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Subject: "(EX) Operation Archangel 2: Grand Theft Vessel"     Previous Topic | Next Topic
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"(EX) Operation Archangel 2: Grand Theft Vessel"
 
  
Monday, November 4, 2289
Halstead Yard Dock Section 3EC
Halstead, Corporate Sector_

Breaching Dock Section 3EC's central computer room was reasonably simple, if only because it was a section flagged as "medium priority storage" and thus security was fairly light. Once they had the room open and its Boomer guards neutralized, the squad covered the exits and watched for patrols while Kevirin compromised the computer and searched the inventory records.

"There are four thousand vessels in this section alone," Kevirin noted as the list scrolled through the air above his palm. "Going to need to narrow it down." He trimmed out all the ships that weren't working, then the ones that were too big, then those that were too slow, and then those requiring too large a crew.

"Thirty seconds," Alenko reported, the tension obvious in his voice.

Kevirin worked at the same brisk but unrushed pace, all his attention focused on manipulating the data. Fuel requirements; FTL modes available; communications protocols enabled. He built a complicated web of requirements and trimmed them down, narrowing and narrowing the focus until he'd finally reached what he figured was just about the ideal vessel for their purposes.

"Got it," he said. "Bay 35F. One starship in the 400-to-500-foot range. Class isn't listed, nor name, but whatever it is, it has a required crew of five, accommodations for up to 30. Fueled, armed, factor-one hyperdrive. That's as good as we're going to get."

"Can you bypass the security on the bay?" Garrus asked.

"Not from here. I can redirect the patrol groups to the far ends of the complex, that will buy us some time, but when we penetrate the bay, it'll probably sound alarms. Those systems are hardwired."

"Well, if it was easy everybody'd be doin' it," Williams remarked. "Let's go."

They moved through the corridors quickly and quietly, avoiding the infrequent personnel rather than wasting time in confrontations. Along the hallways, periodic long windows looked out into the docking bay complex. They passed ships of almost every size and description, from Victory-class Star Destroyers awaiting drydock space for overhauls to captured pirate vessels and warships of various nations that had "gone missing" in the wake of the WDF's fall. Liara recognized one as the asari cruiser Sudden Epiphany, the loss of which had been attributed to the supposedly-rogue WDF warship Righteous Indignation by GENOM's PR machine.

"Next one's ours," Kevirin said when they passed the door to Bay 35E. The team tightened up and picked up the pace - until the next window showed them what was in the bay, when they all paused as one and stood staring, dumbfounded. The ship moored in Bay 35F was a Corellian-built Model CR90 corvette, its hull thermocoated in plain grey except for some simple markings:

Kaidan stared. "My God, it's one of ours," he said.

Ashley Williams scowled. "This is one of SPECWARCOM's ships," she said. "How'd GENOM get ahold of it?"

"Judging by the lack of hull damage," Wrex observed, "I'm guessing without much of a fight."

"They must have had infiltrators aboard, like we did," Garrus mused.

Wrex's wide mouth curled up at one corner in a nasty smirk. "Who had better luck than ours."

"Damn shame about Yeoman Chambers," said Williams wistfully.

"Okay, guys," said Kevirin, firing up his omni-tool again. "This is the place. When I crack this door, things are going to get very busy around here. Is everybody ready?"

Wrex primed his shotgun. "Let's do it."

The bay door yielded almost instantly to Kevirin's codebreaker - and, as he had predicted, opening it set off a red strobe light and an alarm whose howl reverberated painfully off the alloy corridor walls. The Normandy team piled into the docking bay lobby in assault formation: Wrex and Williams in the lead, Alenko and Liara maintaining protective cover around Joker, Kevirin and Garrus covering the rear.

Roaring a krogan battlecry, Wrex blasted down the guard standing nearest the door before he even had time to react fully to the alarm, then delivered a telekinetic slam that hurled the man at the security console away from his post and against the far wall, preventing him from sounding any remote alarms. Next to him, Williams shouldered her MA5 rifle and nailed the two guards at the back of the room with quick, precise bursts, clearing the door that led to the boarding lock.

