Unity – Easy pickings
by Commander Isha t'Vaurek & Cardassian Vi'kar Gul Tharek Getal
Post Details
A window of opportunity, that was what Acantha Sul saw when chaos erupted on the promenade. Whilst people ran here and there, without aim she moved with them, but against the flow like a fish migrating up river. To a casual observer she might just be being swept along.
Tucking her hair behind her ears the Argelian placed herself near the rail where she could get a better view and decide whether or not this was truly an opportunity or merely a hidden trap that would snap shut if she stepped too far. This way of life had proved easier for Acantha than working, it harmed no-one except those who were insured anyway, and left her free to follow her own pursuits, but she was still careful ...
A tap on the shoulder came for Acantha, as Helok stood beside her. The Saurian was tall, and could see most of the promenade, along with the civilian shops.
After a stream of phrases that would have made a Risan blush Acantha calmed herself and craned her neck to meet his eye, "It's been a bloody long time since I saw you," she complained all the while monitoring what was going on around them - a panic with the prospect of evacuation was one of the few times no-one would ask you questions if you had a lumpy duffel back slung over your shoulder. "You've kept yourself damned well hidden, why sneak up on me now?"
"Perfect opportunity. Why not?" Helok asked, gazing at her with his gargantuan eyeballs.
"Well unless you plan to literally bite my head off can we just agree to say hi and move on? I've got business ..." Acantha paused, "Your eyesight is more acute than mine ... you know what I mean," she suggested.
"That it is. Target?" He asked in a militaristic manner.
Acantha shrugged at the change, "So its business now rather than trying to scare me out of my pants," she observed, it did not do to linger too long when everyone else in the crowd was shifting, Acantha crouched to fiddle with the fastening on her bag as she explained. "A fashion store on the lower level, look straight ahead, three fronts down to the left. It carries high end jewellery but has no safe storage of its own. Every morning the proprieter comes very early to recieve a delivery from the assay office. He's taken a chance."
She rose and nudged the Saurian, "Helok, he's pulled down the grille and left. I think he's taken a chance and left the goods inside. That's first on my list."
"Jewellery... " Helok started, obviously not impressed. "Another target. More... Expensive."
"You're the one with the eyes, you big freak," Acantha said beneath her breath, "the stones can be broken up. I made my own way and if you don't like it, spot something better. I've no reason to change my plans because they're not magnificent enough for you."
"Hmm. Stones are better broken down to composite level, better market value." Helok said, barely phased by her comments. "Plan of action?"
"Oh, a distinct lack of flair. We go down, you cause a distraction while I break his lock ... once we have them we'll move on to bigger things, but one at a time." Acantha knew a lot better than to reveal her plans at the start start but once they were inside ... well, that seemingly innocuous store would prove a gateway.
"Agreed." He stated bluntly. "I'll go now, begin breaking the lock." Helok was very blunt. Didn't talk much and didn't care much. Besides for money. He was built like a hull plate and had latinum on the brain. As soon as he finished speaking, he wondered off, down to the lower level and outside the shop.
Why can't I meet anyone normal? Acantha asked herself as she walked in the opposite direction, She would take a different route.
---
As she walked in front of the store Acantha whisperd "Progress?" without a glance at the lurking Surian.
"Good." He said, as he picked up a small piece of debris. "I sugest you begin work immediately." Helok said, throwing the small lump of metal at a shop window, facing the other direction to the jewellery store.
"Give me five minutes then slip under the grille and join me, you won't be disappoined," Acantha smirked.
"Alright." He said, as he strode off further from the shop and began pushing running civilians, creating a suitable 'distraction' for Acantha.
True to his word the metal barrier had been loosened. Acantha drew out a padd tajing notes as though she owned the place which she did not. For the second time in ten minutes her vocabulary exploded as she pulled up the grille.
"Where is Security when its needed?" she complained pointedly at a pair of passers by.
Then she ducked beneath the grille and pulled it down behind her.
The value of a raid depended on what you valued. Acantha had never got the hang of the Saurian, but before the fashion store had been uesd for that function or maybe while, some enterpising soul had used the jeffries tubes and other more functional conduits to forge a connection with the assay office a deck below - from there they could take the wealth of the station, at least that proportion that belonged to the rich and paranoid. Even the Saurian would have to be impressed.
