Not with a Bang Start and Ongoing

[voidtreckermods]

"Good Morning passengers. Today is day seven of the month of Imagination." The voice echoes through the train as passengers wake up in their beds. Not long afterwards their SCA’s glow with the colour of the void and a holographic image will appear.

Preperation

They have about an hour to prepare, a little less than usual but perhaps expected, given the urgency of the task.

The cupboards in the dressing room are open to reveal rows of tents, in all four team colours as well as some basic camp cooking equipment. They are in bags that should be easy enough to carry.

"Shortly arriving on System #6416. All passengers get ready to disembark. Next stop world 6416. Exit from void in ten, nine, eight, seven, six, five, four, three, two, one." The train rocks and lurches, bright colours of the void filling the space and then fading as they fly downwards towards a very green landscape.

Arrival and Initial Task

The train lands in a clearing, curving round in an attempt to fit. Once everyone who wishes to disembark has done it flies back into the air, vanishing from sight.

The air is heavy and humid, though it is not currently raining. The clearing is open to the sky and looking up will reveal a worrying sight. The sky is an angry red colour, colours shifting as if the clouds themselves were on fire. It's an unnerving sight.

Their SCA's show three points, one Orange, One purple and one that is half blue and half red. The three control centres. Each are a few hours treck through the jungle and it certainly feels like there is no time to waste.

Those that don't want to treck through the forest can start setting up camp, though the darkening sky might be a little distracting. As time goes on flecks of fire drift down, though they extinguish before hitting the forest floor.

Orange are to travel to the north, Purple to the south and Blue and Red must travel together to the west. Each route takes them through thick and unrelenting jungle. Flying is difficult here unless you can get up past the canopy layer, which means vision of the ground is severely hampered.

The control stations themselves are half buried in vines and require cutting into. If voidtreckers are unlucky they will meet their first security robots here, firing on the intruders. They might even meet their first giant Armadillos, the creatures are curious and may wish to investigate. They are not helpful or constructive to trying to power up the stations and prevent the destruction of the planet.

The control stations are simple enough to operate, but there's quite a lot that needs to be done in way of repairs and clearing. It will take a team effort to get it in working enough order to activate the shield.

The shield itself, when it is activated, is mostly invisible but there is a loud humming sound. The meteor, which has gotten more visible throughout the five hours, hits the shield and splinters, fire enveloping the whole sky. It is visibly terrifying, but no fire falls to earth, no rocks get through, the planet is safe.

Ongoing

Once the planet is safe the voidtreckers deserve a rest. But once the next morning dawns it is time to start with their next tasks, to make sure that this planet stays safe from future threats.

Red

The robots at the control stations are not the only malfunctioning security robots around. They roam the jungle, or are more often stranded in the jungle, powering up only when faced with a new threat.

Some are benign, terraforming machines whose only crime is using up precious power. These need to be dismantled so that power can be saved for the shield system. Others are security robots that will attack the intruders to the planet.

Though the machines are scattered they are often obvious, emitting warning alarms or flashing lights. Their SCA's will show some areas where there are larger clusters but machines can be found anywhere.

Purple

Their SCA's are filled with hundreds of purple dots, each a solar stations that needs cleared and brought back online. It's not the most glamourous job, the stations are deep in the jungle, the treck is difficult and most of the work needed is weed clearing.

But once the weeds have been cut away they will need to patch up the station, doing basic maintenance to get it back online. In some cases wires need to be patched back together but it shouldn't take any great feats of engineering to get the stations up and running.

They may run into some of the security automatons, needing to fight their way into the stations before they can begin the clean up operations.

Orange

Like the red team their SCA will show areas where there are clusters of the small insectoid automatons that need to be rescued and restored. However they can be found anywhere throughout the jungle, they are not too suited for the terrain outside of the stations and so they have gotten tangled in vines. They can be found powered down, stranded and in dire need of maintenance.

Tools and spare parts can be found in many of the solar stations that purple team have been locating. Actually repairing the robots takes some engineering knowledge but once they are restored they will go about their tasks in the stations. They will need help getting to the further flung stations as well as the main control centres.

They are very basic in design and follow pre programmed instructions rather than being able to hear and listen to orders. But once in the correct place they are very effective at their job.

Blue

Once the shield is up there is a faint humming that can be heard throughout the jungle if they listen closely and find it among the sound of rain and insects. But once they hear it, it is obvious where it is louder and more prominent.

Their SCA will pin point some of the larger control boxes but there are truthfully too many to show on a map. Not all of them have attracted Violet Pandas, but many of them have.

