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GM: Raven
Players: Mr.Terrific, Aife, Raven, Carpenter
Synopsis: Raven leads a team to raid data from one of Djotto Serri's recruitment offices
Date: Saturday April 25 2080
Herr Colonel,
While I am not actually an employee any longer, I am appending a narrative of my efforts to gather intelligence on your behalf in mission summary format. Habits die hard.
Warm Regards,
J. Crowe.
Mission Report — April 25, 2080
Unit/Personnel: NAMES REDACTED
Mission Primary Goal: Acquire time-sensitive intelligence.
Mission Secondary Goal: Disrupt local recruiting efforts.
Mission Outcome: Success.
Mission Narrative:
Operative RAVEN was tasked with locating and raiding a DJOTTO SERRI recruiting center in the Orktown area of Denver. Due to RAVEN's unfamiliarity with local assets and the time sensitive nature of the mission, RAVEN used a local resources specialist to assemble an ad hoc team for this mission.
The team was contacted independently of each other through the same resources specialist, and asked to meet at a local establishment ('Plastic') that specializes in these sorts of business arrangements. Personnel present included a local magical practitioner, a mercenary based out of Denver, and what appeared to be some sort of B&E specialist. The level of ability in this team varied /WILDLY/.
Once the terms of the mission were agreed upon, the team separated to retrieve necessary equipment for the mission, and then consolidated 1.5 hours later at the RV, 2 kilometers northwest of the target. The team decided that, due to local security conditions, an insertion using magical concealment was the best option. The Orktown area of Denver is currently experiencing a massive local buildup of military-style small arms, including assault rifles and the like. As a consequence, the team opted for a low-observable infiltration.
The team's magician was, to be blunt, the single most gifted magician I have ever worked with. He managed to pull off contemporaneous spell constructs that fully concealed the team while still functioning normally. While moving south from the RV to the target structure, a problem typical of field operations presented itself, however. Because the team opted to use back alley ways of the dense urban sprawl to conceal their approach to the target AO, there were members of the local population present. The team stumbled, through no fault of their own, on a pair of orks engaged in amorous, mutually satisfying social activity. A third ork, who had apparently been observing the pair, accidentally knocked over a mound of trash, alerting everyone.
This, unfortunately, left the team exposed in a tiny alley way. The magical concealment used was only effective against visual devices, and one of the orks detected the team via olfactory means. Rather than risk an engagement so far from the AO and so unrelated to the primary mission goal, the team rapidly fled the area with the assistance of magic. As I explained, the local magical asset was absurdly well-endowed, magically speaking. Gifted.
Once the team moved away, the infiltration to the AO was uninterrupted from this point forward. A decision had been made, pre-mission, for RAVEN to act as a spotter, scout, and overwatch northeast of the target structure. The other 3 members of the team moved to the south of the facility conducted a hasty reconnoiter of the AO. I summary, there was heavy non-combatabt foot traffic moving in and out of the main doors of the facility. The facility was a former box-box store of some variety, and did feature a loading dock. Our intelligence indicated the actual recruiting center was in the north half of the structure. This stood to reason to mean that the loading dock was part of the recruiting center.
As recon was being performed, RAVEN noted to the team that two armed, military-aged males were smoking outside the loading dock doors. Once they entered, the team's mage made a judgment call to try to rush past the guards, leap six feet up onto the edge of the loading dock, and rush past the guards while under magical concealment.
It was then that the tactical situation evolved into chaos.
The local mercenary was competent, and managed to leap up onto the dock without much effort, and clear the door without alerting the orks inside the facility who were operating as local security. However, the mage and the B&E specialist (Mr. Terrific and Aife) failed to make the jump up onto the dock, and crashed into the side of it. The noise alerted one of the two guards who had been outside smoking.
To the team's credit, they did not panic. The mercenary (Carpenter) inside the facility relayed the bare facts: inside were at least 10 orks armed with assault rifles, and several workers. There were an unknown number of personnel deeper in the facility. However, in another stroke of sheer bad luck, while the B&E specialist and mage attempted to get up on the dock, an armed ork guard was investigating the noise, and he and the mage ran into each other. Obviously, magical concealment will not help with that.
The armed ork indicated that something was there, and further inside the facility, an older female ork (age: 40-45, by description) began acting in a manner consistent with someone using astral perception. At that moment, the mage and mercenary both fired needle guns tipped with narcotic drugs to render the mage unconscious. By agreement, we had opted to use non-lethal methods if at all possible to avoid casualties. Both hit the presumed magician, and she was rendered unconscious. However, as she lost consciousness, she managed to raise a warning to the security force in general.