As she thought this Acantha gathered the limited pickings from around the store and waited.
Helok slid himself in through the grille and stood erect. "Humans can't fight for brandy." He said, jokingly. He eyed the amount of jewellery around, and took his words back. Jewells and precious metals lathored the room. "What do we take first?" The Saurian asked, as he unloaded a sack from his shoulder. He didn't have it before, meaning he must've taken it off when of the poor 'victims' that came his way during the distraction.
"Now your eyes are glittering," Acantha said, "but listen. the proprietor waited after the bombs last night and tried to get his goods secured and could not. He came back an stashed it all, I happened to be shopping for a new bag at the time ... he did not leave. He stayed all night then scarpered after the alert."
Acantha was almost bouncing with glee that eclipsed what had been left behind.
"He was a crook, Helok, that is why he waited ... but do you know what is here?"
He looked around aimlessly. "Jewellery?" He asked with a gawked face.
She chuckled, sniggered, then smirked, "The Assay Office itself. My friends got cold feet after last night - it will be six to twelve hours before it occurs to them that this is the perfect time to strike - we'll be gone by then ... if you're in, that is"
"If latinum is involved, I'm always in." He said, smiling. it was an awkward smile, but a smile nonetheless. "Tell me what to do and I'll do it
Acantha dug into her bag and pulled out a sheaf of papers, the old fashioned kind. She spread them out on the floor revealing the pencil drawn outline of a section of the station, "The blueprints of this quarter," she told him, "drawn with painstaking precision." She traced her finger along the page as she spoke, "We take this conduit through the levels and we hit this wall," her finger stabbed the page, "but over the last few months it has been eroded, never the same method used twice ... no more than a skin now separates the vault from this tube. All we have to do is get there."
"Alright. Let's get started." Came Helok's reply.
Resting her hands on her hips Acantha looked the saurian up and down, "Are you sure you can fit? Not a secret shapeshifter are you?"
Helok stood there and kept his blank face. His eyes not moving from hers.
"So bite me," Acantha said as she folded her arms and looked around ... where was it ... right ... around ... here! She approached a wall panel which came away with ease. "Let's go," she said turning back to pick up her bag before stooped to enter the crawlspace.
Helok soon followed, getting close to her heels. "How much of this cut is mine?" Helok questioned Acantha.
"In terms of gold pressed latinum eighty:twenty," she said as she crawled, building in some room for negotiation, "as for the rest, whatever takes your fancy is yours if you can carry it."
"Fifty:fifty. And I get to keep the rest." Helok said, crawling right behind her.
Pausing, Acantha glanced back, "Seventy:thirty," she said knowing that they'd settle on sixty:forty, she was the one who had screwed her friends over and needed the extra compensation to deal with that. As to the rest there was only one bauble in the Assay Office that she was interested in and she was working on commission to acquire it.
"Sixty fourty." Helok responded accordingly. "I get sixty. I also keep everything in that vault besides your cut. I know you Acantha, and your not fucking me over that easily."
"You're no fun anymore," Acantha said as she considered kicking sharply back and taking Helok out of consideration altogether. On balance she still needed assistance for now. It was time to climb, not too difficult with a convenient access ladder embedded in the wall to help out maintenance teams. Acantha climbed and off the ladder she starightened.
"You get forty," she told Helok as she stood above the ladder's top, "and whatever you can fit in your mouth."
"Agreed." Came Helok's reply. He blew off her latter comment and followed Acantha up the ladder.
The wall, when they reached it appeared to be intact, "Watch this," Acantha said knowing that it was an illusion generated in case a maintenance team passed by in the narrow passageway in which they stood, but also to fool the sensor equipment on the other side. She reached round the shadowed edge of a pillar reaching up as high as she could and the holographic generator clicked off.
Unmasked the metal had been painstakingly eroded and it was clear that between them and the goods there was only a skin; this operation had been meticulously planned and executed, only to be disrupted at the last minute. Acantha pulled a phaser and aimed it at the wall, knowing that for now at least sensors were down and if they were quick they could get in and out. She turned up the setting and fired.
Helok looked on at Acantha with his large, Saurian eyes and retained his blank face. "We only have an estimated time of five minutes, by my calculations. In. Now."
