Roleplaying: Mercenary Mission One

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RPG Summary.

We start in the briefing room where we are briefed on a modified version of Mission C by our group's commander (Jedi_Christopher's character Adenn Kadd). We're given a ship fitted with a gravity well projectorfrom the Imperials, crewed with a skeleton crew of Imperial officers and twelve squads of stormtroopers. The plan is to ambush a lightly-defended New Republic cargo convoy, destroy the escort ships, and protect the Imperial troop ships as they board the six large cargo ships so we can capture them and bring them back to Thrawn.

Before we do go on the mission, I think we should all spend some time introducing our characters properly, maybe as we prep our ships and such. I don't want to jump into the battle to quickly before we get to know that characters in our group.

Everything is going as planned until we yank the ships out of hyperspace and find ourselves facing a New Republic military scout force, a fleet more than matching the power of our own. Three Nebulon 3 frigates, four Correlian gunships, four squadrons of X-Wings and two squadrons of Y-wings. Against all odds, we beat the Republic scout fleet. After we destroy one of the frigates, the second surrenders and we return to the Empire with our prize. Impressed by this, the Imperials sign us on for several more missions.

We later learn that the Empire knew that we were going to face afleet instead of a cargo convoy, because they wanted to see how good our group was at handling hard missions before giving us more high-profile assignments. This is kept a secret between the higher-ups of our merc group, because we don't want to foster mistrust between the Intradictor cruiser we'll be going on missions with.

Wow! How exciting. I guess I'll open this one up, being the commander and all. Sorry it turned out so long, but I really needed to establish the group. From here on my posts will be much shorter.

The first day on any new job was always the hardest. The funny thing was, this wasn't the first day by a long shot. Adenn Kad had been working with the Skar'kla Commando Corporation for nearly a year now. But now, standing in command aboard the bridge of the Skar'kla's flagship, a Munificent-class Star Frigate named Glitterclaw, he felt uneasy. Adenn Kad, a Mandalorian warrior by blood if by nothing else, had been put in command of the Skar'kla commandos after the Skar'kla's former commander, a bothan by the name of Wil Af'fliey, died in battle. Being second in command, the position came open to Kad, who took it.

Af'fliey had been a perfect commander. Charismatic, a born leader, and a good tactician, Af'fliey had lead them through dozens of successful missions and kept most of them alive. Adenn, dressed in his full, head-to-toe green Mandalorian battle armor, knew he could never replace his former commander. He did hope, however, the transfer of leadership wouldn't create too much stiff between the Skar'kla's many mercenary associates.

When things had quieted down in the ranks of the Skar'lkla Commandos, Adenn had receiving a message from one of Grand Admiral Thrawn's commanders stating that the Empire wanted the Skar'kla Commandos to sign on with Grand Admiral Thrawn's forces. Against the protest of some of the Skar'kla's officers, Adenn had agreed to work for the Empire in exchange for a large amount of money and a percentage of whatever they raided from the New Republic

Adenn thoughts returned to the present as the bridge's com unit chimmed. Jace Kadara, a short, blond boy younger than even Adenn, was sitting at the communications station. " Commander, Captain Pajji has arrived from the Tempest. The rest of the officers are waiting in the briefing room. Captain Iyniri from the Inevidable insists we leave within the hour." Kad frowned. He was already starting to regret ever having signed on with Thrawn's forces. " Tell and Iyniri to shove it out the airlock and give me adequite time to brief my officers. It was his idea to keep this mission a secret until the last moment so nothing leaked." Kadara blinked, apparently taken back. " Is that what you want me to tell him?" Adenn turned around and strode towards the turbolift doors. " Sure. Make sure to put the emphaisis on the 'shove it' part." Adenn couldn't see it, but he was sure the comm officer was smiling. He keyed the turbolift as Jace commed the Imperial interdictor cruiser and stepped in.
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Saul Razaar sat uncomfortably in his chair as he waited for the briefing to commence. He looked around the stuffy room, taking note of the faces he knew and those he didn't. Saul had been with the Skar'kla Commandos for over eight years now and he'd seen many faces come and go since then. It wasn't always easy keeping up with the roster.

All of the units officers were circled around a large rectangular table that filled the expansive room. Next to Saul was his trusted aid and compatriot, Frender Tuultof.

