In reply to Samantha Kilgore (msg # 23):

"Tell him we're on our way. Maybe ... what? ... ten-or-so minutes to get there?" Vonon says.

"I'll tell him to start in 15 minutes - sound ok?"

Sharik gave Samantha a 'thumbs-up' for the timing; she seemed quite confident that they'd be able to cover that distance in time.  "Sneak in, meet up with Justev, secure data and the dome, let everyone else in...." she repeated the objectives quietly for her and everyone else's edification.  That sequence may require revision after the first item, but that remained to be seen and the items themselves didn't seem to be in debate.

Then the diminutive socialite turned to give her other EVA companions the 'thumbs-up' as well, to inform them of her readiness.  A gentle touch to the side of her helmet and the face-plate began to cloud over, transitioning to a polarized, semi-reflective surface that occluded the details of her face.  With stunstick in hand, Shar waited by the portal that would allow them to step into liquid.

Walter assisted the others in getting ready to make the dive, acting as an extra set of hands and double checking to make sure the diving equipment was secured correctly.

Sam returns the thumbs up "good luck to you all, I'll be with the pilot" and returns to the main cockpit

On the way she taps on her comms

In reply to Samantha Kilgore (msg # 28):

Vonon steps up to the edge of the open hatch, then steps off, dropping down into the water. Upon landing on the sandy surface below, he overcompensates for his bouyancy and trips on his own feet, slowly falling down upon the seabed.



OOC:
Not sure what other DMs there might be, but just a basic Zero G plus DEX roll produced:
07:13, Tue 05 May 2015: Vonon Ronkunu rolled 7 using 2d6+2 ((4,1)), with Zero G skill.

Once Vonon got the hang of the buoyancy issue, it was a bit like EVA, the difference being with EVA you could make sudden moves, but they weren't avisable, while here, you couldn't make them if you wanted. Most EVA was done in a zero-gravity environment, and the buoyancy of the water almost replicated that.

Vonon, Sharik, Quinzella and Tolman drop down through the moon pool to land on the sand beneath the submersible. Once Vonon regains his feet, the four of you are able to walk out under the back of the submersible, then walk around to the front and climb/swim/jump over the coral reef that was keeping the submersible hidden.

One at a time, just in case there was some sort of observation, you make it over the reef and head for the dome.

Quinzella and Tolman are actually swimming, of course, using SCUBA gear, but not bulky airtanks--they are using a rebreather unit. Without the tanks, they also don't need a weight belt. They can maintain their depth just by swimming.

Quinzella and Tolman can swim faster than Sharik and Vonon can walk, so they reach the dome first. Oddly, there's a sort of doormat in front of the airlock, but they realize this is to prevent the sand from getting into the airlock.

The airlock is operated manually from outside. Its design seems rather antiquated, but it is also quite practical. Any kind of electronic and electro-mechanical airlock could malfunction, and then either not open or not close.

Okay, Quinzella, you're up!

Quin swam into the outer entrance area (in a pressurized system an outside door is usually open so you can close it and release the pressure, or water, and open the inner door.  If this is an incorrect assumption for this instance then she goes to a control panel).  She begins to check to make sure all is set before the others arrived, others, she sighed in her oxygen less way, at one time her friends might have been a more appropriate word.

Khea enters the submarines cockpit and while standing inside the doorway asks
"How fast can we be at the dock? When the team gets spotted there is no need to hide anymore and if we are standing right outside the doors they wouldn't be able to escape if they can manage to hold of the males."

The outer door of the airlock was closed and the airlock itself was filled with air, since that was the way it was left the last time someone entered. The exterior control is just a wheel valve--as you begin to turn it, it activates the flooding of the airlock. There are electronic systems inside, but nothing directly on the outside.

The outer door does have a viewport in it. You can look through and see that the airlock is empty.

The flooding of the airlock probably does create some sound, but more so when the water is pumped out.

There is no way to tell if the alert signal/internal alarm has been deactivated, as it is on the other side of the nnner door, which is closed (most likely as a safety precaution). In any case, your man inside, Justev, was going to create some sort of distraction or diversion so that the sound of the airlock flooding wouldn't be heard by those inside. Also, the dome is of quite modern construction, so there is sound insulation and baffles to cut down on the noise of the airlocks cycling.

