Public Rogue Protocol Op: Off the Rails, and Way Out of Your Minds.

[GhostKey]

Rogue Protocol Op: "Off the Rails, and Way Out of Your Minds."

• Board Train LX-718 a high-speed mag train in the hyper-busy Rvnoss Undercity Train Hub, and slice its encrypted data relay before it reaches Corporate Sector control. Nearly always in motion, the train acts as a permanently mobile data vault that is almost impossible to track. The package is unknown, but too many credchits invested in too many secrets are on the literal line.
  Risk Level: Redline Level 4. Highly elevated risk due to entry method. High-security protocols, armed data-enforcers, and unpredictable passenger activity. The train's lockdown countermeasures can activate if tampered with.
• Target Status: In motion! The internal data payload is heavily shielded, isolated from undernet nodes with Grade 6 encryption. Droid slicers cycle their signals off multiple locations to avoid decryption as the target moves. A failed entry may trigger a data wipe or an alarm signal to off train Corpsec security.
• Undervine Whisper: What goes up must come down.

[[THEME]]
​

Contact: Shortwave | Echo-ID: SWV-4 | Undervine Alias: SW114 | Race: Pantoran
Assistance: Signal Scramblers and Rapid Decryption
Location: Two miles above the train hub in a stealthed shuttle.
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd

Coruscant Level 891. Despite the number, this was lower in the undercity, not lost to myth, but low enough that crime ran the show and the shadows had their own signal. Steel towers loomed high above, disappearing into the endless cityscape, while maglev trains cut past below, in a dizzying maze of crisscrossing rails, each one ready to slice and dice the unwary limb. Hold onto your butts—things are about to get hairy.

The shuttle door slid open, city lights flashing like a busy lifeform reader. Each of the crew had a Blackwing drop-pack strapped tight, because reasons.

"We really doing this?" Sickle laughed, checking her neon green rig.
"Got a better plan?" Ibis smirked, stretching out her legs. The dancer was all style.
"Yeah! How about not?" Juju rolled her eyes.
"Awww you guys gettin' all the fun," Glade sighed. She wasn't jumping, her hoverchair meant she'd be their getaway pilot, waiting to pick them up, or just run interference.

Yep they were doing it, jumping. Ghostkey's first real test with the crew. Dressed like some neon-soaked cyan skydiving holo-hero, he peered over the edge, side-eyeing Trix, the second youngest in the crew. They were daring each other to jump first and both grinned wide.

Chronicle checked his chrono.

"Go."

Timing was everything in this lethal maze. The crew jumped, plummeting faster than a supernova through a galaxy of exploding neon stars, threading the grav-train deathtrap like street sabaac, played to the barrel of a Rodians first-shot gun.

Who was crazy enough to go with them? More importantly—who was crazy enough to try and stop them?

Time for another Rogue Protocol job.

Dice

Spoiler

Higher Always Better
D1: Entry Issues?
NPCS free to use as always. Open to crew, opposition, storytellers, security, anyone.

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant riding on top of a mag train! Clinging on with magboots and gloves.
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd

"Bad idea! Bad idea!" Juju kept losing her nerve, voice crackling over the comms.

"WOOOOHOOOOO!" Trix whooped, GK chuckling as they plummeted through the neon-steel haze. He felt invincible, air screaming, and his heart hammering hard. Like dropping off trees back on Kashyyyk's, only a hundred times higher and with no lake to break the fall.

Mag trains tore a blur on all sides, streaks of light and sonic booms rattling his bones. Their window was thinner than a bad noir novel's plot, miss the mark, and they were either street paste or gliding forever down.

"See it?" Ibis's voice spiked in static panic.

He didn't! Wait he did! A steel blur shot beneath him, faster than a blink of his eye, and impact was incoming. Magboots primed. Gloves ready to grip.

"Third carriage in, overshoot and we're fragged," Ibis warned.

GK aimed central, flared his pack's thrusters, angling smooth, drifting, leveling, leveling, and CRUNCH. Yeah real smooth, wind knocked right out of him. THUD THUD THUD came the others.

