Fail Flail/Grif Mason - N/A
The door to the tower opens easily enough, and it’s only a short climb up a spiral staircase. Once inside, you see dozens of panels and buttons. Some old clipboards have cryptic schedules written on them.

You find what looks to be the power button, and hit it, then spend a couple of minutes wiring your headset into the tower. It’s a bit touch-and-go, but it works.

9 vs 5 - Success!

The signal is pretty bad, but you manage to boost it enough to pick up on some chatter. The Ulysses made a crash landing on the icy northern continent, and is going to be grounded for the foreseeable future.

All primary units are to converge on the colony/city of Taris and investigate. Some of the other more experienced units appear to be getting specific orders, but that’s their worry not yours. A couple of units are currently considered MIA until further notice, although yours doesn't seem to be on that list.

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Harzipan/Nikolai Petrouski - N/A
The hut nearest the wall appears to have been primarily used as accomodation - it has half a dozen bunks, a small kitchen/dining area, and a small recreation area. The personnel here left in a hurry - there’s no food out, but the beds aren’t made. The footlockers at the end of each bed are still open, emptied out of anything they may once have held.

The other hut is an improvised storage area, with rack shelving. Most of it is clutter, and of little use to you, but you do find three sealed waist-high lockers at the back that look suspiciously like weapon lockers, along with a long footlocker. Unfortunately they’re all codelocked, and nothing you try is working.

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TheKebbit/Havelock Dagenham - N/A
Dammit you, you’re a medic, not a tech! You do find a box of (slightly rusty) nails, a couple of screwdrivers, and an old hammer in the storage hut though.

New Item: Basic Tools - You won’t fix much more than a fence with these things, unless you’re feeling unusually creative.

Added to Inventory: Basic Tools

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Miggles/Dirk Mason - N/A
You aid Nikolai and Havelock in their looting-- equipment redistribution, and manage to haul a large box of ration bars out of a kitchen cupboard. The rest of the squad seems a little disinclined to take any, though.

I guess nobody trusts the ‘eat by’ date on those things, huh?

Speaking of which, the rest of the food doesn’t look too good either. You set about salvaging as many tins, cans, and bottles as possible, then stash the resulting box in the back of the APC. A search of the storage hut turns up a couple of old field cookers too, so those are set aside in the APC as well.

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Izen/CD-V5 - N/A
The APC is old and battered, but its robust nature pays off. No wonder the Marines used these things.

9 vs 4 - Success!

From an external access panel on the roof you’re able to restart the power/propulsion unit, and two of the three backup cells are still almost fully charged. This should easily get you to the outskirts of Taris.

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Traumahawk/Georgii Alekseyvich Vorotyntsev - N/A
The only weapons you might discover are in the lockers Nikolai found, assuming they’re not empty. It occurs to you that one of the techs might be able to hack them open. Failing that, the footlocker looks like it could be moved by two of you.

There is no ammunition lying around. These guys must have been well-disciplined. Or maybe just didn’t have many guns.

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caekdaemon/Bob Jones - N/A
Whilst CD-V5 stomps around on the roof, Jones gets the rear ramp open and heads into the driver’s seat to adjust to the controls and fire it up. It’s too old to have the now-standard Pilot Interface System, so this’ll have to be done the hard way.

After a couple of false starts, the APC rumbles to life!

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Saber Squad - N/A
You all get the sinking feeling that something is watching you. Or maybe getting closer. Possibly both.

Grif’s motion sensor pings again, a little less quietly. Only he can hear that, though.

Drive the APC directly in front of the towers entrance.
"Sir, the APC is running, I'll bring it around to the tower."


"Hey guys, do you think you could gut the radar van to bring some of its radar equipment to the APC? Who knows, we might be able to get it running."


Do we have a squad radio so we can talk to each other?

Yes. You can all talk to each other, although the terrain and other situational features (no point broadcasting out of a faraday cage) might reduce signal range. You can transmit to a specific individual (although anyone near you will probably still hear you talking) or to the squad as a whole.

Meet up with the APC. Get in it.

"Hey Commander, did you find anything in the tower?"

(Still not sure what to call Fail. Commander? Grif? Sir?)

Superior officer Sir is fine

*ping* Oh shi-
"Alright men, we're moving out! Leave that locker behind, we are marines goddammit, we don't need some damned hill-billy rifles. Now, everyone get your ass into the APC, and I want someone on that gun!"
>Usher everyone quickly but efficiently into the APC before that little blip on the motion sensor becomes some sort of carnifex and a long stream of very angry blips from my mouth.

caekdaemon/Bob Jones - N/A
The APC is parked at a really bad angle for this, but you manage to bring it to face the gate towards Taris at the very least.

Fortunately the ramp is suspended just slightly off the ground, and so doesn’t interfere with your driving yet.

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Harzipan/Nikolai Petrouski - N/A
Niko clambers in the back despite Bob’s best attempts to turn him into a meat pancake!

Oh hey, what are those things by the south gate? They don’t look very friendly.

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Fail Flail/Grif Mason - N/A
Four-- six-- no, eight! Eight pings! Grif hurriedly detaches his headset from the tower and rush downstairs, piling into the APC behind Niko. Some smaller things that look like they might be a distant cousin of zerglings are clustering by the gate you came through, but they seem to be somewhat lacking in smarts.

Unfortunately, you seem to have forgotten to enlighten Command as to the nature of these hostiles, or even that you’ve encountered anything suspicious.

Well, they’ll probably find that out by themselves anyway.

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Izen/CD-V5 - N/A
And what a gun it is. These APCs weren’t just built to carry troops, it’s practically an IFV! CD-V5 finishes up on the roof, then hops down into the main body of the APC through a hatch and takes the gunnery controls.

The display blinks blearily to life;



The turret deploys from its semi-contracted state, swivelling towards the new... things.

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TheKebbit/Havelock Dagenham - N/A
Up we go! Havelock is behind Grif, and gets a seat near the driver/gun controls.

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Traumahawk/Georgii Alekseyvich Vorotyntsev - N/A
It’s a big gun! Georgii buckles in, nice and secure. Although that will mildly hamper his ability to shoot from his seat, should he feel so inclined.

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Miggles/Dirk Mason - N/A
That makes seven! Dirk is the last one aboard.

Just in time, too - the crowd at the far side of the compound is looking a little bigger than it was a second ago.

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The Mob - N/A
Friendly-looking, if friendly involves scything arms and teeth and mottled colours that would give them decent camouflage in a forest.

Fortunately, they're only just starting to get a clue, and start into a wobbly, disorganized sort of charge towards the still-open ramp of the APC.

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Saber Squad - N/A
Now would be a very good time to leave.

I mean, you could stay, but I wouldn’t really advise that. I don't think anyone would.