10-14-2017, 06:52 AM
Hijiri gave the sensor panel in the steel wall a light tap and the metal door slid open with a barely audible hiss. He stepped through, into what looked like it might have been intended to serve as some sort of informal meeting room between officers, back when the Empire had actually believed they could keep Tier Five under control. Of course, nowadays there were barely any officers on this tier at all, much less within this one barracks. Technically, even Davion could likely leave if he wanted to; he hadn't been specifically instructed to stay, so it probably wouldn't be so hard to get himself transferred to some cushy office job on Tier One or Two if he were to request it... not that he was the sort of person who would, even if doing so didn't mean abandoning his allies down here.
Since there were no officers around to care what was going on here, Kroll had apparently taken it upon himself to lay claim to this room and its comfortable black leather sofas. He himself sat on the one near the opposite end of the room from the door, watching Hijiri as the Prime entered.
As this meeting was taking place during their down-time – and, more importantly, since Davion wasn't invited – none of the 'troopers had bothered to wear their uniforms. In the case of Kroll vor Iechtelsteir, this meant dressing in a white tracksuit and trainers of the same shade, and constantly having to brush aside his bangs as chin-length white hair repeatedly fell in front of his ice blue eyes. This guy was pretty fond of the colour white. Even his skin was so pale as to be almost albino.
The couches were all three-seaters and to Kroll's left sat the newly re-awakened Frank Leben, still nursing a hangover, yet miraculously alive despite downing a bottle of rubbing alcohol, which really ought not to have been possible. Frank wore a dull brown shirt with the top few buttons undone, baggy jeans and black shoes. He went for a 'rugged' sort of look, being tanned, muscular, and not bothering to shave the stubble from his chin. His unkempt short blond hair completed the image, as well as matching the colour of his eyes. He took a sip from a metal flask as the Battle Rabbit entered.
To Kroll's right was Brandon Windvale, whose brown, shoulder-length hair and slim, elven features remained exactly as they had been this afternoon when Hijiri had seen him in the training section, though he now wore some sort of silky brown tunic, black leggings and shoes to match. The green-eyed elf still chose to sit cross-legged, just as he had been earlier, despite actually having a seat now. He was also still messing around with some gizmo, though thankfully this one did not appear to come with an attached blaster.
Further right still, on a separate sofa, Priya Singh and Leon Nash sat together. Leon with his spiky crimson hair and identically coloured eyes, had a Caucasian complexion and an average build, wore navy blue trainers, black cargo trousers, and a short-sleeved pale grey shirt. As was usual for him lately, whenever he was given a moment to rest and let his mind wander, he had grown solemn and brooding. His girlfriend, Kashi, had been a member of the squad as well, up until the day Hijiri had joined and they had come across that convoy whilst on patrol; she had not survived the fight.
Priya was dressed in a denim waistcoat, black shorts, and black sandals. Her build matched Sarah's almost exactly, which explained why her clothes had fit the other woman so well. Her skin tone was what have been called 'Middle Eastern' back on Earth. Her eyes were dark brown and her black hair, which normally had to be tied back in a bun while on duty, to stay under her helmet, now fell down to the middle of her back. She sat with one knee crossed over the other, and lay a hand on Leon's arm supportively. Despite all of the stormtroopers having lost friends that day (not to mention on many missions previously), she was the only one Leon would acknowledge as actually being able to understand what he was going through; Kashi had been her sister.
Though both were clearly pained by the loss, the fact that they (and the rest of the squad, for that matter) had managed to simply get on with their lives despite such tragedy struck Hijiri as being a very unfortunate thing; the rate of law enforcement casualties on Tier Five was clearly far too high if members of the EPD had gotten so accustomed to losing those closest to them that they could just go back to work the day after such an incident, almost as though nothing had even changed...
