FFFF

[X] Snatch the Biff Colonel and his aide, and more importantly, their command electronics.

Your team could take out the weapons here, or even kidnap the Mentats, but neither of those things will really neutralise the complex. Even if it means giving an ancient Nereidi weapon to ECHO CHAMBER potentially, you need to at least make sure the River don't have it. Accessing the Colonel and the files within his command box could also be useful to you if you have to negotiate with the Nereidi later on.

<<Luyu. Can you make a snatch on that Biff Colonel?>> The Balwar squad guarding him has pushed forward to the edge of the hole, firing downward into the killing frenzy below.

<<Yeah. I'll lose a body if we're unlucky but I think I can.>> She works her way closer, spreading out. Alawen moves up a floor and begins to set up in one of the passages with a heavy smoothbore electromagnetic which she assembles in sections from her back pack. A Jingal.

It's comforting to know the Communion has at least a normal reverence for her singular life. The mockmaids, meantime, press the attack with an intensity that both impresses and horrifies you. One of the great advantages that forces of the Garden have always had over the River, the advantage that's allowed the Garden to turn around so many battles against the firepower of the River and the alien strength of its war slaves is the ability to come back from the dead. Originally codified in the great work on military strategy by the Black Rose conflict specialist 29 Refine, an insight that even the Chrysanthemum had to accept: Continuity is the product of memory and personality, not physicality. Unconsciousness, the planck instants of renewed time, these do not break continuity, so neither does physical death. It has let the Garden produce warriors of a ferocity that even the most imperialistic of the River empires cannot match.

'Mockmaids', 'False Ancients', both names seem too insulting for the gallantry you see before you. Plasma bolts from the fast firing weapons shred them one after another, their thrown spears and harpoons utterly outclassed by the waves of firepower the River are throwing. Yet still they come, dogged, using the corpses off their own snakes for cover as they pour up the shaft at the River defenders.

You find yourself wincing at every kill shot. Luyu is made of something harder though, and continues her movement. The area where the Riverines are shooting from actually has a lot of cover. Boxes, machinery and scientific sensor gear stacked up in a tangle. The Luyus leapfrog from one cover to another, until she decides she's close enough and tosses out a swarm container.

The grenade lands unnoticed and drops off a flight of gnat sized combat micros. The Colonel is walking back and forth behind his troops, shouting orders and occasionally firing with a heavy silver projectile revolver. Spears shatter uselessly on a forcefield around the command post..

In their own shielded shelter, the computers are screaming loudly.

Luyu selects her targets, designates them for Alawen, and then throws a hand out. A flight of combat micros reach out for the Biff and Balwar closest to the Colonel, make soft contact, then detonate.

Two Biff die instantly. A Balwar screams, oddly high-pitched. The Colonel, hit with a non-lethal, drops. His Lieutenant curses, aiming over him with a plasma submachine gun, then his eyes roll back and he drops too.

Luyu switches on her plasma rifle and the three of her pour fire into the enemy in an almost perfect enfilade across their flank. The Balwar sergeant snarls, turns and throws a grenade at her, charging forward. There's a bright boom and a flash of smoke, masking for a moment, then Alawan's gun speaks, and the big Balwar is knocked off his feet by a burst of hyperkinetic fragments. Somehow, impossibly, the creature is still alive, turning his charge into a roll behind the corpses of one of the big snakes.

"You're pretty fast, Balwar." One Luyu calls out in what must be one of the Balwar languages as the three of her advance."Name yourself." The one of her with a plasma gun lays down suppressive fire, keeping the Balwar and his companions pinned down.

"I am Sergeant Three–" He makes a burping sound. He's speaking in Biff.

"That is not your name." Luyu laughs. "That is the designation of a slaver's weapon. Tell me your name."

The Balwar snarls. "I am God-Enacted. And you?" Now he's speaking Gardenian.

"I am Luyu of Many Bodies. I was a token on Tembril, where you also fought. I saw your ash streak."

"That is a reward long expired, but I'm still going to eat your heart."

"Maybe." Luyu gets near the Colonel and pauses, makes sure she's covering herself properly with her other two then skates forward to grab him. She checks she's got the command pack, then books it backwards. "But not in this slice of time."

Across the chamber, one of the quad-barrels rises up on its anti-gravity system, trying to target Luyu. Alawen is faster though, and the Jingal thumps out another round. This one's a solid shot, and the weapon detonates in mid air, its river core cooking off in a spray of in a bright burst of particles which momentarily blinds the Biff defenders.

Luyu and Alawen pull back, the later balancing the massive Jingal under her arm as she pounds down the cover. Plasma fire chases them and Luyu tosses a proximity bomb back to cover their retreat.

On the drone you can see the Balwar squad assembling to chase, while the Mockmaids make the most of the opening. You hope they enjoy it, because the enemy focus is now determinedly on you.

Luyu lifts the command box free of the inert Colonel and holds it up. <<Reizay, can you get into this?>>

Reizay sniffs over the line. <<River information systems are actually quite difficult to hack, and not just because of the alien background. Coming from pervasive general computation it can be difficult to get one's head around a paradigm of solely dedicated systems.>>

<<But can you do it?>> you ask.

She can't quite keep the smug tone of her setup paying off out of her voice. <<Of course.>>

Alawen jams the coppery command box onto a metamorphic connector, and dull grey nano oozes into the shape of an interface. The Riverine device makes jagged, oscillating sounds for a handful of seconds, then settles down.

<<Making progress. This guy was a little sloppy.>>

You wonder where she learned to do that, cooped up inside the Closed Dyson, but of course it's learning it there that's the real proof of her skill.

<<Those Balwar are coming up awful fast behind us.>> They are. The enemy advance is marked by a series of destroyed drones as they hunt out and kill each of the surveillance devices in their wake. Luyu begins to strip the Colonel of his gear and powers down her plasma gun. <<They might be able to track the box itself.>>

<<I need at least another minute to get into it. Then we can wreck their command net real good.>> Reizay says.

Luyu looks down at the Biff <<Shit. He's not wearing any kind of olfactory masking. They're tracking his scent.>>

<<Dump him. We've got the box.>>

<<Dead or alive?>> Luyu asks. It's a fair question. It'd be an escalation in a delicate diplomatic situation, and you don't like to permanently kill people if you don't have to, but the Biff are slavers and monsters. For the Mockmaids to have attacked them so implies that they did something horrendous to them in return. Not to mention, it'd possibly do permanent damage to their project here. And they escalated first - your conflict with ECHO CHAMBER was an intra-Garden affair.

You could also use the Balwar's often quite strong attachment to their River leaders against them by trying to hold him as a hostage, or using him as bait for an ambush. Though the latter will mean fighting eight Balwar head on, which could be a losing proposition. The former will also be tricky, but if you can make it to the sub with him alive, you have the intelligence jackpot and a big card to play against further River interference.

A final option would be to have one Luyu take him and lead the others astray. It'd make the escape a lot safer and let you further confuse the fighting in the base, but at the presumptive cost of one of Luyu's bodies. On the other hand, you might lose one anyway when the chase goes hot - and that's going to be very soon.

[ ] Kill the Colonel and leave.
[ ] Knock the Colonel out and leave.
[ ] Use him to bait a trap and try to get the Balwar squad.
[ ] Take him as a hostage.
[ ] Use him to lure the Balwar on a false trail.