Haarmon starts sort of bouncing up and down on the balls of his feet and his hands start tapping against the side of his legs. He listens to Rhijans, nodding, nodding. At Shard's endorsements he actually blushes the tinest litte bit and then gets a little more manic.

"No arrival for us. Got it. No departure for them. Yeah. And don't you worry about the rest, Cap. Confusing and contradictory is what I do best. And I say we call the ship the Needle. As in, the haystack, like?"

And, sparing a single snorting laugh for the 'quality' of Juragga's translation disk, he bolted from the room, top speed, toward the cockpit.

With some focus, Shard manages to pick up a fair chunk of Juragga's question. "Working on it," she mutters, but her quick smile, there and gone, takes any edge out of the words.  It's frustrating.  She used to know more, but that went years ago.  Lack of practice, the woman supposes.

And, quite likely, the booze.

She lets out an amused snort as Juragga's translator disc proves both its value (considerable) and the value of actually learning Wookie (considerably more).  "I just need to get the hang of it again, Juragga," Shard assures him, rubbing her aching forehead.  Out of the corner of her eye, she notes Haarmon's change of shade and reviews the young man's rapid-fire speech in her head.  Both eyebrows go up this time.  Can't be.  He...no.  I must be mistaken.

She'd better be; Shard isn't sure if the possibility amuses her, charms her, or frightens her.  I'm worn-out, cynical, and just plain nasty at times, she reminds herself.  That kid needs someone his age with stars in her eyes.

Suddenly tired, she sits down in a nearby chair, stuffing her hands into the opposite sleeves.

Haarmon Dak goes to work, even as Vekkis Lund drops the ship towards the snowball.  By the time they are in the region that local traffic control designates as "High Orbit", the pilot is able to provide a name, a shipment number, and a destination for that shipment.

There is a brief pause, during which the freighter, currently operating under the name Needle is put into a holding pattern.  And then...

And then there is an apology from the mine's civilian operated traffic control... "Apologies for the delay, Needle, we seem to be having a lot of computer problems today.  Please proceed to Landing Pad 27 and await loading."

Needle begins her final approach, and touches down on the designated pad just a few minutes later...

Juragga woofs a quick note of foreboding.  Things were going well, but it wouldn't do to be overconfident.

Rummaging in his duffle, he came out with a weathered old poncho and pulled it on over his head.  His fur was thick enough to protect him from most weather, but this made him look more like a worker or laborer.

At least, he thought it did.

Mark Jacobs sat in his seat. He closed his eyes. Gotta make it through this. This time it'll be different. "Let's do this." Mark replied to nobody in particular.

Vekkis grins at Haarmon Dak, "Very nice work, kid.", then activates the comms, "I hope your computer problems aren't going to delay Me too much, Control.  I have deadlines to meet, and not just with your consignment.  I've got two more cargoes to pick up after this one, and one of them is perishable."

He releases the switch, "There.  They'd think it was strange if I didn't complain about their mess."

"There's the right pad, just over there."

The landing, when it happens, is a little heavier than Vekkis would have liked, but at least it isn't "erupting in a ball of flaming plasma" heavy.  The pilot, looks over his shoulder, and says, sheepishly, "Oops."

OOC: Vekkis Lund rolled 4 (8 excluding the wild die) using 4 dice and +2 pips with the WEG Classic system with rolls of 5,1,1,{Wild}1. Landing.

Mark winced at the rough landing. "I hope your landing isn't an indication of what's to come. But you got us here, that's important. I just hope you can fly us out of here without trouble."

Shard feels a surge of something unfamiliar as the confirmation comes in - positivity.  The plan actually appears to be working for the moment.

Sadly, some of that optimism goes away as they bounce into place on the ground.  Wincing, she releases her white-knuckled grip on the safety bar and stretches her jounced back.  "A little warning, eh?"  Checking to ensure her gear is in place under her travelling cloak, she shakes her head.  "Don't worry about it, Vekkis.  Maybe we can pass it off as their beacon screwing us up.  That would fit with the mess they're in right now."

