Cover of Night: Mercs attempt Corruption mission (24/09/2403)

The Mercenary contingent arrived in China some time ago, but they had only recently finalised the plans for their infiltration of a suspected Power User development facility.  Under Bayman’s command, the team would exploit one of the Terran made facility’s design flaws, infiltrating it through the sewer system, rather than attempting to breach the perimeter by some other method.  Kiara was particularly amused at the fact that these kind of security flaws even existed in modern facilities, but she would simply chalk this up to the fact that the facility was for research and development rather than being an actual military installation.

The team would move through the sewers in their user forms, only powering up to an extremely capped state as they attempted to breach the facility.  This would require weak shell cascade from Kiara, destabilising the facility’s energetic defense before utilised their infiltration thrusters to phase through the now weakened walls.  This breach would create a small blip on the facility’s security systems, causing a team to be dispatched the investigate the disturbance.  The team would be relatively small though, as the distortion was also small and could possibly have been a result of a naturally occurring anomaly.  The Mercenary team would utilise their Energetic Interlocks to stick to the walls of the room, making their way onto the ceiling of the room and laying perfectly still, allowing the stealth of their combat suits to mask their presence.  The team would stay completely still until the security team left, before quietly making their way back to the floor and following the team out of the room.  Once outside, they would follow the team up from the maintenance rooms that housed the facility sewage dumping facilities and into the main area before breaking away from that security team and taking up a position out of the way.

Once there, they would not be able to communicate, only having a general idea of each other’s positions due to their Tactical Scanner Uplink systems.  From there, they would need to find a way into another maintenance room, one which housed the janitorial staff, as they were the employees with the highest security clearly but the most easily dispatched.  Unfortunately, the facility didn’t have much in the way of wall hung maps and the team was still too out in the open to risk interfacing with any of the information consoles lying around the place.  This forced them to rely on Kiara being able to map the facility using her Combat Ops, a passive mapping technique based on her natural ether sensing ability.  Unfortunately, with so many locked doors, there was only so much she could do, opting to just move in the direction with the least guards before beginning a manual search for maintenance.

This in itself would be an extremely difficult task for the team, who had to now accustom themselves to the guard movements and stealth past them when they were not looking, as even with their stealth suits, they would be pushing their luck by just strolling around the facility.  Luckily however, after some time of searching, they would finally come upon a rather large broom closet, which served as the office of the janitorial staff.  Kiara and Vasily would be placed on lookout duty, while Isis and Bayman interfaced with the consoles in this room to acquire a map.  Once this was done, they would look for the best way to get into the control room from their current location. 

As was expected, security increased closer to the important areas, those being the control room, the armoury and the research and development labs, so going in on foot would not be the best approach.  Like most bio-chemical labs, the labs in this facility were self-contained to prevent pathogens or harmful chemicals from leaking into the facility’s normal ventilation system, meaning that the ventilation ducts were not a viable option for the labs, but it could be used for the control room and the armoury. 

Bayman would opt to take this route, ordering his team into the ventilation systems and towards the control room.  Once at the control room, Kiara would take note of its occupants.  The room consisted of 15 users with controller type enhancements and three security type power users, each registering around level 27.  Bayman would make a quick and simple plan, setting ROM to engage and dispatch the first member of the security team, while he dealt with another, leaving the last to be dispatched by Kiara and Vasily.  Once this was done they would quickly lock down the facility, before ROM and Kiara made their way to the generator room.

Four of the five channelers would stealth their way into the rooms before Vasily tripped a pressure sensor on the door.  This would draw the attention of everyone in the room to the door, right before they spring their attack.  Bayman would power up to full and pump his right arm with Anima, driving all of the force from his form into that arm, through his combat knife and lodging it into the back of the neck of his target; a quick twist from the blade would internally decapitate the power user, separating his skull from his spine.  Kiara and Vasily would team up, with Kiara utilising her Shell Cascade to erode the power user’s defences before Vasily’s Hollow Storm sniper rifle blasted through the power user’s neck and out the otherside, dispatching him in one as well.  ROM would simultaneously assault his opponent, utilising his incredible Force to mimic Bayman and dispatch that man as well.  The entire thing would take less than a second, allowing them to turn their attention to the controller types as soon as they began to react.

