GESB: Operation Time-Cops

[Chad32]

"Well first off I actually work for Visser Two. I'm not obligated to tell Visser Three anything. Secondly of course he'd take all the credit for himself and probably kill me for good measure. Even Yeerks who have never been to Earth would know that. But if you're going to call me a dapsen fool, then just lie there quietly. I don't have to talk to you. Sir."

[Luke Skywalker (Ossanlin)]

Ossanlin's fingers fly over the console with practiced ease as he simultaneously gives thought-speech commands to the computer to adjust the flight path.  He quickly re-forges the shield matrix drawing extra energy from the ship's two small but powerful matter/antimatter reactors.  The nav-com works through the routing for z-space as the Mirage lances through the remainder of the planet's stratosphere and into its mesosphere.  It would be mere minutes before they burst through the thermosphere into the ionosphere where z-space became possible, but the bugs were dogged, and worse, Ossanlin looks at the monitor and sees the heat-signature of a Blade Ship moving in on their position.

Ossanlin banks the Mirage hard to the left, sleek curves slicing through the thinning atmosphere.  <Just a few more minutes Myitt and we should be able to jump.>

[Terenia]

"You also hardly have the authority to instruct me to do anything," Zorish says in a dangerous voice, "unless you possess a rank higher than mine, which I sincerely doubt since your plan for glory failed, you should show me a little more respect."

Zorish pauses, giving a moment for that information to sink into Sukohn's mind, then continues, "Now, you said that you have seen me before, and yet you also say that you work for Visser Two. That brings up two issues. Firstly, why are you on Earth? Secondly, how could you have seen me before, as I am almost always stationed aboard Visser Three's Blade Ship?"

[Chad32]

"Sorry SubVisser. I shouldn't get snotty with you. Anyway, there's an Andalite-"

<Quiet Sukohn!> Claxter said, just remembering Ossanlin wanted there to be a cover story about exactly why they had Zorish. If he allowed Sukohn to keep talking, Zorish might figure out why they really took him.

"What?"  Sukohn said incredulously.

<Nothing. Just shut up.>

"What's your reason for taking Zorish anyway, especially before me?"

<Shut. Up.>

[Alic]

((Woke up. Posting. Back to sleep now. I think I'm sleep typing right now so I hope its ok))

Alic's face had turned another shade of red, this time out of embarrassment. She had no intentions to upset Ossanlin, and was actually confused as to why he hadn't tried to take Claxter himself. That young andalite made mistakes everywhere and should have been put in his place a long time ago. Alic was just the only one who would do it.
She had followed Claxter into the medbay and leaned against the wall with her arms crossed, trying to ignore their prisoners and Claxter.
She turned her head away, lost in thought.

[Myitt]

"Aahh!" Myitt cries as the ship banks hard left.  The four red beams aimed at the Mirage's engines lance by the main viewscreens, missing just barely.  "Okay," she exhales weakly, shaken, "okay, let's just make sure we survive the next few minutes!"  She swallows and focuses on the weapons array once more, gripping the manual controls like this was the world's most life-threatening level of Duck Hunt.  "Tell me you're seeing this," Myitt says, staring at the large red icon that clearly denotes the faint energy signal of an Imperial Blade Ship.  She doesn't dare to look up at the viewscreens or the windows, although the imposing spacecraft is cloaked.

For Zorish, their little ship is so close to salvation, full circle from where he had come.  For most of the others, what loomed in front of them was worse than death.

[Luke Skywalker (Ossanlin)]

Ossanlin veers again, taking on an uncharacteristic flight path.  <Yes I see it.  They're in the outer ionosphere, we can jump as soon as we get through the planet's thremosphere, it will take a lot of energy and the backlash wave will be intense, but it shouldn't harm the planet's atmosphere that high up.  They assume we have to completely escape the gravity well before we can jump...thankfully the Mirage has quite a few surprises in store.>

Ossanlin begins to prime the pulse-missles.  If the Blade ship decided to open fire, the hyper-magnetic wave that was generated as a side-effect of the pulse explosion would throw off tracking and eliminate line-of sight for a few seconds.  <I don't know if you know this Myitt, but the pulse-missiles I have stocked on here create a momentary gravity-vaccuum after explosion.  If we line our trajectory up with the explosion and time our jump to execute a nano-second after the explosion, we'll be able to enter z-space.  The only reason I'm waiting until we hit the ionosphere is that the resultant shockwave from opening a z-space rupture inside a body's gravity-well is incredibly significant.  The greater the gravity, the greater the shockwave.  Down in the troposphere it would eliminate buildings and citizens as well, in the stratosphere and mesosphere it would destroy the planet's natural weather patterns for years.  It's a tad...risky...what with flying through a pulse-missile explosion with slightly compromised shielding and timing the jump precisely so that we don't get caught and twisted like a granek in the gravity-collapse or get sliced in half by the unstable z-space rupture...>  Ossanlin falls silent thinking perhaps that was a bit too much information.

[Myitt]

Myitt allows herself a few seconds of shock to absorb this information.

<We're going to what?> Tara demands.