Rough landings were an inevitability, but this one was rougher than most.  Rhijans bit back any commentary...he'd learned, long ago, from others' bad experience, that antagonizing your pilot was a good way to be left behind in hostile territory.

"Better double-check the landing gear once we're out...we won't need it to take off again, but if anything got damaged, it will be good to know before we try landing again."

He looked around at the crew.  Another person would have probably smiled and made a joke of it, but he was deadly earnest.  "Everyone try to look official.  Should be easy...as far as they know, we're just another tramp freighter, independently contracted.  But does anyone have any ideas of what cargo we're supposed to be picking up, as a cover story?"

That was the problem with making the plan up on the fly...gaps in the plan would pop up at the most inconvenient moments...

Mark pointed at Haarmon, "The kid ought to have the best idea."

"What do you say. Shall we go with power converters. Seems that everybody these days needs a power convertor or two."

Outside the ship, the gusting wind sends flurries of snow and hail whipping across the open landing field, the latter rattling against the cockpit canopy.  The lights of the mine complex can be seen in the distance, though they are occasionally obscured by the weather.  It's only an illusion, of course, but the interior of Bold Gambit starts to feel a little chilly.

There are ground vehicles, crawlers of some sort, moving about out there, but details are impossible to make out in the poor visibility.  Their headlights wink in and out of sight with every lull and gust of wind.

A large shape looms in the middle distance, visible in the gaps between the blowing veils of snow and ice particles.  According to the intel, that would be the storage warehouse, with the landing field's control tower attached.  Beyond it, lost in the  white blur, are barracks, equipment sheds, and the minehead itself...

Shard peers out the window.  "We don't need to know what cargo," she notes.  "'Unspecified materials'.  Imperials are bastards like that - hire some poor independants to transport around the crap cargo they don't want to deal with.  Waste ores that might contain useful materials, hazardous chemicals, cheap crystals, whatever; it's not like someone willing to pick up that kind of thing is going to argue about a vague manifest."

The intermittant flicker of lights through the sheets of snow is mesmerizing.

"So that's all we say.  We're here to pick up 'unspecified materials', Manifest number X-whatever, or however they make up their manifest numbers."  Haarmon can tell them that.  She tears her eyes away from the swirling vista and turns back to the interior of the hold.  "They don't have anything of the sort on their records, which are currently getting scrambled to high orbit, so they crab at us about upper management never telling them anything or giving them the correct information.  In return, we crab at them about upper management never giving us enough to go on, and how last time we shipped something from somewhere it ended up being a kilotonne of hydrogen sulfide emmitting ore.  They nod sagely and sadly, we nod sagely and sadly."

"Everyone's happy."

She looks back out the window.  "Cold weather suits, everyone.  Doesn't look like we're getting much of a ride - fallout from our cover, I expect, with everyone scrambling."
This message was last edited by the player at 12:34, Mon 30 May 2011.

Nodding vacantly, Haarmon stares out of the cockpit window, his thoughts lost in the blowing wind and snow. Just for a moment he's hit with how very, very far he's come from everything he's ever known. Just for a moment he was struck with the reality that this is all really happening. It's a heavy thought. Especially for a kid like him.

But he shakes his head and turns around at Mark and Rhijans' questions. He slips his sneer and his strut back on like a pair of comfortable shoes and saunters over to the console. "I got our order all printed out right here." He picks up a sheaf of papers and immediately starts rolling them and unrolling them, twisting the corners and shuffling them. "Shard's got it all the way right. We're picking up some... vanadite? I think. Some crystal or another that they mine here." He grabs a nearby cup of coffee and spills some on some of the pages. "But it doesn't really matter. Just remember, we're just mooks, right? We're sheep. We're supposed to look like we have no idea what we're doing." He looks at the rest of the crew, Rhijans in particular. "Highly skilled Rebel operatives always have their poodoo on a hook, right? Know all the numebrs? All the angles? Yeah? But independant transport drivers? They're just paying the rent. So don't freak if the man asks a question and no one knows the answer. No one ever knows the answers."