"Little help!" Sickle dangled off the edge, fingers slipping. Ghost lunged, their mag-gloves locking tight. Boots held firm against the hull, anchoring them against the screaming velocity

"Come on, Sickle! Pull!"
"I'm trying!"

Frak it. Ghost let go with his gripping hand, yanked her over, nearly ripping off his own boots in the process. She hit metal, grabbed him back, and locked them both down.

Trix grinned over, still buzzed. "One hell of a ride!"
"Kid one day I swear! No way they didn't hear that," Juju spat.
"Oh, they heard," Ibis their architect reported. "Along with fifty other trains screaming through the grid." They'd picked this spot for a reason.

Time to make entry, if they could hold on!

Dice

Spoiler

D1 Making entry
D2 Guards Alert?

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant entering a moving magtrain!
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd

Hanging on for dear life, GK clipped his mag-lines to the train, stabilizing himself as his boots and gloves locked firm with the maglocks. The air howled past, ripping at his suit, but he focused. Stay steady to stay alive. Lifeform detectors pinged as the crew tracked movement. Guards were coming to check the noise.

"FAST!" GK heard Sickle shout as they shifted out of view.

A CorpSec agent in a black suit peered out the window. GK pressed himself flat against the train, boots and palms clamped tight, watching the neon-lit city blur past. He side-eyed the guard, heart pounding, hoping he didn't turn too far. Not the cleanest landing—but no broken bones. Of all the jobs, on all the worlds, this was his first. Hell of a way to start.

"Seven minutes." Chronicle's voice cut in through the comms. Clock's ticking down.

"Lock it down, Sickle." Savant's order came firm as always. The train's sensors were masked, not blocked, but spoofed up to look clean. A slick trick, but for Sickle, half in the physical, half jacked into the undernet while hanging onto a speeding train, it was gut-wrenching. Not that it was much better for the rest of them!

Juju's silent cutting tool was halfway through the roof hatch when it shorted out. "Scrap-tier piece of junk," she muttered frustrated, "told you this was a bad idea."

Ghostkey reached over and slapped a spare into her palm. Small delays—but thirty seconds they didn't have. The hatch finally gave, and they filtered into the train, stealth fields shimmering. Two walkways with four rows of seats. Not much room, patrols were light, but close enough quarters to make movement tricky.

"Keep it cool, on cameras, nano-sec," Ibis whispered.

Trix, Ghost, and Chronicle had the guards tagged on their feeds, lifeform detectors patching through to their HUDs. Their shimmering stealth fields weren't Spire-grade, but better than black-market scrapwear. Trix ghosted forward, stun baton primed, aiming for a clean hit to the temple. Ghost reached for his target, a strong chokehold incoming. Chronicle, their ion specialist, reached to plant a silent stun charge next to a patrolling droid.

Seconds stretched out further than they should, too many calls at once, their execution had to be perfect.

Dice:

Spoiler

D1: Sickle's Sensor mask [Hard]
D2: Ibis's Camera Hijack
D3: Trix's Guard Takedown
D4: Ghostkey's Chokehold
D5: Chronicles Ion Charge.

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant Moving Magtrain 4th Carriage
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd​

Cams were a bust, Ibis didn't even find the access node till they'd already been seen, which might have been okay if Sickle hadn't also fragged up the sensor mask and pulled attention their way! They got both shut down eventually, but the damage was past done.

Trix went for a stun, catching an elbow to the chest for his trouble, but dropped the guard on the second zap. Ghost got a firm chokehold, taking a hard stomp to his foot, then a couple of shin kicks, Trix ran over and zapped him down too. Chronicle was near perfect with the ion charge, moving off before the droid even had time to turn.

"Pull it together," Savant cut in sharply.

But the alarms were already tripped. Silent but the system was awake and alert. A datawipe was rolling in fast.

"Kriff, kriff, KRIFF!" Trix caught it first. With how badly Sickle and Ibis were struggling, it'd be a small miracle if they could read through the static across their readouts now.