Saul leaned over to Frender, "Wonder what's taking the commander so long. Hope our new employers aren't causing any trouble."

Frender blew a shrilling chirp through his nose, a reaction novel to his species, the Ryn. "I wouldn't worry about that. Have you looked at the charts on the holoprojector? Looks like we might be heading into the Inner Rim."

Saul gazed at the holo images projected out of the center of the big meeting table. The star charts did look familiar. Probably somewhere near the Rimma Trade Route.

"Well the squadron should be ready for whatever. The newbies have been about as trained as we can get them without any combat experience. Time for them to get their feet wet hey?"

The Ryn just smiled in return.
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Magenta Marr sat in the briefing room, waiting for Commander Adenn Kad to give them details on the upcoming mission. Glancing around, she took noticed of the various members of the Skar'kla Commandos, most of whom she recognized immediately, a few she did not know.

Magenta had been with the group for about two years now, and was usually glad about the fact that she had joined. But recently, they had signed on with the Imperials. And she was not happy about that.

She was not an Imperial sympathizer - anyone who knew her well knew that. But again, she was a mercenary - she did not have to like Imperials to work for them. As long as she got paid for the job, she was satisfied.

The turbolift fell down three decks before reaching the briefing room. The pair of durasteel doors retracted back into the sides of the turbolift car as Adenn stepped through into the briefing room, finding himself standing in front of more than two dozen being of various species, all of whom were staring directly at him. Although wearing an assortment of armor, flight suites and civilian clothing, each person present wore a grey armband baring the Skar'kla Commando Corporation's crest, the only piece of uniform required for members of the Corporation.

The briefing room consisted of a large holoprojector surrounded by a circular, two-tiered stadium-style couch seating arrangement. In the middle of the domed room, a large projection of the Klavanor system glowed blue. Walking into the middle of room, Adenn swept his black t-shaped visor back and forth amongst the officers, most of which were familiar faces, some of which were new members of the group. One face he recognized immediately was Saul Razaar, a crack starfighter pilot who had shown his competence and skill again and again under Commander Wil Af'fliey's command. He had been one of the few people who hadn't been against Adenn taking command of the Skar'kla Commando Corps.

Out of the people he didn't know, however, it was easy to tell who were the new ones. The ones that cowered as his visor passed them; the ones nervously fiddling with they're blaster belts. The idle chatter stopped completely as Adenn eased off his helmet and stashed it under his left arm, revealing a pale, handsome face and a mop of shaggy brown-blonde hair combed neatly torwards the back of his head. A Mandalorian who took off his helmet was more suprising than one with a helmet on, he noted, as he watched the reactions of his officers.

"Gentlemen, you know why you're here. You know who you are: the best of the best. You know what we're about to do: whatever the hell the one who pays us says to. The Empire has offered us money and supplies in exchange for our loyal service, and we're going to be joined by an Intradictor Cruiser who will be assisting us on several missions in the near future."

Adenn strode into the large rotating holoprojection of the Klavanor system, which consisted of a large yellow sun, an abundance of astroid belts and two large inhabitable planets, Klavanor 1 and Klavanor 2. Whoever had scouted the system sure hadn't been that imaginative with the names. “The Klavanor system, which is inhabited by an extremely poor race of humanoids, recently joined the New Republic. The New Republic has a very large cargo convoy, containing everything from food to blasters to speeders, to Klavanor as a welcoming gift." The projection focused in on a small piece of space a few light years from the system. "It's never going to get there. With the help of our Imperial Interdictor Cruiser, we're going to pull the cargo ships our of hyperspace, blast they're escorts to space dust and bring the cargo back to Grand Admiral Thrawn."

" The plan is to launch our fighters and gunships and take out they're squadrons and small craft in fighter-to-fighter combat. After that's done, the gunships will target the cargo ship's engines and the fighter squadrons will protect the Imperial landing parties that'll be taking control of the ships. Once that's done, we'll have everyone jump back to the Imperial's given cordinates." Adenn shut off the holoprojector. " I've made specific instructions for each flight, which can be found on you're datapads. Remember: we've got to get all this done and be gone before the convoy can get a distress signal out. We don't have enough fire power right now to take on a full Republic fleet. Get to you're ships; we'll be jumping to hyperspace in an hour and transit will only take four hours. Be ready for anything. Dismissed."
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Knight Joined: 04 Feb 2008 Posts: 170 Location: Cloud 9

Karis Jorvin stayed back in the corner of the room. She hated being late. Why oh why did she have to get lost right before the briefing? When she had finally found the briefing room Adenn Kadd was just saying "...The empire has offered us money and supplies in exchange..." She paid close attention for the rest of the briefing. Fine thing, getting called on to join the commandos and late for the first briefing. That hardly makes for a good first impression.
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Saul and Frender rose from their seats and filed out with everyone else. With only five hours before launch time, Saul wanted to make sure his squadron was fully ready for combat. Thus they headed off toward the hangar to check out their ships and fill in the rest of the squad mates.

