosion. "Are we in trouble?" Orrey asks Isa. "We're in trouble!"
Isa doesn't flinch. "Motherfucker," she unconsciously echoes. "Can you get this to the ship? I'll go trigger the warehouse bomb."
"Got it!" Orrey pushes one cart and pulls the other behind him awkwardly.
A tremendous commotion is coming from inside the barracks, between Bast and the two airships, as lights start turning on, illuminating the windows.
Isa books it for the bluespirit warehouse.
As Isa races for the warehouse, shapes are rapidly approaching from the west. "What's happening?!" one of the soldiers shouts, spear held defensively, their conversation forgotten.
Bast bites off a curse and sets the tied-together ends of quick match on fire, ignoring the slow match he was going to use for a delay, before making his way out of the enclosure.
"It came from the mountains!" Isa yells back, running past them with the clear determination of someone who has their own orders to follow.
As Bast comes out of the small passageway leading back to the generators, he can see a group of people starting to run out toward the burning airship. "Get the Duke!" someone shouts, sending a younger woman heading for the passageway up to the Noble house.
Running toward the ships suits Bast just fine; the radio, his next stop on the plan, won't be much use without power anyway. Behind him, the sharp pops of the cutting charges go off.
The flames are roaring as Bast approaches, more and more people starting to come out of the barracks and administration buildings. Someone is rushing to get water started.
"Copy!" The two guards race past Isa toward the mountains.
Orrey uses his whole body to manhandle the carts, tearing off the entire top of his uniform to show his finely tailored coat.
Isa slips back into the bluespirit warehouse. She counts crates for a moment and has the grace to wince a bit at how many remain. This does not stop her from triggering the ten-minute detonation fuse, though.
Orrey hides by the door after removing the last pieces of the torn uniform, watching for anyone coming towards the ships to inspect it.
Bast holds back in the shadow of a building, not stepping out into the fire-illuminated landing zone yet. As the electric lights sputter and fail and the noise of confusion jumps a notch, he looks around to make sure no one's watching and yells "BOMBS! BOMBS! CLEAR THE YARD! GATHER AT THE DUKE'S HOUSE!"
The burning airship is between Isa and her own escape route, and the shortest distance between her and safety has a very scared crowd in the middle of it. For Bast, the two are an equal distance away, with plenty of panicking people around.
The crowd around the burning ship start sprinting away, at least all those not holding buckets and trying to save the ship.
Bast promptly changes course, trying to take advantage of the darkness to get closer to the warehouse.
Orrey eyes a bucket in the hands of one of the people still near the ship and unleashes some Special Effects, causing a terrifying, wailing, explosion of purple sparks and green flames.
Isa looks at the routes available to her, and takes a moment to square her shoulders and set her jaw. When she moves through the crowd it as if she expects it to part before her, and her voice is harsh with command. "Don't just stand there pissing yourselves, move! What the fuck did we drill for? GO GO GO!"
As the crowd evacuate, spurred into even more disarray thanks to the sudden fireworks of purple and green in some poor rookie's hands, one shape does not move, a rock holding firm in the roaring rapids.
The crowd parts for Isa.
Sirens are blaring now.
Aranea lists to port as something on the back around the engines pops.
The sirens are suddenly cut off, and the entire dock is plunged into darkness.
...save, of course, the roaring flames.
Orrey throws out the stencil meant for the side of the ship onto the dock instead and detonates the paint bomb provided by River.
The paint bomb detonates just as a pillar of brilliant blue smoke shoots up from the deck of the Aranea, enough of a charge crackling out from the airship that one of the lights sparks back to life, its spotlight on Bast as the moogle slides underneath a black chain that slams into the wall of the barracks, the spiked head retracting just as quickly through the dissipating smoke of Bast's allergic reaction to the light.
A tall figure in obsidian armor, carrying a spiked-chain launcher in their right hand, their body hidden by a six-foot-tall spiked tower shield on the left, steps into the light just as it dies.
"Surrender. Now."