Acantha was not argueing. She stepped through the hole she had burned taking care to avoid the glowing curled edges of the metal. Her boots echoed in the interior as she took a few seconds to cast her gaze around the laden shelves and rows of strong boxes. As her former friends had expected the locks were basic - no-ne ever really expected anyone to be able to break in here. Everything really was for the taking, but Acantha was looking for one in particular.
Helok glared around at everything in the room. He could probably tear open each box with minimal effort. Fourty percent of all of this treasure was his. He was on the brink of salivating.
Extracting a trichorder Acantha dropped her bag open on the floor and began to scan the various boxes, "Five minutes, remember," she reminded her rapt companion as she moved down the row. She did not know what it was she was here to retrieve, merely that the data in her device would allow her to locate the object. She paused to jimmy open a few boxes, jewellery, latinum, trinkets and dump them in the bag pushing it along the floor as she progressed; Acantha did not want her 'friend' to get the impression that she was after any one thing in particular - then the tricorder flashed. There it was.
The locker contained a flat black box about six inches square, it did not look impressive from the outside and she was not being paid to see what was on the inside so she tossed it into the bag too and continued.
Helok didn't care for what was in which box. He merely teared off the locks, and if he didn't think the contents of the box would make any money, he'd throw it behind him. Already his bag was half full, and he had barely got across the room.
"Greedy sod," Acantha muttered beneath her breath as she took something else from her bag; with two mintues left she had just enough time to erase her own DNA signature, and that of Helok and to replace them with those of her former colleagues. "Time to go," she said moving back towards the hole, the enzyme would take about forty seconds to work. She waited until the Saurian had joined her before activating the spray.
Helok would be smiling, if he wasn't so blunt. He had just made off with the biggest pay of his life. He was thinking of what to spend it all on whilst crawling with Acantha. Food? No. Weapons? Possibly. A ship? Deffinitely. He though to himself as he scuttled on with his sack in tow.
OFF
Acantha Sul
Stealing Something in particular
Helok
Has latinum on the brain
by Commander Isha t'Vaurek & Cardassian Vi'kar Gul Tharek Getal
Post Details
| Title | Easy pickings | |
| Mission | Unity | |
| Author(s) | Commander Isha t'Vaurek & Cardassian Vi'kar Gul Tharek Getal | |
| Posted | Tue May 18, 2010 @ 8:57pm | |
| Location | DS5 | |
| Timeline | SD17 - 15:00 |
Tucking her hair behind her ears the Argelian placed herself near the rail where she could get a better view and decide whether or not this was truly an opportunity or merely a hidden trap that would snap shut if she stepped too far. This way of life had proved easier for Acantha than working, it harmed no-one except those who were insured anyway, and left her free to follow her own pursuits, but she was still careful ...
A tap on the shoulder came for Acantha, as Helok stood beside her. The Saurian was tall, and could see most of the promenade, along with the civilian shops.
After a stream of phrases that would have made a Risan blush Acantha calmed herself and craned her neck to meet his eye, "It's been a bloody long time since I saw you," she complained all the while monitoring what was going on around them - a panic with the prospect of evacuation was one of the few times no-one would ask you questions if you had a lumpy duffel back slung over your shoulder. "You've kept yourself damned well hidden, why sneak up on me now?"
"Perfect opportunity. Why not?" Helok asked, gazing at her with his gargantuan eyeballs.
"Well unless you plan to literally bite my head off can we just agree to say hi and move on? I've got business ..." Acantha paused, "Your eyesight is more acute than mine ... you know what I mean," she suggested.
"That it is. Target?" He asked in a militaristic manner.
Acantha shrugged at the change, "So its business now rather than trying to scare me out of my pants," she observed, it did not do to linger too long when everyone else in the crowd was shifting, Acantha crouched to fiddle with the fastening on her bag as she explained. "A fashion store on the lower level, look straight ahead, three fronts down to the left. It carries high end jewellery but has no safe storage of its own. Every morning the proprieter comes very early to recieve a delivery from the assay office. He's taken a chance."
She rose and nudged the Saurian, "Helok, he's pulled down the grille and left. I think he's taken a chance and left the goods inside. That's first on my list."