As they walked through the ship's portals and hallways, Saul's thoughts drifted to the their new employers, the Empire. It was almost six years ago that he and some mercs did some freelance work for the Imperials. Some rogue Admiral seized a bunch of TIE facilities and none other than Thrawn himself was given the task of taking them back. Saul scraped by with an old beat up ARC-170 starfighter with Frender as his copilot. They squared off against some of the strangest TIE's he'd ever seen, both experimental and cutting edge.

Afterwards was when he got his ship the Sando Eight, a ship design created by Thrawn to counter the TIE/D's and TIE Avengers they had to go up against. Thrawn was a good commander, skilled and level headed. Yet Saul and his people never liked how the Empire ostracized aliens, himself included.

Turning to Frender, "You think with Thrawn running the show, the Empire might change?"

Frender looked over with a thoughtful look on his violet hued face. "I don't know boss, I don't know."

Maybe, just maybe, things could turn out for the better... He thought to himself.
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Last edited by Salaris Vorn on Wed Apr 30, 2008 10:51 am; edited 1 time in total

Gavin Vendar had been standing at the back of the briefing room leaning up against one of the walls silently listening to Commander Adenn Kad give the mission briefing. It was his habit to never sit down in the briefing room chairs, a habit he had picked up from his old squad in the Corellian Military. He knew it had been considered back luck by the squad to sit down in the briefing room though he had never found out why it was considered bad luck. Shrugging Gavin figured the “why” didn’t matter since he was still alive and in one piece. He glanced down at his utility belt to check his vibroblades power cell to ensure it was fully charged. “Well can’t say I love this idea of doing jobs for the Imperials” Gavin thought “Then again if the intel is right on the convoy we’ll probably get a fair bit of money from our percentage of the profits.”

As he exited the briefing room he saw his LOM droid and co-pilot K4D-38. “Sanquine Dawn is fueled and battle ready Captain Vendar. Privates Jensen and Ulrand have also recovered from their injuries and will be manning the quad turrets again.”

“Good.” At least I know my two quad gunners will know what they’re doing Gavin thought. Now it was just a matter of making sure the rest of the flight was clear on their roles. “I hope we don’t have any hot shot rookies trying to take on the galaxy this mission, they just end up get too many of our own men killed before they die” Gavin muttered under his breath

It was a big adjustment for Adenn, having to command on the bridge as his comrades fought. Up until four months ago, he had been the commander of small special-ops squad that had been deployed to capture small cargo ships. While at times he was glad he no longer had to be on the front, another part of him wished he was with his squad, leading the front.

The ship was scheduled to jump to hyperspace in under an hour now. The gunships were launched and hovering in delta formation around the Glitterclaw, and the starfigher squadrons were prepping they're ships for combat. In under five hours they would be pulling a New Republic cargo convoy out of hyperspace and engaging it in battle. He hoped the Imperials had gotten they're intel correct. If they hadn't, it could mean the end of the Skar'kla commandos, and the end of him. He didn't want his command to be remembered as the fool who signed on with the Empire and then got the entire group killed on the first mission.

"Commander!" A woman in her mid twenties, dressed in light battle armor and hair pulled back in a tight bun, strode through the doors of turbolift car. Adenn turned his head from the front viewport. " I'm Captain Tistell of the Crimson Mynock. I was transferred here by Luitenant Commander Plaschk to be the Glitterclaw's second in command." Adenn recognized the young woman; the ice-cold captain of the Crimson Mynock. Geran's special ops team had worked with her on several occasions, and if he knew one thing about her, it was that she was the sort of person who would do anything, anything, to complete a mission. He didn't particularly like the idea of her being in second command. " Welcome to the Glitterclaw, Captain," Adenn managed as the rather striking Tistell made her way down the bridge's isle. "Congratulations on the promotion, but if you could please inform Luitenant Commande Plaschk that he'll need my permission with any officer promotions, I'd rather appreciate it." Tistell nodded. " Yes sir."

