Mika stayed back from the edge as autofire continued to pour upwards.  Keeping her sensors well back from the edge she merely held her hand with the blaster over the edge and shot down.  She didn't expect to hit but at least it kept her safe.  While she shot haphazardly she looked around the edges of the roof.  She recalled the walls were fairly easy to scale.  Anyone could have done it with a rope or basic climbing gear.  Even without it was possible. 

The autofire from below had slowed to controlled bursts everytime Mika's hand appeared.  At one point she heard the merc below cry out in surprise and for a second she thought she'd hit the merc but a burst of autofire suddenly shot up the hole.

"Cute, real cute." the merc called up.  "Scramble the input protocols so it wont accept my code.  Nice trick."  The voice seemed more amused then angry.

Mika didn't respond immediately.  One of the last bolts had caught her in the hand holding the gun.  While powered down it still gave off a nasty sting and mild thump.  The shock alone had nearly made her drop the pistol but sheer will had made her hang on and pull her hand back.  Examining her hand she saw mild red mark that was already fading.  There was no pain.  It had been a suprise more than anything.


**GAME CLOCK - 1 minute 00 seconds remaining**

Mika pulls her hand back in shock and inspects it.  She sets the blaster aside and shakes her hand.  She'd hoped the scrambled input would give her a bit more of an opening to try a shot.  Oh well.

At this point, there was two reds and a minute to go.  There was no way she could take out the merc and get to the other building to hit the button, so she couldn't hope to win and if she kept to her current strategy, it might slow the merc a bit, but wouldn't stop him.  So, taking a deep breathe, she stops worrying about avoiding getting hit and she focuses on taking out the merc.

Heard by the other team members but not, presumably, by Mika, CC9 issues a short statement.

"All team members are to assemble in Briefing Room B upon match completion.  There are alcoholic beverages and organic nourishment."  He stomps that way himself without another word.

Mika steeled herself and decided to brave the suppressing fire of the repeater.  Moving forward she opened up on the merc with her pistol.  She noticed the merc had been typing with one hand while resting his repeater on a table, allowing him to shoot roughly in her direction.  Now he saw her taking more careful aim he abandoned his work, took a two-handed grip and opened fire whilst taking cover under the desk.

The exchange of fire seemed to last an eternity but was closer to thirty seconds.  Both combatants were using cover to their advantage.  Finally, Mika edged forward slightly to get a better shot on an exposed sensor on the merc.  Spotting her move he fired another autofire blast that blinded Mika momentarily.

"Players Blue Nine and Red Six have been terminated.  Blue team has been terminated.  Red team wins.  All players collect all equipment and report to your respective debriefing areas."

---

OOC: All Talons are now able to post/act once more.  You exit the sim through the same door you enter.  There is a room to leave all the sim gear and collect your own equipment.  Then you are shown to a debriefing area where according to CC9 food and drink awaits.

Fiarr gratefully stood and stretched.  She'd died in the first few minutes of the fight, the first person to die in fact.  It was nice to finally be ably to just stand and stretch.  Even though she often sat immobile for hours at a time when working as a sniper, at least then she got to choose her ground.  Here she was lying on and admist rubble.

Silently she hoisted her weapons and walked towards the exit.  After discarding her training equipment and collecting her own she walked into the debriefing area and helped herself to a drink while waiting the others.  Since she'd been closest to the exit she assumed it might be a minute or two before the others caught up.

Mika moves to collect the rifle before heading down.  She was annoyed, having been hit.  Still, at least she took the merc out with her, better than some of the others had done.   And she had outlasted the others, though a lot of that had to do with the fact that she had stayed back to guard home base.

Kyvarr grabbed what little gear she had left after her 'corpse' had been looted mid-battle and she made her way out.  Finding Fiarr in the debriefing room she grabbed a lomin ale and moved over to stand next to the Bothan.

"Some great soldier I proved to be.  Won't get employed with a performance like that!"

Fiarr chuckled.  "At least you died fighting.  I'm supposed to be the sneak and I got blown away in the first few minutes without even seeing an enemy!  What role could I fill?  Target dummy perhaps!"