Bast reaches into his satchel, pressing the most recently added button on his crossbow as he pulls it out, the noise of the fire and panicked crowd immediately dying away. He changes direction from the heading he dodged in and does his best to get away from the inconvenient guardian, counting on the darkness to hide him.
Isa displays the utmost confidence in her captain...by leaving him to fend for himself. She crosses the field behind the back of the Bulwark, moving as quick as she can without drawing attention. Given the general air of panic, that's pretty quick. She vaults up the ramp to the Ohl Deel, calling ahead of herself, "Get ready to leave the moment he's on board!"
"I'm ready NOW!" Orrey yells.
The Bulwark fires the chain hook into the darkness in the direction of the interloper as she stomps after him.
Bast lunges forward, the hook missing him by inches as he rounds a corner of the barracks in a panicked silence.
Orrey winds up his clock and launches a blast of purple light at Bast when he sees him being pursued by the Bulwark. A familiar clock-spinning image settles down over him and the hands begin to accelerate rapidly.
There's no time for stealth, or fighting, or subterfuge. There's just the ship ahead of Bast, Orrey visible on board, and all the speed he can manage.
Well, and a canister of poison gas rolling around on the ground when the Bulwark rounds the corner.
"Hurry up I...uh...Ygrette!" Orrey barely manages to avoid shouting Isa's name.
Isa dashes up the corridor to the bridge of the ship, throwing herself into a chair and flicking switches. "I'm trying! This thing is older than I am!"
The Ohl Deel roars to life, though it sputters a little in the middle of that.
The Bulwark rounds the corner, hook launcher aimed right, then left, then right again. She doesn't find Bast.
Her right foot finds the canister.
The Bulwark vanishes in the poisonous fog.
Orrey focuses again on his grandfather's watch, and sends out a dark grey glowing orb that shifts and coalesces into an image of gigantic chains surrounding the Bulwark in a flurry, the weight of them forcing her down on one knee.
"Don't smear the paint!" Orrey yells with a grin at Bast.
Bast clambers up the side of the ship, glancing at Orrey as he sees his lips move but not stopping on his rush to the bridge. He remembers to turn off the silence field before tapping Isa on the shoulder.
"Let me try."
Isa nods, moving out of the pilot's chair to go push buttons at another console.
Orrey glances back to see if Cosmog is still in the same condition and then watches for anyone else coming towards the ship.
All of these buttons are red. Probably fine.
Bast goes through a few combinations that he remembers from starting up that half-junked airship several years back. Nothing seems to make much of a difference.
The ship groans, unwilling to cooperate.
"How are we on cargo?" Bast asks over his shoulder.
Cosmog is still blissfully out cold.
Isa just lets out a growl of frustration and slams her fist into the engine panel.
The Ohl Deel roars to full life, then settles into an eager purr.
"I think we did ok! We were cut short, though!" Orrey yells towards the cockpit.
"Bombs all over the place! Let's get out of here!" Bast yells.
"Close that door!" Isa yells down to the hold.
Orrey holds the watch up above his head and hurls out a green bolt that screams towards the Bulwark, flashing a sword that shatters into a thousand pieces just before it arrives to tint her green, showering shards around his target. Then he shuts the door.
Bast vacates the seat with an "All yours" and goes back out on deck, crossbow at the ready, watching for any last-minute surprises.
Isa nods, "Let me know once we're clear, we'll find a spot to drop out guest," she says as she slips behind the controls, taking the Ohl Deel on a course away from the burning wreck of Jozech Station.
As the Ohl Deel streaks away from Jozech, the Aranea explodes, the vaunted flagship of the Albarea family blowing itself apart, scattering the scraps of its ill-gotten weapon modifications all throughout the valley.
A moment later, the bluespirit warehouse goes up in a significantly larger explosion, obliterating the western half of the facility.
Bast lets his head drop to the railing for a moment as he looks back on the wreck of the shipyard and the original plan. Wrong. Damn. Fuse. What was he, ten years old?
The stolen airship streaks into the night toward the rendezvous point, leaving the rest for the postmortem.