[Day 2 - LE] Through Fire and Flame

[Kannon]

Dorian kept an eye on the Harkonnens, watching how they interacted with the workers and how the workers reacted. He wanted to get a sense of things before approaching.

-----
LE2, Watching Harkonnens, Discipline 4 + Faith 6, TN 10: 2#1d20 14 15
Failed 0 successes, unless Constantly Watching would apply to watching Harkonnens and reduce difficulty by 2 to 0.

Dorian noticed that the workforce was denser between the sanded area and the water farms. There, they were not only digging but also collecting something, throwing it onto heaps, and those heaps were then incinerated with short lasgun shots. Beyond that, an occasional lasgun surge was released into the sand itself. Without knowing what it was they were destroying, ti was hard to make sense of the activity.

[Kannon]

She kept one eye on Harkonnens. Maybe she should have kept both of them on them?

~~
I noticed you noticing me (Discipline+Truth) DC13: 2#1d20 11 18
1 suxx

Gene's eye got preoccupied with the Harkonnen commander himself. His face was disfigured somehow, though in what exact way it was hard to tell from the distance. Another thing was curious about him, however. While he was shouting orders just fine, feedback was offered to him in some hand language. It was unlikely this level of sophisticated secrecy made sense in this environment, at least nothing pointed to it, so the man could be suffering from impaired hearing.

[Kannon]

Cuyler slowed down as she walked with the others. Was she hearing things?

- - -
[Day 2 - LE] Through Fire and Flame, Discipline/Truth, Difficulty 4, TN 16, Listening, Constantly Watching?: 2#1d20 10 9

She was. Some hum, coming from underneath this mad-made pile of sand that was now obscuring several hectares of former suburban area. Or a buzz. But there was something, somewhere there.

[Cuyler Gray]

She moved close to the others.

"There's something in the sand. I can hear a hum of something."

[Dorian Drake]

Walking towards the site, Dorian spots the odd behavior with the lasguns. Pointing it out to the others he asks, "Think they're destroying evidence over there? It seems we may be lucky after all. If it's something worth destroying, it's probably worth a closer look."

He quickens his pace towards the soldiers with the lasguns and attempts to get their attention by shouting out, "By order of CHOAM mandate, halt your activities now!"

Cuyler's words register in the back of his mind, but he is focused on the possibility of lost evidence, not necessarily what the evidence is.

-----
LE2, Hummm, Understand 4 + Faith 6, Focus danger-sense, TN 10, +1 threat: 3#1d20 13 8 20
Failed 1 success vs 2 difficulty, 1 complication at 20, +1 threat

[Kannon]

The words were signalled to the officer, and he almost immediately bellowed "Stand right there, idiot!" His voice rang wrong because of randomised tones. Lasguns were raised against Dorian, though for now they stopped shooting.

[Complication: Worked Up]

[Dorian Drake]

Dorian steps in front of the two women to shield them and shouts back to the Harkonnens, "Have your men stand down, unless you intend to attack the delegates here under the blessings of the Emperor, may he rule forever, and under CHOAM mandate." He activates his shield belt, "And unless you wish to be known as the Harkonnen who violated the Great Convention and blew Arrakeen off the face of Arrakis."

[Genevieve Wallach]

Genevieve raises her hands at the two sets of people, raising her voice. "There's no need for all of tension. How about we all calm ourselves down and we can talk, okay?"

She didn't know about the deaf guy, but hopefully the others could understand him. "Hopefully we can avoid invoking the Emperor's Wrath or, at the very least, a subatomic explosion."

[Kannon]

Dorian acted on the assumption that ordinary soldiers could be intimidated without breaking their commander. But among the Harkonnen, they feared their superior more than any enemy. And here, their commander didn't react to anything Dorian had said in any other way than lowering the lasgun and drawing a stunner. Nor Gene's conciliatory tones, for the matter.