"Clear!" she declared.

"Clear," Wrex concurred.

"I've got movement at the far end," Garrus announced from the hallway door. "Must be a QRF from the dockyard hub."

"We'll be long gone by the time they get - " Kevirin began, but then he saw that the quick response force's point element was charging toward them on a plume of thruster fire. "... Boomers. Right," he added.

Garrus swapped his own MA5 for his Viper sniper rifle, drew a bead, and pegged the lead 55-series Boomer in the middle of its forehead. It crashed to the deck in a spray of shrapnel and coolant, but the two behind it were closing faster than the turian felt like hanging around for. Collapsing the Viper back to storage mode, he turned and shoved Kevirin into the docking bay lobby ahead of him, shouting, "Gangway!"

Kevirin turned to the bay door control and, lacking the time to do it any more elegantly, fried its brains with an electromagnetic pulse. With a burst of sparks from the panel, the security blast shutter clattered down and sealed off the bay.

"That should buy us a few more seconds," he said, following the others to the airlock.

Within five minutes, that entire sector of the dockyard complex was on alert and the external security force was scrambling to prevent the hijacked ship from departing - but by then, the Normandy team was in complete control of the Minuteman Nine and ready to move out.

"OK, we're powered up and ready to go," Joker reported from the helm. He ran his hand along one edge of the panel, flicking a row of switches, and then announced, "All moorings retracted. Kev, you want to get the doors for me, buddy?"

Kevirin pored over the display of his omni-tool for a moment. "Strange system," he mused. "I mean, I can see the underlying logic of it, but... aha. 'Emergency egress override.' That looks promising." He pressed a holokey...

... and through the control room's main forward viewport, the crew watched in surprise as the bay doors, a hundred yards away, were blown from their moorings and flung out into their own orbits of Halstead by explosive bolts.

"When they say 'emergency override' around here, they're not fooling around," said Kaidan, eyebrows raised.

"Thank you, Mr. Zorah," said Joker with exaggerated cordiality. Shoving the impulse throttles forward, he added cheerfully, "We're outta here."

Exhausts flaring white-hot, the Minuteman Nine glided out of her berth like a departing train, accelerating less decisively than their lost Normandy would've but with a certain smooth inexorability. By the time they cleared the blackened remains of the bay doors, they were doing a cool 75 megalights and counting.

"Free and clear," Joker announced, turning the ship onto an outbound vector. Glancing down at the controls, he nodded with satisfaction. "Nice. I mean, she's not the Normandy, but she'll do; she'll do."

"Interceptors are inbound," said Garrus from his place hunched over the sensor scope. "I make it a dozen in the first wave, with at least two more waves behind."

"Defense systems are hot," said Williams at Tactical; then she frowned at one of her readouts, keyed her intercom, and asked, "Wrex, what's the story on our dorsal turrets?"

"Looks like the automatic fire control system's out," replied Wrex's voice, speaking from the upper gunnery bay abaft the entry port. "I think I can slave 'em together for manual... "

"Let me save you the trouble, my good krogan," said Joker with a grin. "Professor, what've you got for me?"

Liara glanced up from the navigation panel, smiled slightly in return, then bent back to her work. Two seconds later, as the first of the wildly inaccurate long-range blaster bursts from their pursuers began to whine past, she reported, "Course computed and locked."

"It's such a pleasure to work with professionals," Joker observed. Then, with a decisive flourish, he engaged the hyperdrive, and they were away. "And that, ladies and gentlemen," he declared with satisfaction, "is how we do that."

"Grand Theft Vessel" - Part 2 of Operation Archangel, an Exile Mini-Serial by Benjamin D. Hutchins
Based on characters from Mass Effect by BioWare
Special to the Eyrie Productions Discussion Forum
© 2012 Eyrie Productions, Unlimited_


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