Opposite them, on the third and final couch, sat Trevor Dodson and Jallus Reiner. Trevor, despite being an incompetent coward with an unhealthy attachment to his ex-girlfriend, looked every part the dashing hero; with wavy, light brown hair that reached his shoulders, a strong jaw, high cheekbones, brilliantly white teeth and gleaming amber eyes. He even had a cleft chin. Wearing a dark blue t-shirt, stretched tight over a surprisingly muscular chest, and tracksuit bottoms of the same colour with black shoes, he actually would have looked pretty cool, if not for the fact that he was clearly intimidated by having been asked to come to Kroll's little no-lieutenats-allowed meeting and so was shuffling around awkwardly in his seat and fidgeting. The brief episode featuring Michelle's hologram notwithstanding, he seemed to be getting more and more pathetic with every day he spent down on Tier Five.
Beside him, sitting with an ankle crossed over his knee and reading what looked – judging by the front cover – to be a cheap and trashy romance novel, was Jallus Reiner, the final surviving 'veteran' squad member. Jallus was a tall, thin black man with short cropped hair and dark eyes. He was just an average stormtrooper as far as skill went, though not so much in personality. He was an introvert who had grown up reading fantasy stories filled with brave heroes going on grand adventures, and had naively joined up with the EPD imagining some sort of 'glorious' battle awaited him, only to quickly become disillusioned by the reality of war. To his credit, though, he'd never actually shown cowardice in battle, unlike Trevor. Instead, he seemed determined to simply ignore reality by spending as much of his free time reading as was possible. He no longer cared for adventure novels.
“So, what was it you called me here for, sergeant?” Hijiri asked coolly as the door slid shut behind him. Unlike the others, who were all out of uniform, the Battle Rabbit wore the same suit as always. Rather than sitting, he chose to simply lean back against the door-frame.
Kroll smiled at the use of his fake title, but waved a hand dismissively, “There's no need to keep that up here... though it does lead pretty well into the answer to your question, since the first thing I wanted to say was 'thanks'. We hadn't actually been expecting you to want to play along, but this'll make things a lot easier; it'll give me a lot more legitimacy to be seen getting respect from you; because of your rank, because you're a Prime, and because of your fight with Sarah Watt. New recruits are an impressionable bunch, you know, kinda like little kids, and they all seem really impressed by your 'heroic' deeds.”
“I see.” responded Hijiri, “Mind explaining next why you're doing this? Surely you don't actually think Imperial Command will just forget your true rank and so accidentally promote you, do you? I may not have been here long, but even I could tell you that as soon as you set foot on Tier One or Two with that pauldron on, you'll be court-martialed for impersonating a superior.”
“Hah, no, it's nothing like that. I'm just trying to get people used to thinking of me in a position of power. It's all part of Phase One of our brilliant plan.”
“Oh yes, your wonderfully, brilliantly, not-at-all convoluted plan.” piped up Frank, before taking another swig from his flask. There were a few nods from around the room.
“Oh, come on, it's not all that complicated. Michelle and I-”
“'Michelle'?” Hijiri interrupted, eyes narrowing in suspicion. She may not have inspired in him the same level of fear as she did in Davion, but it didn't take a genius to work out that someone who could mess with other people's thoughts could easily be dangerous. “Officer Andreas is involved in this? And since when are the two of you on first name terms?”
“I know, it's so tragic,” sobbed Trevor, suddenly on the verge of tears, “but you mark my words, sarge, I will win back her heart one day, and when I do you'll be the one feeling this horrendous, gut-wrenching pain!”
“Seriously? I've told you four times already, you mind-numbingly ignorant cretin, we are not a couple. Honestly, you should be thanking me; it wasn't easy convincing her to let me bring you on board. Her original suggestion had been that we find a way to kill you off as quickly and painfully as possible. Quickly, so as to get you out of the way before you can tarnish the squad's reputation, and painfully just because she really, really hates you.” Kroll attempted to explain, though it was obvious to them all that Trevor was as intent as ever on ignoring the reality of his relationship.
“Anyway,” the ex-noble continued, “yes, Takanomiya, she is involved. Though I came up with most of the actual plan, her network of contacts will be essential to carrying it out.”
“They already have been, haven't they?” asked the Prime, putting two and two together. “You never would have been able to have the sergeant and I promoted without her 'contacts', would you?”