"Out, idiot. I have no time for suicidal maniacs here, bringing shields against lasguns."

From there, they could see what the lasguns had been used against. Now that the work had abruptly stopped, a wave of strange amorphous haploids, mostly transparent, left the sand and crawled quickly on their cilia toward the water farms. They kept falling into the ditch with the intention to crawl back on the other side.

[Cuyler Gray]

"Can you at least tell us what that humming is?" Cuyler spoke up.

[Genevieve Wallach]

"Can you at least tell us what that humming is?" Cuyler spoke up.

"He can't hear you, he's half-deaf." Gene shrugs and sighs. "Not that it'd stop him from trying to beat you silly, Dorian. Unless you all have a better idea to get around them, they won't listen to me. Quite literally, in fact."

[Cuyler Gray]

She turned to look at the soldiers.

"You can talk to him, right?" she asked them. "Tell him what we're saying. Otherwise, this will take forever and your work will be wasted."

[Kannon]

The man's facial scar tissue twisted demonically as he got his finger on the trigger of the stunner. There was no way to communicate with him because he was not looking sideways, just on Dorian.

"Shield down or I'll send a pellet across your throat." Some stunners could penetrate shields. It was a case of luck more than anything else, but it was possible.

[Dorian Drake]

Hearing from Gene that the commander was likely deaf, and taking a cue from Cuyler, Dorian tries another approach. Holding his arms up, but keeping his shield on (because an actual suicidal move would be to leave himself unguarded from lasgun or pellet attack), Dorian called out to the soldiers. "You better find some way to relay to him that he is putting his and all of your careers and likely lives on the line if he continues to threaten us and defy orders that are backed by the Throne, CHOAM, and the Landsraad. Not to mention our Sardaukar escort back there in the groundcar won't be very happy if this goes sideways."

[Kannon]

A thrown knife jostled the stunner off the lieutenant's hands, another hit coming from a shield-shimmering body tumbled the man into the ditch, where the little crawling somethings reacted to the presence of a living organism momentarily, exploring the man with their cilia, trying to envelop him in colony-like behaviour. Sardaukar had their own way of resolving standoffs.

Only the deepest instincts of Harkonnen soldiers prevented them from firing. One's sense of danger overcame inhibition and blazed out. Fortunately to all the living things in the area, he missed.

The Sardaukar did not seem troubled. He did not like either of the sides here. However it had resolved, he would have no remorse.

The ditched lieutenant screamed as he crawled out, tossing the leathery things off him.

"We've been dealing with water-stealing vermin here, sir." One of the Harkonnen who had apparently wised up after the Sardaukar laid down the Emperor's law. "Cadryalls brought it with the sand."

Indeed, uncontrolled, the things had been swarming out of the cordon.

[Kannon]

[2 Threat: On Knife's Edge]

With their commander compromised, lagun-armed Harkonnens were on their own in making calls whether to keep shooting at the sand...

[Genevieve Wallach]

Her eyes stared at the man being slowly swarmed by...whatever it was that was swarming him. It wasn't a pleasant sight to behold, but with her life, she had seen much worse. Gene, regardless, wasn't sure what it was that was going on with these creatures, and with her ignorance, it was unwise to chime in on something she didn't understand. However, that didn't mean she couldn't say anything. "See, now was that so hard to say?"

Never mind their leader was half-deaf.

"You have our thanks, Sardaukar. So how about you just answer our questions and we'll let you get back to what it is you are doing."

[Cuyler Gray]

"Will everyone just listen for a moment!" Cuyler spoke louder. "There is a humming coming from the sand. It sounds a lot like the humming of these shields. Is that something we should be concerned about?"

[Dorian Drake]

Thankful for the Sardaukar's timely intervention, Dorian called out, "Now, before you compromise the scene any further, everyone gather around here so we can talk instead of trying to kill one another."