He shuffles through the sheaf of transport papers, now wrinkled and worn and stained, staples them in mulitple places, sticks them in a clipboard and hands them to Mark.

"We act too smart and they might offer us job, huh? Am I right?"
This message was last edited by the player at 12:38, Mon 30 May 2011.

Rhijans managed to keep the snicker suppressed to a tight-lipped grin, when Dak made the claim that Rebel operatives always had their act together.  He held his tongue, however, until the kid had finished talking.

"Actually, in my experience, independent operators are usually a helluva lot more organized than any Rebel operation I've been privy to.  But as long as we've got a line to hand them, I'm not particular about what it is.  I just wanted to make sure nobody asked what cargo we were here to pick up and we suddenly started looking at each other and asking, 'Yeah, just what were we supposed to pick up, anyway?'  I can go with the unspecified cargo option, or the vanadite, or whatever...just making sure we've got an answer to the question."

He grabbed his cold-weather gear and started suiting up.  The weather could be a benefit to them...especially if they could get one or two people in Imperial exposure suits.  It was so bad out there that people would assume anyone who was out in the weather was there because they HAD to be...wouldn't be likely to be questioned about it.

Juragga caterwauled in assent, ready to go outside.  With his heavy fur, even without the poncho he now wore, he figured he'd be okay.  It was when things got... interesting... that he figured he'd be needed most.

Mark threw on his cold weather gear. A fur-lined helmet was strapped to his head for good measure. "Let's hurry. Not sure that this gear will really keep me warm."

Rhijans snorted lightly.  "Stay out there long enough, and nothing will keep you warm.  While the Captain and the kid do the talking with their ground control, we should see if the rest of us can get any kind of info on where the rest of the operations are located...the main shaft of the mine, storage, quarters for the slaves if they don't keep 'em in the barracks building, loading equipment, and a larger transport or two.  The tricky thing will be finding all this stuff without looking like we're looking for it."  He gave a humorless grin.

"I love a challenge...but this might be just a little ridiculous..."

Haarmon's attitude seems to have returned, both good and bad in Shard's eyes.  Good, in that it should keep him focused.  Uncertainty can be the worst killer in this kind of situation.  Bad, in that...well, the temptation to scrub the sneer from his lips with something rough is unbearable.  It's not hideous; rather, it's an ugly sign of a lack of confidence.

And yet...

Watch him work, Shard.  Look at that business with the coffee.  The kid is a natural, despite his waffling self-confidence.

Jacobs has the papers, Rhijans the orders, Juragga the agreement, she thinks.  Shard rearranges some things under her cloak; when satisfied, she ditches it, leaving her in the embroidered black silk, blaster pistol in a shoulder rig.  On goes a cold weather coat.  Bending over her cloak, she fumbles through it; fingers glide across cold, smooth steel, then close about it.

The flask goes into her coat.

A few more adjustments and she's done.  A long scarf wraps around her head and neck several times, leaving her eyes and sharp, fox's nose exposed.  "Ready," Shard affirms, moving to the door and prodding Rhijans with a finger on the way by.  "Don't say that.  I hate challanges, myself.  Keep hoping this one will be the easy mission they keep promising."

Rhijans grunted in response to Shard's statement.  "There are no easy missions...that's a myth they use to get you to say 'yes' in the first place.  If it was easy, they'd be doing it themselves."  Despite the cold tone of his voice, there's a gleam in his eye...his version of gallows humor, perhaps?

He moved to the top of the ramp.  "Everyone ready for this?"

Haarmon was just finishing suiting up. His thin body was covered in the bulky protective gear and most of his face was covered. He appeared quite ill-at-ease. Shifting his weight from foot to foot, constantly adjusting the shoulder strap of his computer bag. And his hand kept dropping to his side, where his gun holster normally was, clenching, unclenching and moving away, as though looking for the assurance of the weapon's weight and not finding it.

One of his toes tapped incessantly in a quick, staccato rhythm. It woud pause every now again, and Haarmon's gaze would flicker to Shard or Juragga or Rhijans, as though he realized he was being a goober. But moments later it would start up again.