Dohr was both relieved and slightly disappointed in hearing the final call. He was happy to hear Kimy did her part and stopped the Red repeater guy from typing in the code. She had done very well. No. He was disappointed in himself and the work he'd done, not his teammates. With a little more time to plan the game would have definitely gone in a different manner. But that was a lousy excuse. He had made a couple of fatal mistakes (which fortunately weren't fatal) that probably had cost their side the victory.

As the doctor waited for Mika to climb down, he nodded in acknowledgement to the "enemy" team members. It had been a good and fairly even game and he held no grudge against them. When the girl arrived, Dohr smiled behind his mask and did quite an un-Kel Dorian thing and padded her on the shoulder as he had seen humans do innumerable times. "Well played, Kimy. You did your part well even if you had fairly little to do other than run around following my… let us say, varying orders. I have understood that you are not a soldier by training, but you certainly acted like one today. Thank you."

Dohr then followed the young human down and to the briefing room B. Once there he too grabbed a bottle suitable for his kind and nodded to everyone present. "Well done everyone. I must apologize for our loss and I hope you understand it was not your doing. I will personally assume the responsibility. However, while not trying to make excuses, I would point out that this was quite different from a normal combat situation, if such a thing as normal does exist. The strict timeline, the lack of planning time and the rules were something I was not accustomed to. And that was good… But I believe we will go through what happened a little later. Let us now enjoy some refreshments and hear what Rian has in store for us."

The Doc's goggled, smiling gaze went through everyone and he then gave the group a bow. "Thank you for a good game."

CC9 shifts slightly as Dohr speaks.  When the Kel-Dor finishes he seems inclined to speak.

"Combat data is being collated and analysed.  Initial results are compiled, though further analysis will yield greater results.  The Acting-Commander will be notified as to statistical findings."  It's unlikely to be clear as to whether this is in response to Dohr, a comment to Fiarr and Kyvarr, or an independent comment.  What it clearly doesn't include, however, is a personal opinion.  Given that CC9 is a droid he's likely quite used to organics that have no interest in his opinions.  Many likely feel he isn't even capable of having them.

Mika gives Dohr a winsome little smile and a shrug for his words of encouragement.  It was nice of him to try, but regardless of his words the end result is the same, they lost.  Still, if one is going to lose a fire fight, it's nice to have everyone walking away unscathed.

"Like my fellow mission commander said, the situation was unusual and yet you handled yourselves far better than I would have given you credit for before this session. We lost by a narrow margin, but it was because of poor preparation on our part and there is only one course of action for that - learning from it. I thank you all for a good performance, even if it was a short-lived one."

Fiarr looked at Idaya with surprise.  "Not sure what was so unusual about the situation.  We had to capture a time critical target while defending our own.  I can think of several comparable missions I went on for the Bothan Military.  Of course, I managed to survive those!"  There was a edge of humour to her last statement.  She obviously didn't mind having 'died'.

CC9 speaks up again.  "Combat analysis complete.  Forwarded to acting-command unit and comms officer."

As CC9 speaks a small M4 droid buzzes in and begins projecting an image of Cor from about the solar plexus up.

"Analysis received, thank you, CC9," Cor says pleasantly.  Her smile is one of schooled mildness.  "Extrapolated analysis concurs with initial findings.  Relative skills of the enemy mercenary team have been taken into account.  I am interested, Idaya, in hearing exactly how well you thought the team would do, considering your claim that they exceeded your expectations.  Irrespective of that, however," she continues, "I believe from conversations gleaned both in the field and very recently, that the purpose of this exercise has been...  Misunderstood.  CC9, would you care to remind the team of this and provide summary conclusion and recommendation?"

"By your command," CC9 grates.  "Primary objective of Combat Scenario Alpha was to assess leadership capability in new recruits.  Objective was to assess how recruits Idaya and Veen would respond to a live-fire situation without placing them in a life-or-death situation as it was determined that if their leadership abilities lacked it may result in themselves or other team members being permanently terminated."  There is a pause.  "Primary objective was not to assess efficacy of the team, the skills of individual team members or to win the scenario.  Those factors have generated useful data but are ultimately irrelevant.  Primary data gathered suggests that team leadership units Veen and Idaya failed to treat the situation as a live-fire circumstance.  Their actions have therefore compromised primary data gained."

