Re: [JMC_Blue_Dwarf] Cassandra: A little help here?

Jay struggled with the controls of the Phoenix as the port nacelle was torn away from the ship, but eventually managed to compensate and get it under control
"Aw hell,..." he said through gritted teeth. "They just made this personal..."
"They didn't make it personal when they kidnapped, beat and threatened to kill me?" Katrina snapped, from the co-pilots seat
"Erm...well..yes of course hun, but now it's MORE personal!"
Katrina sighed, she should know by now she'd always be second place with Jay. His first love was always the Phoenix.
"So what now.." she asked "The Dwarfs gonna blow in less than 10 minutes and then what?"
"The Dwarf's not gonna blow..." Jay said "That was a trick, even I don't have the clearance to set the self destruct on my own, it takes a separate authorisation from the two most senior officers aboard at any given time. At the time it was set, that was you, and you didn't authorise anything.."
"So what are you saying?"
"I wanted to make them think it was going to blow, so they'd evacuate in the escape pods, and we could re-take the ship then bring them in for arrest...my hands were tied, I had to do something to get you out of there safely and all I could think of was to make them think I'd handed over control of the ship, giving me chance to get you out of there, so I can go back in with a security team at no risk of any civilians getting hurt. If I could get them off the ship at the same time, it would make it even easier still"
"Clever"
"Yeah...but it didn't quite work out..no escape pods have launched, so now I need to take a team in right away so that they don't have time to realise that theres no kaboom and get Cass to hack the command systems..."
 
**** On Mollopod ****
 
"Chris..." Jay said, running over to Harris shortly after the Phoenix touched down. "Now, I am smegged off...look what they've done to my baby!" He pointed past Katrina and at the Phoenix.
"Again...Jay...Hi" Katrina said, reminding him of her existence
"Oh yeah" Jay said flatly "They hurt her too..." he nodded nonchalantly in Salters direction as he said this.
"Assemble a team...we're re-taking the Dwarf."
"What about Jones?" Harris asked.
"SHE'S THE ONE WHO DID THIS TO THE LOVE OF MY LIFE!!" once more he pointed past Katrina and at his shuttle.
"I'm leaving you..." Katrina said flatly
"Sorry..." Jay said
"S'ok, I forgive you..."
"Cassandra helped me get Katrina out of there.." Jay said "She was working unwillingly, forced to act as she did by the mobsters that YOU and your security forces were supposed to have cracked down on!" He directed this last part angrily at Chris.
"...in fairness" Chris said "They're big and scary..."
"Yeah, well, time to grow a backbone..."
"Captain.." Harris said "What about the situation with Monsoon?" he nodded toward the hospital as he said this.
"I can't deal with that right now...but if anyone bleeds green if we get into a firefight...do what you have to to subdue them...."
 
<Tag to anyone in security, or Cass!>   

From: andylocke@...
Sent: Wednesday, June 16, 2010 9:47 PM
To: JMC_Blue_Dwarf@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [JMC_Blue_Dwarf] Cassandra: A little help here?
 
