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 Posted: Wed Mar 11, 2015 7:12 pm
The nights grew familiar with a routine budding, so Umber sought the stretches of city he never witnessed before to demand a higher measure of alertness. He was loathe to slacken his awareness with the natural ease that stemmed from familiar ground - from tuning out his environment and its obstacles solely because he traversed them previously. Now he darted through flatted concrete canyons or crossed the rooftop canopies that overlapped or distanced themselves just far enough to prevent civilians from hazarding those same leaps. His footsteps found even pace with the acclimation to tar paper or concrete over dirt underfoot.
And as he looked toward the sky, he noticed the crescent growing thinner by the day. A steadfast reminder of the time that's passed since I last saw my home. Has it been a month now? No - now isn't the time to consider it. My focus belongs on the hunt. Or have i spent too long outside of my vocation to remember how to seek prey.
his agile travels brought him through more residential streets sporting intact sidewalks mixed with foliage tending toward young. Mostly he found townhouses clustering toward the more metropolitan hub of the city, and somewhere beyond the accordion of establishments lingered a signature much like his own - a lieutenant, if memory served, and they danced about somewhere beyond these darkened streets. Umber shifted direction immediately, cresting the stretch of houses to descend into a narrow back yard, and off again he leapt over the half-moldered fence.
Another length of moments left him panting through his mouth as he closed the distance toward the signature in question. Somewhere near an elementary school it was, perhaps within or around the cluster of buildings. His gaze traveled through rooftops before dropping to ground level to look for common hiding places, but found nothing of the sort. This person must be further. Or within. Or somewhere beyond. If only these senses were more accurate, I could track without so much frustration...
Wait. There. Is that someone?
Though Umber slid to a halt, the figure lacked lighting for him to discern friend, foe, or nothing at all. Instead, the lieutenant managed a quick jump to crown one of the street lamps in hopes that the added luminance might direct attention toward him instead.Das Tor let me know if anything needs changing!
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Posted: Wed Mar 18, 2015 6:53 am
Another night, another perch. Sphalerite sat in a spot where she could see senshi and knights going by, tracking their passing on the tablet she carried. She hadn't expected her comm crystal to start glowing with a chaos signature, followed by the faint feeling of another lieutenant. [The energy wasn't like Cinnabar's, or Buddy's, so it had to be another lieutenant like her.] She stood, stashing her tablet away in the bag she kept it in, moving to try and meet up with the other agent.
She was a bit surprised by what she found.
It wasn't too hard to spot him once he'd hopped onto a street lamp. She'd never really seen someone before that...well, he looked a bit wild, that was the best thing she could think of. "Hi there!" It was pretty clear he was the other Negaverse agent, though, and that alone lended to her being her normal outgoing self. "Didn't expect to run into any allies tonight!" She moved into the light of another street lamp, grin on her face.
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Posted: Sun Mar 22, 2015 6:26 pm
This one seems chipper. A welcome change from the somber or confrontational lot I've met so far. After a once-over, he found her outfit closer to the gym wear he'd seen than typical Negaverse garb; he wondered if she considered gyms for fertile draining grounds. Uniforms spanned a wide spectrum, with not all of them so impractical for stealth as his.
"We must be sparse," he answered back before descending from his perch, and he touched down a few feet from the penumbra of the lamp. His arms returned to a fold over his chest while his posture shifted to one hip. "I didn't expect to find anyone out here myself. Most combatives I found in the denser parts of the city, not the suburbs." A glance toward the nearly squared portions of housing separated by picket fences confirmed very few out on evening strolls. The two pair that left the house knew well enough to bring another on the trip, and often stayed in the more lighted areas of the sidewalks. One set intended to turn down their street, spotted the two lieutenants, and immediately backtracked in a panic. Umber shrugged before turning his attentions back to his new find.
"I hope you're not here to hunt." Doing so is asking for failure, unless the intent is to burglarize a home as well. I can't speak to what agents do with their anonymity, nor do I care. "Or do you live around here?"
