Ask Coruscant Pain delivery to spice things up.

[Gareth Gin]

There were many things that got Gareth excited, alcohol, fights, women and sometimes men...But nothing made him happier than leading an important operation for the Zaa Fenn, not only did it mean getting a good fight out of it most of the time, it also meant credits, fame, becoming an even bigger legend among the Zaa Fenn. With every heist, every operation, every mission...His reputation grew larger, his people respected him more and his enemies were more and more scared of him, it was just a magnificient feeling that was only boosted even more by the obscene amounts of credits that he got out of it.

That being said, today's operation was a big one, in one graceful attack, Gareth would take out the leader of the Black Enders and secure both the gang and their very profitable assets for the family. Of course, he was not gonna do it alone, he was bringing along with him Vence Klortho, a promising slicer that had gotten him the coordinates to the secret spice lab they were about to take, while Gareth got violent inside and secured the laboratory, Vence would make sure the job would be easy for the enforcer and that his prey didn't get away, a good subtle worker to complement the straightforward and overt strengths of the White Lion of Zaa Fenn.

Stopping the cargo speeder in front of the sushi and noodles storefront that the Black Enders were using as a front for the spice lab, Gareth left the vehicle with a big crate that contained the spice he had borrowed to pose as their smuggler, wearing is White Lion's Armor for the first time in order to not be recognized, Gareth was ready to step inside "All right, I'm about to get inside, are you ready, Vence?" Gareth spoke through the comms, talking to the slicer who he had dropped 100 meters away near a public terminal as he requested, guessing he would use that terminal to guide him, the Zaa Fenn enforcer would make sure to wait until Vence was in.

@Clayton

 

[Darius Gal]

Vence stood at the public terminal and smiled as he brought up a local map. One of the many benefits to operating on a planet as developed as Coruscant meant that there was a tremendous amount of public information on the local districts and levels, all thanks to the wonderful government whose noses they were operating under. It was a short matter of bringing up the building they were going to hit, and flagging the local holoconnection box. As expected it was on the outside of the building, although one story up from street level. No matter, there was an access ladder for utility workers.

Without first consulting a map, he'd have had to physically circle the entire building, carefully looking at the walls starting from the street and going up, to locate the box. And that's if it wasn't hidden behind an exhaust fan or sign. A few minutes of preparation beforehand paid off every time. He logged off the terminal, regretting not having more time and a monitoring virus he could upload. Perhaps later - it would be useful to know if anyone was using the terminal to surveil Zaa Fenn's soon to be acquired assets. He broke into a brisk walk towards the alleyway that contained the ladder to the second story of the sushi bar cum spice lab.

In the landspeeder, before they'd split up on this job, Vence had given the White Lion a small, cylindrical device from his bag, one of a handful he tried to keep on his person when possible. A security spike. "In case something comes up," he explained. "Not as fast as a keycard, but certainly handy if they have someone like me that's very interested in keeping a door shut."

The access ladder was more like a series of spikes stuck into the wall with a thin strip of grippy coating on the top side of each rung. Cheap, crude, but workable enough. One rung at a time he hauled himself up to a landing where the building did not rise further, whatever room below the flat, duracrete roof was in a one-floor section of the building. The holonet box was located next to a large exhaust unit, which emitted a gentle white haze that slowly drifted towards the sky, propelled by an idling fan.

Vence smiled as Gareth's voice crackled in his ear through the commlink. "Setting up now, I'll be in the system in a minute," he said as he plugged his port scanner cable into a universal port. A hardline connection to a system was much faster than hacking over a wireless connection, already he was seeing connected systems populate a tree, but he preferred to be ready to kill any alarm and outgoing calls before Gareth did his thing. "Try the food," he joked. "Maybe the chef is worth keeping around after the change in management." His eyes flicked over the screen and evolving information. Alarms, communications, cameras, internal layout...

