DOMAIN OF EVIL - Episode One: Crash Landing

[max_vale]

Two ships enter the upper reaches of the planet Trinta's atmosphere while volleying laser blasts at each other; all while being back-lit by sudden strokes of lightning and being buffeted by storm winds and thick air….

Crutag's ship The Scent of Fear has closed to short range and its two Twin Laser Turrets track the erratic flight of the acquired freighter aptly named Trallus' Rustbucket as it dives towards the flickering, hazy greenish surface far below. The ship's controls are sluggish and the whine of the storm-force winds battering the hull grows louder and louder; almost enough to take everyone's attention off the shuddering impact from a laser blast into the rear of the hull…..almost…

Borsk La'Reth finds himself in one of the two seats behind the pilot/co-pilot front seats and alone among the crew of Rebel Alliance operatives; his full attention is NOT on the battle at hand, but rather he finds himself troubled by a growing unease…a tremor in the Force unlike any he has ever felt before. Something sad and angry and seemingly WAITING…

Professor Clark Jones finds himself strapping into the turret seat of one of the two Laser Turrets onboard the Light Freighter; his thoughts instantly going back several months to the last time he found himself in the same predicament; out in the Roche Asteroid Belt, staring down an Imperial Frigate. He shakes the memories off and finds his weapon powered up and swivels it towards the menacing Scent of Fear; close on their tail…

Gavin Storm; mirroring the Professor; had rushed to the other Laser Turret seat and thrown himself into it while quickly powering the weapon up and turning it to face the enemy. The Bounty Hunter's ship was larger, newer and definitely more MENACINGLY looking than this scrap heap they were in; but he had no time to worry about that now; there was a battle going on and like it or not; he was in it….

Jackson Crowdoski sat in the co-pilot's chair; quickly running over what was actually working on the ship and what wasn't. The Shields had given out under the first withering barrage of fire and glancing at the Sensors showed that most of the surface of the planet in the sector below them would appear to be heavily forested swamp-land; with numerous islands and sand/mud bars interspersed with deep water. Also, the Taloron Hunter's vessel behind them appeared to be larger, faster, more maneuverable; still had solid shields protecting it and was capable of carrying a crew of up to 15 people. On the positive side; it appeared to ONLY be armed with a pair of Laser Turrets, just like this ship. On the negative side; those two Laser Turrets were HEAVY Lasers as opposed to the Medium lasers the -Rustbucket was packing….

Zinn found himself at the controls of what was quite possibly the slowest, least maneuverable and most falling-apart ship he had ever had the misfortune of flying. At the moment; the ship would DEFINITELY need to be pulled out of this dive or it would quite probably start to suffer major structural damage in a matter of seconds. On the other hand; the ship was almost CERTAINLY making better speed than it otherwise could have hoped to do….

[kipper]

Clark puts the Bounty Hunter's ship in his sights, grits his teeth, and commences firing. He hopes he can buy the pilots enough time to pull off some kind of amazing manoeuver to get us out of this mess...

[Jedi Skyler]

Zinn loudly curses their ship in several different languages, the tirade likely leaving everyone's ears soundly ringing. He begins to pull out of the dive, not wanting to shed too much speed, but knowing he needs to alter their vector or allow the ship to start taking damage, which it surely CANNOT endure...

[GreyWolfVT]

Gavin too takes aim at the bounty hunter's ship and fires. "Out of the fire and into the frying pan." he comments out loud at nobody specific.

[max_vale]

The battle in the storm-filled skies of the planet Trinta continues; with Zinn managing to arrest the plummeting dive of the freighter Trallus' Rustbucket; before the crumbling vessel broke apart in mid-air. This caused the pursuing vessel, the Scent of Fear to momentarily overshoot the Rebels and it gave Professor Jones and Gavin Storm a good opportunity to use their laser turrets to open fire on the Bounty Hunters' ship….

Clark just misses the ship with his laser turret but Gavin manages to score a solid blow that drains Crutag's vessel's shields by a third of their power. The gunners' smiles of triumph are short-lived however as the Scent of Fear's two twin laser turrets swing about to return fire. One of the heavy weapons misses wide to the right while the other turret lands a hit on the port quarter of the -Rustbucket and the ship lurches with the impact and begins to shake and rattle even more than it already had been…

Jackson, in the co-pilot seat manages to use the ships scanners and sensors to find what appears to be a sizable archipelago of islands and mudbanks in the swampy waters of the surface that may serve as a decent landing place for the freighter and he points this out to Zinn in the pilot's seat. He then begins to see if the computers have any kind of survey or other information about the planet…

Zinn heels the ship over hard and into some green-tinged clouds in an attempt to use any possible cover to try and escape or lessen the effectiveness of the Scent of Fear and its crew of a dozen bounty hunters. Lightning flashes across the sky and the rain continues to drum against the hull and the wind makes a haunting shrieking sound that sets the Rebel crew even more on edge.

