Zethina's equipment was all neatly stowed and arranged on her person by the time they made landfall once more but the sudden drawing of weapons on a bystander ground against her sensibilities as she stepped down the ramp. A hand moved carefully to the holster of her shotgun at her hip as a precaution as she drew closer but never drew. Everything speaking to well drilled in training and the maxims of the Drill Abbots.

"Yes, lets keep our presence as quiet as we can otherwise we'll either find ourselves buried beneath our enemies or that any lead has gone to ground and we will have failed." Zethina offered softly with a mindfulness to her voice not carrying farther than it needed to. She didn't care to be closer to the woman than she had to as her stomach turned and revulsion roiled to the fore of her mind and she was forced to swallow it down just as swiftly.

"Remove your hand or I will" she says coldly to corpsman as he grabs her wrist and she stops, her blue-grey eyes staring at him "The last team, was ambushed and killed and I don't wish to follow their example." she hisses at the older man.

"So your thinking is to make an announcement that were a bit off?" He asked as he let go of her wrist "Listen I don't know what they teach you in the arbites but in the guard they taught us about a thing called stealth, and it is not running up to random people guns drawn demanding them to identify yourself. Again unless you plan to kill him it will make more problems down the road." He said as he look from Morrigan to Zethina "But thats just my two cents as the doctor of the group so what do I know, except a multitude of ways to kill someone and make it looks like an accident." He said with a smile as he walked back to the craft "And remember one way or another you'll eventually be under my knife so might be wise to listen to me." He said as he returned to help unload anything else that was needed.

"ey my ninkers. If ya are done, good to see ya all. Sparrow be my name an ol' Leo's the game. If you catch my meaning. Don't kill each other so easily, there are plenty of ninkers to kill 'round 'ere."
Casually he popped a piece of unidentified and barely edible fried meat in his mouth and muched on it happily.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:17, Sun 31 May 2020.

"I've never been in the Arbites, that's her" she says angling her head towards Zethina "Besides our enemies have known about insertions before and we just landed a damn VTOL with no cargo, stealth isn't a viable option, neither is arguing in an undefended launch pad with little cover" she adds before walking away from the man towards this Sparrow "Morrigan, ready to move out when you are."

"Fair enough. Sooner we can get a base of operations up and our investigation begun, the sooner we can be on the offensive." Zethina agreed with a quiet note as she offered a nod towards Sparrow. Her expression making it clear enough that she did not trust the operative any farther than she might throw the man until there was something further to cement his relationship to their present master.

"If it mean's less gun pointing and yelling I agree." He said as he grabbed a duffel bag and lifted it onto his shoulder one hand free incase he had to pull a gun or his axe which was secured to the small of his back "Hope where ever we are set up has a decently sized room with a drain in the middle of the floor." He said with a chuckle as he walked over to the others.

"Lets move out before this one's shouting draws more attention" she says to no one in particular. She moves back to where she dropped her bag before encountering this Sparrow, gathers it up then moves back to the others, keeping her pistol in hand.

"Fine fine gents and gentle ladies. "
The man lazily jumped off the prometheum drum and motioned the group to follow him.
"Th' place is not too far" he grinned "but don't expect anything fancy.
His grin quickly disappeared and was replaced by a professional frown as the group exited the semi-disused landing pad. His accent changed slightly.
"I posed as the errand boy of a prometheum merchant to rent a disused warehouse a couple of blocks down, around 30 minutes walk from here. It has a couple of offices that were converted into sleeping quarters back when this stack was up and going. There is a buggy that would fit three of us conveniently and four of us inconveniently. What do you call yourselves?
This message was last edited by the player at 19:07, Wed 10 June 2020.