@Versok

 

[Gareth Gin]

"We'll try it out after we are done with this, is not like the guy is gonna be able to leave any time soon" Gareth said in jest before carrying the spice inside the storefront, his force sight giving him a clearer view of what was going on deeper inside the store, a big, hidden underground level that had no entrance from the front of the store. So, it was indeed better to play along and fool them for as long as possible after all.

"I'd like to have ribboned Firaxan." The Miralukan said after approaching the man taking care of the storefront, a short, stocky Trandoshan that looked at the armored man from head to toe, obviously the Trandoshan thought he was dressed in a weird way, but smugglers from the lower levels of Coruscant all came from different cultures, so it didn't pose a problem...At least at first "You have to go through the back entrance to retrieve that order, it's a special deal, hope you enjoy it"

And so, the Miralukan simply nodded and headed towards the back entrance, stopping in front of a big metal door, guarded by nothing but a camera...Before it was opened and two armed guards that told him to get in. Big box of spice on his hands, the White Lion of Zaa Fenn was being escorted without much of a problem, the security not questioning anything...yet. Gareth didn't doubt eventually they would realize he was not the original smuggler but by the time that happens it would be too late.

@Clayton

 

[Seyd Mac]

It sucked not even being recognized for one's talent in the field. Seyd had spent a few years now running slicer support for operations in the background where no one even knew he existed. That made law enforcement easy enough to handle, but reputation in the syndicate hardly came from being so unnoticed that your job could be done by a simple droid. Hoping for the lucky break had not been working out so far, but this mission was with an Enforcer and a known slicer.

"Hey, Vence, I think that module is going to require constant vigilance. It's the older one before new standards, means you're stuck here babysitting it if you don't want issues... I'll cover from here." Seyd tried hard not to sound like he was enjoying himself as he broke the news to his unofficial supervisor. This was the big break. A satisfying click signaled him activating the comms over to Gareth. "This is Seyd, I'm taking over the next steps for Vence. We encountered more resistance than we expected on the tech side."

Seyd did not wait for a response before he began typing at his datapad. He casually leaned against a wall below where Vence was working and sync'd his datapad with the hard-wired hack. It may have been wireless but the main connection was still hard wired and being babysat by Vence. Essentially, one slicer held the door open while the other went in to do some work. Both were key, but Seyd would get to be the star. As long as he didn't feth it up.

First priority was the main alarm system. Someone flicking a silent alarm or a glass break would make this a bust. Disabling them would be too obvious if someone was watching from the inside, but rerouting them could go unnoticed. Amateurs destroyed to get the job done, professionals never get spotted.

"Okay. I've rerouted a few functions behind the scenes. If someone presses the silent alarm now, it will close the blinds instead." A smirk crossed his face as he imagined a frantic employee smashing the alarm button only to cause it to flap the window blinds erratically. "Next is the camera duping trick. But I will monitor for any issues like calls going out as well."

Seyd realized he was probably speaking too much. He wanted to show he was capable but rambling would only make him seem annoying. These idiots likely wouldn't notice a hack even if Seyd wasn't careful. It just wasn't a risk he could take. A counter-slicer could cause alarms or headaches. Maybe he should check the cameras to see if one was inside...

@Versok

 

[Gareth Gin]

Truth be told, Gareth didn't expect the change in main slicer, but he was one to adapt quickly, the Miralukan didn't say anything in response (after all, he was being escorted by a couple of security guards, can't really go and say anything in response) and he didn't doubt the abilities of other people in the family, that being said, he hoped this one would be able to act as fast as Darius could.

Eventually, Gareth and the guards made their way to yet another door, one that was less fortified, but guarded by another two guards holding blaster rifles, these ones, however, stopped Gareth and the other two guards "...I don't recall being told the contact would look like this" One of the guards said as the other scanned Gareth from head to toe, to which the White Lion of Zaa Fenn responded by shaking his head and holding the crate towards one of the two guards that were escorting him "Hold this for me, I'm gonna get my ID so you guys know I am the right guy."

