FWTM: Incursion
Apr. 25th, 2010 01:26 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
x-gambit.livejournal.com posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
xp_logsX-Force heads to one of their main targets; the situation room, from watch command authority can be given to unlock India's nuclear arsenal.
Following their brief rendezvous with the other X-Force team, the group set off through the now chaotic Secretariat Building towards their objective; India's situation room. Their intelligence had been clear. Neramani was willing to threaten nuclear reprisals if his conventional forces were stopped, and in the event that he felt his own control might be slipping, could just as easily order them for the sake of revenge. X-Force was not about to allow that to happen. No matter what the cost, India's ability to launch WMDs had to be neutralized, and since they couldn't strike at the bunkers and tactical submarines simultaneously, the only option was to hit the command authority hard and fast, disrupting the chain of command long enough to get Neramani out of the equation and hopefully allow saner heads to prevail. That was the reason that they were there; a madman had a chance to touch off the first nuclear exchange the world had ever seen, and in the process, kill tens of millions.
Failure was not an option.
"We need the floorplan thirty seconds ago, Cypher." Marie-Ange's voice showed little sign of the difficulties she and Doug were having. But her lack of patience was unusual - at least where anyone not Jubilation Lee was concerned, and Jubilee was nowhere to be found. "I think you would prefer not to shoot everyone in the building in the back, yes?"
Doug bit back a testy (and probably unproductive) reply. Then he bit back another, and another, rather than give in to any of a series of impulses to lash out in frustration at his girlfriend. He wondered sometimes if the other members of X-Force had an appreciation for how difficult work like this could be, and that, to bastardize Leonard McCoy, he was a hacker, not a magician. Another thirty seconds or so passed, and Doug grunted, rapping out a particularly complex series of keystrokes with short, angry movement of his fingers. "Got it," he said briskly, as a series of wire diagrams cascaded on the screen of his ruggedized laptop.
"Children. Even if I did provide couples counseling, which I do not, now is hardly the time. Let's wait until after we've saved the world to express how disappointed in Cypher we are." Sofia drew a short but manicured nail down the screen, following a concise path to the main hub. It was an even distribution of time versus probable meetings with guards. "Behind Tarot and I. We don't know how to work the off button."
"We have two blind turns between here and there." Marie-Ange noted, as they passed one hallway intersection without incident. "Winddancer, you can..." She paused, remembering Sofia's intense dislike of the code name and gave the other woman an almost embarrassed look, and then continued. "er, I do not know the term, make the wind bring us sounds, yes? So we do not get caught unawares?"
As he trailed behind the two women, Doug continued to tap at his laptop's keyboard as he held it in one hand. He deftly wove camera feeds together to cover their passage, ensuring that a camera was pointed in the complete opposite direction of their movement in one hallway, splicing a quick loop of empty hallway through another, but only long enough to avoid detection. The camera feeds almost certainly had date/time stamps, and the longer he left footage looping, the more likely it would be that someone would notice something amiss.
"And move our footsteps and conversation away at the same time," Sofia replied, affirming Marie-Ange's question. "So we can do sneaky things like this."
A guard had just appeared, and they stilled, barely hidden by the corner, as he walked past them, completely oblivious. The second corner was handled in a similar manner, and the whole thing was proving to be rather uneventful, especially by their standards, until they stood in front of their destination.
"That is a very big metal door." Marie-Ange plinked it with a fingernail, and frowned. "I do not suppose it has a very high-tech electronic lock that you can just make it unlock by remote control?" She asked, obviously to Doug, but did not wait for his response. That would have been too easy, and he'd have said by now. "I could try to make an image to knock it down, but that would be very loud."
Doug examined the door. "No," he said to Marie-Ange's rhetorical question. "This looks fairly old, and probably has some redundant backups, given what's inside. Not to mention the number of people that are almost certainly inside." His eyes flicked from floor to ceiling and back again. "I'm not sure I see a solution other than the brute force option," he murmured, his brain analyzing the various possibilities of the three of their powers in concert. "We're sort of limited by line of sight." The door was, of course, of a single piece, with no viewport or anything, not even a small fisheye peephole.
Down the hall, they could now hear activity, as whatever guard unit was normally posted to the area was returning from their response to any of the numerous alarms. They weren't close enough to be seen, but it was clear that they only had a brief window before they were discovered.
Looking grim, Sofia traced the thin line between steel and plaster with her finger. "I've got this one," she said, letting go a breath. The sound continued even as she inhaled, a sharp, narrow gust rushing past the door frame and effectively draining the room inside of air, much too slowly to be anything but torturous. It took long, agonizing minutes, as the other members of the team's eyes flickered back and forth, training for a glimpse of a threat, but finally began to slow. The door popped at the last minute, never swinging open just the sound of the locking mechanism, a desperate attempt from someone inside to save their own life, but it was too late and still the last stuttering puffs of air brushed past, before leaving the hall in awful silence.