"Six minutes. Plan B." Chronicle made the call. They'd lost their stealth advantage. Plan B was about misdirection, control, and managing the fallout.

Ghost nodded, slapping two charges onto the floor behind, and sealing the door lock with a scrambler. Sickle primed the bombs, they needed to isolate and stall for time. The nuclear option was ready, but blowing the carriage link meant a mag-train with no brakes and no controls. That was Plan C. Maybe even F.

"Running a mimic," Ibis came through clutch, rushing to fake a security all-clear over the network.
"I'll frag their comms," Sickle cursed under-her-breath, still fuming about her earlier screw-up. She wanted another shot.

The rest of them unholstered their weapons, this op just got a whole lot messier.

Entering the fourth carriage…

Dice

Spoiler

D1: Severity of Guards Response
D2: Mimic vs Datawipe
D3: Comms Block?

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant Moving Magtrain outside the 4th Carriage
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis?, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd

While they kept barreling along faster than a rail divorcing from a gauss rifle, alarms still tripped silently in the background. The mimic was almost perfect—security system bought the all-clear, and the data purge stuttered to a halt with minimal loss. Ibis looked chuffed, grinning, she'd redeemed herself! Right up until the doors slid open to a wall of blaster and slug fire.

Rounds ripped through the cabin like ricocheting darts. Ibis caught a chestful of it and crumpled back into Chronicle's arms.

"FRAKKING FRAKKERS!" Sickle yelled, hurling a frag down the corridor. The blast sent a corpo-guard reeling, staggering their line just long enough for Trix to pop a canister. A signature purple haze smoked ahead, clogging the space in a neon-purple denon-mist. Blaster bolts and slugs flashed through the smoke wildly, both sides firing blind.

"No way we're pushing through that," Trix garbled, ducking behind cover. At least Sickle had done more than just jam their comms—she'd fried them so bad, corpo chatter had completely flatlined. "She gonna make it?" Trix asked, voice edged with worry.

"Still checking," Chronicle said quietly, working to patch Ibis up.

Ghost glanced out the window, raising his eyebrows, and tilting his head.

"Oh no," Juju muttered, already shaking her head. "Nope. Not happening."

Ghostkey looked resolute—he just smashed the window with the handle of his gun, cleaning out the glass with its barrel. The howl of the rushing wind filled the train cabin as Trix clipped their mag-lines as safety to the frame, mag gloves and boots powered up.

"Payback for Ibis." Trix scowled, throwing a hi-five.

GK was already out before anyone could argue. Rushing air ran along his body, hair whipping back as he crawled along the train's hull, mag-boots and gloves locking with every step.

Sickle spat a curse, looking between Ibis and the broken window, their anarchist friend soon joined them. Three of the most reckless street-rats hanging off the side of a speeding mag-train, weaving its way through the Coruscant cityscape.

What could go wrong?!

Dice:

Spoiler

D1 Train Firefight
D2 Ibis's Condition
D3 Train Crawling Trix, Ghost and Sickle
D4 Securities Ongoing Response

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant Moving Magtrain 5th Carriage Data Vault
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd​

Pulling himself forward along the train's surface, chin bouncing of a bump! OUCH. Ghost re-hooked his magline safety to the next carriage. Each of them did the same for the others, locking in secure. The firefight inside wasn't great, but at least no one else was getting shot up. They'd even managed to push up a few more seat rows—their crew was way more comfortable fighting in Trix's neon fog than the corpo goons were.

"Chron, how's she holdin' up?" Ghost comm'd over.

"She's comin' around," Chronicle replied, voice running a little too raw for his usual cool.

"Just a scatch, don't go drafting your elegies." Ibis coughed. The armor had eaten most of the hit—a small miracle, given how patchwork their gear was. Ibis especially liked her upgrades, and right now, they were worth every cred.

"Ha! Told ya, corpo scrapwear didn't hit that hard!" Sickle's voice cracked removing some of her worry.