“Nope, I definitely could not have done that. Well spotted, by the way. After seeing what you were both capable of during the raid, I got the idea to continue to place the pair of you in situations which would earn you more and more acclaim, and make it easier to have you promoted further. Rank creates distance, after all, so with you both being elevated much higher than the inexperienced recruits I'm sure Command is certain to keep sending us as reinforcements, that'd make it easier for me to influence them... without having to risk attracting the attention of more important figures, as I might if I asked Michelle to have me promoted myself.”
Hijiri turned to Frank. “All that just to get some new recruits to listen to him? You sure weren't kidding about it being convoluted.”
“Oh, you ain't seen nothing yet.” Not the most reassuring response.
“Can I continue?” Asked Kroll. Hearing no objections, he did so. “Phase One is 'Recognition', which includes my false rank, but also much less obvious things, like Woodvale choosing to do his tinkering in the training area rather than in private, and even Dodson cleaning up around the base; the important point here is to make each of us stand out as individuals, not just appear as faceless members of the Empire's army. Next up, Phase Two, is 'Preparation'; we begin training. Obviously, now that we have you on our side, this will be a lot easier... though we may still go ahead with the original plan anyway...”
“Hell yeah we should.” Priya spoke fiercely. “After all the effort Leon and I went through to get them to agree to help us, you'd better not just say 'oh, there's a better option now, sorry, guess you just completely wasted your time'.”
“Agreed. They're fine, so there's no reason not to use them.” Leon added with a nod.
“'They'?” Hijiri asked simply, unsure as to whom the others were talking about.
“You're not really familiar with the way things work in Coruscant, and Calrime was completely distracted by being pissed off at his new uniform, which seems to have worked out in our favour quite well. Neither of you picked up on the fact that when our reinforcements arrived, the prisoners all should have been transferred at the same time. The lieutenant may simply not have noticed yet, but this time around what actually happened was that only those first four – the ones we caught from the convoy – were taken to be tried and imprisoned. Watt and Fischer remained behind.”
“Oh. You cannot be serious...” the shock was actually visible on the Battle Rabbit's face for a moment, before he mastered his emotions and returned to his default stern expression. “You allowed highly dangerous criminals to remain in this low-security barracks instead of being sent to a proper prison, and as if that wasn't bad enough, you also plan on letting them out of their cells so that you can train with them... have you lost your minds!?”
“Have you spoken to them?” Priya countered, her tone harsh.
“What? Yes, of course I-”
“For more than five minutes.” she snapped.
“... No.”
“Those two are no masters of deception. Trust me. Leon and I have been trying to talk with them as much as possible, and honestly, they don't seem so bad. I mean, sure, they're criminals... and not particularly remorseful ones at that... but it wasn't like they had much choice. In their original world, it's illegal to be infected by a supernatural creature, so werewolves like Sarah are automatically considered criminals from the moment they're attacked, rather than victims. By the time Omni pulled her here, she'd been living outside the law for years. It was only natural that they'd join a gang.”
“Uh-huh?” he replied sceptically, choosing for the moment to ignore how weird it felt hearing a stormtrooper of all people defending a criminal. Perhaps working on Tier Five for so long had given this lot more of an insight into the actual causes of crime, and the feelings of the criminals, than their higher-ups might have bothered with. “And Fischer?”
The pair looked a little awkward now. This time it was Leon who spoke. “In retrospect, we probably should have started talking with him first; the moment he realised we weren't going to be willing to actually torture Sarah, he immediately started acting all mysterious and secretive. He still talks plenty, but seems to think it makes him look cool to keep all his personal information hidden. All we know about him is what Sarah would tell us... which wasn't a whole lot, since she always gets weirdly embarrassed whenever we bring him up.”
“She did say that she summoned him here herself, and that he was a friend of hers back on their world. Given that we know she was part of a supernatural gang there, it seems likely that he's some sort of magical creature as well, though she wouldn't actually confirm it.” Priya added.
“Great. That's not worrying at all.” Hijiri muttered with more than a hint of sarcasm.
“In any case, if we have you with us and they were to go rogue, we'd have a much better chance of survival, right? You don't want us all to get killed, do you? So why not agree to help out?” Kroll asked, clearly spotting a good moment to spring his little recruitment pitch.
