A New Power - Rebel Group

[Kemrain]

"...Then again, maybe I will get myself killed," she says with a sigh after listening to the Stormtroopers talk.

 

[Ambrus]

Turning back to face forward the droid continues: "There may not be an opportunity for the type of infiltration mission you're describing if the empire already has the Dawnsprinter or its hyperdrive aboard one of their transports or capital ships. They may very well have located and secured it before we arrived. If so, our only chance to deprive the empire of the opportunity to study the hyperdrive may be to destroy the transport or capital ship in a suicide attack. It is of course a worst case scenario."

 

[Kemrain]

"Well, crazier stunts have been pulled. If it's in the Interdictor, we have an advantage, though. I know that ship well, and they're unlikley to alter it too much over a single intelligence leak. I hope it doesn't come to that, though. It seems like it's still on the ship, and I'm hoping we can at least find it as they're finding it, and they'll be distracted. We're lucky that Stormtroopers aren't the most observant soldiers, even with their helmets."

 

[Angcuru]

Shortly after the comm signature from the troopship dies out, the Deepscan's long-range sensors pick up a signal from the visible edge planet ahead. It reads out "YT-1300 Class Transport Ship, designation Dawnsprinter" before fading out with the rotation of the planet.

 

[Ambrus]

The patina stained droid tracks the Imperial troop transport, extrapolates its flight vector and calculates the probable location of the settlement to which they're heading. It then refocuses the Deepscan's sensors on those coordinates to attempt and identify any buildings or large masses of refined metal in that location that may prove to be the Dawnsprinter.

"I'm detecting the transponder signal of the Dawnsprinter just over the horizon" R-LE-1 carefully focuses the Dawnsprinter's enhanced sensors in that direction to locate its point of origin. OOC: Does it match up with the location of the settlement? If not, how far apart are they? The old repair droid then attempts to discern whether there is an actual mass of refined metals and/or a hyperdrive engine signature at the same location as the transponder signal. OOC: How far apart is the settlement, the Dawnsprinter and our assigned landing spot?

 

[Angcuru]

According to Arlee's readings, the Dawnsprinter's IFF signature puts it smack dab in the middle of the projected location of the settlement. Conventiently, the Deepscan's assigned landing spot is near these areas, and a note in their objective List indicates that due to readings indicating dense vegetation covering most of the planet, they are allowed to deviate from their course as necessary to locate a proper landing site to begin their readings.

 

[Angcuru]

Fine-tuning the Deepscan's sensors on the projected location of the settlement, Arlee gets a clearer signal of the Dawnsprinter. Strangely enough, the scan doesn't reveal the particular metallic signatures one would expect when trying to sense a ship. Similarly, his scan of the settlement doesn't reveal anything particularly enlightening. Arlee detects no telltale signatures of structures in the sense of electronics, architecture and the like, only a clearing in the heavy forest, wherein, according to the scan, sits the Dawnsprinter. Going by the size of the clearing, which scans as less than five hundred meters in diameter, the settlement cannot be of any significant size, even if the residents are tightly packed.

 

[Kemrain]

"The Imperials can't have missed that. How long until we can see it?"

She watches the planet growing larger over the nose of the shuttle, thinking to herself.

"What are the chances that the imperials in orbit won't notice if we open fire on the Stormtroopers and their shuttle after they've landed? It's not subtle, but it could prove a wonderful distraction. Especially if we could commandeer or down the other shuttle."

 

[Ambrus]

"The Imperials can't have missed that. How long until we can see it?"

"With tele-optic sensors? Approximately five minutes and twenty three seconds."

The old droid's heuristic processor, networked into the Deepscan's computer core, continues too race as it sifts through terabytes of raw sensor data. With but a thought, Arley brings the Deepscan's conventional sensors online to work in parallel with the vessel's enhanced sensors. Outside the cockpit's window, the black starfield begins to lighten into a light cyan as the vessel nears its mark. Somewhere ahead, out of sight, was a similar vessel carrying imperial troopers spoiling for a fight.

"What are the chances that the imperials in orbit won't notice if we open fire on the Stormtroopers and their shuttle after they've landed? It's not subtle, but it could prove a wonderful distraction. Especially if we could commandeer or down the other shuttle."

"The chances that they could detect the blaster fire directly is actually rather remote. This vessel is equipped with some of the empire's best sensory systems and we are unable to yet sense any signs of the settlement aside from a large five hundred meter clearing and we are much closer to it than any other imperial vessels in orbit above. An explosion would have to be of several orders of magnitude larger than the troop transport's destruction would cause for a vessel in orbit to detect it directly.

Unfortunately though the troopers aboard could transmit a report while under attack, thus alerting the vessels in orbit of our treachery. It would be possible to jam their transmissions before we attacked, however each imperial vessel including this one is equipped with a transponder which allows all imperial vessels to identify and track each other while in the same system. That is how the officer on the ICS Interdictor was able to identify us as soon as we entered this system. If we were to destroy the other vessel or jam its transmissions its transponder signal would be stopped and the other imperial vessels would immediately seek to investigate why."

Arley turns its head to face Jaess. "I'm afraid I'm getting rather unclear readings from the settlement site... if there is one. I'm uncertain how the empire concluded that there was a settlement there in the first place; I can't yet detect very much at this range. It must be quite small and doesn't appear to have any significant technology or industry. I can only conclude that some of the other Deepscans must have performed some low altitude scans of the area before our arrival."

 

[Kemrain]

"That makes sense. Do you think we could rig up something to transmit a false transponder signal? It could be useful. Then again, it would be even better if I could board the other shuttle and overpower the pilot and communications officer. Then we could attack them with two ships, and keep them from transmitting any messages. A communications jammer would be great, here. I doubt that the other transport will remain on the ground long, though. I suspect it'll drop it's cargo and bolt until they need a pickup."