The streets are really crowded - maybe as expected from a hive city. People constantly bump into you then without looking they continue on their business. You trod along a wide sidewalk next to a major artery road. Junk litters the streets, vagrants burn junk in empty prometheum drums and the local manual laborers sometimes give the Magistratum a wide berth when they appear. This looks like an industrial neighborhood where some kind of petrochemical processing takes place: The smog is awful, the lingering smell of burned plastic permeates everything. Streetlights barely work and the deafening sound of cargo-12 convoys bearing the sigil of one of the Fanes often block out all conversation.
This message was last edited by the GM at 19:13, Wed 10 June 2020.

"My name is Morrigan" she says to Sparrow as she gets ready to head to the warehouse, breathing through her nose so the filtration plugs took most of the fug before it went into her lungs.

Looking at the cargo-12's she tries to remember which one of the fanes it belonged to. "How much further and is this compound secure?"

Morrison walked along a smile on his face he was use to crowds, maybe not this many but it didn't make him feel awkward at all "Well he said thirty minutes and I'd bet we have been walking between five or ten minutes so probably another twenty or so." He said with a chuckle "And it will probably be as secure as we make it honestly, more then likely our best tool will be anonymity not looking to out of place." He said though right then he looked to be the most out of place in clearly guard issue gear a large duffel bag on his shoulder "Just call me Morrison, I have a last name but Ive gotten tired of people failing to pronounce it so most of my paperwork just has my first name." He said with a chuckle as they walked.

Zethina followed after the others and took a moment to consider the casual acts of offering their names. Her own fall from grace had made her paranoid and there were precious few assurances of loyalty or trust in the depths and shadows they were now expected to act in. Which only really dove tailed into the more dire lessons of her upbringing and the ultimate corruptibility of man save for the grace of Him on Terra. Still, if their enemy were so connected as to already deduce what was sent against them then the fight was already a dire one.

"Zethina." she offered as she checked the ties and bindings of her own respirator. It was a far less elegant response to the muck and pollution of a hive world but it provided a far stronger aegis against contamination of the body.

About thirty minutes later "Sparrow" led the group to a disused warehouse seemingly at the armpit of Gunmetal City or GMC as he lazily referred the hive. The large warehouse had a lower level where at least five cargo 8 or cargo 12 could park and a flight of stairs leading upstairs to a converted office. Out of the four amply sized rooms there two have been converted to sleeping quarters capable of housing at least 20 people, the third was a small kitchen and finally a common room.
Downstairs smelled like human waste and garbage with an almost dismantled cargo 8 stuck in the middle for all eternity next to a barebones all terrain buggy that to the contrary of what Sparrow said could barely fit two people, let alone four. Upstairs the kitchen had several boxes full of corpse starch rations and gallons of recycled water. The sleeping quarters were dirty and smelled of old socks but one could cherry pick some pillows or duvets that were less disgusting. The common room had a large table with a dozen chairs around it and in the middle the group could see a state of the art vox station probably capable of voxing to near orbit.

"Get yourself comfortable then gimme the plan. I see youz guys are not really the talking type."
Sparrow said upon arrival.

"It really depends on the conversation, and right now I think we are all a bit on edge wanting to get to a point of relative safety." He said as he put his duffel down at the bottom of the stairs and looked at the others "Would either of you ladies like to assist me in a good old fashion sweep?" He asked with a grin as he pulled the shotgun from the duffel half racking it to be sure there was a round in the chamber "Or would you two like to split the bottom area?" He added with a smile as he looked at Sparrow "For the moment I'd say stay where we can see you, don't want to say we don't trust you but.." He trailed off as he started up the stairs slowly seeming to look at each one incase one was rigged or just plan old.

"Talk has generally made more trouble for me than action. For now, I'll join my compatriot in a quick sweep of the perimeter and then we can sit down to discuss in full how we'll begin and approach our investigation. The trail is likely cold enough that even finding a lead will be difficult." Zethina replied as she set down her own baggage with care and drew out the length of a las carbine in consideration of the shotgun held by her compatriot. She moved through the rites of maintenance and activation with practiced care then as she slid home the charge pack. The weapons machine spirits stirring to life with that distinct whine of power distributed through it's wiring and systems that every guardsmen knew well.