Hijiri sighed and shook his head... but then agreed anyway, “Fine, I'll do it... but you are aware that we're all going to be in serious trouble of the higher-ups find out about this, right? I don't know how much influence Michelle thinks she has, but there's no way someone like Judge Dredd would ever approve of this. All it'd take would be for one of these 'contacts' of hers to get a message to him and this ridiculous plan of yours will be all over. You realise that, right?”
Before Kroll could respond, though, Frank beat him to it with a laugh. “If you think this is bad, you might want to sit down now, rabbit-dude, it gets even worse in steps three through seven. Hell, you haven't even heard why he wants us all training so hard yet.”
Hijiri looked at Kroll... who avoided meeting his gaze. The Prime groaned, “Ugh, fine. I guess I maybe should.”
So saying, he strode to the nearest couch and took a seat there, to Priya's left. “Go on.”
“Excellent. Phase Three, 'Separation', could potentially begin as soon as our next mission, if Calrime can be convinced. We have to get people – the lieutenant in particular – used to thinking of us as a separate group entirely from his regular soldiers. This will hopefully become easier as time passes and we're able to get him promoted further; the higher up he gets, the more troops he'll be able to request Command send him, so the more easily he'll likely agree to splitting the party. Now that you're with us, that'll likely make this easier still, since he'll obviously be more willing to place troops under the command of an actual NCO than someone who simply pretends to be one.”
“Okay... that's all? That one doesn't seem so bad.”
“Glad you agree. Next is Phase Four; Acquisition. We steal a vast amount of Omnilium.”
“Aaaand there we go again. Because if we're already impersonating superior officers and freeing prisoners, why not just go out of our way to commit more crimes while we're at it?” Hijiri glared at the would-be sergeant. “You can't actually be serious, can you?”
Priya laughed lightly and patted him on the shoulder. “There, there, it's not as bad as it sounds, Iechtelsteir is just trying to get a rise out of you. The actual plan is to confiscate as much criminal property as we possibly can, then 'forget' to record it officially. After that, we can take it to use ourselves, or give it to you and Sarah to de-materialise then imbue into our other gear, which should hopefully increase its power level somewhat. If we get enough, we might even be able to spare some stuff for Windvale's crazy experiments.”
The elf looked up and gave them a bright grin at that... he was practically drooling at the thought of it, actually. Trevor shuddered just looking at him, and the Battle Rabbit might have felt like doing so as well if he could have spared a moment to wonder what madness was going through the guy's head this time. As it was, he obviously had something else on his mind.
“Yeah... but... that's still theft. I have no idea what you're all up to here, but I don't see why this entire plan seems to involve going out of your way to break the law as much as possible.” Hijiri complained, trying his best not to sound petulant. He might have easily expected this sort of thing from some dumb group of vigilantes trying to protect their neighbourhood from gang warfare... but these idiots were supposed to be stormtroopers... could the lieutenant actually be correct? Was this his fault, as a Prime, for showing them that even without discipline and unity, it was still possible to be of use to the Empire? And if so, how could he make it right? Since Kroll had concocted this absurd plan and somehow convinced the rest of the squad, and even Michelle to get in on it as well without the assumption that he would be involved, it wasn't like he could just ask to be re-assigned away from this area and hope they'd give up.
“It might technically be illegal, yes, but so long as we start getting results before anyone finds out, Michelle ought to be able to keep Command in line. This isn't Tier One, after all. No one will really be surprised to find out that playing by the book doesn't always work this far down. We just need to make sure to keep our activities secret at least until they've begun to bear fruit. Now, if you're done with your little ethical dilemma, I'll get on with my explanation...” Kroll said, and then did.
And after covering the Phases Five to Seven, as Hijiri was still reeling from the stupidity of their plot, he took the opportunity to announce that it was now time to go right back to the start and run through the whole thing in much greater detail, making sure that they all knew exactly what was expected of them at every stage of the operation.
