Private The Quick and the Dead

[Tansu Treicolt]

CORUSCANT | UNDERWORLD | HIDDEN HEART
BEFORE THE INVASION OF CORUSCANT
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MISSION FAIL
00:14:39

Everything around them fell away into digital pixels, collecting in piles before evaporating into an unseen place. What had been a three dimensional, fully immersive training sequence in a virtual environment, high threat and all, returned back to the empty dojo in Hidden Heart.

Tansu snatched her hat from her head in frustration and slapped it to the ground.

"What the Feth, Tal?" Now she gestured ambiguously, still waving her lightsaber around.

"You missed that last guy?? How could you not see him? I thought you had him but instead he gets a KILL SHOT? I'm DEAD!"

This was the third try on this mission objective. Their first failure had been Tansu walking straight through the door, ignoring Talsin's please to try and splice and disable the security system. Second, Talsin had spliced, but had triggered the alarm. Which earned him an annoyed I-told-you-so look. The third they got through, Talsin decided to go through an HVAC way, and Tansu took the door (again!) and one of their decisions resulted in having to take down an innumerable number of guards.

Tansu, of course, blamed Talsin.

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Talsin Lota
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[Talsin Lota]

"I told you not to go through the door alone!" He said incredulously. "I got through the side corridor easily, there was no one there, Tan. We could have sneaked through it and bypassed that entire security force."

Gesturing around them in an attempt to replicate just how many guards were patrolling there.

"So don't even start on 'what the feth, Tal', if you'd just listen to me we would have won this mission three failures ago."

Tansu Treicolt

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

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"You also told me you had me covered?? You're doin' an awful lotta tellin' and a whole lotta not showin'." She huffed.

Perhaps the worst thing about this was the record. If anyone went to the logs, they'd see Talin and Tansu's names entered to engage the system and their one, two, three failed tries. Did that mean they didn't work well together? If Kyric split people into pairs again, and used this track record as anything to go by, Talsin and Tansu were not looking like a good choice together.

She scooped up her hat and disengaged her lightsaber.

"That is such poo doo and you know it. We tried you way and you tripped the alarms way worse than just walking through the door. You let the whole STATION know we were comin'. My way at least kept the threat isolated to like.." she gestured around. "Here!"

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Talsin Lota
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[Talsin Lota]

"That's only because we got killed in record time! What do you think they would have done if we lived 5 seconds more? They would have engaged the entire station alarm anyway, come on, Tansu, you know better than that."

He grimaced at her accusation of having her covered, because that was true.

"Look, I am sorry, I was trying to- but there was some kind of deflector system up there. The moment you got attacked by them, I was locked away from even SEEING you." And then he gestured with his finger triumphantly.

"But if you had just come with me, then we wouldn't have had that issue to start with!"

Tansu Treicolt

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

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"They wouldn't have lived five seconds more if we lived five seconds more." She sounded exasperated, as if she'd been making that point the whole time and Talsin missed the most obvious outcome.

Taking virtual lives was a cinch. Tansu did not hesitate. She knew in her gut, however, that this would not be the case if this were anything close to real. All she saw were vacation days, sick leaves, and men and women who were just employees.

Her arms folded and she sniffed triumphantly at managing to get an apology from him. They were so close to agreeing now, if he just admitted he was wrong.. but then his finger came out!

"What?! Yes we would have! Either way, we're endin' up here squaring off with the same goons and you're up in the ceiling twiddlin' your thumbs. Are you kidding me right now."

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Talsin Lota
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[Talsin Lota]

"No, we wouldn't have! We would have bypassed all the guards TOGETHER and then you wouldn't have died and we could finally get to the mainframe to retrieve the intel! That is the mission, Tansu, not executing as many virtual NPCs as possible."

Exasperated now.

"You know, I know TALIN seems to enjoy beating up as many of them as possible. But I don't really get what YOUR obsession is with them."

Tansu Treicolt

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

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Tansu whipped around freakishly fast. This time her finger was up and pointing right into Talsin's sternum. Hard.

"I don't like whatcher insinuatin'. Don't you dare talkabout Talin like that."

Blue eyes and tight lips glared up at him. He had a point, and that made her angrier. Like somehow the muscle memory of using her blade to cut through virtual bodies would mitigate the amount of hesitation she'd evidenced so far in the field.

She wasn't fully conscious of that though. Especially not when Talsin crept under her skin with his insufficiencies and bad ideas!

"Fine." She huffed, and drew herself back in. "Let's try it again sneaking through the stupid ceiling and see if we don't get found out like womp rats."

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Talsin Lota
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[Talsin Lota]

He hadn't even SAID anything bad about Talin. Just stated a fact. But he felt bad about it anyway, because... he knew she was concerned about it, even if Tansu would never say it outloud, but Talsin saw it from the sideline whenever they were on a mission. The way Talin seemed to revel in whatever chaos they found themselves in. Enjoying adventure was one thing, but the other Tal seemed to be particularly in her element about it.

As they went to the console to turn it on again his hip gently bumped into hers.

"Sorry." Talsin said quietly to her. "I shouldn't have brought her up, I won't do it again."

Tansu Treicolt

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

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"Whatever." Tansu grimaced, and peeled her hat from her hair and set it on the side. If they were going to be crawling through the HVAC system, it would get in the way. She hated the concept of being small and unseen. It was so entirely opposite of everything she was used to. She'd grown up being as big as she could, and now, the most effective way to get the bad guys was to go unnoticed?

A long, drawn out breath slipped out and she loosened herself up. His sincerity touched her, but she was too many levels of frustrated now to fully accept it for what it was.

"Start the thing. Let's do this. I got my sneakin' and crawlin' boots on now."

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Talsin Lota
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[Talsin Lota]

Nodding there.

"Didn't realize you had sneaking and crawling boots, Tan. We could have used those several tries before." Dryly as he hit the button and all around them the scene changed again.

"Follow my lead this time. I don't wanna go back AGAIN from the start."

Tansu Treicolt

 

[Tansu Treicolt]

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Her lips curled up sharply, right into her nose, and she made mouthed mockingly we could have used those several tries before — entirely soundless, but the expression was loud enough.

"Isn't sneaking supposed to be silent, hot shot?" She snipped quickly while the scene built itself up from the ground and the ceiliing simultaneously. The dojo's light, calm walls became hard steel, harsh lines, and an endless corridor. Even the atmosphere changed, from well-circulated air to the feeling of heavy oxygen that felt recycled, as if they were on a giant space station.

"Fine. Go. I will cover you and make sure you don't get shot in the face. Unlikesomepeople."

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Talsin Lota
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[Talsin Lota]

He turned around with a raised finger but as he opened his mouth the scene had solidified around them and stole his opportunity to come up with a comeback.

Eyes flared up there in annoyance but then he sighed and turned around again.

Leading the way just as he had said he would while stewing in his failure to one up her.

Tansu Treicolt