"I'd avoid any splitting up unless we absolutely have to but His will has somewhat ensured that we're at a disadvantage in even that for the moment." she added with a nod towards Morrison as she held the carbine with a finer studiously away from the trigger in Schola approved technique.

"I'm more just checking for things like explosives, or maybe a vagrant thinking this place turned real nice and started crashing here." He said still moving up the stairs "If we were going to be attacked they would have done it while we didn't have our weapons out, maybe as soon as we walked in." He added calmly the threat of death becoming a numbing constant to a corpsman in the guard.

"I'd think it'd be too risky to attack the pad. Especially as they don't know if that was a covert gunship or not. Odds are we're still under surveillance." Zethina offered with a slight frown hidden behind the bulk of her respirator mask as she followed. her voice muffled but still infused with those particular tones of someone that had benefited from a full and thorough education. Which begged the question as to what she did to get her own set of conviction branding and then have it further turned over.

There was a certain care and stiffness in her posture as she moved that spoke to deeply set drilling twice over though the look in her eyes showed the will of someone recovering and clinging to a central truth. Not something that was uncommon among the combat arms of the Adepta Terra but there was certainly more to consider there.

Morrigan unholstered her scalptaker and moved into the building. She moves into the ground level, searching the main cargo area before moving to the stairs to examine one of the bedrooms. "We should find a way to reinforce the structures entry points and especially these quarters" she says before dropping her kitbag on one of the beds.

Morrigan and perhaps the others did a sweep of the building. The buggy and the vox seemed to work properly and most of the food has still not expired. The food that's expired has only done so by a couple of days so it should still be edible by Guardsman standards. With the right tools one could further dismantle the cargo 8 to somehow fortify the building but you didn't really have the right tools and according to Sparrow "our chief weapon is surprise" and fortifying the exterior with cargo 8 parts would not be useful.

If you have any relevant skills you want to roll, please do. I'll apply any modifiers and tell results.

Zethina was meticulous but between paranoia and the disquieting sensations that left her skin still crawling from Morrigan... She wasn't quite as attentive as she believed herself to be. That did not, however, mean she was unaware of her environment by the same token as even the lowest sectors of a Hive held at least some familiarity thanks to hard won experience and a dogged pursuit of truth and justice through it.

Coming back out of the furthest bunk room she says to the others "You two may want to both use the other room if you want to sleep well" then looks around the room "And we will want to reinforce this space, perhaps some sandbags if they can be found in this place for along this corridor in case of an ambush or assault, perhaps strip panelling from the the useless vehicles, if we can acquire more vehicles to strip as well that may be an idea." she adds

"Take care when reinforcing." Morrison said as he had gotten his pack from the bottom of the stairs and was bringing it up "Barricades go both ways, and honestly if they were ok with blowing up the first lot why would they pay us the kindness of attacking with standard arms." He said as he threw his pack into the room Morrigan had recommended as he looked at the others "Only thing that really bothers me is the lack of a proper medical station." He said as he looked between the two women "Don't get me wrong, you two ladies look more then capable of handling yourself but if you take a bad enough hit I'm not sure this" He paused holding up the field kit he always carried letting them see the various silver cutting utensils that dangled off it "Can do much but put you in a decent state to die in." He said as he silently prayed that if they did take a bad wound it was from a las gun and nothing that shot slugs or shells as las weapons had the uncanny property or cauterizing any wound they caused making death a little less likely.

Sparrow added some cheap advice himself.
"Y' might wanna be careful with reinforcing the walls. These ceilings are made of cheap plastec blocks from back in '03 and if you pack enough weight on it the whole inner thing might crumble. Also if you guys don't attract much attention or y' know kill everyone else -noone will come after yous guys. I don't think y'll find any sand nearby either. Perhaps some rocks. "
He smirked irksomely.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:00, Thu 16 July 2020.