The crawl over the hull was steady. Well, as steady as crawling along a screaming-fast mag-rail train at breakneck speed could be. One wrong move and it was a long, final drop

Shots still bounced around inside, sending the occasional jolt through the frame, a window cracked, but nothing serious kicked outward to the hull. Sickle reached out, steadying Trix when a grenade blew. The guards inside seemed asleep, as the outside crew reached the next carriage, bypassing the fourth entirely.

Ghost cursed under his breath. He'd lost his laser cutter earlier, which meant cracking this door old-school. "Here goes nothin'," he muttered, scrambling the door controls and prying it open just enough to drop two stun charges through the gap. Tap Tap. Thunk.

Boom.

Ghost hit the deck first, blaster up, couple of corpo's out stun-napping. Trix and Sickle followed, quick and easy, setting up a selective crossfire.

"Five-thirty," Chronicle reminded over comms. Tick tick tick.

Dice

Spoiler

D1: Problems in the fifth Carriage?
D2: Crossfire Firefight on the fourth carriage
D3: Ongoing Internal Security response.
D4: Random Event Good or Bad.

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant Moving Magtrain 5th Carriage Data Vault
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix? | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd

Redlining hard. Riding the wire only lasted so long before you crashed out. Maybe today was that day. Turns out the corpos weren't as clueless as they seemed—those Data Enforcers knew exactly what they were doing. They wanted Ghost, Trix, and Sickle in that room.

"NOW!" one of them shouted.

Ghost caught it a split-second before it hit, a surging shockfloor, the whole carriage electrified! He launched onto a foam chair, yanking Sickle up with him, but Trix was too far. The kid took a full-voltage jolt, flung clean off his feet and into the wall.

"Fraggin' corpos! You don't burn one of ours and walk away!" Sickle snarled, hands clawing at her eyes, still blinded from the burst. Ghost was already working to flip the current, fingers flying free to keys on his deck.

And then it got worse.

"Not good! Not good! Guys! Seeing flyers!" Juju's voice panicked past the point of return as she let off a few potshots. Outside, a swarm of small drones hovered, lining up their aim. Inside the fourth carriage, corpsec had dug in deep—forcefields up, gunports manned. This was their fallback point all along. Savant caught a grazing shot, gritting his teeth through the burn.

But sometimes, when the whole world's gunning for you...

BOOOOMMMM.

Turns out fate ain't picked a side yet. The wall to the fourth carriage exploded inward, daylight slicing through the wreckage. Glade, riding her shuttle, strafed past, raining saving fire as she weaved between magrails and speeding trains, leaving a trail of corpsec in the shell of the carriage.

"Tell me ya missed me."

Dice:

Spoiler

D1: Trix's Condition
D2: Droids Effectiveness
D3: Glade's Piloting Skills to Dodge.
D4: Ongoing Security Response

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant Moving Magtrain 5th Carriage at the Data Vault
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd​

Ghost bent down. "Sick is he?"

Sickle's face was pale beneath her neon-green locks and goggles. She wasn't a medic, but she'd pumped more bacta into the kid than they put sugar in stimcaf. Giving up wasn't written in her code, Trix was hers, and she wasn't about to let the kid flatline while there was hope.

"You don't have time! Get to the vault!" Savant's voice shouted through the comms, static punctuated his urgency, the air rushing outside twice as loud with the 4th carriage ripped to shreds. Drones harassed the team, firing in from outside to bounce or puncture off the hull, pinning them down hard. Juju took a glancing hit, cursing louder than usual as they scrambled to set up a slicing override on the bastards.

"Frak you, Sav." Ghost gritted his teeth, gripping Trix's hand.

"He's right, Ghost," Sickle's voice murmured, checking Trix's vitals. Her fingers resting on the kid, twitching for something to grab. "Do the thing or die for nothin'."

Ghost exhaled and then he stood.

He turned toward the vault, curbing his desire to run toward it. His visor scanned for traps, infrared heat signatures, any pressure triggers, or distortions to trace. Had to be something between here and payday.

Then:

SCRAAAAAAPPPPPEEEE

"Phew, got a lil cooked but I'm okay." Glade's voice crackled in as her ship skimmed too close to the magrails, sparks kicking back at her off the hull. Her wild saving run hadn't just exposed her, she'd also blown an easy exit out "But they know I'm here."