"You're going to try and make a z-space jump in low orbit?" Myitt yells aloud, almost as indignantly.  "But that's...you're going to get us all killed, and even if it doesn't harm the planet, it's going to be..." She wrestles with what she's trying to say, her hands trembling on the controls.  The Blade Ship is closing in, ever closer, and the Bug fighters are still hot on their back...

"Just tell me when to deploy the pulses," she says finally.  "Yeah.  Okay.  There's a chance we can do this.  By the Kandrona itself, I just hope we can pull it off before the Blade Ship can activate its tractor beam."

[Chad32]

<Making a Z-Space jump in low orbit?> Claxter said. He felt guilty about them having to do this. Those minutes chasing Zorish could have caused them to fail the mission after all. They were on a time limit, and now they were taking risks because of his blunder. He felt guilty, and it likely showed on his face. He did not know how he would reconcile with his Prince.

[Terenia]

((Sorry for the delayed/crappy post guys. I don't know why, but I had a really hard time responding this time around. Brain fart or something. ))

Zorish falls silent, letting Sukohn's words and Claxter's sudden, violent reaction sink in. He hesitates for a few moments, absorbing the information, and when he speaks again he is now addressing the Andalite Warrior, his voice thick with contempt.

"What is it you want to hide from me, little Andalite?" He sneers, "Something I should know?"

He turns his attention back to Sukohn, "Sukohn, whatever it is the Andalite wishes for you to abstain from saying, I demand you tell me immediately. Do not let this filth silence you."

--------

The two Bug Fighters pull behind the Mirage, loosing a little ground but managing to, for the most part, keep pace with the Andalite craft. The closer of the two ships lines itself up with the Mirage's Zero-Space thrusters and, moments later, a beam of red energy explodes from the weapons. Meanwhile, the other Bug Fighter zips along, preparing to line up the next shot.

Further out in space, fully beyond the Earth's atmosphere, the Blade Ship of Visser Three is rapidly closing an intercept course. The Blade Ship has its visual cloaking up, but it is not even attempting to block the energy signals from its powering Dracon Cannons.

[Chad32]

<We have imprisoned you to acquire information. That is all you need to know.> Claxter said.

"Either your priorities are strange, or that's a load of bull. What would he have that's more important than stopping me? Or did you just not think I could do it? I had the little Human morpher in my bug, afterall. Of course you're kind of a strange lot in a strange place. Although what's-her-name having been on the blade ship and acquired the Subvisser's host might not be related to this. That's just something I noticed.

<Must you be so talkative!?> Claxter said, walking towards Sukohn menacingly.

"I'm a curious person, and this has been the most interesting thing I've been through in my life.

[Luke Skywalker (Ossanlin)]

((Hey Jessi, is it cool if I call you Jessi?  Umm..anyway, the bridge is sealed off from the rest of the ship, it's pretty unlikely that Oss would hear you through the door since there's some distance between the med-bay and the flight-deck.  I mean, you don't have to change your post or anything, but I'm not gonna have Oss respond since he wouldn't be able to hear you, I just didn't want you to think I was ignoring you. ))

Ossanlin winces a bit... <Well, not exactly low orbit...more like mid-orbit....sort of.>  The ship rocks a bit as the bug's beams impact the shields and are mostly absorbed and dispersed.  <If it helps any...I've pulled this off dozens of times, and simulations are 97.5 percent accurate to real Universe conditions.>  Ossanlin watches as the nav-com finishes plotting their route and the ship rockets up out of the mesosphere.  <Z-space route plotted.  A good thing too...the Mirage has powerful shields but a direct hit from a Blade Ship dracon...well we don't really want that to happen.  We might live through one shot.  Prime the pulse missiles, I need a volley of two to explode at one precise spot approximately 1.894 Kilometers directly in front of the ship.  Let me know when you have them ready, we should be into the Ionosphere in the very near future.>

Ossanlin closes his eyes a moment, his fur shifting from deep blue to silver, his eyes glowing their soft sky-blue hue.  His senses expand rapidly and he can suddenly feel the interchange of energy around the ship and outside of it as well.  Timing the jump would be a 50% gamble at best without his Silver Blade senses, with them...well he's confident to say the least.

[Terenia]

((Oh, Zorish was talking to Claxter, not Ossanlin. I meant to say 'warrior', not 'prince'. My bad. Fixed it. And yes, you can call me Jessi))

[Luke Skywalker (Ossanlin)]

((Oh cool.  NP Jessi.    I'm Luke BTW if you haven't heard Tara and Patty say it a million times already.  :p I'll post after Tara again. ))

[Myitt]

((Wow, pretty decent timing, I've been offline all day XD mostly because I was up until 5 and woke up not too long ago...oops  RAF party.))

Myitt primes the second pulse missile as soon as Ossanlin gives the direction to do so.  She watches the screen intently and then nods. 

"Alright, both missiles primed," she calls out, double-checking the calculations and trying to block out the fact that Tara's heart is hammering away in her throat.  "Checking conversion...yes, they're set to deploy 1.8941 kilometers in front of the ship."  Myitt adjusts her grip on the manual controls.  "Just tell me when."