He continues without any particular pause.  "Conclusion: data gained must be treated in one of two ways: either it is corrupt and the scenario has been a waste of resources; or the data is valid and the leadership units would in fact act as they did in a live-fire situation.  Recommendation: the simulation should be run again on a different training ground with different mission objectives."

"Hear that?" Devon asked no-one in particular as he ambled in, flicking through charts of information on his datapad.  "I'm not a person any more, I'm a unit." he didn't sound particularly offended.

Gravitating toward the table Devon scooped up a bottled beer and some finger food whilst the conversation flowed around him; then leaned against the door frame, still engrossed in his datapad.  After CC9 delivered his assessment, Devon nodded agreement with the droid.

"CC9 is right - dont forget that this wasnt about whether we won or lost, this was about assessing leadership skills without getting anyone permanently dead.  I wanna hear how people thought we did, what mistakes we made, how we can do it better next time.  But right now I gotta go have a quick chat with leader of the other guys - names Pranger - and a couple of the instructors.  Shouldn't be more than ten minutes."

Nodding to the group, Devon made his exit and disappeared from view.  After a few moments his voice echod back to them.
"SEV!"
Before the shout had faded, Devons M4 droid zoomed past the open doorway in hot pursuit of its master, whistling in excitement.

The droid's calculation of the game was very… droid-like. Dohr disagreed with parts of it, but he could not deny the truth behind the evaluation. In his mind such an exercise was never a waste of resources however. He'd never played a game quite like this one, but on the other hand he'd fought through more than a few simulations and field exercises during his years. All, even failed ones, had been valuable learning experiences. And he saw this game as one too. At least for himself.

The other option… Was not completely true either in the Kel Dorian Major's mind. In real life and death situation, he would not have acted with such a haste. Not at least had the scenario had been the same. In live-fire situations, as CC9 had called it, Dohr would've taken a few more minutes to plan the whole thing. Had the game been for real, he probably would have considered an all out defense a better option than dividing their team into two. But CC9 had a point. Perhaps he had not taken the game seriously enough. He had after all reminded himself numerous times that the game had been just that - a game.

Yet the evidence was clear. He had made a terrible mistake in the first minute of the game by not sending a pair of eyes to the window. It had allowed the enemy to run unnoticed across the strip separating the buildings and take the Defense Team by surprise. Unforgivable.

Keeping his mouth shut and letting the rest of the team give their evaluations first, Dohr nodded in acknowledgement to Devon. Rian was right of course. It had not been just a game. It had been more of an interview for the job the Merc team was offering. Not a full failure in Dohr's mind, but neither a complete success.

Mika kicks back in her chair and pushes her feet against it's edge, riding the chair back on it's rear legs.  She wasn't so concerned with the stated primary goal of the exercise.  In her thinking, they'd had an= contest and they had lost and she didn't like it.  It wasn't so different from the swoop race, although this time she wasn't all banged up.

Kyvarr sat uncharacteristically silent.  In her own mind she went over the battle in her mind.  They had been outplayed.  Not outgunned or outclassed, merely outplayed.  The mercs had been good but they had not been great.  She'd done training exercises with commandos back on Laridia and they'd been far superior to these mercs.  She suspected if they compared range scores this group would probably score higher.  No, the enemies had known the field and they'd used it to their advantage.  Infiltration teams, barricades and fall back points.  They had planned, and planned well.

She gripped her drink tightly, glad it was metallic as a glass would have shattered under her grip.  As it was the cup would carry indents from her fingers and deep grooves from her claws.  The Cathar berated herself for losing her team to what she considered an inferior enemy.

Fiarr looked over at CC9 as he spoke.  Then she turned her attention to Idaya and Dohr.  "Is he right?  Would you have done things differently if the weapons were live and the objective real?"