And that was another problem.

Ghost pushed it out of his mind, looking at the vault doors, it all came down to this.

Dice:

Spoiler

D1 Trix Death Roll
D2 Drone Override and Fight
D3 Ghost approaches the Vault
D4 Ongoing Security Response
D5 Alliance Authorities Alert Level (Gradual Increase)

 

[GhostKey]

OOC: Dice roll

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant Moving Magtrain 5th Carriage at the Data Vault
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd

"Legacy made." Sickle's voice tightened with grief, tears stinging her eyes. She pulled the bomb detonator from her belt, fingers twitching over the trigger. This was it, Trix's Legacy Run, his last op. The kid had died the instant the shock hit him, but his name wouldn't fade. She pressed a hand over his eyes, closing them for the final time.

Dead silence filled the comms. Too young, they lived too fast. Only the distant hum of blaster fire as the drones outside still loomed forcing the rest of the crew further away from the three trapped at the vault carriage.

Ghost's heart sank, a slow, dragging weight pulling him down. He didn't know what to think, or how to process it. Suddenly everything felt too big for them, more than they could handle. But they were all out of their depth, diving onto a moving magtrain miles above Coruscant, trying to pull off something bigger than any of them.

Savant, their Chiss, was the first to break the silence. Even his voice lacked its usual cold precision. "Ghost, talk to me."

Ghostkey steadied himself against the vault, slick, corporate-grade, but not invulnerable. He started his slice, jacking in through the nearest control panel, his AT link pulling a datastream as his mind moved between the code and the chaos around them. The train lurched hard to the right, its damaged carriages rattling and wanting to pull free from the strain, nearly throwing him off. A warning flashed across his HUD, two hidden turrets near the vault door, do or die. Its what Trix would have done.

He was so focused and alone in the moment that he didn't tell anyone.

"Sickle?" Chronicle's voice broke through, reaching for his friend to ground her.

She didn't answer either.

Her finger just hovered over the bomb trigger, a big frak you to the corporate world.

Dice:

Spoiler

D1: Sickle's Decision. 1-3 Yes 4-6 No
D2: Ghosts Vault Hack
D3: Drone Problem
D4: Ongoing Security Response.
D5: Coruscant's Authorities Awareness (Slow raise)

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant Moving Magtrain 5th Carriage at the Data Vault
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd​

"Trix." Glade's voice crackled in over the comms from their shuttle, eyes wet, little hands shaking.
"Trix." Ghostkey said out loud, gritting his teeth, not daring to look back.
"Trix." Chronicle marked the time.
Each of them repeated his name, just as they would a thousand times from today on, ending in a…

LARGE EXPLOSION

"Trix." Sickle's voice broke down as her finger hammered down on the trigger. Face a mess, she watched his cold body as the front carriages detonated their links broken in a violent reaction. The train lurched, rocking the crew, but even Savant understood.

At the vault, Ghost wasn't at his best. He'd scrambled the lock, the metal beginning to rotate for opening, but the turrets still spun up, hunting for their target. One whirred toward him, he dodged, blasting it apart before the other tracked him, spewing blaster fire across the carriage floor after him.

He still wasn't inside the vault. But at least it was open.

Behind him, Sickle grabbed a blaster, barely looking, and fired over and over again. Sparks erupted from the turret as it twitched, sputtered out, and died. "Finish it," She said bitterly, face red and raw

Ghost exhaled, readied himself, and finally got his hands on the vault's terminal, jacking in directly.

Meanwhile, the fourth carriage remained a broken battlefield. Drones and crew locked in a constant, uncertain back-and-forth, with neither side gaining ground, just chewing through ammo and running out of options.

"We gotta try something else," Juju cursed, almost taking another hit and seeking cover against the doorframe.

Savant was already moving, fingers working fast, trying to interface to rewrite the drones' friend-or-foe signals.