Quinzella has no difficulty in spinning the control wheel, and can watch through the viewport as the airlock fills up with water. When it's completely filled up, a small puff of air is purged from the seal, indicating that the outer door can now be opened.

Walter watched from the cockpit as the others headed towards the dome. "Well, we are now committed. Lets get ready to board. We should start heading there in say three minutes since it will take two minutes for the sub to get there and about five for the dock to flood if we are lucky. Let hope that there is space for us to dock or we will have to swim in." he said.

Sharik trundled along the seabed beside her wingman, Vonon.  She made no effort to move faster or slower than her vargr companion, simply matching his pace.  Her own vacc suit was tailored and would be considered high-tech, even by Imperial standards.  It weighed no more than a heavy set of clothes and protected her at least as well as any Imperial Standard HEV suit - let alone anything that Beowulf itself could actually manufacture.  And though, the vacc suit wasn't as tough as the military-grade Imperial combat armour, it was more than enough for the task at hand.

She'd considered using the fins that she'd requisitioned back at Grev's dive shop, but had settled on just strapping on the dive knife instead.  Strapped to her other thigh was cunningly shaped piece of metal, which most salvage crews referred to as a 'wrecker', or the equivalent of a crowbar-sized, space-age multitool.

As Shar moved, she tried to keep the illumination to a minimum, lest they be seen before seeing the dome.  Still, some light was needed, otherwise navigating on the sea floor would be nearly impossible.  Well, nearly.  The diminutive socialite still had her sensorshades on inside her helmet.  With it linked to her personal network, her glasses gave her an HUD-enhanced, augmented reality view with access to a more extensive visual palette outside of just the visible range of the E-M spectrum, which helped her effectively see in the dark - by giving her access to both heat patterns and the UV spectrum.

Plodding on, she moved inexorably closer to the location where the dome should be, Shar glanced in Vonon's direction and gave her friend a 'thumbs-up'.  "Show time..." Sharik chimed in casually on her commlink to him.

In reply to Walter Zeller (msg # 34):

Sam nodded at Walter. "Good point. We should probably have a plan b in case of that"

Waiting for some signal or comms to move towards the sub airlock. Monitoring for any SOS transmissions and will jam as needed.

In reply to Darrel Cromwell (msg # 37):

Vonon, in an effort at a stealthy approach, had simply turned the Light Enhancement function of his helmet up to maximum -- barely providing enough light to see by, here on the seabed, at night. Sharik's muted suit light helped a lot, there.

Approaching the outer airlock door, Vonon gave Quinzella a thumbs-up for cycling the lock, then pointed at himself, then Tolman, then Quinzella and Sharik before pointing at the airlock.

After this, he stepped forward and opened the airlock door, stepping inside and crossing over to the inner door.

OOC: Assuming he doesn't get blasted by an autogun that we didn't see ^_^

Quin reared back, aghast.  She sent a general message in text back to the ship, Is Vonon now leading and I was unaware?

However aggravated this afront caught her by she still waited until the appropriate time to enter, if for no other reason than to have a familiar face watching her back.

Quinzella, keep in mind that Vonon is a Vargr, who tend to be a bit aggressive, and he's also an ex-Patrolman, so he's used to leading the charge, so to speak. While the technical definition of 'leader' is one that others follow, in present-day usage, it now also means the one who gives the orders. He just thinks that the one who should be in the front is the one with the heaviest armor.


Baffles, sound proofing and modern pumps make filling up the airlock with water to be relatively silent. If you were listening for it specifically, you might hear it. But these domes are also meant to be habitats, so they are designed and built with the idea of not having sounds that annoy those living in them.

There are also viewports on both the outer and inner doors, so you can see what is transpiring on the other side... within reason, of course.

Once the airlock is full of water, the outer hatch opens and everyone moves inside. Last one in closes the outer hatch, and then the internal controls are activated to pump the water out of the airlock. Once that is done, the inner hatch can now be opened.

Vonon will stubbornly refuse to let anyone else go first, since he's the better armored and protected.

As the inner hatch swings open toward him, no one is in sight.

In reply to StarMaster (msg # 40):

Vonon waits for the door to finish opening -- expecting a hail of bullets any second -- and when said attack doesn't come, he steps out into the central chamber; taking a step to the left, towards the doors into the kitchen.

