Ch 4. Landfall

[dakota]

Shep sounded drowsy," Okay Doc, the headaches gone. Socrates, sorry to ruin your idea of fun. Sam, I didn't mean to put the mission at..." his statement dropped off as he fell asleep.

Abe just shook his head as he patted his dog lightly. He looked at Richardson and Sam, " so just why do you all want to know about slavers and such? This is more than a usual recovery mission judging by the hardware y'all be carryin'"

[Dome]

Richardson looks down at the rail with a shrug he says, "we heard about the Dino's, we came prepared."

Her glances at Sam and then turns his gaze back to the door drifting them over Autumn as he does, showing that he isn't going to say anymore than that.

[Renekin Skywalker]

Socrates sat silent, but thoughtful. Abe wasn't really talking to Socrates. He talked to the cats, but not him. Must be CS, then. The Cats were new, novel, to him, but not a dogboy. Humans, of course, were more than able to answer a question about any kind of authority, not the mutant animals.

"Not so much." Socrates finally said, deciding on a different kind of truth. "Technology has simply advanced enough to make more firepowerful more portable."

[Mierin]

Sam nods at Autumn as she says "Good work." She half smiles down at Shep, who has fallen asleep and resists the urge to ruffle his hair as she asks Autumn, "How long does he need to rest for and how long do you need to rest for? Though we might be here awhile given the storm's worsening conditions." Speaking of which, Sam radios the shagcats and says "Come back inside for now. With the worsening storm conditions, nothing will be venturing outside to bother us."

Turning to Abe, Sam contemplates exactly what she would be able to tell him. Deciding on telling as much truth as she can, she explains, "A squad of soldiers went missing a few months ago. At first, it was thought they had been killed, but photos surfaced that they were being held near a city called Char. We're not sure who is holding them captive or how many of them there are, which is why we're asking about slavers." Sam falls quiet as she waits for a response.

[Tori]

Tori climbed out of her hidey-hole. Being inside armor meant mud would not be too uncomfortable, but her coat meant getting wet or muddy meant little anyhow. The sideways blowing wall of water had her clean in no time. "Tori to Six. Shagcat copies. Falling in from watch, over."

She walked back into Abe's house, still cradling her rifle, and dutifully wiping her feet as instructed. She found her way to the group, and removed her helmet, boots and socks. She looked at the piece of shrapnel resting on Shep and wondered how a metal flechette as large as that could go unnoticed on an X-ray. "Santiago, if that's what field surgery misses, may you always be our team."

At that, Tori seemed to revert to quadruped posture, and sat on her tookas, like a cat would. She leaned to her left and gave herself a vigorous scratching just behind her left ear, as only a cat could. Her facial expression was a mixture of intensity, determination and sheer pleasure.

"I've been waitin' to do that all damn day long." She stood upright again and the tip of her tail began to swish happily seeing Sam in full command mode. "What's the drill, Six?"

[Janxi]

Janxi slid down the trunk of the palmetto she hid in using her claws in the soft wood, like Errol Flynn slid down the sail in "The Sea Hawk." She followed Tori in, her tail swishing with mild boredom. She removed her helmet and returned to the food, K-Bar in hand to carve off a piece of dinosaur meat. She took a bite and assessed the goings on in the room, before she tossed a bit to Abe's dog.

"Hey Abe, ya were gonna tell us more about them barbarians with them dinosaur weapons?"

She watched Tori kick and shook her head. "Don't get nonna yer fleas on me, Smurfette."

[dakota]

Abe nodded as he junked off a piece of the spit roasting meat and taste tested it. " I was, wasn't I? Mmmm, better than chicken." He took the charred raptor meat off the fire and set it on the table, then put a large kettle in it's place to boil. " Help yourself folks. Now the Barbarian wizards, they'll be easy for your dog boy to sniff out, cuz there ain't many psychics in the tribes, at least the couple I trade with. Problem is the rest of them make their weapons to look the same as wizards, so you don't know which is which till a you get zapped by a lightning bolt or sumpthin. "

something battered against the side of the cabin. " Nuthin to worry about. This hut is tougher than anything this swamp will chuck at it. Guaranteed." He grinned, taking another bite, then looked at Sam," We're a long ways from Char down here, but not unheard of. They might have gotten traded around by the tribes, but keeping them together would be rare. Not sure any tribes have enough clout to pull that off, cept mebbe the Yellowjackets, and I try to avoid them. Not the friendliest. Which way you think they headed?"

[GM Note: No one said the fragment was metal, so X-Rays may not have picked it up

[Tori]

Tori looked at the thunk but didn't seem overly panicked. She followed Abe to the table and carved herself off some more meat, and sat about eating and listening. The news about simple barbarian weapons looking the same as magic did not surprise her much. Indians were kind of the same way, but non magic weapons meant little against modern armor. She had little interest in waiting around to get hit to figure out which one was magic did not interest her. She could possibly study their clothing and symbols to determine rank and possibility of using magic weapons.