More movement at the sixth carriage doorway. Train security had either finally woken up or found their spine, creeping forward, maybe just trying to figure out why they'd lost all control, brakes, and everything else! The increasingly broken train rattled hard, veering into the next turn at a sharp gut-wrenching lean… And Coruscant Authorities? Whoever was on duty there might as well be napping in a whiskey-induced slumber.

Dice

Spoiler

D1: Ghost interfaces with the terminal
D2: Savants Drone Friend or Foe Override
D3: Train leaning—how bad for everyone and everything?
D4: Ongoing Security Response
D5: Coruscant Authorities, are they awake yet?

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant Moving Magtrain 5th Carriage at the Data Vault
Team Status: GhostKey, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd

Flux luck had gone from horrific to cruel. Force-sakes. First, the out-of-control magtrain leaned hard, not quite tipping, but enough to send everyone scrambling for something to hold. People clung to whatever they could, while downed corpsec bodies spilt across and out of the wreckage falling into Coruscant's lower-levels below. Sickle fought to keep hold of Trix's body, keeping him from slamming into the tilting wall!

Then the vault bit back.

Counter-code poured and clogged up Ghost's interface, drowning his connection and overheating his deck. The new download sent warning signals through his cybernetics, the heat in his rig building to a dangerous level. And Savant ,yeah, he rewired the friend-or-foe protocols all right, but so badly that the drones went berserk! They were firing at everything, themselves, the team, passing trains, city buildings. The whole zone was fast going loud.

"We gotta call it quits!" Ibis, their escape artist, knew when to bail better than anyone. This op had blown past the redline at least five minutes ago.

"I'm not leaving." Sickle held onto Trix's body, knees pressed to the floor, defiant to the end.

"I'm not either." Ghost gritted through the pain and building heat, knowing this was a losing battle, but he wasn't letting Trix's memory go unavenged. He wouldn't let this be for nothing, he went for full control of the system now, nothing less but all in.

"C'mon guys, please, no, there'll be other ops." Glade somehow was the responsible one now! Others backed her up over comms. "Vote." Savant cut in, his tone cool and logical as ever under pressure, showing the leadership they needed. That and he knew he'd win the vote.

But Ghost wasn't waiting to hear it.

Ghost pushed past the redline, optics screaming warnings, wire's wanting to split apart, heatsinks melting, but he pushed anyway, and went for control of everything. Sickle laid Trix's body down, securing him the best she could, then took up position beside Ghost. "For Trix," she whispered, aiming her blaster at the far door. The first Code Enforcers breached, and she responded with her answer, "ice every last one of em."

And the Coruscant Authorities??? Still nothing. Somewhere a Gungan shift manager was about to lose his damn job.

Dice

Spoiler

D1: Ghost Redlines his slice going for broke.
D2: Sickle Tries to Hold off the Data Enforcers coming into the datavault.
D3: The Beserk Drones, how much damage do they do to everything!
D4: Out of Control Train Roll
D5: Coruscant Authorities. Hello. Anyone home?

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant Moving Magtrain 5th Carriage at the Data Vault
Team Status: GhostKey?, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd​

Scent of electric tang and scorched circuits. The smell of burning metal filled the air, acrid and potent. And then they hit him with a pulse surge, a brutal ECM spike that burned out his rig, the implants in him glowed hot. Ghost's deck fried in his hands, sparking out, and his direct interface meant he went with it. Like a stun baton detonating inside his mind. He staggered, body locking up in twitching spasm, then crashed down prone against the vault door.

Sickle slid behind a dead service droid, using it as cover while blaster rounds made of a mess of the plating. No matter how fast she laid down fire, they were already in—the Data Enforcers had breached, two heavily armed suits pushing her back to cover. Kneeling with her back to a cargo loading rail, she pulled it out to get some better protection, metal churning under the barrage of their fire, as she tried to steady her breath.

"Need some fraggin' support back here!" she snarled angrily into the comms, her voice ragged with rage.

She glanced up, Ghost down.
Then across, Trix gone.

But they were standing right where she wanted them, a charge was set near the vault. Despite the train being a runaway with nobody driving, it took the turn smoother than expected, still hurtling ahead with no brakes….