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Posted: Wed Apr 08, 2015 9:38 am
"From what I know, we are pretty spread out." Sphal frowned, shaking her head. "I mean...from what I've seen, we're far more organized than the other side but...there seems to be more of them." Quite a few more. It was...terrifying. It made her project all the more needed, to help strategize and make use of their lesser numbers to their fullest advantage. She caught sight of the pair that had backed away from their street and sighed. "I wish they'd be less afraid of us. But...I can't blame them, considering some of the fights with the other side have resulted in collateral." Another reason for her project.
"Neither hunting nor a resident." She pat the bag at her side, cheering up a bit if the giggle was any indication. "Scouting. Making maps. If we have a record of what enemies patrol where, we can better utilize our own forces. Send more experienced agents to where they're needed, or find opportunities that would be best used to train newcomers. And perhaps avoid situations where an agent would let their dislike or fraternization with an enemy could distract them from our goals."
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Posted: Thu Apr 09, 2015 8:19 am
"They will fear those who prey on them." Umber watched the pair impassively. "We can assuage their nerves in any show of sympathy that we fancy, but we still use them for their energy. Protection from the enemy is just a trade-off." He wondered if the pair had been drained before, or simply knew of the powered creatures that haunted evenings so commonly. Once they vanished from sight, he returned attentions to Sphalerite.
"All good reasons, but how are you managing it? From my experience, the enemy will discover me as soon as I discover them and respond to my presence. Do you use traditional tracking practices?" Even that seemed unlikely; the concrete jungles of Destiny City afforded very few opportunities to leave marks. With few muddy areas, trees for light scrapings, and branches to catch hairs, Umber figured that their location alone rendered tracking exceedingly difficult. However, if she held some kind of device that could process auric after-effects... But that was reaching far into the unknown. Instead, Umber let the question hang.
If it's possible for me to replicate her method, I should offer to help. Her idea is quite valuable. And if she can somehow compartmentalize this information and render it obtainable at distance, then every officer would be able to track the senshi they wanted. Most of the drawbacks only occur if the enemy discovers that their routes have been mapped. The false sense of security latent in knowledge may damage us.
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Posted: Fri Apr 17, 2015 5:47 am
"I guess you're right." She sighed, shaking her head. Why did they even have to drain energy again? Whatever the reason...she'd worry about it later. She had a job to do, and a fellow Lt. to talk to. And more pressing questions to answer.
"I find a vantage point to observe from. Sometimes I'm found and have to retreat for that area for a time, other times I haven't been noticed. But for the information gathered...it's worth the occasional discoveries. Though finding a way to suppress my aura in the future would be a most advantageous thing...especially once I move up ranks..." Sphalerite looked thoughtful, arms crossed and her lips drawn a little tighter. Yes...looking into something like that might be useful. Maybe a superior officer would know of such an item? Or she could find a way to do it otherwise? Hm...
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Posted: Thu Apr 23, 2015 4:47 pm
"Maybe you should consult one of the superior officers about covering your signature." If it were possible, he assumed one of their captains or generals would have some idea how to do so. He wondered if more accurate tracking and reconnaissance methods would improve her success rate, but inquiring about it may imply distrust in her abilities. He knew nothing of this officer five minutes ago - she may jump to conclusions based on that alone.
Slipping his hands into his back pockets, Umber cocked his head to the side for a less formal disposition. "What have you discovered so far? Are some areas more frequented than others?"
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Posted: Fri May 01, 2015 9:09 am
"I think I'll do that, yeah." Maybe Buddy knew how to do that? Or Mica. She really ought to check on Mica. "If they know something, it would definitely improve my results." She perked when he asked about her discoveries.
"So far, I haven't noticed much difference between suburban and more city-centric. There are definitely less people patrolling when you get out to the city limits, though. That might be used to our advantage starting out with..."
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Posted: Sat May 02, 2015 6:47 am
So there are senshi in the suburbs too? I haven't been out that far yet. I wonder how far this war spans.
"That would make sense. If their enemy is already within the city limits, then there's not as much reason to patrol the 'outer walls' as if this war is a siege. I don't know what areas they mark as important and worthy of protection - maybe their schools, or their homes - but if I were a senshi, I would place most of my forces in protection of those areas and work outward. If the whole city were of great importance to the senshi, then it's prudent to eliminate the threat from the inside out. Though I don't know if starting from the center and working outward is ideal - I don't have enough tactical knowledge for that." Her answers did, however, beg some study on those matters. If he could learn from older strategists and tacticians, would it then be possible to organize their forces in a more potent manner?