They are curious creatures, both of the power boxes and the voidtreckers. They are protective of each other but not so much of territory and therefore it is not difficult to move them on. Keeping them away is another matter, the power humming is interesting and they will unearth wires and chew through them. It doesn't seem to do them much harm, there is clearly safety stops in the system for such eventualities. It does however cut power off to entire solar stations and require a lot of patch work.

Good luck voidtreckers!

Comments

[zechs_isonfire]

"Not too surprising, since we were apparently kidnapped for this purpose," Zechs agreed. "Though I keep wondering about the sheer number of civilians."

And, though he kept it to himself, the fact that even those powerful people here seemed clearly unmilitary. Why else run this mission in such a disorganized way?

[pleple]

"There's a great enough variety that it's difficult to pin down the purpose." Let alone what a child soldier mostly out of her area of expertise is good for.

[zechs_isonfire]

Zechs is quiet for a moment as he made a few more vicious slices through some vines. But then they're clear to move forward again. They'll make the deadline, if Zechs understood the distance as prompted by the SCA and their pace traveling so far, with even some time to spare.

Just potentially pretty worn down by that point. He would need to keep that in mind if there end up being hostile targets at the site.

"What did you do, before you were kidnapped?" Zechs asked with curiosity and not a trace of judgment. Well. Not for her. Just because he'd been a child soldier himself, didn't mean he approved of the path of history or leadership that got things to that point on his Earth.

[pleple]

They're making steady progress - they usually aren't put into situations that are too close to impossible, as dangerous as they are. Ple Two will tired faster than Zechs, but so far she's as reasonably optimistic as she should be.

"I was a soldier," she responds simply. There's a sense, even if she can't place it, that she can be honest. "I was... meant solely to pilot specific machines using a mental interface."

[zechs_isonfire]

There's a long pause as Zechs thought about that.

"At the age of ten, I began training as part of an elite force to pilot machines as well," Zechs shared with her. "But the interface wasn't mental."

That sort of technology came later.

"Your world was at war?" Zechs confirmed in a question.

[pleple]

He was like her. In some small way, at least... she sighed deeply.

"Mine was... a mix. Manual controls, with mentally operated remote weapons." Very complicated, even for an adult. "Off and on, for a decade now, with no sign of... long term peace."

[zechs_isonfire]

... "Don't lose hope," Zechs told her, calm even as he cut through brush. "We managed it, in the world I'd been abducted from. Though they had been waging war for decades, and it was ... a difficult path to get there."

"Peace is possible," Zechs told her solemnly.

[pleple]

"There's a lot of hate. And the violent results lead to more hate; and more violence." The whole of humanity could easily destroy itself like that, she worried.

"I may not want to return, if I can avoid it, anyways."

[zechs_isonfire]

Zechs did his best, and largely successfully, to avoid judgment. Not that he could relate - he had too many sins to pay for, a duty to meet if they ever required him to fill a certain role. One last performance, worst case scenario, to make him into the scapegoat a final time.

But. "I can't fault you for enjoying the peace, of a sort, that we can have on this train."

He inclined his head. "Most people, I'd imagine, would want to escape a constant war if they could."

[pleple]

Ple Two has made poor choices, but she's less sure that they're purely her own mistakes at this point. Given her age and origins, after all - they're both victims in so many ways, although obviously Zechs is a young adult now.

"I do not know what fate would await me. Who would be waiting for me. Here... there are people I care about, who care about me, who I can take care of." It's simple and it makes her feel good.

[zechs_isonfire]

And that's likely the difference - Zechs didn't see himself that way, not at all. He's aware, because he set out to be exactly that - that he's the villain of his story.

Zechs was quiet for another moment, as he made another few slashes through undergrowth. "If I had felt that way - I would probably feel the same way. I would fight to remain here."

"As things are ... I have a duty at home," Zechs told her. "It would be selfish for me not to return. But our situations are very different."

[pleple]

Zechs has had quite a few years to make that chain of decisions. Ple Two was woken up out of cold sleep and sent straight out to kill people.

All the same, they're products of their circumstances and their personalities and their decisions to varying degrees.

"I hope you get to go back soon, then. I hope your duty goes well." While she stays here, thanks.

[zechs_isonfire]

Considering that he imagined his duty was to become some sort of scapegoat if some future uprising happened, since all mobile suits except his had been destroyed? Allowing him to both stop the threat to peace and become the villain who held back such a weapon in secret?

"I hope it does as well," Zechs agreed solemnly. "And I hope you are allowed to remain with those who'll let you live in peace."