It was a good question and they all did deserve an answer. Dohr nodded to Fiarr and stood up from the chair he’d been sitting on. The doctor cleared his throat and thought about it a moment before speaking. ”It is fairly difficult for me to think of a real-life situation in which the setup would be the same as was in the game. A time limit of 15 minutes would be possible of course, even probable in some situations. Defending a base while trying to infiltrate an enemy one would be a normal scenario in any war. Combining those two… Now that would be a rare thing. And when one adds to that the need of distributing previously unknown amount and range of weapons to people whose skills are not fully known, it becomes a one in a million situation. And having two commanders without a predefined roles doubles the unlikeliness.”

Dohr kept a pause and lowered his gaze to do some more thinking before continuing: ”Therefore I cannot give you a definite answer. Had the exercise been for real, we all would already have had our weapons at the ready. We probably would have had some intel on the enemy and the target building. And we definitely would have known our base setup better.” The Kel Dor raised one hand to halt any arguments for a moment. ”Now that was not meant as an excuse. But fifteen minutes is a very short time to plan and execute any kind of a military mission. Had our lives been at stake, I would have preferred to stay and defend our base of operations… Well why did I not choose to do so now? It was the decision Idaya and I made as your commanding officers. For even thought the goal of the exercise was to evaluate our leading skills, we also wanted to give us all a chance at winning the game as well and the only way to do so was to eliminate the enemy team or to catch their ‘flag’. And in dividing the group into assault and defence, we had two separate groups for two leaders making it easier for both us and you to operate and your leaders to evaluate our performance.”

Dohr took a sip of his drink and carried on. ”So I would say: Yes, I would have done things differently with live weapons and real objective. But that I am sure must have been clear to your leaders before the event took place. And it should not really matter. Even if orders would have been different, then I am sure this exercise gave them a good chance to evaluate our way of operating in charge of a small troop. It is after all the way all officer students are assessed during military training as well. They do not, and fortunately so, usually have to face death during their education.”

Another sip and another pause. ”So. It comes down to our successes and failures in the exercise, I believe. While I do not dare to presume I know how Idaya and I will be evaluated, I would like to give you my opinion of my own performance even though Rian is not present… In my mind, all in all we did fairly well as a team. The enemy clearly had earlier experience of the game and knew the layout of the buildings very well. I would go far enough to guess they even knew exactly how a first-timer team would operate, how we would be forced to waste time in planning and considering our options. And that is what made this game very interesting and a good learning experience.”” At this point Dohr looks at Fiarr and spreads his arms in surrender. ”Although it must not have been too interesting for those of you who got removed from the game very early…"

"I would consider my… or our”  The Doc smiled at Idaya. ”worst mistake having no eyes on the strip for four full minutes at the start of the game. That was totally unacceptable. It gave the enemy plenty of time to get their defences in place and worse yet, it allowed their assault team to reach our building without us knowing anything about it. So the error was in fact considering the enemy beginners in the game as well or in fact not taking them as veterans instead.”

Dohr had been speaking for a while, but decided to carry on a bit longer. ”Another mistake was the weapon distribution. Janine and Vyn should have been given a rifle as well. Though you valiantly tried to shoot at the enemy building as per my order, Janine, it was totally useless. With a rifle you would have been able to do much more. Apologies for that. And same goes for Vyn on rooftop. Although I fear you would have been taken as a target even earlier, had you fired shots at the enemies.”

”I would like to finish by expressing my thanks to the Defence Team. You did admirably despite the mistakes I made as your leader in this exercise. Kimy, your idea of hacking the console was brilliant and Vyn heading to the rooftop to observe the enemy, that was very well thought of as well. Janine, I fear your chances of shining were killed by the fact that we let the enemy slip into our building unnoticed. Well played nevertheless.”

CC9 remains silent through this discussion.  When Dohr finishes talking he speaks up.  His speech is simple, direct.

"Scenario: The team has been dropped into enemy territory with little to no information; the lack of intel is due to communications failure.  After an extensive fight the team has run out of ammunition but has been told of a cache in an abandoned forward base; they have been told this by indigenous peoples who have fled before giving any strategic intel.