Again Adenn found himself missing his special ops team. Back then, the plan had been simple. Shoot everyone not wearing a Skar'kla armband, and shoot to kill. Being a Commander required more... political skills.
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Keenen Ackbar studied the faces of those around him carefully. He knew a few, but was unfamiliar with most of them. The Skar'kla Commandos was mostly new to him, having worked with them for only three months. There were still many people in the organization that he was unfamiliar with.

Keenen had an excellent memory. He was sure that he could have memorized the names of each member of the Skar'kla Commandos in half the time he had spent with them if he had wanted to. He didn’t care about names though. He cared about getting the money he needed from the job. He didn’t care if he did it by working for the Imperial forces or very the Rebellion. He just wanted his life back.

He pushed himself out of his seat as the commander dismissed the briefing. Adenn Kad didn’t impress him. Most Mandalorians failed to do so. Most living beings failed to do so, for that matter. Besides, what had Adenn proved? He was pushed into the commanding position. As far a Keenen could tell, he had done nothing to earn the title.

Keenen walked through the corridors, making his way to The Star Wing. He would prepare his starfighter. He doubted that he would do much more in this mission than follow the leader of his squadron around, just making himself look busy. He had no intention of fighting hard enough that he got himself killed.

He stopped and stepped out of the way of the other members, bringing out his datapad. He pulled up the file listing his instructions.

Pearl Flight

Consists of:

-The Star Wing Alpha-class Xg-1 Star Wing
-Century Arrow A-Wing
-Liquid Fire Preybird-Class Starfighter

Squadron Leader: Keenen Ackbar

Keenen stopped abruptly. He looked over the words he had just read again. Leader? How was that possible? Hert Jostwood, the Bith pilot who was considered one of the best in the Commandos, had been in charge of the squadron, the last time he checked. Keenen noted that the Bith's starfighter was also missing from the list. Keenen struggled with the idea of being in charge, and came to the conclusion that it must be a mistake. He turned around, heading for the command bridge. He needed to speak to the Mandalorian commander.

Ferno Valorne stared at the Century Arrow's empty astromech droid socket. He had lost his astromech, R2- T5, over six monthes ago and he still missed him... or it. He leaned against the wall and watched as people walked past him, giving him scared, dirty, and humored looks. Since his face had been scarred, no one had ever had the courage to speak to him. When they did, they reffered to him as just "Inferno". R2-T5 had been the best (and only)friend he ever had. He put his head in his hands and wept. How he missed R2-T5.
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Where sky and water meet,
Where the waves grow sweet,
Doubt not, Reepicheep,
To find all you seek,
There is the utter east.

Gavin was making the rounds in the hanger to check that each member and ship in his flight was ready for the coming battle. He could see in their faces they were worried about having a new commander and whether in a matter of hours they would all be dead because of Commander Kad. Gavin offered them reassurance Adenn Kad would be a good commander, after all he had been chosen as the second in command and Wil Af'fliey had been no fool. Adenn Kad, Commander Kad, had also done his fair share of special-ops so Gavin was also confident Commander Kad wouldn’t misuse Dawn Flight when it functioned as part of the standard frontline forces and would continue to use their skills in spec-op surveillance/infiltration.

No Gavin’s worries were most definitely over the rookies who were going on their first mission. He was especially uneasy about one rookie, Karis Jorvin, who was going to be leading Nova Flight. It was one thing to have a rookie added to a flight under the command of an experienced officer, but it was a whole other game when the rookie was going to lead the flight. In his experience he’d seen two things happen in those situations: either the rookie proved their abilities as an officer or they would get all under their command horribly injured if not outright killed. Gavin hoped it wouldn’t be the latter, especially since he had been assigned to watch over Nova Flight with the orders to lend assistance if needed and had no desire to get a member of Dawn Flight killed because of a rookie officer's mistake. Rookie or not though, Gavin had his orders to help Karis Jorvin and Nova Flight if they got into trouble, he never had abandoned those trusted to his care and wasn’t going to do so now despite any misgivings he had of Karis Jorvin’s leadership abilities.