"Jewellery... " Helok started, obviously not impressed. "Another target. More... Expensive."
"You're the one with the eyes, you big freak," Acantha said beneath her breath, "the stones can be broken up. I made my own way and if you don't like it, spot something better. I've no reason to change my plans because they're not magnificent enough for you."
"Hmm. Stones are better broken down to composite level, better market value." Helok said, barely phased by her comments. "Plan of action?"
"Oh, a distinct lack of flair. We go down, you cause a distraction while I break his lock ... once we have them we'll move on to bigger things, but one at a time." Acantha knew a lot better than to reveal her plans at the start start but once they were inside ... well, that seemingly innocuous store would prove a gateway.
"Agreed." He stated bluntly. "I'll go now, begin breaking the lock." Helok was very blunt. Didn't talk much and didn't care much. Besides for money. He was built like a hull plate and had latinum on the brain. As soon as he finished speaking, he wondered off, down to the lower level and outside the shop.
Why can't I meet anyone normal? Acantha asked herself as she walked in the opposite direction, She would take a different route.
---
As she walked in front of the store Acantha whisperd "Progress?" without a glance at the lurking Surian.
"Good." He said, as he picked up a small piece of debris. "I sugest you begin work immediately." Helok said, throwing the small lump of metal at a shop window, facing the other direction to the jewellery store.
"Give me five minutes then slip under the grille and join me, you won't be disappoined," Acantha smirked.
"Alright." He said, as he strode off further from the shop and began pushing running civilians, creating a suitable 'distraction' for Acantha.
True to his word the metal barrier had been loosened. Acantha drew out a padd tajing notes as though she owned the place which she did not. For the second time in ten minutes her vocabulary exploded as she pulled up the grille.
"Where is Security when its needed?" she complained pointedly at a pair of passers by.
Then she ducked beneath the grille and pulled it down behind her.
The value of a raid depended on what you valued. Acantha had never got the hang of the Saurian, but before the fashion store had been uesd for that function or maybe while, some enterpising soul had used the jeffries tubes and other more functional conduits to forge a connection with the assay office a deck below - from there they could take the wealth of the station, at least that proportion that belonged to the rich and paranoid. Even the Saurian would have to be impressed.
As she thought this Acantha gathered the limited pickings from around the store and waited.
Helok slid himself in through the grille and stood erect. "Humans can't fight for brandy." He said, jokingly. He eyed the amount of jewellery around, and took his words back. Jewells and precious metals lathored the room. "What do we take first?" The Saurian asked, as he unloaded a sack from his shoulder. He didn't have it before, meaning he must've taken it off when of the poor 'victims' that came his way during the distraction.
"Now your eyes are glittering," Acantha said, "but listen. the proprietor waited after the bombs last night and tried to get his goods secured and could not. He came back an stashed it all, I happened to be shopping for a new bag at the time ... he did not leave. He stayed all night then scarpered after the alert."
Acantha was almost bouncing with glee that eclipsed what had been left behind.
"He was a crook, Helok, that is why he waited ... but do you know what is here?"
He looked around aimlessly. "Jewellery?" He asked with a gawked face.
She chuckled, sniggered, then smirked, "The Assay Office itself. My friends got cold feet after last night - it will be six to twelve hours before it occurs to them that this is the perfect time to strike - we'll be gone by then ... if you're in, that is"
"If latinum is involved, I'm always in." He said, smiling. it was an awkward smile, but a smile nonetheless. "Tell me what to do and I'll do it
Acantha dug into her bag and pulled out a sheaf of papers, the old fashioned kind. She spread them out on the floor revealing the pencil drawn outline of a section of the station, "The blueprints of this quarter," she told him, "drawn with painstaking precision." She traced her finger along the page as she spoke, "We take this conduit through the levels and we hit this wall," her finger stabbed the page, "but over the last few months it has been eroded, never the same method used twice ... no more than a skin now separates the vault from this tube. All we have to do is get there."
"Alright. Let's get started." Came Helok's reply.
Resting her hands on her hips Acantha looked the saurian up and down, "Are you sure you can fit? Not a secret shapeshifter are you?"
Helok stood there and kept his blank face. His eyes not moving from hers.