"Do they got mind melters and such? Maybe they're usin' some kinda mind control or hypnosis..." She ate her meat, contemplating the mission. They would lose the storm's cover, and now had a long trek across the swamp, and possibly several assaults to recover the objectives, if they had been dispersed.

"Hey, Abe... All the old interstate roads had elevated roadbeds. I figure a lotta bridges are gone, but are the roadbeds still there and passable?" It made sense these roads might make for a good way to travel.

She explained to the rest of the crew. "The American Empire built massive super-roads to connect cities to one another. Most of the biggest cities had an interstate that led to another big city. There could be one between the Cape and this Char place, maybe. Good places for traps and ambush, but beats slogging for a buncha miles through swampground."

(My bad. Most explosive frags are metal. My cousin got bombed over in Iraq and still sets metal detectors off. I figured it was something about like that. Please disregard my comment, but Tori still remains somewhat in awe of Autumn for helping Shep in a swamp shack when surgeons in a hospital could not.)

[dakota]

"Never heard of mind melters with them." Abe replied with a shrug. " Anything is possible. the old road are there, but like you said, they ain't safe to travel unless you got a heavy duty ride, and I ain't heard no tanks rumblin by."

[Renekin Skywalker]

"It is a heavy storm." Socrates says to Abe. "Some sounds go unheard."

[dakota]

"Five minutes you'd be buried up to your turret." Abe countered. " Abe the ground is too uneven for them new fangled hover tanks."

[sasqaricious]

Autumn responds to the Captain, "I would recommend at least a day of rest for him but seeing I do not think that is possible I would say a minimum of 8 hours. Or if I can get at least 4 hours I can expend more energy to get him up and about but that would leave my psychic reserves drained."

[Tori]

"Well, we ain't goin nowhere with the storm like this. It will be over pretty quick after we get through the worst of it, too. We're gonna lose whatever distraction the storm would have given us, but even now, it's too bad to travel. Six? It might be good to give Shep whatever sack time he needs to make a full recovery. We're gon' be here for a while, especially if our objectives have been dispersed. Best all-uv-us be at 100 percent. 'Sounds like we got a long ways to go, anyhow."

She sighed, realizing this would be no in-and-out, striking under the storm's cover. They still had to find the objective, or track down several individuals or groups. They needed more intel. No sense pretending this would be a day trip anymore. Char was nowhere near their insertion point, and these Yellow Jackets seemed like a dangerous enemy.

"All the streams are gonna be flooded, and the swamp is gonna go from knee deep to neck deep for a day or two anyhow with all this here rain. Fordin's out, and marchin's gonna suck. We ain't got no boat, so I think we're goin' nowhere fast. We got a dry billet, plenty of hot chow, and a gracious and knowledgeable host. With Shep at full speed, and Autumn rested up, we're all gonna be better off, in my opinion."

She took a generous swig from her canteen and sighed with satisfaction. "The roadbeds may be trapped, but we can trek them better than a tank. Our hike speed on elevated, even muddy ground may be faster than trekkin' the swamp, too. I reckon me, Soc and Richardson could find boobytraps and mines out on the roads, too. Abe, who are these Yella-Jackets, and 'bout how many you talkin' 'bout when you say 'clout?'"

[Mierin]

Sam nods at Tori, "That is correct. Given how bad the storm is right now, it wouldn't be safe for us to leave even if we wanted to." Turning to Autumn, she says "So you and Shep will get the time you need to rest. In the meantime, we'll do what we can to try to get as much information we can about what we're heading into so we can try to be prepared."

Sam smiles at Abe in a frienly manner as she says "I do appreciate the intel you are able to provide us with."

[Janxi]

"This is some tasty chow, Abe. Much obliged. It's like duck but it ain't so oily. Bigger and better than chicken!" Janxi said. She reached into her pack and opened an MRE with one of her long, natural claws that was every bit as wicked as a raptor's. "Ratfoxing" the pack, she found a tiny bottle of Tabasco and put a few drops on her meat, then tossed it to Tori.

"Here Teabag the Fleabag. This ain't that smoky stuff, but it puts the heat on. And don't forget I can clear mines and traps as easy as I can settim!"

Continuing to ratfox the MRE pack, she found a Ooh-rah! bar and passed it to Abe, along with a pack of crackers, with peanutbutter and jelly, some beverage mix and some baked apples. It was only right for her to pay him back with a couple of treats. She continued to sort the bag, saving the entree, sides and other treats for later. At the bottom, she found something that made her narrow her eyes. It was a packet of "Charms" candy. She wasted no time tossing it into the garbage.

She continued to listen to the conversation, trying to learn what she can about the enemy. Janxi knew Abe probably knew more than she ever could about the swamp, and it behooved her to listen.