-----
LE2, Hummm, Understand 4 + Faith 6, Focus danger-sense, TN 10, +3 threat: 4#1d20 16 18 17 16
Failed 0 successes, +3 threat

[Kannon]

Qobat, the Sardaukar, retrieved his knife and skewered one of the crawling things. Slowly, bright green syrup trickled onto the blade. That one was stopped, thousands of others had got through.

It trickled...

As the Lieutenant struggled with getting out of the ditch and casting off the leathery layer formed around his hands, the gross of people involved in the operation remained leaderless, left to their own judgment. And most of them were grossly unprepared for the responsibility. They knew their orders: stop the vermin from destroying the city's water lifeline.

Some dozen lasguns opened fire at the crawling frontier.

`[Move 2 to avoid getting affected by the laser fire. Complication on a shielded person is laser catches the shield. Difficulty raises by 1 and complication level drops by 2 as long as the situation is not resolved. ]

[Dorian Drake]

When the Harkonnens ignored him and open fire with their lasguns on the creatures, Dorian flips off his shield to avoid any catastrophes and confidently moves out of the field of fire.

-----
LE2, Avoid Lasguns, Move 6 + Power 7, Focus escaping, TN 13, shield off: 2#1d20 17 15
0 successes, Succeed at a cost

[Cuyler Gray]

As it was clear they weren't going to accomplish anything here, Cuyler tried to leave. She tried.

- - -
[Day 2 - LE] Through Fire and Flame, Move/Duty, TN 12, Difficulty 2: 2#1d20 3 20
Success at a cost.

[Genevieve Wallach]

She clearly was not prepared for what was to happen next. She moved swiftly with inhuman speed out of the way, but she was still outrunning the fire. Thankfully, her training and conditioning helped her a little. It probably could have been so much worse.

~~

Remember What Mother Boss Taught You. (Move+Duty = DC13): 2#1d20 18 14
RUN BITCH RUN [Prana-Bindu Conditioning Reroll] ((Move+Duty = DC13): 1d20 8

1 suxx, so suxx at a cost, then.

[Kannon]

Thankful for the Sardaukar's timely intervention, Dorian called out, "Now, before you compromise the scene any further, everyone gather around here so we can talk instead of trying to kill one another."

-----
LE2, Hummm, Understand 4 + Faith 6, Focus danger-sense, TN 10, +3 threat: 4#1d20 16 18 17 16
Failed 0 successes, +3 threat

[+1 Advancement Point]

[Kannon]

In the stroboscopic mayhem of laser fire they all managed to get out of the shooting line... except not. Cuyler was pushed hard and flopped into the sand right into the spluttered remains of the sand creatures, finding the taste of that light green syrup molasses-like, certainly rich in carbohydrates. Her face earned a mask. [Sand-caked; ???].

As Dorian tumbled, one of his kindjals remained somewhere in the sand behind him. [Complication: Displaced Asset]. Genevieve could forget about looking presentable until given toilette time soon enough. [Dishevelled].

[???] But who had pushed Cuyler? Seconds later they could see Qobat darting toward the nearest Harkonnen and executing him with a knife thrust from below the mandible into the skull. But something was wrong; where the Sardaukar should have had another hand, only cauterised stump remained. The perpetrator didn't live long enough to have thoughts about mutilating an Emperor's soldier.

Scarface, who had recovered enough, having spat out a curious haploid which had rightly pursued the inside of the man's mouth for moisture, mortified by what he had just seen and earlier experienced from the Sardaukar, began to shout.

"Pull back! The perimeter is lost! Ten yards back!" The nearest water farms seemed indeed to be lost, overrun by the amorphous vermin, getting into condensers and dew collectors with astounding vigour, draining poverty grasses of all juice in an instant.

They... won? The shield buried somewhere inside the sand hadn't been hit, obviously; the Harkonnen weren't cutting the sand with lasers anymore, though large swathes of it turned to glass.

Qobat didn't pursue them, just stood at the ditch, tilted to the side, possibly heaving.