"So bite me," Acantha said as she folded her arms and looked around ... where was it ... right ... around ... here! She approached a wall panel which came away with ease. "Let's go," she said turning back to pick up her bag before stooped to enter the crawlspace.
Helok soon followed, getting close to her heels. "How much of this cut is mine?" Helok questioned Acantha.
"In terms of gold pressed latinum eighty:twenty," she said as she crawled, building in some room for negotiation, "as for the rest, whatever takes your fancy is yours if you can carry it."
"Fifty:fifty. And I get to keep the rest." Helok said, crawling right behind her.
Pausing, Acantha glanced back, "Seventy:thirty," she said knowing that they'd settle on sixty:forty, she was the one who had screwed her friends over and needed the extra compensation to deal with that. As to the rest there was only one bauble in the Assay Office that she was interested in and she was working on commission to acquire it.
"Sixty fourty." Helok responded accordingly. "I get sixty. I also keep everything in that vault besides your cut. I know you Acantha, and your not fucking me over that easily."
"You're no fun anymore," Acantha said as she considered kicking sharply back and taking Helok out of consideration altogether. On balance she still needed assistance for now. It was time to climb, not too difficult with a convenient access ladder embedded in the wall to help out maintenance teams. Acantha climbed and off the ladder she starightened.
"You get forty," she told Helok as she stood above the ladder's top, "and whatever you can fit in your mouth."
"Agreed." Came Helok's reply. He blew off her latter comment and followed Acantha up the ladder.
The wall, when they reached it appeared to be intact, "Watch this," Acantha said knowing that it was an illusion generated in case a maintenance team passed by in the narrow passageway in which they stood, but also to fool the sensor equipment on the other side. She reached round the shadowed edge of a pillar reaching up as high as she could and the holographic generator clicked off.
Unmasked the metal had been painstakingly eroded and it was clear that between them and the goods there was only a skin; this operation had been meticulously planned and executed, only to be disrupted at the last minute. Acantha pulled a phaser and aimed it at the wall, knowing that for now at least sensors were down and if they were quick they could get in and out. She turned up the setting and fired.
Helok looked on at Acantha with his large, Saurian eyes and retained his blank face. "We only have an estimated time of five minutes, by my calculations. In. Now."
Acantha was not argueing. She stepped through the hole she had burned taking care to avoid the glowing curled edges of the metal. Her boots echoed in the interior as she took a few seconds to cast her gaze around the laden shelves and rows of strong boxes. As her former friends had expected the locks were basic - no-ne ever really expected anyone to be able to break in here. Everything really was for the taking, but Acantha was looking for one in particular.
Helok glared around at everything in the room. He could probably tear open each box with minimal effort. Fourty percent of all of this treasure was his. He was on the brink of salivating.
Extracting a trichorder Acantha dropped her bag open on the floor and began to scan the various boxes, "Five minutes, remember," she reminded her rapt companion as she moved down the row. She did not know what it was she was here to retrieve, merely that the data in her device would allow her to locate the object. She paused to jimmy open a few boxes, jewellery, latinum, trinkets and dump them in the bag pushing it along the floor as she progressed; Acantha did not want her 'friend' to get the impression that she was after any one thing in particular - then the tricorder flashed. There it was.
The locker contained a flat black box about six inches square, it did not look impressive from the outside and she was not being paid to see what was on the inside so she tossed it into the bag too and continued.
Helok didn't care for what was in which box. He merely teared off the locks, and if he didn't think the contents of the box would make any money, he'd throw it behind him. Already his bag was half full, and he had barely got across the room.
"Greedy sod," Acantha muttered beneath her breath as she took something else from her bag; with two mintues left she had just enough time to erase her own DNA signature, and that of Helok and to replace them with those of her former colleagues. "Time to go," she said moving back towards the hole, the enzyme would take about forty seconds to work. She waited until the Saurian had joined her before activating the spray.
Helok would be smiling, if he wasn't so blunt. He had just made off with the biggest pay of his life. He was thinking of what to spend it all on whilst crawling with Acantha. Food? No. Weapons? Possibly. A ship? Deffinitely. He though to himself as he scuttled on with his sack in tow.
OFF
Acantha Sul
Stealing Something in particular
Helok
Has latinum on the brain