Exigency: The Old Guard

"No," says Cáceres, "I’m not buying it."

Valon’s Chief of Police stands up and faces the window, or what’s left of it. "I am not calling you liars. But I believe you have been misled." His fists clench. "Even now, I feel some bastard’s hand tugging at our strings."

He sighs and shudders, but immediately whirls back towards the party, as blank and stone-faced as ever. "We can bounce back from this: there’s a disused phase transceiver tower in the mountains. We should be able to put an SOS out on to the infranet."

He doesn’t state the obvious, either out of respect for the party’s common sense or out of unwillingness to lower the mood: without the phase beacon, emergency responders would be limited to conventional drives. Getting to Valon would take them weeks instead of hours.

"But before that, I need to know what happened. From the beginning.

"Tell me how those monsters blew up my city."

Chief Cáceres looks pensive. The messages and transmissions of a planet's independent bionetwork are a fleeting, temporary thing, very different from the star-spanning infranet.

"Are there no records of this suspicious bionet activity? Computer, can we gain access to—" Cáceres stops. The machine he's addressing is silent. "Nevermind. I forgot that the HQ's mainframe was down." He rubs his forehead. It's peppered with flecks of blood and he merely rearranges the stains slightly.

"That leaves a data investigation in your hands, Iranii. Consider yourself an official aide to the Valon Police Department. If your skills impress the Maintenance Association, they impress me.

"I would offer the same courtesy to the rest of you," he adds, turning to Falstaff, "but I doubt a hunter working for the Highs has much need of my support. I won't hinder your pursuit as long as you extend me the same courtesy and don't disrupt my investigation or the emergency clean-up operation."

Cáceres looks Serana up and down, slightly wary of having a military-grade cyborg in his office. "And I shall, ah, leave you to continue your business at the Embassy. Thank you for your co-operation."

A few minutes later...

The party exits the building via the stairs at the main entrance, acutely aware of how loudly their footsteps ring out in the suddenly silent street. The only other people in sight are four officers in police body armour, all lacking badge numbers or unit markings. Three with SMGs take up positions on the party's side of the road but the fourth— a giant of a man in heavy armour, almost certainly a Gef or genetically modified— rests his plasma repeater on the bonnet of a battered response vehicle and takes aim.

The HQ door slams shut.

Serana clears the car, skidding over the bonnet. She punches the gunner as she slides past but he barely flinches. From behind his visor he sneers, swinging the repeater back around for what he expects to be a devastating retort...

"Fuh," says the repeater's targeting computer, spewing sparks.

Swearing audibly, the gunner discards his twitching weapon, drawing a large combat knife and plunging it towards Serana's face.

The gunner is down 1 HP: now 6/7. Serana will also take 1 Fatigue hit, HP 4/5, but you can describe how she counters this otherwise dangerous attack.
Landing a hit was enough to let you estimate your opponent's durability. The gunner has Constitution 6 and 8 armour.

"Iranii, watch the right!"

Wilhelm rushes the two assailants on his left, scythe in hand. He slides between them and sweeps the leg out from underneath the larger of the two.

(assuming i can't use a scythe attack bacause I moved)

Enemy 2 is down 1 HP: 3/4. Landing a hit was enough to let you estimate your opponent's durability. Enemy 2 has Constitution 4 and 4 armour.

Wilhelm shouts his warning and if anything it seems to spur the rightmost "police officer" into action. He fires a burst at Pudge.

Meanwhile the other has rushed to his comrade's aid, coming in close to avoid a friendly-fire incident. Both men attempt some sloppy CQC: their training is nothing special, but they are ready to try and block Wilhelm's inevitable counter attacks.

Pudge is due to lose 2 HP : 5/7 (initially I said 4 HP, but then I edited when I realised he actually has Reactions 4 if I let him use his Psi rank, I made the mistake of applying a ranged attack to his Constitution 2 at first)
Wilhelm dodges one hit entirely, but the other lands and costs him 1 HP: 4/5.

EDIT: I kept saying 3 and 4 were attacking Wilhelm in the rolls, but it was actually 2 and 3. Whoops!

(Does Harder They Fall apply to being outnumbered?)

Whihelm ducks under a blow and spins up behind #2. For an instant the scythe glows in the light of the Valoni sun, just before it is brought down on its target.