So much of the Negaverse felt absent direction, as if their leaders were intermittent at best. The New Year's Eve ball offered a margin of insight into that, but only one coordinated attack wasn't enough data to confirm that hypothesis.
"Do you need help? Energy draining doesn't demand much time anymore. I could help you chart on the side."
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Posted: Sun May 03, 2015 9:59 am
"True, true. It could play to our advantage, though. It's harder to fight against two fronts than one." She looked more thoughtful than smiling in that moment, like her brain was trying to do overtime. "Tactics are one thing I'm actually pretty good at. Another reason for me gathering info. The more I know, the better I can plan. Especially if I get higher up in this group."
His offer to help got the smile growing again, and Sphal nodded. "That'd be awesome! Two of us could certainly cover more area. Map things out quicker."
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Posted: Sun May 03, 2015 5:50 pm
"Are you a part of the Information branch, then?" If she was, he might have some lead on how to go about changing branches with another personal example. Had she gone through another officer to do so? Or did she put in for the branch and was accepted out of the gate? "Zircon mentioned branch specializations, and that in earlier times, the Negaverse placed focus on small groups with tactical throughput. If tactics suit you, perhaps you can try to resurrect those groups." He'd met a handful of officers already, though most ventured out on their own. What happened to disperse group endeavors?
"I can document what I find in my own patrols; I figure exploring separately maximizes our efficiency. if you can tell me what areas of town you've already covered, i can start looking for patrolling senshi in the areas that you haven't yet touched. We can also arrange to patrol at different times of day, in case certain senshi only patrol during school hours or otherwise."
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Posted: Sun Jun 21, 2015 8:31 am
"Not currently. Looking at it as a high possibility, though! Just GenOps for the moment, though." The name Zircon tugged at something in her [though the memories it tugged on, she didn't want to touch with a ten foot pole, just ******** that]. "That may definitely be something to look into. That sort of thing I think could work best in Info or SpecOps...either way, it's definitely a good idea." Especially if they had something overall to help co-ordinate between them...
She pulled the notebook-tablet out, motioning for him to come look at the screen. Sphal pulled the map she'd been working on up, zooming out to show the entire city. "I haven't covered much yet, thanks to a lot of factors, but the areas I've been starting with are....these ones, highlighted in red."
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Posted: Mon Jun 22, 2015 5:15 pm
Umber leaned over to read the tablet himself, and frowned slightly when he realized that technology might be a necessity for reporting this information. If she expected him to update a map online with the areas he patrolled, then he'd have to ask Porsha's help on how to do it.
Luckily, the physical aspects of the task proved a lot easier. Many areas were left open for him, which meant he could choose segments as he pleased. "I'll start near the industrial district. It's near to where typical draining grounds are, so there might be senshi attracted to the region. I'll start for it now, unless you have more to add."
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Posted: Wed Jul 08, 2015 8:25 pm
Sphal nodded. "Just let me know when you have additions to make. And bring whatever you keep record of with you when we meet up. It's easier for me to copy things from sight, rather than verbatim." It was a relief, knowing she'd have a little more help. Covering one city was a big job for one person. Especially when that person had school and other things and a secret identity. "I'm most easily reached through the communication crystals." She dug hers out of her pocket, both to show she still had hers and to emphasize.
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Posted: Thu Jul 09, 2015 5:07 pm
"I can do that. It's more accurate." He offered her a quick nod of assent. "I'll try for you when I find something, and we'll meet where we can." Traveling to give the information rather than reading it off over the intercom proved somewhat cumbersome, but likely no worse than the drain from using the crystals. He would surmount the issue as it came up.
Unaccustomed with issuing goodbyes, Umber simply turned from the lieutenant and crouched to descend from the building. It required a few ricochet leaps but he descended to street level without too much difficulty, and later started in the direction of grounds he was more familiar with. He lacked reason not to start tonight.
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