Borsk La'Reth stares outside the cockpit, trying to reach out with the Force in an attempt to discern the nature of the tremor he felt earlier. For an instant he thinks he sees a malevolent face materialize in the clouds, but then it fades and he's snapped back to the here and now….a race between the forces of nature AND some evil bounty hunters and their ship as to which will knock their ship out of the sky first….

[kipper]

Clark continues firing, providing he can see his target. (If we're obscured by the clouds, he will cease fire.)

[GreyWolfVT]

Gavin continues to fire at the enemy ship. Two shots again this time targeting the enemy ships guns.

[Jedi Skyler]

Zinn is in full evade mode, looking for a way to shake their pursuit. "Next time we snag a ship, we need to lay hands on a Skipray Blastboat or something...something with some real TEETH!"

[crazy ski 1701]

"Next time we snag a ship, we need to lay hands on a Skipray Blastboat or something...something with some real TEETH!"

"if we cant do that...." Jackson pauses as the ship shudders, either from another hit or from atmospheric drag, ".. give me a few days with it... and ill make it Grow some Teeth!"

Glances over the controls again, looking to see if he can jam the Scent of Fear's targeting computers with a focused scanner beam, or cluttering the Fear's scopes by jettisoning the Bucket's cargo hold...

"you know.... i had some great ideas for the Runner... she would have been a FAR superior craft... by turning the ventricle thrusters on a dual gimael.. " he glances over his shoulder with a smile, thinking "shop" always lifted his spirits ... but no one else is smiling.. so he goes back to the console, and tried to think of a way to save their skins.. or at least helped.

[max_vale]

Darting in and out of storm clouds; with frequent bolts of lightning giving an eerie strobe light effect in the dark, greenish clouds; the two ships continue to trade shots with each other....

La'Reth shakes off the strange tremor in the Force he has been feeling and instead looks around to see if there's anything he can do to help. Seeing that Jackson has broken off from his attempt to search the databanks for any information on the planet Trinta to more actively help out in the fight they found themselves in; Borsk does what he can to complete the search. Despite not having much knowledge in how to best employ computer systems; he soon finds the information and does what he can to get that information sent to his datapad...

Professor Clark takes a deep breath and holds it and does his best to wait for a good opportunity to fire on the Scent of Fear; and seizes his chance when it lurches out of a rainy cloud in hot pursuit. He lets out a yell of triumph as his shot lands solidly on the Bounty Hunter's ship's shields and he smiles as he notices the shields are drained to almost nothing after his solid hit with a quick glance at his targeting system....

Jackson's fingers fly over the console as he utilizes the ship's sensors to jam the pursuing Scent of Fear's scopes and a tight grin crosses his face as he realizes that he has succeeded at his task and the bounty hunters will now have a harder time attempting to blast the Rebel ship with their scopes trying to break through the 'fuzz' of the jamming beams...

Gavin Storm fired twice and while he was dismayed that his first shot sailed under the larger vessel's hull; his second shot slammed into the starboard section and he was happy to see the shields on the pursuing vessel 'pop' and dissipate from the damage....

Zinn managed to slew the -Rustbucket over hard and a combination of his piloting skills and the jammed sensors led to one of the Scent of Fear's laser turrets sending a bolt very wide to the right and not coming close to hitting them. However, the gunner in the second turret must have been a really good shot as they managed to keep a bead on the falling apart freighter and sent a heavy bolt their way which slammed into the rear engines and with a shuddering, sickening sound of metal snapping off and a plummeting feeling in the stomach of everyone on board; the -Rust Bucket's sublight engines were shattered and gave out completely.

The battered old ship began a spiraling plunge towards the surface, eventually breaking out of the heavy clouds and a thick canopy of leafy trees was rapidly filling the cockpit view ports and sensor scopes along with the brownish-greenish-blue of water and sandy mudbanks and marshy islands which comprised the bulk of the planet's surface....

[crazy ski 1701]

"Zinn! Put, This, Rusty BITCH down, HARD... shes Never gonna fly again any way if we take another Hit!!!"

"just make the landing ... survivable..."

Jackson leans back and cinches down his seat restraints, keeping half a mind to continue jamming. our scopes may be blind, but so are theirs.

"Storm! Clark! Put a hole in that canopy for us... give us a soft spot to crash into!"

" and Storm.... if you bring up what happened on Pragia last month... I WILL SHOOT YOU IN THE FACE!"

[GreyWolfVT]

Gavin fires into the canopy to attempt a clearing. "Eh calm your ass down, I wasn't even thinking about that. Anyway speaking of holes I made us one."

[Jedi Skyler]

"When we get out of this," Zinn says through gritted teeth, "you can definitely add some upgrades to the 'Runner. They oughtta have her fully repaired by the time we're done with this little bit of business..."