He looks around the central chamber -- which he has been assuming would be a laboratory of some kind -- as he pulls the stun baton from where he had attached it to his suit.

~I hope these are really as water-proof as The Count was told they are~ he thinks, as he activates the baton.

The large central area has the appearance of an operating theatre. There is a large flat table in the middle with an assortment of control stations along both side. Perhaps of more concern is the large dead carcass still on the table. It's easily the size of a small whale.

You also notice that there is another door off to the right and yet another one further along that side of the curve.
This message was last edited by the GM at 19:41, Fri 15 May 2015.

In reply to Samantha Kilgore (msg # 36):

"A bit late to come up with that." Khea replies while staring at the dome in the distance.
"We can always hover our vessel in front of their docking bay and threaten to destroy that glass windows. But I am more concerned that our advance team is shooting the place up including the data we need to recover.""

Visibly excited, she pushes herself away from the chair she was leaning against and without waiting for an answer leaves the cockpit, shouting. "Anyway, we need to get prepared to board".

With a twitching tail she goes to the stored equipment, takes one of the leftover stunners and her old Khaifealate which she loads and checks. She thought about trying out her new humaniti gun, but decides that she first needs to take it apart to understand it before using it.

Sharik is backing up Vonon as he makes his way into the structure.  She nods to Quinzella and then Tolman to ensure that they are both ready to enter.  Then the diminutive socialite pulled her own stunstick from its thigh holster and brandished it, moving to back up Vonon as necessary.  Her own vacc suit started to wick the water away, causing it to bead and then drip off quickly as high-tech smart fabrics were want to do.

She tested the weight of the rod, knowing that it wasn't exactly a fencing blade, like she was used to.  However, the stun stick did have an end that could be used on the target - so, perhaps some of those fencing lessons that her father paid for might come in handy.  If not, Shar still had the diving knife strapped to her other thigh.

Entering the room, the auburn-haired dilettante regarded the carcass in the room for a moment.  She hrumphed quietly, then turned slightly towards Tolman prompting him, "A grendal, I presume."  She moved to see if she could get a visual capture of the scene on her hand computers camera without removing her vaccsuit glove.

Then Shar motioned from Vonon to cover the two large doors on the far side and wait there.  The she gestured for Quinzella and Tolman to check the single door off to the left.  If the floorplan, which her virtual personal aide had overlaid HUD-fashion into her glasses lenses, held true, the near doors were likely the kitchen and the far doors led to outer ring and ultimately to the docking bay.  But the area at the near doors would need to be secured first.

Sharik herself moved to the other side of the table with the autopsy corpse, which gave her a view of both doors and the potential to be able to rush to either, as necessary.  She motioned for Quinzella and Tolman to proceed when they were both ready.

In reply to Sharik Kaagira (msg # 44):

Vonon similarly had a schematic of the dome displayed on the inside of his faceplate, and nodded as Sharik issued a few quick instructions.

"Good plan." he responded, quietly, through his suits external audio, as he headed left, around the big table.

"Remember, there are windows looking into this chamber!" Vonon added, pointing at the window into the kitchen as he passed it, "Keep an eye on them."

Vonon paused at the end of the second window on the left -- the one after the kitchen door, behind the desk -- and peeked around the edge to look into the hallway, before he heads on to the double doors.


OOC: first, does Vonon see anyone in any of the hallway that he can see through the window? second, are the double doors solid panels, or do they have windows -- and if they do have windows, can they be seen through?

The doors are solid... no windows in them.

Looking through the windows to the hallway, you don't see anyone. However, you do catch a glimpse of movement through one of the windows at the opposite end of the operating table.

Quin quietly walked over to Sharik as she stood at the corpse, she whispered something.    She sighed, "I am sorry."  She placed her hand on the carcass and closed her eyes a brief moment.

She eye scanned the room for surveillance gear, to her knowledge it could be anywhere, independent or not, cameras and the like.  Then she slowly made her way to the door she was asked to penetrate, she stood at the ready waiting for Tolman's signal he too was ready.

My bad! Don't know my left from my right sometimes!


There are four doors out of this central room, plus the airlock. The two that are shown on the map, plus there's a door to the right where the second window would be, and there's another door behind the desk on the right.

Quinzell and Tolman can hear arguing through the door behind the right side desk. The door muffles it so that you can't quite make out what is being said, but it's loud enough to penetrate through the door.