By the time the next morning rolled around, and Lieutenant Calrime began the daily training regimen that they had been given in order to beat their reinforcements into shape in preparation for their next big mission, the only one who had actually gotten enough sleep to perform at his best was Jallus Reiner... no one had paid much attention to him in the previous night's secret meeting, and so unbeknownst to Kroll, he'd been able to simply fall asleep for several hours.
Since there were no officers around to care what was going on here, Kroll had apparently taken it upon himself to lay claim to this room and its comfortable black leather sofas. He himself sat on the one near the opposite end of the room from the door, watching Hijiri as the Prime entered.
As this meeting was taking place during their down-time – and, more importantly, since Davion wasn't invited – none of the 'troopers had bothered to wear their uniforms. In the case of Kroll vor Iechtelsteir, this meant dressing in a white tracksuit and trainers of the same shade, and constantly having to brush aside his bangs as chin-length white hair repeatedly fell in front of his ice blue eyes. This guy was pretty fond of the colour white. Even his skin was so pale as to be almost albino.
The couches were all three-seaters and to Kroll's left sat the newly re-awakened Frank Leben, still nursing a hangover, yet miraculously alive despite downing a bottle of rubbing alcohol, which really ought not to have been possible. Frank wore a dull brown shirt with the top few buttons undone, baggy jeans and black shoes. He went for a 'rugged' sort of look, being tanned, muscular, and not bothering to shave the stubble from his chin. His unkempt short blond hair completed the image, as well as matching the colour of his eyes. He took a sip from a metal flask as the Battle Rabbit entered.
To Kroll's right was Brandon Windvale, whose brown, shoulder-length hair and slim, elven features remained exactly as they had been this afternoon when Hijiri had seen him in the training section, though he now wore some sort of silky brown tunic, black leggings and shoes to match. The green-eyed elf still chose to sit cross-legged, just as he had been earlier, despite actually having a seat now. He was also still messing around with some gizmo, though thankfully this one did not appear to come with an attached blaster.
Further right still, on a separate sofa, Priya Singh and Leon Nash sat together. Leon with his spiky crimson hair and identically coloured eyes, had a Caucasian complexion and an average build, wore navy blue trainers, black cargo trousers, and a short-sleeved pale grey shirt. As was usual for him lately, whenever he was given a moment to rest and let his mind wander, he had grown solemn and brooding. His girlfriend, Kashi, had been a member of the squad as well, up until the day Hijiri had joined and they had come across that convoy whilst on patrol; she had not survived the fight.
Priya was dressed in a denim waistcoat, black shorts, and black sandals. Her build matched Sarah's almost exactly, which explained why her clothes had fit the other woman so well. Her skin tone was what have been called 'Middle Eastern' back on Earth. Her eyes were dark brown and her black hair, which normally had to be tied back in a bun while on duty, to stay under her helmet, now fell down to the middle of her back. She sat with one knee crossed over the other, and lay a hand on Leon's arm supportively. Despite all of the stormtroopers having lost friends that day (not to mention on many missions previously), she was the only one Leon would acknowledge as actually being able to understand what he was going through; Kashi had been her sister.
Though both were clearly pained by the loss, the fact that they (and the rest of the squad, for that matter) had managed to simply get on with their lives despite such tragedy struck Hijiri as being a very unfortunate thing; the rate of law enforcement casualties on Tier Five was clearly far too high if members of the EPD had gotten so accustomed to losing those closest to them that they could just go back to work the day after such an incident, almost as though nothing had even changed...
Opposite them, on the third and final couch, sat Trevor Dodson and Jallus Reiner. Trevor, despite being an incompetent coward with an unhealthy attachment to his ex-girlfriend, looked every part the dashing hero; with wavy, light brown hair that reached his shoulders, a strong jaw, high cheekbones, brilliantly white teeth and gleaming amber eyes. He even had a cleft chin. Wearing a dark blue t-shirt, stretched tight over a surprisingly muscular chest, and tracksuit bottoms of the same colour with black shoes, he actually would have looked pretty cool, if not for the fact that he was clearly intimidated by having been asked to come to Kroll's little no-lieutenats-allowed meeting and so was shuffling around awkwardly in his seat and fidgeting. The brief episode featuring Michelle's hologram notwithstanding, he seemed to be getting more and more pathetic with every day he spent down on Tier Five.