After the briefing by Commander Kad, Magenta had filed out of the room with everyone else. She wanted to see as soon as possible the additional details of the mission.

As she stood in the somewhat crowded halls, Magenta flipped out her datapad and stared at it's compact screen. One detail in particular caught her attention.

Squadron Leader: Keenen Ackbar

She cocked her eyebrow after she read this. Why was he in charge? He had not been apart of the squadron that long, and he had not done anything to prove himself worthy of the position in such a short time. Blowing a slow sigh, she shrugged her shoulders and continued walking. Perhaps someone else would have more information about this.

Or maybe he's just one really good pilot....

Keenen reached the command bridge and laughed to himself. As he had walked, he had decided that it must be a technical error. There was no good reason to be named the commander of the Pearl Squadron. He entered on to the bridge, unnoticed and unstopped. The other members of the commandos were too busy preparing for launch to notice him. He spotted Adeen Kad, speaking with a woman he didn't know. Commander Kad was one of the only people he recognized on the bridge. Keenen stood with his hands behind his back, waiting for his chance to talk with Kad.

Saul walked into the hangar and saw his men wandering about their ships. Jen'ri was messing with his fighter's undercarriage while Dek held a fist full of loose wiring. Off to the side Bannick and Odalis were sparring in some ancient hand to hand ritual from who knows what system. They turned their heads as they seen Saul approach.

In a deep voice he called out, "Skull and bones...fall in!"

Immediately heads snapped to attention and bodies appeared out of canopies and service hatches. Promptly the squad formed up around Saul and Frender.

"Command has given us the details on our new assignment. Just as some of you speculated, our new employers are indeed the Empire. Seems there is some cargo goods heading to Klavanor, a welcoming gift from the New Republic. Now Klavanor itself is just a run down colony planet, nothing special. We'll get there before the New Republic convoy, rip them out of hyperspace, then deliver the goods to the Imps."

"Sir?" Phaedon Castell raised his hand tentatively. "How are we going to pull the convoy out of hyperspace?"

"Good question Cas. Our new friends are going to lend us an Interdictor and some stormies. Once we take out whatever cover the cargo ships have, we sit tight while the stormies board and take the goods."

Jen'ri shifted uncomfortable while he stood, arms crossed tightly on his chest. "So we are to act as pirates on this expedition, with the goal of..." He looked down to survey his datacard and the mission's details, "...a years worth of dry consumables, over three thousand kiloliters of petrol, blasters, speeders, clothing, etc etc." Jen'ri looked up with an expression of concern, a purple hue spreading across his throat, it was an Anx sign of doubt. "Sir, we all know these items are of absolutely no value to the Empire, and I fail to see what depriving some struggling colonists of said items would accomplish. What do you think they are really after, sir?"

Saul smiled to himself. Jen'ri's high society etiquette always seemed so out of place for a mercenary. "Well Jen'ri, either the Empire is harder pressed than we thought or they're not telling us everything we need to know." He cast his eyes over his squad. "And if they're not telling us what, then we need to be prepared for anything." He specifically threw his attention at Bannick. "That means the cross-training drills we've been going over for the past few weeks might get put into action. So let's go over it one more time. Frender..."

Frender stepped forward and began pointing to those concerned, "Bannick, Jen'ri, and Nev form up with Skull Leader. They represent are punch flight. I'll take over command of Blood Flight while Krip fills in Jen'ri's spot in Bones Flight. With Skull going in to deliver torps and missiles at whatever we desire, the other two flights fly cover." Frender turned his stare at the two women of the group. "Now Ariel, since Illacia is new with us, I want you to look after her. Same goes for you Dek. Stick close to Cas all you'll make out just fine."

"All right everyone, you know the drill and we've got the details. Less than five hours till launch so let's get ready." Saul's thundering voice was met with a chorus of cheers as his squadron fanned out to prep their ships for the mission.

As they all scattered to their ships, Saul noticed a man sitting next to an A-wing and he could have sworn he was crying. Saul looked over to Frender, "Looke like a morale problem, I better go take a look."

"No problem boss."

Saul weaved through the power cables stretched out on the ground and made his way over to the human who was indeed sobbing into his open palms. But before he could approach him, the pilot got up and crawled into his cockpit to be alone. Saul respected the pilot's privacy and decided to leave him be.
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