Excelsior: Onward and Upward (Excelsior Arc Mega Thread)

[Kazkin]

This thread is a collection of the news stories and post directly tied to the hivemind arc. This post here is placed for the purpose of recaps and results at the end of the arc. Each week, it is highly suggested after events to check this thread for new recaps on either Sunday or Monday.

Later on this specific post will recap the code and development changes that happened as the end result of this arc.

[Kazkin]

Those god damn commies... (Event 1)
Once more, the colony has been presented with an attack by the communist cult known as the Excelsior. While not unusual, the scope and damage caused by this assault may yet herald a new chapter in the colonies on going conflict. It began with a strike team of excelsior agents and slaves landing on the colony LZ in a bottle shuttle. Having been detected on their approach, the colony had ample time to prepare before the ship touched down and the airlocks opened to a hail of gunfire. The initial contact ended in many casualties, with excelsior slave soldiers using their dug in position within their own shuttle to draw out the battle into pitched sniping competitions of traded bullets. Sadly, this proved highly effective, with would be snipers on the colony side taking multiple injuries as attempts to push in were met with an increasing storm of bullets.

Attrition, however, was on the colonies side as the excelsior soldiers began to succumb to building wounds up until a durand was deployed to storm the shuttle. With a mechanized combat suit, the colony successfully cleared the remaining agents before the shuttle was swept for anything of importance. Scott Williams, an enforcer of the Prospectors found a missive from a member of the excelsior inner party that the shuttle attack was a diversion and the true attack was taking place far underground where infiltrators were building a teleporter to funnel in troops. The missive also detailed that the shuttle was rigged to fly into space and detonate when the last excelsior soldier's life signs ceased. Sadly, this information was not shared by the prospector and the shuttle departed with two colonist still aboard. The mech pilot and fellow colonist were MIA for the remainder of the shift, though scouts from the void wolves later recovered the mech pilot and corpse, with the pilot living through the explosion thanks to the heavy layers of armor on their combat mech.

The conflict then moved to the old forgotten library in maintenance where the excelsior had already dug in with shield generators, turrets, and a fresh batch of slave soldiers. The conflict then became another dug in fight of pushing, retreating, flanking, grenade detonation, and pitched close quarters fights as the rebel faction attempted to hold there fortification so that their primary telepad could be brought online and the surface layer could be utterly overrun with communists. Seeing the dire nature of the situation, Jun Jiro of the colonies allied void wolves the Iron Lords sent his personal hell brute exosuit to aid in the defenses through a drop pod. However, as the suit was being readied, the combined forces of blackshield, marshals, prospectors, and the church had managed to push the last two agents to their energy shield wall. Supported by heavy turrets, the excelsior were maintaining their position until Raven Armstrong of the Artificer Guild managed to explode the brains of both enemy soldiers with a clean head shot, using a highly modified and heavily kitted Reductor rail gun of his own design.

With the last two primary agents dead, it being revealed later that these two were acting agents of the outer party, the hell brute mech was able to roll in and destroy the remaining mechanized defense turrets before the base was quickly destroyed through a combination of quick engineering and explosives. With the attack finally dealt with, the colony turned towards investigating the matter and concluded... very little, unfortunately.

What can be surmised or at least guessed is that this event is the herald to a far larger attempt by the excelsior to make a bid to take control of Nadezhda. With many of the original hostile threats such as the Hivemind, Greysons, and even the Forgotten destroyed or rendered a much smaller threat, higher ups in both the Blackshield and Marshals feel that the communist cult will make a more defined bid for control. Missives and reports are already being released urging both factions and the colony as a whole to be ever more vigilant in the following weeks. The excelsior are above all subversive first and violent second, whatever tricks they may try to gain an edge over us must be thwarted at all costs.

Ayanda, leader of the Blackshield, will be preparing a colony wide missive revealing the information that Blackshield agents have collected about the excelsior, this information offered to the colony at large so they may better be prepared for whats likely to come. This information shall reveal the general structure and capabilities of the Excelsior, though it is hardly considered complete, the Brigadier is urging all members of the colony to read through this directive, when it is released this following week.