Unfortunately, they would not be able to stopped all 15 of them from sounding the alarm.  Bayman would curse under his breath and the room was pelted with Diamond Grenades, locking the staff of the control room in stasis fields, while Isis dashed in and interfaced with the computer systems.  Her first task would be to lock off the Control Room from the rest of the facility to prevent them being being overrun.  This would only be partially successful as she managed to shut she room off, but not before another three members of the security team made their way into the facility. 

With each of these Power Users rivalling the power of the last set, Isis would be forced to retreat while the four man team of Mercenaries engaged their opponents.  This battle would be considerably more difficult than the first as they were now forced to deal with opponents that knew that they were there.  This locked ROM in battle against a power user that equally matched his level, while Kiara and Vasily teamed up on their level 27 opponent.  Bayman would have the easier time as his power easily trumped that of his level 27 opponent however.  As the battle progressed, Isis would move back to the consoles and begin to download as much information as she could from the systems on the specific power user project which this facility housed.  This project, like the one which ROM had faced in his initiation mission, seemed to be geared towards creating a single power user with simulated power capacity far higher than the usual augmentations, one capable of going toe-to-toe with high level Perfect-tier channelers, and even Ultimates if pushed to the limit.  Needless to say, such technology would be very useful to the Mercenary Army’s own manufactured units, making their acquisition of the technology beneficial on two fronts.  Unfortunately for Isis, she was unable to access the more complex files from the control room, meaning that she would have to get them from the lab area.

By the time she had relayed this information, her teammates had dispatched their opponents, having taking some damage from the process.  Isis would then inform them that they needed to make their way to the laboratory if they wanted to complete their mission.  Bayman would nod, ordering Isis to disable the internal scanners and detection equipment before she and the others made her leave through the vent, he would stay behind and rig the room with some unpleasant traps for the security team when the finally breached the door.

Within minutes, the team would make their way to the laboratory under stealth, exiting the ventilation system some distance from the entrance to that lab area to find a small security team standing guard on the outside.  Once again, the Mercenary team would quickly stealth kill three of the Power users present before actively engaging the others, while Isis worked on hacking the lock for the door so that they could get in.  As the door opened however, Isis would be hit with a punch that sent her flying through the Mercenary and Power User battles, knocking away a ROM Splice, Kiara and a few power users before she hit the wall and dissipated into code instantly.  Bayman would waste no time dispatching his final opponent as he turned his attention to the primary security unit for the facility.  This man seemed to be a prototype for the Power User champion which these people were trying to produce, exhibiting a power level equal to that of a level 45 channeler.  Bayman would quickly engage his Omega Drive and engage the hulking bruiser while ROM Spliced and assisted him.  Kiara and Vasily would then make their way into the lab area under stealth, while another ROM Splice took Isis to safety.

On the inside, the lab staff would be quickly transmitting and erasing data on the project, forcing Kiara and Vasily to neutralise them as quickly as possible.  The remaining grenades would flood the area, trapping a number of them while others fled, leaving the two snipers to utilise their ranged abilities at low power to incapacitate these scientists without killing them.  Once this was done, they would manually access the consoles and stop the transfers and deletions before copying the data that they had come for.  They would only be able to get about half of the information on the project, due to the rest being transmitted to another facility and deleted from the servers.  Once the copying was complete, they would finish the deletion of the information.  Now the Mercenary Army had half and whoever they had transmitted the data to had the other half.

Kiara would keep the information before she and Vasily turned their attention back to the door.  By now, what was left of the security team, those who had not been caught in Bayman’s trap, had reached the lab area and were engaging Bayman and Rom’s splices.  This would definitely be the cue for everyone to flee the area.  Kiara would power up her Omega drive and Shell Cascade the wall of the building, breaching it just long enough for everyone to Omega Flash out.  ROM would choose to allow the Splice guarding Isis Omega Flash out, sacrificing the others within the facility.  Of course, they would detonate to leave no traces of their presence, while taking out a few Power Users with them.

The Mercenary team would appear at their pick up point, where a Stealthed Carrier would be waiting for them.  The team would disappear into the night, leaving the facility in Chaos.

Outcome: The Mercenaries were not able to gain all the data which they sought, but they acquired enough to complete the mission.  The Power User research facility has been effectively rendered useless as all of the data has been destroyed and a number of their technological systems in the control room and the lab damaged.  The Mercenaries cannot be traced back to the action.

Bayman: 410 Exp (-1600HP)
  Kiara: 340 Exp (-820HP)

ROM: 370 Exp (healed)

Vasily: 340 Exp (-600HP)

Isis: 300 Exp (reverted)