Beside him, sitting with an ankle crossed over his knee and reading what looked – judging by the front cover – to be a cheap and trashy romance novel, was Jallus Reiner, the final surviving 'veteran' squad member. Jallus was a tall, thin black man with short cropped hair and dark eyes. He was just an average stormtrooper as far as skill went, though not so much in personality. He was an introvert who had grown up reading fantasy stories filled with brave heroes going on grand adventures, and had naively joined up with the EPD imagining some sort of 'glorious' battle awaited him, only to quickly become disillusioned by the reality of war. To his credit, though, he'd never actually shown cowardice in battle, unlike Trevor. Instead, he seemed determined to simply ignore reality by spending as much of his free time reading as was possible. He no longer cared for adventure novels.
“So, what was it you called me here for, sergeant?” Hijiri asked coolly as the door slid shut behind him. Unlike the others, who were all out of uniform, the Battle Rabbit wore the same suit as always. Rather than sitting, he chose to simply lean back against the door-frame.
Kroll smiled at the use of his fake title, but waved a hand dismissively, “There's no need to keep that up here... though it does lead pretty well into the answer to your question, since the first thing I wanted to say was 'thanks'. We hadn't actually been expecting you to want to play along, but this'll make things a lot easier; it'll give me a lot more legitimacy to be seen getting respect from you; because of your rank, because you're a Prime, and because of your fight with Sarah Watt. New recruits are an impressionable bunch, you know, kinda like little kids, and they all seem really impressed by your 'heroic' deeds.”
“I see.” responded Hijiri, “Mind explaining next why you're doing this? Surely you don't actually think Imperial Command will just forget your true rank and so accidentally promote you, do you? I may not have been here long, but even I could tell you that as soon as you set foot on Tier One or Two with that pauldron on, you'll be court-martialed for impersonating a superior.”
“Hah, no, it's nothing like that. I'm just trying to get people used to thinking of me in a position of power. It's all part of Phase One of our brilliant plan.”
“Oh yes, your wonderfully, brilliantly, not-at-all convoluted plan.” piped up Frank, before taking another swig from his flask. There were a few nods from around the room.
“Oh, come on, it's not all that complicated. Michelle and I-”
“'Michelle'?” Hijiri interrupted, eyes narrowing in suspicion. She may not have inspired in him the same level of fear as she did in Davion, but it didn't take a genius to work out that someone who could mess with other people's thoughts could easily be dangerous. “Officer Andreas is involved in this? And since when are the two of you on first name terms?”
“I know, it's so tragic,” sobbed Trevor, suddenly on the verge of tears, “but you mark my words, sarge, I will win back her heart one day, and when I do you'll be the one feeling this horrendous, gut-wrenching pain!”
“Seriously? I've told you four times already, you mind-numbingly ignorant cretin, we are not a couple. Honestly, you should be thanking me; it wasn't easy convincing her to let me bring you on board. Her original suggestion had been that we find a way to kill you off as quickly and painfully as possible. Quickly, so as to get you out of the way before you can tarnish the squad's reputation, and painfully just because she really, really hates you.” Kroll attempted to explain, though it was obvious to them all that Trevor was as intent as ever on ignoring the reality of his relationship.
“Anyway,” the ex-noble continued, “yes, Takanomiya, she is involved. Though I came up with most of the actual plan, her network of contacts will be essential to carrying it out.”
“They already have been, haven't they?” asked the Prime, putting two and two together. “You never would have been able to have the sergeant and I promoted without her 'contacts', would you?”
“Nope, I definitely could not have done that. Well spotted, by the way. After seeing what you were both capable of during the raid, I got the idea to continue to place the pair of you in situations which would earn you more and more acclaim, and make it easier to have you promoted further. Rank creates distance, after all, so with you both being elevated much higher than the inexperienced recruits I'm sure Command is certain to keep sending us as reinforcements, that'd make it easier for me to influence them... without having to risk attracting the attention of more important figures, as I might if I asked Michelle to have me promoted myself.”