Doug pulled at the unlocked door and peered inside at the personnel scattered around the floor, their faces contorted in various shades of desperation reflecting the terror of suffocating to death. "Note to self, never get on Sofia's bad side," he said with a wince.
Following their brief rendezvous with the other X-Force team, the group set off through the now chaotic Secretariat Building towards their objective; India's situation room. Their intelligence had been clear. Neramani was willing to threaten nuclear reprisals if his conventional forces were stopped, and in the event that he felt his own control might be slipping, could just as easily order them for the sake of revenge. X-Force was not about to allow that to happen. No matter what the cost, India's ability to launch WMDs had to be neutralized, and since they couldn't strike at the bunkers and tactical submarines simultaneously, the only option was to hit the command authority hard and fast, disrupting the chain of command long enough to get Neramani out of the equation and hopefully allow saner heads to prevail. That was the reason that they were there; a madman had a chance to touch off the first nuclear exchange the world had ever seen, and in the process, kill tens of millions.
Failure was not an option.
"We need the floorplan thirty seconds ago, Cypher." Marie-Ange's voice showed little sign of the difficulties she and Doug were having. But her lack of patience was unusual - at least where anyone not Jubilation Lee was concerned, and Jubilee was nowhere to be found. "I think you would prefer not to shoot everyone in the building in the back, yes?"
Doug bit back a testy (and probably unproductive) reply. Then he bit back another, and another, rather than give in to any of a series of impulses to lash out in frustration at his girlfriend. He wondered sometimes if the other members of X-Force had an appreciation for how difficult work like this could be, and that, to bastardize Leonard McCoy, he was a hacker, not a magician. Another thirty seconds or so passed, and Doug grunted, rapping out a particularly complex series of keystrokes with short, angry movement of his fingers. "Got it," he said briskly, as a series of wire diagrams cascaded on the screen of his ruggedized laptop.
"Children. Even if I did provide couples counseling, which I do not, now is hardly the time. Let's wait until after we've saved the world to express how disappointed in Cypher we are." Sofia drew a short but manicured nail down the screen, following a concise path to the main hub. It was an even distribution of time versus probable meetings with guards. "Behind Tarot and I. We don't know how to work the off button."
"We have two blind turns between here and there." Marie-Ange noted, as they passed one hallway intersection without incident. "Winddancer, you can..." She paused, remembering Sofia's intense dislike of the code name and gave the other woman an almost embarrassed look, and then continued. "er, I do not know the term, make the wind bring us sounds, yes? So we do not get caught unawares?"
As he trailed behind the two women, Doug continued to tap at his laptop's keyboard as he held it in one hand. He deftly wove camera feeds together to cover their passage, ensuring that a camera was pointed in the complete opposite direction of their movement in one hallway, splicing a quick loop of empty hallway through another, but only long enough to avoid detection. The camera feeds almost certainly had date/time stamps, and the longer he left footage looping, the more likely it would be that someone would notice something amiss.
"And move our footsteps and conversation away at the same time," Sofia replied, affirming Marie-Ange's question. "So we can do sneaky things like this."
A guard had just appeared, and they stilled, barely hidden by the corner, as he walked past them, completely oblivious. The second corner was handled in a similar manner, and the whole thing was proving to be rather uneventful, especially by their standards, until they stood in front of their destination.
"That is a very big metal door." Marie-Ange plinked it with a fingernail, and frowned. "I do not suppose it has a very high-tech electronic lock that you can just make it unlock by remote control?" She asked, obviously to Doug, but did not wait for his response. That would have been too easy, and he'd have said by now. "I could try to make an image to knock it down, but that would be very loud."
Doug examined the door. "No," he said to Marie-Ange's rhetorical question. "This looks fairly old, and probably has some redundant backups, given what's inside. Not to mention the number of people that are almost certainly inside." His eyes flicked from floor to ceiling and back again. "I'm not sure I see a solution other than the brute force option," he murmured, his brain analyzing the various possibilities of the three of their powers in concert. "We're sort of limited by line of sight." The door was, of course, of a single piece, with no viewport or anything, not even a small fisheye peephole.
Down the hall, they could now hear activity, as whatever guard unit was normally posted to the area was returning from their response to any of the numerous alarms. They weren't close enough to be seen, but it was clear that they only had a brief window before they were discovered.
Looking grim, Sofia traced the thin line between steel and plaster with her finger. "I've got this one," she said, letting go a breath. The sound continued even as she inhaled, a sharp, narrow gust rushing past the door frame and effectively draining the room inside of air, much too slowly to be anything but torturous. It took long, agonizing minutes, as the other members of the team's eyes flickered back and forth, training for a glimpse of a threat, but finally began to slow. The door popped at the last minute, never swinging open just the sound of the locking mechanism, a desperate attempt from someone inside to save their own life, but it was too late and still the last stuttering puffs of air brushed past, before leaving the hall in awful silence.
Doug pulled at the unlocked door and peered inside at the personnel scattered around the floor, their faces contorted in various shades of desperation reflecting the terror of suffocating to death. "Note to self, never get on Sofia's bad side," he said with a wince.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}