Rhijans' question, however, was met with a wide bright smile and a full-on strut. "You kidding me, Cap? Ready?" He said, unable to keep all the tightness out of his voice, "We're not ready, we're hungry for justice. And I think we got Imperial on the menu this fine morning. Rags? Am I right?"

Juragga let out a muffled "RrrrRRRRAAaaaauuuueeerrrRRRR!" of agreement.  He wasn't losing sight of the mission goals, but anything to stick it to the Impys made him happy.

"GrrrUUUHHhhhn," he rumbled, trying to reassure the kid that everything would come out right.

In spite of himself, Rhijans found that he was growing just a little fond of the kid's bravado.  Once Dak got to be good enough to actually stop using it as a mask, there could be real hope for him...but until then, Rhijans wasn't about to encourage anything further in that manner of behavior.

"Lund is the captain here, not me.  And be careful your hunger for justice doesn't wind up choking you...it's an easy appetite to lose control of."  Anyone watching him, however, would notice a fleeting hint of a smile cross his features, as he turned back to the hatch.

"Ready when you are..."  He turned and looked at Vekkis, and the fleeting hint of humor lit up his eyes.  "Captain," he finished.

The ramp drops, the inner doors slides upwards, and a blast of cold air and snow rushes into the ship.  The rebels start down the ramp, pulling cold weather clothing tight around their bodies, and start walking in the direction of the warehouse.

While they're not really there to pick up a cargo, the warehouse is the closest shelter, and the natural first stopping point for any ship's crew who are supposed to be collecting a consignment.  A crawler rumbles past, heading out across the field to a group of parked transports a little way off from Bold Gambit.  Eyes slitted against the wind and shoulders hunched against the cold, the infiltrators make their way closer to the building.

The only one who doesn't seem that bothered by the weather is Juragga.

After a few minutes walking, which seems much longer, the group reach the front of the warehouse, and spot a door marked as giving access to the office.

The team...is gelling.  An ironic choice of phrases given the weather, but still.  Rhijans is more supportive than cutting, Haarmon is bringing his best, Jacobs hasn't threatened to shoot the new people yet, and Juragga...

Juragga might be the best of us all, Shard considers, mulling over the Wookie's support of his friend.  Her grasp of the language is returning, slowly but surely, and she's getting more and more of his verbiage.  It's the inflections that still throw her - GrrrUUUHHhhhn versus GrrruUUHHhnN, for example.

The wild card is their ship's captain.  She still doesn't know much about him.

There's plenty she'd like to say to everyone, but the biting wind strips any thought of discussion out of her mind, replacing it with a driving need to reach shelter.  Pushing herself forward through the frigid blast, Shard slogs along the tarmac, eyes fixed on her goal.  The building looms closer with every step - she checks her back to make sure the others are following, picking them out of the howling storm - and finally Shard reaches the door.

Opens it.

Holds the switch.  "Get in!" she screams over the wind's cry, following only when everyone has entered the office.

The door hisses closed and she leans against the metal, stiff, frozen fingers fumbling with her flask.  Up.  Down.  The fiery liquid follows the motion, burning its way along her throat.  "Next time," Shard snaps hoarsely, "we're taking contract with a tropical planet!"  Her arm rises again, proffering the flask to the Wookie.  "Juragga?  Last call."

As they headed in, Juragga glanced about, his teal eyes taking in the snow and wind around them.  As they reach the building, he stared intently into the blizzard.

"RRrrAaaaaaaggghhhhRRRRHHHnnnn," he rumbles low, dangerously.  To Haarmon, the meaning would be crystal clear; he didn't know how the others were doing with their spoken Wookiee and didn't want to take time to fish out his translator.

Then, not wanting to be silhouetted by the interior lights - at his size, he makes a good target - he ducked inside and let Shard come in after him.  He smiled a Wookiee grin at Shard, wan but sincere, and took a small swig from her flask, before handing it back.  To be polite.  Really.

(OOC any who understand Juragga:  He says their are Imperial troopers out there in the snow, having just come around the corner of the building, headed this way, but not in a rush.)