As the guard grabbed the box and the another one turned his gaze away to start a call to some higher ups...Gareth went and sucker punched the other one next to him with his Matukai Gloves, a hit to the temple of the head being more than enough to knock him out before he lunged at the armed one with a rifle that was not distracted and hit him with a force enhanced headbutt hard enough to knock down a Wookiee. All of this happening in the span of a second as the other two just started reacting, having to waste time stopping what they were doing.

Of course, this was done as soon as Gareth heard that Seyd had taken control of the cameras, no one would know what was going on yet as long as Gareth managed to knock the other two out without them letting out shots...Which he was planning to do as. Gareth threw the man that got headbutt at the one that wanted to check in through comms before, staggering him as the White Lion dealt with the other one that had just dropped the spice box, a knee to the stomach making him kneel before Gareth grabbed his face and smashed it against the floor, all the while he sent a powerful force blast at the other one that made him crack the wall behind him as he hit it.

"All right, that makes the main entrance secure, now you need to disable the alarms inside the spice lab part, scout ahead with the cameras for me and make sure that any secret exits within the lab are locked as well in that order. If I am found out, focus on the exits, understood?" Gareth said as he put the four guards into a pile, giving the man a bit of time to acknowledge it and start working.

@Oreus

 

[Seyd Mac]

Pushing into the camera system and implementing the duping trick had just finished when Seyd spotted Gareth get stopped by another pair of guards. That was cutting it close. He began doing a wide sweep of the camera feeds to see if anything of concern was present. That's when the sounds struck. It was all over the comms but it was certainly a commotion. Seyd frantically scrolled to find the real camera feed for the room just in time to see a guard hit a wall so hard it cracked.

"Okay that... was not subtle." The slicer couldn't help but chuckle a little as he commented to the boss. "Checking now if anyone is coming to investigate it...."

Camera feed after camera feed showed guards inside peeking around corners and seeming confused. No one had raised the alarm quite yet, but that powerful his alerted them a little. It wasn't quite following orders to the letter, but that noise was a concern. Seyd shook his head and quickly went to looking at the spice lab's alarm system.

What good is a slicer if he could just smash through loudly anyway...

"You're good... for now. But it certainly woke some people up. Be careful. Alarms are down."

A soft ping emitted from the datapad as Seyd hit confirm to push his changes to the spice lab monitoring systems. The alarms were now coded to turn on and off the lights if triggered. It was the first thing he found to tie it to on short notice. Apparently all button functions were grouped together in the code. The lights button still did the lights as well, and did not simply swap with the alarm. That would be silly.

@Versok

 

[Gareth Gin]

"...I know, but better that than blaster fire." Gareth said in response as he grabbed the vibroblade of one of the fallen guards, figuring it would allow him to be more subtle if the situation called for it, after that, Gareth decided that...Well, if anyone was going to check in, he might as well make sure they didn't get alarmed until it was too late as well, so he used the force to break all the lights inside that hall, making sure to not do it so violently as it could be heard by anyone outside, after that, Gareth would hide in one of the corners of that hall, the one the door would be faced after it was opened, the reason for it was quite simple: He had felt two more coming, confused and wanting to check the sound out.

"Hey guys, did something happen?" Just in time, the two guards came through the door, staring into the darkness of the hall. One of them tried to turn the lights on to no avail before stepping inside and noticing the sound of broken glass beneath his boots "Ah, the lights are broken...Was there a voltage problem in here?" The other one asked as he stepped in as well, using his holopad as improvised light as he pointed it at the lights "Zim and Hal must've gone ahead to get some help about it I suppose".

The other one turned his head to his partner as he kept going forward "Wouldn't they have gone to us then? Why would they go to the store front when the storage room and the electric stuff are the opposite way?" ...The door started to slowly but surely close as the two men started moving further "Maybe to accompany that smuggler that apparently came just now?" The other one shrugged in response...as the door fully closed "That seems like quite a coincidence...This feels fishy..."