Hijiri turned to Frank. “All that just to get some new recruits to listen to him? You sure weren't kidding about it being convoluted.”
“Oh, you ain't seen nothing yet.” Not the most reassuring response.
“Can I continue?” Asked Kroll. Hearing no objections, he did so. “Phase One is 'Recognition', which includes my false rank, but also much less obvious things, like Woodvale choosing to do his tinkering in the training area rather than in private, and even Dodson cleaning up around the base; the important point here is to make each of us stand out as individuals, not just appear as faceless members of the Empire's army. Next up, Phase Two, is 'Preparation'; we begin training. Obviously, now that we have you on our side, this will be a lot easier... though we may still go ahead with the original plan anyway...”
“Hell yeah we should.” Priya spoke fiercely. “After all the effort Leon and I went through to get them to agree to help us, you'd better not just say 'oh, there's a better option now, sorry, guess you just completely wasted your time'.”
“Agreed. They're fine, so there's no reason not to use them.” Leon added with a nod.
“'They'?” Hijiri asked simply, unsure as to whom the others were talking about.
“You're not really familiar with the way things work in Coruscant, and Calrime was completely distracted by being pissed off at his new uniform, which seems to have worked out in our favour quite well. Neither of you picked up on the fact that when our reinforcements arrived, the prisoners all should have been transferred at the same time. The lieutenant may simply not have noticed yet, but this time around what actually happened was that only those first four – the ones we caught from the convoy – were taken to be tried and imprisoned. Watt and Fischer remained behind.”
“Oh. You cannot be serious...” the shock was actually visible on the Battle Rabbit's face for a moment, before he mastered his emotions and returned to his default stern expression. “You allowed highly dangerous criminals to remain in this low-security barracks instead of being sent to a proper prison, and as if that wasn't bad enough, you also plan on letting them out of their cells so that you can train with them... have you lost your minds!?”
“Have you spoken to them?” Priya countered, her tone harsh.
“What? Yes, of course I-”
“For more than five minutes.” she snapped.
“... No.”
“Those two are no masters of deception. Trust me. Leon and I have been trying to talk with them as much as possible, and honestly, they don't seem so bad. I mean, sure, they're criminals... and not particularly remorseful ones at that... but it wasn't like they had much choice. In their original world, it's illegal to be infected by a supernatural creature, so werewolves like Sarah are automatically considered criminals from the moment they're attacked, rather than victims. By the time Omni pulled her here, she'd been living outside the law for years. It was only natural that they'd join a gang.”
“Uh-huh?” he replied sceptically, choosing for the moment to ignore how weird it felt hearing a stormtrooper of all people defending a criminal. Perhaps working on Tier Five for so long had given this lot more of an insight into the actual causes of crime, and the feelings of the criminals, than their higher-ups might have bothered with. “And Fischer?”
The pair looked a little awkward now. This time it was Leon who spoke. “In retrospect, we probably should have started talking with him first; the moment he realised we weren't going to be willing to actually torture Sarah, he immediately started acting all mysterious and secretive. He still talks plenty, but seems to think it makes him look cool to keep all his personal information hidden. All we know about him is what Sarah would tell us... which wasn't a whole lot, since she always gets weirdly embarrassed whenever we bring him up.”
“She did say that she summoned him here herself, and that he was a friend of hers back on their world. Given that we know she was part of a supernatural gang there, it seems likely that he's some sort of magical creature as well, though she wouldn't actually confirm it.” Priya added.
“Great. That's not worrying at all.” Hijiri muttered with more than a hint of sarcasm.
“In any case, if we have you with us and they were to go rogue, we'd have a much better chance of survival, right? You don't want us all to get killed, do you? So why not agree to help out?” Kroll asked, clearly spotting a good moment to spring his little recruitment pitch.
Hijiri sighed and shook his head... but then agreed anyway, “Fine, I'll do it... but you are aware that we're all going to be in serious trouble of the higher-ups find out about this, right? I don't know how much influence Michelle thinks she has, but there's no way someone like Judge Dredd would ever approve of this. All it'd take would be for one of these 'contacts' of hers to get a message to him and this ridiculous plan of yours will be all over. You realise that, right?”