Drone fire was chaotic, but not near as devastating as it could have been. One high-speed commuter train outside took a stray hit, passengers scrambled; some didn't make it. Nearby buildings were tagged, signs and neon symbols scorched, a few windows shattered, but most of the drones were targetting each other. The last corpsec agent in the 4th somehow alive tried to stand, but he didn't get far.

The rear team pushed forward, finally securing the 4th Carriage, it was a tough battle and they weren't out of it yet. Chronicle's eyes observed the three still pinned in the 5th Carriage. He caught the worry in Sickle's young, pained stare and relayed over comms, "Ghost is down. Sickle's pinned. Sit tight."

Then he turned to Savant. The Chiss barely blinked, already injecting his counter-strike. Fingers playing their slicing-tune over his deck. Hitting send he deployed a sensor spoof, a rogue signal, feeding false data ironically to the Data Enforcers' HUDs, hopefully blinding their feeds for just long enough to make a rescue.

Glade wasn't waiting for them to ask her, "Hold on t'ya butts, I'm comin in!" Time for a Siobhan Kerrigan-style rescue on an out-of-control moving train that was barely hanging together. Yep just like old times!

And… by now as expected by certain unchanging flux luck, everyone on duty in Coruscant was still asleep.

Dice

Spoiler

D1: Ghost's injury roll
D2: Sickle's explosive effect
D3: Crews Rescue Attempt (Easier Multiple)
D4: Out of Control Train Roll
D5: Coruscant Authorities…..

 

[GhostKey]

Location: Coruscant Moving Magtrain 5th Carriage at the Data Vault
Team Status: GhostKey?, Sickle, Chronicle, Ibis, Juju, Savant, Trix | Shuttle: Glade NPC'd

Glade overshot completely, nearly plowing into another magline. "Umm, about that swooping rescue. Less saving, more crashing." She barely pulled up, scraping the hull hard before overcorrecting into a near 90 degree turn, clipping the shuttle against a wall, metal announcing it was ripping away. The hub's dense tangle of maglines left no room for mistakes.

The Enforcers caught on fast. They shot the explosive before they even stepped forward. Sickle barely held her position as they pounded her cover, round after round slamming metal against her back. And Savant's efforts didn't fire, or get anywhere, the train was on too tight lockdown Except for one thing, with all the damage and the counter slicing, he triggered the data purge again.

A full flatline to all their struggle, right when it counted most. But some ops? Some ops, there was nothing you could do.

"Told you we were on borrowed time with this one," Juju muttered, cursing under his breath.
Savant, cold as Chiss steel, turned his attention to their escape artist. "Ibis."
No need to say more. This job was past done. "Thought you'd never ask." She'd been waiting for the call.

Safety magline clipped in, their nimble dancer dived through one of the ruined walls, taking out a stray drone mid-leap. Falling into a roll onto the hull, her mag-boots locked, gloves clipped, she pulled herself forward. Hands already slicing into the rear-side controls of the 5th carriage, working fast to decouple everything.

Chronicle set his weapon past safety, then fired an ion shot at the nearest wall. It bounced like a pinball, ricocheting at deep angles through the cabin ahead, blinding, disorienting, giving him cover to push forward. As he reached an outer doorway for protection, he spotted one of Trix's smoke bombs, half-buried in the wreckage.

He grabbed it and tossed it toward Sickle. For a second, Sickle's spirits lifted and she nodded. She caught the canister and threw it forward, watching as Trix's signature neon mist spread. His last smoker now a lifeline from beyond the grave for Ghost.

But her and Chronicle, were in it now. Fire ripped through the cabin. They could and should run. But they weren't leaving their own behind. The op was a bust. But not the crew.

And that's when— "Deadlight."

Every single one of them fired. All at the same targets at the same time.

A Rogue Protocol, executed. Named in blood and fire.

Dice:

Spoiler

D1: Sickle
D2: Chronicle
D3: Savant
D4: Juju
D5: Ibis tries to decouple the rear carriages.