Who: Cassandra, Le Souteneur, and a bunch of mercs.Where: Shuttle hangar bayWhen: Just after Jay initiated the self destruct<snip>Jay nodded, and let go of Cassandras arm, who began to walk toward Le Soutener, who still had a gun trained on Jay. Once the pad was in his hand, he lowered it so as to place him thumb print on the scanner. Jay climbed into the Phoenix and the hatch began to close."Auto destruct sequence initiated…" Hollys voice boomed over the speakers"Abandon ship…repeat, auto destruct sequence intitiated….""Oops…" Jay said, through the still closing hatch "Silly me.,…" The Phoenix began to move down the runway, toward the waiting hangar bay doors.</snip>Cass narrowed her eyes as she watched the Phoenix accelerate away down the runway"Damn it Jay" she hissed, her fingers moving over her handheld "You were meant to help; not just run away and leave me to my doom!""Jones!" Le Souteneur snapped "Do someting!""Already on it"Cass held off from executing the command to close the hangar doors, waiting long enough to give the captain a chance of escaping before she finally triggered itThe massive bulkheads ground closed quickly enough to force Jay to bank hard, and corkscrew the Phoenix out through the rapidly diminishing gap between the doors; only just making out into space after he had clipped one of the doors and torn an engine nacelle from the fuselageFrom Cass' viewpoint before the bay doors finally boomed closed, the wildly careening Phoenix didn't look like it would respond to the flight controls let alone make planet fall, but Jay was a resourceful kind of guy, so she figured she needn't worry undulyBesides, if all else failed there was always the chance he could be picked up later on"Alright dudes" Holly intoned "Fifteen minutes until self destruct. You might want to hustle on down to an escape pod" "Merde" Le Souteneur screamed "'Ee got away!""Uh, yeah!" Cass replied sarcastically "But who smegging cares? We're going to be trace elements blowing on the solar wind in quarter of an hour!"Le Souteneur snarled like an animal and hauled his pistol out to point it at Cass, shaking with unsteady fury"Unless you can do someting about zat, Ah'm keeling you where you stand you leepy beech""Alright! Alright!" Cass snapped "I can stop it, but you'll probably want to consider evacuating as well in case this doesn't go to plan"Le Souteneur narrowed his eyes"Oh, non" he chuckled "We all stay! Ah'm not leavin' zis sheep when Ah'm so close to eet bein' mine"Cass scowled and shrugged; she hadn't really expected that particular ploy to work, but had considered it worthwhile trying "Right" she snapped after a moment's contemplative silence "I need to do three things in around thirteen minutes, and there's no chance I can do them all, so we're going to have to split up and go to the drive room, the main reactor, and the computer core.""You" she continued, pointing at Le Souteneur "You go to the bridge. I need someone with a modicum of intelligence to issue the retraction commands from the helm once I finish in the computorium; Holly's got your prints, so it has got to be you anyway. As for everyone else, I need all hands in the reactor room resetting Kinetically Neutralised Octagonal Batteries; there are about a hundred of them and they look like this..."Cass glanced down at her handheld, her fingers moving over the display, pulling up a schematic of the K.N.O.B's general location and what they looked like to show to the assembled mercenaries"They come in all kinds of sizes" she continued "The big ones can be a little unstable, so be sure to treat them gently... You wouldn't want one blowing up in your face"Le Souteneur laughed"Oh you sink you've got eet all sought out eh?""I've no idea what you're on about" Cass glared at the man "I'm trying to save my... I mean: all our lives""Okay, okay" Le Souteneur smiled "'Ave it your way, but Ah know what you're sinking, and an Ah don' trust you one beet; but ze way Ah see it, Ah don't 'ave any choice: so we'll do it your way for now, but you get to go wit' an escort – an' zey kill you if you even sink about crossin' me"Cass pursed her lips, glaring at the man"Kaufmann, Fox" Le Souteneur beckoned a couple of the heavily armed thugs in their party "You two make sure she don' go gettin' us into trouble...""Whatever" Cass snapped and turned to walk away "We need to go"The group split up and went their separate ways, Cass trailing the two mercenaries behind her as she hurried down towards the computorium, their weapons trained on her backBefore long she was striding down the computer core's main access corridor, talking via the handhelds comms link to the other teams "Alright dudes. Five minutes to self destruct" Holly intoned helpfully"Yeah yeah" Cass muttered to herself before raising her voice to address the team in the reactor core "How's it going with your K.N.O.B's guys?""Not too bad" the man on the screen shouted above the sound of short circuiting K.N.O.B's "We're holding our own down here, but we could do with some extra help to really get on top of them all""Yeah, okay, I know you've got your hands full but just hang on in there; it's essential that you get the K.N.O.B's excited up to at least 85% charge so you can blow back the Frontzman-Erheart Lift Capacitor Housing, but only after I've got my hands on Holly's Native Application Driver's and disabled them""Roger that""Philippe: We're going to have to move quickly once I complete the process here, so stand by - I'm about to enter the computorium""Yeah, right. Ah don' trust you Jones, so let's get zis charade over wit'""Four minutes to self destruct"The blast doors shielding Holly's inner sanctum hissed open, allowing Cass to stride into the vast dimly lit room - the only light source in the area a single harsh beam of white light lancing down from the ceiling to illuminate Holly's chrome toaster casing at the bottom of the core's pit"Holly?" Cass asked above the sound of her small party's echoing footfalls "Lock the ship down and then execute protocol twenty three please"The point defence cannons deployed with an echoing boom in under a second; barely giving the mercenaries chance to bring their weapons to bear on Cass, before a vicious barrage of energy vaporised large and vital chunks of themIgnoring Le Souteneur's howls of fury, Cass strode on leaving the two smoking corpses in her wake as she picked her way through the smouldering craters pock-marking the floor to finally arrive at the safety barrier surrounding the computorium pit"Now, Holly: The drive room K.N.O.B's should be excited enough by now. Blow them out"Screams and explosions sounded briefly through the handheld's speakers along with Le Souteneur's venemous curses"You are so dead you smegging beech!"Cass curled her lip and cut him off; the vile man was locked out of harm's way for the time being, so she'd see to him later"Three minutes to self destruct""Hmm? Oh, right. Knock that crap off will you Holly?""Oh, alright" Holly replied peevishly "...I was enjoying that""I know; thanks anyway Hol"Resting on the safety rail around the edge of the pit, Cass closed her eyes and took a deep breath, ignoring the tang of ozone and scorched flesh at the back of her throat"What do you suppose I should I do now, Hol?""Dunno. Whatever you like I suppose; it's what you normally do...""... It's just that once I get Le Souteneur out of the way, there'll only be me on board here... in charge; and it's a big galaxy...""Huh, you'll have to find him first!""What!?""I said: You'll have to find him first. Le Souteneur, I mean... He's just broken out of the Drive Room and I'm not reading him anywhere, so I suppose he must have gotten into the service shafts or something""Aw, shit" Cass sighed and opened her eyes as wide as her black eye afforded "I'm going to have to deal with him before he catches up with me and kills me""Right..." she continued after a moment's thought "I want a personal force field generator, a bunch of kill-bots as guards, and a genetic sample from Le Souteneur; there should be something in the drive room that I can work with. I'll get a tailored doom virus brewed for him and then feed that into the vent system; should do the trick""I'm afraid I can't do that Cass" Holly smiled, savouring the opportunity to get all HAL-9000 with her"What!? Why?""This is a mining ship remember? We don't generally pack military grade force fields or kill bots... I can do you a few skutters with laser pistols if you like?""Aw, smegging hell" Cass moaned "I wouldn't even trust them to wave a knockwurst around let alone a laser pistol, which leaves me safe enough in here with the defence cannons, but very few other places"Holly stayed quiet; probably reasoning that saying nothing was the best option if he didn't have anything helpful to say"Okay, maybe next time..." Cass blew out a resigned sigh "Call Jay up and tell him I've cancelled the destruct and neutralised most of the insurgents for him, I just need a hand with the ringleader..."<tag:Jay>How bad is the damage to the Phoenix?Will Katrina mind you rescuing Cassandra? - Would you even want to?What do you fancy doing?</tag:Jay>