Before Kroll could respond, though, Frank beat him to it with a laugh. “If you think this is bad, you might want to sit down now, rabbit-dude, it gets even worse in steps three through seven. Hell, you haven't even heard why he wants us all training so hard yet.”
Hijiri looked at Kroll... who avoided meeting his gaze. The Prime groaned, “Ugh, fine. I guess I maybe should.”
So saying, he strode to the nearest couch and took a seat there, to Priya's left. “Go on.”
“Excellent. Phase Three, 'Separation', could potentially begin as soon as our next mission, if Calrime can be convinced. We have to get people – the lieutenant in particular – used to thinking of us as a separate group entirely from his regular soldiers. This will hopefully become easier as time passes and we're able to get him promoted further; the higher up he gets, the more troops he'll be able to request Command send him, so the more easily he'll likely agree to splitting the party. Now that you're with us, that'll likely make this easier still, since he'll obviously be more willing to place troops under the command of an actual NCO than someone who simply pretends to be one.”
“Okay... that's all? That one doesn't seem so bad.”
“Glad you agree. Next is Phase Four; Acquisition. We steal a vast amount of Omnilium.”
“Aaaand there we go again. Because if we're already impersonating superior officers and freeing prisoners, why not just go out of our way to commit more crimes while we're at it?” Hijiri glared at the would-be sergeant. “You can't actually be serious, can you?”
Priya laughed lightly and patted him on the shoulder. “There, there, it's not as bad as it sounds, Iechtelsteir is just trying to get a rise out of you. The actual plan is to confiscate as much criminal property as we possibly can, then 'forget' to record it officially. After that, we can take it to use ourselves, or give it to you and Sarah to de-materialise then imbue into our other gear, which should hopefully increase its power level somewhat. If we get enough, we might even be able to spare some stuff for Windvale's crazy experiments.”
The elf looked up and gave them a bright grin at that... he was practically drooling at the thought of it, actually. Trevor shuddered just looking at him, and the Battle Rabbit might have felt like doing so as well if he could have spared a moment to wonder what madness was going through the guy's head this time. As it was, he obviously had something else on his mind.
“Yeah... but... that's still theft. I have no idea what you're all up to here, but I don't see why this entire plan seems to involve going out of your way to break the law as much as possible.” Hijiri complained, trying his best not to sound petulant. He might have easily expected this sort of thing from some dumb group of vigilantes trying to protect their neighbourhood from gang warfare... but these idiots were supposed to be stormtroopers... could the lieutenant actually be correct? Was this his fault, as a Prime, for showing them that even without discipline and unity, it was still possible to be of use to the Empire? And if so, how could he make it right? Since Kroll had concocted this absurd plan and somehow convinced the rest of the squad, and even Michelle to get in on it as well without the assumption that he would be involved, it wasn't like he could just ask to be re-assigned away from this area and hope they'd give up.
“It might technically be illegal, yes, but so long as we start getting results before anyone finds out, Michelle ought to be able to keep Command in line. This isn't Tier One, after all. No one will really be surprised to find out that playing by the book doesn't always work this far down. We just need to make sure to keep our activities secret at least until they've begun to bear fruit. Now, if you're done with your little ethical dilemma, I'll get on with my explanation...” Kroll said, and then did.
And after covering the Phases Five to Seven, as Hijiri was still reeling from the stupidity of their plot, he took the opportunity to announce that it was now time to go right back to the start and run through the whole thing in much greater detail, making sure that they all knew exactly what was expected of them at every stage of the operation.
By the time the next morning rolled around, and Lieutenant Calrime began the daily training regimen that they had been given in order to beat their reinforcements into shape in preparation for their next big mission, the only one who had actually gotten enough sleep to perform at his best was Jallus Reiner... no one had paid much attention to him in the previous night's secret meeting, and so unbeknownst to Kroll, he'd been able to simply fall asleep for several hours.
![[Image: Hijiri_Name_Sig.png]](https://image.ibb.co/k1H7Hd/Hijiri_Name_Sig.png)