[Kazkin]

Pyrrhic Victory (Event 2)

After Action Report #48391
Report Name: Mechanized Rampage
Attack Type: Excelsior
Excelsior Agents: Jeanne Petite, Saengdao Zhimi-Whangmo, Luka
Result: Colony Pyrrhic Victory

Report Summary
Unbeknownst to the upper colony several members of the on duty colonist were secretly and privately subverted by the excelsior (see report header) while in the lower colony before being sent up to the surface to accomplish a then unknown set of objectives. These objectives were later discovered to be an attempt to subvert telecommunications for what the Soteria guesses would have given future excelsior agents access to colony radio systems. Thankfully for Nadezhda, the agents were caught attempting to slice through the protective walls surrounding the telecomms station. A swift deployment of blackshield and marshal forces apprehended subverted agent Saengdao in the maintenance tunnels near the bridge before agent Luka, who was recovering a supply cache of weapons, was gunned down in a short fire fight with marshal officers.

With their primary objective failed, the excelsior took the nuclear option with Jeanne Petite, who had secretly been building a store of explosives and a durand combat mech after murdering xenoflorist Risikio Iscariot to avoid detection. These explosives were then planted around various areas of the colony before being detonated within seconds of each other, causing the marshals, blackshield, and soteria medical to be destroyed in the ensuing plasma blasts. As people began to recover, Jeanne's durand opened fire on the remaining survivors in medical, swiftly killing the remaining colonist before defensive responders could get to the location.

Unfortunately for the colony, a large portion of surface team members died in the ensuing fight, including the destruction of Old Stomper. This bloody fight lead to nearly three forth of the surface team members perishing under the durand's auto cannon. So many died, in fact, that the only reason the mech was successfully destroyed and Jeanne Petite captured was because the mech units ammo reserves ran dry. Report analysis discovered that this was an effective and suicidally idiotic tactic employed by the mob of colonist unwilling to work as a team, instead running at the mech one by one or two at a time only to be riddled with bullets until the auto cannons weapon tanks ran dry. Eye witness reports also mention that Old Stomper was given to an inexperienced pilot, its resulting destruction caused by lack of engineering support (determined to have never been requested in the first place) and the pilot refusing to use Old Stomper as little more than a bullet sponge, the onboard weapons were nearly entirely ignored or used incorrectly. Thankfully, once it was realized the durand was out of ammo, it was swiftly destroyed and Jeanne Petite captured alive but badly injured.

Analysis
This resulting lack of team work and complete disregard for combat engagements involving mechs have now given rise to concerns over what the Excelsior could accomplish with one or two combat mechs. Furthermore, the actions of several colonists proved so suicidal that potential requests for psych evaluations are being considered, given that it is not sane behavior for anyone to charge a combat mech in open ground, in particular when its displayed the very obvious fact it has an auto cannon. It was only that the sheer amount of bodies thrown into the literal meat grinder that the colony managed to prevail, at great cost in both supplies and manpower.

However, the surveillance, investigation, and readiness of the colony both within the blackshield and marshals and beyond those given the duty of protection proved exceptional. The excelsior failed in their objective to silently and deceptively subvert our telecommunications consoles, allowing for what is now considered a pyrrhic victory. While the excelsior failed in their true objective and the colony has now carefully fortified telecomms against future attacks, it came at a severe cost.

Result
-Telecomms has now been given a new additional encryption layer. The excelsior will not be able to attempt subversion of comms units for several months, perhaps years.
-Due to the damage caused by a subverted head of staff, all heads of staff until further notice will now be given full surgical checks and body scans to identify potential subversion both before shift and after shift. This requires exploratory surgery to every part of the body, every day. While a highly inconvenient and unpopular decision, this edict will remain until the excelsior attacks are dealt with and colony safety can be assured.
-The damage caused by the durand mech attack is severe enough to drain additional resources from the colony, future attacks will not be able to get additional support as a result.