"The moment the team reaches their first waypoint a team of mercenaries hired by the Empire attacks from a secondary base.  The merc's goal is to secure the forward base.  At the same time the team learns the only surviving communications equipment that will reach off-planet is in the secondary base.   The mercenaries must therefore secure the forward base, while the team must secure the secondary base.  The mercenaries have comparable weaponry but much more local knowledge.  There is next to no time to plan as the attack occurs only minutes after the team reaches the weapons stash in the forward base."

He pauses and then turns his head to look straight at Dohr.  "This is contrived, of course, as it is a reasoning fabricated 'on the spot', but is not unbelievable.  Drops into hostile zones with little to no intel is, by itself, a scenario with a probability calculation of considerably higher than one million to one against.  As for your assertion that it 'does not matter' that you failed to take the scenario seriously, that is erroneous.  The believability of the scenario should not have impacted on how seriously it was taken.  It was made sufficiently clear before commencement that the scenario was arranged for evaluation purposes, not recreational purposes.  Observing how you acted while taking the scenario seriously was the entire point.  Secondary data may or may not be valuable but the attitude of the leadership pair was key to gathering the primary data.  That fact cannot be ignored or devalued."

His tone is flat and, as always, monotonous.  He can presumably vary his tone when he feels like it but right now he apparently doesn't.  His words are not actually hostile or damning but they are confrontational and they do lack compromise.

"Ballistic data," he adds, "reveals that the mercenary team's overall skill with blaster weaponry to be considerably below the average skill of this team's."

Flash looked over at Sheila and Mika.  "Reminds me of that fuel convoy we defended, the one where we first met you Kimy."

He looked over to the others and explained.  "It was an actual mission this team undertook.  We were tasked with defending a fuel convoy.  We were attacked by pirates and one docked and boarded one of the freighters.  Members of our team had to attack the pirate shuttle while preventing the pirates from taking the bridge.  To make matters worse we had to get it done before their starfighter escort arrived to blow us to atoms.  We won, though a bandoleer of thermal detonators went off in the shuttle but miraculously didn't ignite the fuel.  Still the freighter limped got where it was going."

Dohr shakes his head as CC9 delivers his description of a similar situation in real life. ”With no intention to start an argument with either of you, I would like to point out where our thinking differs… The scenario you have described CC9 is plausible, I admit. I could take place, but would to me seem very unlikely. Then again your mind would be better fitted in calculating such odds, I am sure.”

Dohr took a look around the room ”In your team’s case, I doubt such a thing would happen especially with the people gathered here. I would like to think that your commander would not order an assault team into enemy territory without proper information available. And if he did like in the example Forim has described, I’d assume it would be using military personnel only. And even if all your people present would take part in such an assault, you would still know each other better, have your favorite weapons at hand and would probably have some support available as well. And in any case you would not have two persons, previously unknown to each other and yourselves, taking command of the team.”

”But I am getting carried away here. Let me apologise. You’re absolutely right. None of that is really important. What just moments ago took place, is. As I am no professional when it comes to heuristic processors or droids in the first place, I cannot say your brain works CC9. And though you have taken me completely by surprise with your personality and character, I would have a hard time believing you know how a Kel Dorian mind operates. Therefore I would like to say you have misunderstood my words.”

Dohr took another sip before continuing: ”Let me assure you that even though I mentioned I might have acted differently for example in the scenario you so kindly and quickly came up with, it does not mean I did not take the exercise seriously, for I certainly did. What I merely said was, that when someone is evaluating my performance based on a fabricated game exercise, it should not matter how I might act in a totally different situation. Only how I operated during this mission should make any difference. Then again, that is not for me to decide…

”…and I really cannot see how you came to that conclusion… Aah.. Now I see. Even though I said I wanted us to have a go at the enemy base, that did not mean it was for recreational purposes only. No. That was in my mind, and I believe in Idaya’s as well, the best solution as we indeed had two people in command. Clear division of the troops and responsibilities to avoid confusion. Yes that could have been done with two defending teams as well, but that was the decision we made in all the haste and we cannot go back and change it.”

"But as I said. I do not wish to argue with you. You are entitled to your opinion and view and I will respect that."