Winging the ship wide of one of their pursuit's shots, Zinn hears the comments Jackson makes to his compatriots. "Why would you bring Pragia up?" he asks, continuing his evasive measures. "We weren't being chased by blaster-happy barves on..."

His sentence is cut off by the loud crashing and banging as the ship is hit by another barrage from the bounty hunters' ship. His words turn into another multilingual string of curses as the sublight engines die out. Thinking quickly, he immediately kicks in the repulsorlift engines, and preps the maneuvering thrusters to be of additional help, primarily for sudden, erratic movements to make them harder to hit.

"Concentrate all fire on their or their engines! Their shields are down, and we need them off us NOW!!!"

[kipper]

"Wait a minute, wouldn't it be better to let the trees cushion our fall, who knows what's beneath them?" Clark questions Jackson. He continues directing his fire towards the pursuing ship, aiming specifically for the engines.

[crazy ski 1701]

"Wait a minute, wouldn't it be better to let the trees cushion our fall, who knows what's beneath them?" Clark questions Jackson. He continues directing his fire towards the pursuing ship, aiming specifically for the engines.

"I DON"T (!@#$%^&) KNOW, do i look like a planetary botanist to you?!"
Jackson thinks about switching back to scanning the surface to answer the question.. but decides against it, as jamming the other ship is better then having our ship be turned into multicolored confetti.

[GreyWolfVT]

"Wait a minute, wouldn't it be better to let the trees cushion our fall, who knows what's beneath them?" Clark questions Jackson. He continues directing his fire towards the pursuing ship, aiming specifically for the engines.

Gavin "Ehhhh... toooo late!"

[Jedi Skyler]

"Who knows?" Zinn replies, his voice raised with the effort of keeping the ship aloft. "Do YOU know what's underneath the canopy? How far is it to the ground? We don't know if the ship will fall to the ground, or stay nestled in the canopy; and if it DOES stay aloft, how then do we get down? We need to LAND!"

[max_vale]

The battle in the stormy skies of Trinta abruptly ends when the Scent of Fear; it's shields completely drained, jinks high and into some thick clouds to dodge laser blasts coming from one turret of the plummeting -Rustbucket, while the other turret pours fire into the thick canopy of trees the crippled ship is approaching at high speed....

Zinn struggled to to slow the falling apart freighter as much as he could while also keeping it as level as possible as he aimed for the blasted-open path through the canopy and Jackson called out a "BRACE YOURSELVES!" shout over the ship-wide comlink as the -Rustbucket lurched into its final descent...

The thick branches of the numerous trees were suddenly surrounding the ship and scrapping against the hull as she slammed into and through the canopy and then a brief moment of clear viewing was had where a wide archipelago of small, marshy islands, various mudbanks, thick foliage and a few rare hilly, rocky islands; all lying in a vast, ocean of brownish-green water could be seen by the crew before the sudden slamming down into said water...and mud banks...and foliage....and islands pretty much dominated everyone's world for a long, painful few minutes. The ship eventually came to rest mostly sitting on, and sinking into, a mud bank and about a meter-deep pool of water. Everyone had various bruises and slight cuts from the crash, but luckily, no-one was seriously injured. A steady rain droned down on the ship's hall as everyone picked themselves up and joined up, relieved that at least they would be facing the unknowns of the planet Trinta together....



ABOARD THE SCENT OF FEAR

Jane Corb wondered for about the millionth time that day WHY had he ever agreed to join the large band of bounty hunters that Crutag had recruited back on the station; even if he WAS known for paying out decent wages; he was also completely OUT OF HIS MIND.

The Taloran Hunter, though he would NEVER give up on hunting down a Bounty, once he took the job; was anything but careless. As soon as the Shields 'popped'; Taloran had given the order to break off and observe their prey from afar. This they did, though it was certainly NOT easy. Flying in the stormy skies of this vile planet was no easy task and it was all the crew could do to keep tabs on their quarry. Seeing the ship crash down and then vanish out of sight under the thick canopy of foliage, Crutag ordered the ship to the closest dry island north of the crash site they could find and then they would proceed on foot to catch these Rebels.

As the Scent of Fear touched down; Crutag assembled the fourteen hunters that made up his crew and he decided to break everyone up into five groups of three. He and two hunters would stay at the ship until they received confirmation of the target's crash site and then EVERYONE would rendezvous to plan how best to take them down. Jane was assigned the Eastern sector along with a fellow human hunter named Stitch and a Quarren hunter named Zharrin....

[GreyWolfVT]

Gavin gathers hims self and gets up calling out "Everyone got all of their appendages? Everyone alright, in one piece? Man this reminds me a lot of what we are not supposed to speak of Jackson." Gavin begins looking around for the others to make sure they are all unharmed. "Wed best gather what we can and get outta here that bounty hunter is bound to be here soon searching for us."

[smoke warrior]

Jane Corb
Jane looks at his 2 other bounty hunters.
How loyal to our fearless leader are you.