The tactical situation began to degrade rapidly. The mercenary (Carpenter) was in a room with at least 10 hostiles with automatic weapons, and the other two members of the team were trapped in a kill zone, half through a loading dock door. Again, the mage (Mr.Terrific) that was present displayed an incredible amount of skill. He cast a powerful spell over the whole of the loading dock area, rendering the entire security detail unconscious at once. I feel that I must also point out that there was no way that he could have avoided casting the same spell on the mercenary (Carpenter), who was in the midst of the security detail. So, while maintaining 3 different concealment spells, this magician rendered 10 combatants unconscious, provided some sort of spell defense to the mercenary, maintained the concealment spells, and didn't kill himself in the process. And this was when the combatants were spread over a 20 meter diameter.
I cannot stress enough how difficult this feat of magic had to have been.
The mage's actions rendered combat ineffective all known hostiles except one. The recruiting center inside was filled with military-aged recruits — my estimate, based on the encounter, is that there were 20 to 25 orks in the middle of recruitment. See attached intelligence report.
I engaged the remaining hostile. However, because of the decision to use non-lethal force, I was using a sidearm with gel rounds. Despite two hits and clear pain, the ork did not fall. The remaining hostile fired at my location, presumably seeing the muzzle flash. The team's B&E specialist (Aife) fired a needle gun into the man, rendering him unconscious.
As people began falling unconscious from no apparent sources, some member of the recruitment pool seemed to convince everyone else that poison gas had to have been present, and further indicated to the local security corporation (Lone Star) must have decided to kill all of them. This, of course, caused a predictable amount of confusion and panic, and most of the present non-combatants began to flee.
The team used this opportunity to perform the primary mission goal — intelligence gathering. I will detail the recruitment efforts in the attached intelligence summary, but it was organized. There were apparently four recruitment officers, one of whom had been the magician who as rendered unconscious. The other three fled when they believed the place was being gassed.
Because of the suddenness of the assault, all of their pocket secretaries, and the terminal they were using for on-site work had been left unsecured and turned on. The team collected the devices, and also discovered an encrypted data node on the terminal. The team had the foresight to gather this encrypted data node on the pocket secretary belonging to the magically active ork.
As intelligence collection was underway, the team detected the efforts of hostile leadership, somewhere to the south, attempting to calm the situation. Based on the team's description, the person bringing order had clear military training, was a competent leader, and the team believes that had they stayed longer, very strong force would have been brought to bear, and casualties on both sides would have been inevitable. That decision was made to terminate further intelligence gathering efforts and exfiltrate.
Exfiltration was unremarkable. There had been one fully automatic burst fired by one of the ork security personnel before he was rendered unconscious. This had the effect of drawing in local insurgents, thus clearing our route out of the AO.
No casualties were taken by the team, and no permanent physical harm was inflicted on the opposition. It is highly probable that the DJOTTO SERRI have no idea who hit them, why, or even what was taken. Team performance was generally good. However, the issue at the docks with a failed breach is a textbook example of why physical training is so important. Sustain physical training for all personnel. Had the breachers all been as competent as the mercenary, this might have been accomplished without a shot fired.
INTELLIGENCE REPORT:
The team recovered 4 pocket secretaries that were being used by what appeared to be DJOTTO SERRI recruiters. All four devices were captured while logged into and turned on. That state was preserved for the entire time until they were delivered to the local resources specialist for decryption and data extraction. We did not have time to examine any of the contacts, but it was apparent that the recruiters were gathering personal information from the recruits on them.
The terminal on-site had encrypted, compressed data. We can only presume that this is some sort of high-value data. We do not have any idea what its purpose is. We collected the secure data on the magically active recruiter's pocket secretary, using her credentials. It should be noted that the terminal had been in operation when the female magically active recruiter was rendered unconscious, so we believe the data to be valid.
The facility housed a recruiting center, and it was a far more professional operation than I believed we would find. Whether this is typical of DJOTTO SERRI recruiting efforts or now, I cannot say. However, the recruiting center featured a large holotrid installation where prospective recruits were watching edited footage of the Battle of Reno. It looked edited to present the most heroic face possible to the army the recruits were joining. Recruits were screened and processed by four recruiters, and the magically active recruiter might have been performing magical screening as well.
There was also some kind of real military presence on site. We believe, with a high degree of confidence, that there was at least one officer or experienced NCO on site. As we began exfiltration, this person began quickly establishing order, and we believe a firefight would have broken out had we not departed.
PERSONAL: Herr Colonel, the fixer, Harold Eagle Feather, should have delivered the pocsecs and any paydata to you. I would very much appreciate a heads up on what was on those devices, and in the encrypted data store.
Please let me know if you require further assistance.
Regards,
J. Crowe.
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