"Wait, is that...Oh fuck, Hal?" His partner interrupted as the light showed the pile of taken out people which were most likely very dead...As the White Lion of Zaa Fenn fully got behind the two soldiers, shoving a vibroblade through the skull of one of them before putting his arm around the neck of the other one and enhancing his strength once more to snap his neck.

"That's more like it...All right, need you to tell me where to go now, I see many paths ahead, but I want to be taken to the main lab...Can you confirm that the leader is there as well?" Gareth said as he opened the door once more and walked forward, the route clear for now since the adjacent guards were also taken out.

@Oreus

 

[Seyd Mac]

A good slicer was never noticed. Seyd thought to himself how all this destruction would certainly raise an alarm once someone wandered into the hallways. They'd be caught and this would get messy if they weren't quick about it. A soft ping once more signaled that something was going on in the system, and it wasn't the best of news. There was a slicer on the inside in charge of cyber security. When the building shook he went to check cameras. It was impossible to know if he noticed the duping trick or any of the other hacks going on at the time.

"Right. Left. Left." Seyd droned back with directions for the pathway to the main lab. "Leader is there but... we have a problem. Their slicer is starting to dig around and might detect us soon. Need you to be fast or it'll get complicated in there."

Best case scenario, the slicer checked cameras and then shrugged it off. That was perhaps wishful thinking by Seyd but there was hardly much reason to dig further... probably. He had to take advantage of the time he had before being discovered, but there wasn't much to do until Gareth pushed into the main lab.

"Three more guards inside and double that nearby if you make too much noise. Might be worth it? Your call." Seyd mentioned as he dug deeper into the camera feeds surrounding the main lab. "They're starting to get suspicious so they won't be easy to fool either."

@Versok

 

[Gareth Gin]

Gareth quickly made his way as he heard Seyd's directions, using the force to take a better "look" inside the room, there were indeed three guards and his target, like the slicer said. However, the Miralukan noticed how far apart they were from each other and the amount of unarmed people working inside the spice lab, letting out a sigh "I am afraid not, one of them is inevitably gonna fire before I get to them" Yup, not getting away with making this fight silent "...And I do need it to be loud to secure the place regardless, so...Get ready."

Of course, the White Lion of Zaa Fenn would go loud in order to announce that his leader was battered down and they certainly had to stay in line, they wouldn't mind a change of managment after it had already happened, assuming they knew what was good for them "focus on keeping any escape routes locked away from the target, maybe lock the main lab down to give me some time before the other guards arrive and silence any alarms they may have...Other than that, it's time to get lousy" And so, Gareth prepared himself to enter on Seyd's mark, making sure to not go in until he was prepared.

@Oreus

 

[Seyd Mac]

It was Seyd's worst nightmare. There was an active slicer trying to investigate the weird noises and happenings at the facility. He had to prep for this fight and let Gareth know when to enter, but it was already quickly becoming too late. Somehow, his camera dupe got discovered and the other slicer was seen holding open the network for Seyd too. It wouldn't be long before the inside man was able to lock them out or trigger alarms. They had to go hard right now if they had any hope.

"We're spotted. Go now before they lock the doors!" He frantically shouted into the comlink, attracting a couple glances from pedestrians nearby. He awkwardly smiled at them for a moment as he pretended to be playing a game on his datapad.

That distraction was too long apparently. Seyd turned back to the task at hand on his datapad only to see that his work had been undone. Cameras were back to real footage and alarm reroutes had been undone. No one had pushed it yet but it was probably mere moments away from happening. Panic ensued and Seyd frantically tried to gain control of functions inside the lab. The man inside had the advantage of knowing the system and having actual administrative access. When they knew a hack was happening, all they had to do was press a few buttons. They weren't kicked out at least, they were skilled enough just to stay hooked in for now. Seyd could provide watch but little else at this point though.

"Feth, they locked us out. I can only really watch cameras now." He muttered over the comlink, sure that Gareth was in a fight and might not even hear.

@Versok