Charros IV
Objective(s): Salvage, BYOO
"Drone will be on station in two minutes."
The words crackling through the comm unit were a welcome sound. The Sephi hoped...a lot of things actually. He hoped that whoever controlled the drone's tasking was smart enough to keep it high, he hoped that the video systems on the drone were good enough to get him the information he needed, he hoped that his little mobile system could provide the high-res output this situation called for. He also hoped that they'd get the wounded engineer back to the ship quickly since there was a full med station onboard. Of course, he also wanted to keep as much intact as he could to facilitate research.
As they waited the second engineer continued to work on Oowel'heko. About a minute in she stopped and sat back, looking tired but not defeated. Her sense through the Force was most similar to 'job done' and the Twi'lek was still alive. After a moment she looked up and nodded, explaining that the man was as stable as he'd be outside a full medroom and the sooner he got to one the more they'd know. Right around that time the comm beeped and images fired to life. While the relatively low resolution of the projector didn't help he could clearly tell that the feed wasn't as detailed as he would like. A whir from above showed the drone at a height of about fifty meters...probably a safe distance.
Audren used his controls to zoom in as far as he reasonably could and found it wasn't quite enough. Things got too grainy before he could see the detail he needed. So Central zoomed the drone's camera in more; when combined with the Jedi's manipulation he was able to see what he was looking for in relation to the gun. As a result he moved over to the wall - in a different area - and carefully peeked his head over to visually eye his target. He could barely see it behind a divot in the landscape; imagine that, a pocked landscape near a crash site. It was enough to confirm what he needed however. He turned back to the ambush corner and used the Force to pull a couple rounds from the soft sand they'd impacted when missing him. Without the telekinesis he'd never have been able to get them without exposing himself to the gun, so fortunate that he knew what he did.
The sound of running footsteps brought him back to reality. Another one of the engineers was jogging towards them with a more complete medical kit on his back. At first the Sephi was angry that the man had made the dangerous trek on foot, but that anger dissipated once he learned that the safe path had been plotted using the encrypted beacon the Chev had been broadcasting. The three of them knelt over the unconscious Twi'lek to administer a bit more aid: a bacta injection near each wound and an IV would help keep him alive on the trip back to the yacht. And a painkiller injection as well, since the stretcher would not be a pleasant traveling experience. Then the emergency stretcher was snapped together, Oowel'heko moved onto it, and on its way back to the ship carried by the two uninjured engineers. For his part, Audren turned back to the wall...and the gun behind it.
A glance sent the three salvaged rounds floating into the air. They weren't all too heavy, being just rounds, so they lifted a good fifteen meters up before he let them stop. Once he had an eye on the target again, he forced them to zip at it one by one. The first one was a near miss; the cable sending power to the gun was thin and tucked into a narrow cleft after all, as was smart. The nearness of the miss meant that some of the molten metal spilled onto the cable and damaged it. The other two were more on target, with the second bolt clipping the cable and causing its own splash damage while the third pierced the cable outright. Between the three he could see a clean separation.
Again exerting his will via the Force, the Master sent a larger piece of rubble clattering into the gun's field of view. It adjusted slightly and one bolt fired...then nothing else. He then cautiously poked his head back around the pocked corner, also to no reaction. Lightsaber lit and at the ready, he strolled out into full view and towards the gun. Fully no response came from the gun. Only when he was beside the emplacement and out of the line of fire was his lightsaber blade extinguished, and he took a few minutes to safely separate the gun from power and from the drum that fed ammunition. A glance around showed him that the effort was well worth it: the corpse of one of the Bryn species lay nearby, the remains of the transport were intact, and the contents - while spilled a bit - would no doubt be beneficial over time. He activated his comm.
"Central, this is Sykes. What's the initial prognosis on this site?"
"Uh, hold one."
The Sephi waited with false patience as the technician back onboard the yacht keyed for a data dump and the droid brain crunched hundreds of variables. It was no supercomputer, but the results came back quickly enough.
"Analysis brain declares this location a moderately high likelihood for industrial use, but only as a moderate location to begin restoration terraforming."
"And in comparison to the other two sites visited so far?"
"Better restoration results at site one, with a lower probability of industrial return. Lower results for both at site two."
"We only had one more site left after this one. What were the tentative findings there compared to here?"
"Ummm...no local analysis obviously, but orbital readings suggested similar results as site two."
"Very well. Begin claim paperwork for this site and the contents thereof. Full circle centered on the volcano's core, radius to my location plus another third of the distance. Xi Char are welcome to rebuild their temple as it was before if they would like, with aid from CI, but we want the rights to negotiation contracts with them before others."
"Roger. We still heading to site four?"
"Negative. Call in a freighter and hazmat team, we've got some collections to perform here first. How's Oowel'heko?"
A new voice came over the channel then, the voice of the Chev engineer that had originally been with Audren when the injury occurred.
"In the medbay and being worked on. He'll make it."
"Good to hear. On my way back."
