Week 69 Debrief: Flashmob Hazing

This mission was carried out by Ace, Karishma and Stephen

With most of the corporation on Vastaag and others busy there were only three members available to answer CEO Lee’s call that “There may be an asshole in The Room.”
When the team arrived at The Room they were greeted by the sight of UIG Ranger Warrick sitting in CEO Lee’s chair and with his feet up on the table. Warrick was briefly introduced to the two newer Agents, and reintroduced to Ace, before explaining the crux of the mission.
Kim Nam-Soon was a Rank 2, UIG Officer in command of a team of 12 patrol officers in Seoul. Warrick wanted to know if she was worthy of promotion and challenged the team to test her. He wanted to see how she reacted to combat situations, how she fought and if she possessed some other specific, intangible and unshared qualities.

Warrick left the team with some basic information on Kim and a live tracer on her present location. The first step was to gather information. Ace’s A.I. S.A.M. sent out feelers into the WDN, while they gathered information from the UIG World Database and public knowledge, both on her and her team. They also spent some time physically following her as she went for a twilight jog, after identifying this as the best time to engage her.

It took some time and several iterations for the final plan to develop, with many ideas rejected along the way. They decided against kidnapping her and putting her in an elaborate death-trap obstacle course, as well as trying to get her team to convince her they were traitors and see how she reacted to a daylong escort mission. Plans for a congratulatory party were also scrapped after it was pointed out that she might not get the promotion after all, although not before Stephen has already bought and decorated a cake. Finally the details of the plan were decided and it came time to act it out.

Preparation for the mission was extensive, but actual set up was done only slightly before the mission started, so that local criminals would not steal any of the expensive and important equipment. Several Turrets, vehicles, hologram projectors, explosives, mercenaries and actors were acquired or hired in preparation and deployed accordingly. Most of the people were unaware that the point of all their work was to test a UIG Agent, but they all performed their duties admirably.

Phase 1 was the lure; Yeong Yi, dressed in a dishevelled manner carried an expensive looking briefcase to a building, while looking as suspicious as possible. As expected she was followed into the building, which was an abandoned three floor office covered in hidden cameras, by Officer Nam-Soon. Following the sound of loud arguing from an internal room she crept up on the voices, only to be crept up on herself by Katsu. A critically flawless assassination attempt would have spelled an early end to the Officer, had not her invisible close form shield not absorbed the killing strike and put Nam-Soon on her guard. She held her own well in single combat, putting three rounds rapid into the back of the fleeing assassin and draining his shield in return, but there was no time to that as Yu Lui kicked open a door and knocked the Officer’s Raven handgun out of her hand. GETing in a combination torch-stun baton-sword she waded into combat, holding her own flawlessly against both single opponents and a whole group. As the Briefcase fled away from the scene, Kim pushed her way through the mob to chase after it, her curiosity as to its contents obviously piqued.

This was the point at which Karishma and Ace burst through the wall. Her response was to summon a primed flash bang out of thin air and stun everyone in the room, apart from the Cyberframe clad Ace. As he approached her, plasma sword and Gatling gun at the ready, she did the sensible thing and fled. Krishama tried to stop the Officer, but her telekinetic pull wasn’t strong enough and the Assault shot to her back didn’t stop her chasing after the Briefcase. Kim fled outside and part way across the street when Yong Yi’s head exploded. Stephen’s placement on the roof gave him a perfect view of the scene below and his aim was true, convincingly sending the mercenary flying into the air from a pacifier round to the head while the holographic explosion left a holographic mess and a very real briefcase. Despite the sniper fire from the roof Officer Nam-Soon activated another shield and ran to grab the case. This is the point at which all out gang warfare started. Turrets from nearby buildings opened fire on the crowded street below, while thugs got out of recently arrived cars and started to fire back. Kim quickly abandoned the briefcase and took cover behind a car and a riot shield pulled from space, ignoring the fact that the rain of gunfire was killing innocent civilians, via more well placed actors and stage magic.

Given she was showing no attempt at heroism the plan moved onto the next phase. In the doorway to the building Karishma’s extending tentacle grabbed the case. Ace’s distorted metallic shout of “We’ve got it” to the sniper on the roof was cut short by Karisma’s traitorous cry of “It’s mine now, suckers”. Dramatically flipping the Metallic monster with Telekinesis and Jumping 40 feet into a waiting car she sped off into the city. Nam-Soon was quickly in pursuit in a slightly plasma’d and overridden civilian car. While the Officer was not the best driver, she did manage to keep up with the escaping car, although this was mostly due to the fact that she was supposed to. She was not good enough to notice when the car full of people was switched out for an identical, but empty car, being driven remotely. The chase came to a dramatic end as the lead car Exploded ahead of Kim and flipped onto it’s back, spilling the Briefcase out onto the street in a well timed coincidence.

Officer Nam-Soon’s perceptive abilities were excellent as she noticed the road mine left for her, but her driving skills let her down as she avoided the mine by crashing into a wall. This didn’t help as she had entered the final phase of the plan: Explosion Land. Having loured her away from the crowded areas the Team let loose with their pre-planted explosives, which were designed more to look impressive than damage. A far too well placed incendiary rocked to the car from Vlatka, the Nuke, left the car on its back and Kim crawling out of the flaming wreckage, while also being on fire. She didn’t let being on fire stop her, though, as she rolled for cover and activated yet another shield. Putting the fire out in some impressive acrobatics she finally got her hands on the case and fled to a safer spot, away from the fire and explosions. After confirming she was finally safe she cautiously flipped open the case to reveal the contents that were of so much apparent value, and while she did dive for cover as the party poppers went off a closer look inside revealed a Gyroscopically stabilised interior and a nice cake, with the word “Congratulations” printed on it in big letters. The camera inside the case captured her final reaction, a quite audible “What the fuck just happened?”

He reaction was similar to Warrick’s, who sat in The Room with feet once again on the antique surface and watched the edited together footage. With no visible face it was hard to judge what expression the Ranger had. Finally Agent Warrick discussed the merits of the methods the team had employed before admitting that they had done what was asked. It looks like Officer Kim Nam-Soon will be getting that promotion in the end.

Ace’s comments:

I think that we pulled off a very successful mission, given the time we had. No-one died and I’m sure we left that office cleaner than when we started. Officer Nam-Soon proved herself through a range of combat scenarios with little time to process what was happening. I wish her well in her new job, whatever that may be. Good work everyone

This mission was certainly up there with the most surreal situations I've ever been in. Please rest assured that, should I betray anyone, my last words will definitely not be THAT cheesy! Though having seen Stephen's excelent shooting, it's very likely that they would be last words. It was a pleasure to work on this one with you both.

Reckon she proved herself well in the whole situation. Coming up with and executing that plan was certainly an interesting experience. It's a shame we had to decide against organising the surprise party with her squad, but at least my cake didn't go to waste, which is obviously the most important thing!

That Warrick guy is kind of an asshole, though.
_{Yes, I know he's probably reading this.}