The Gala pt2 - Security Breach

Posted on Monday January 20th, 2020 @ 14:38 hours by Mayterial Droz & Alexandria Farron & Clinton Westbrooke Jr & Mercy

Mission: Hot Couture
Location: Rangalor V
Timeline: MD05 - 21:30 hours
2202 words - 4.4 OF Standard Post Measure

[ON]

The regular hustle and bustle of a large group of gathered people slowly picks up in volume, it becomes clear that several of the attending parties have lost personal affects over the course of the last hour. There's shouting, accusing and security starting to run about. The security escort that was assigned to Alexandria and Clint suddenly seemed very distracted by chatter going on in his ear. He started to lag behind and look back in the direction of the large entrance hall where the gala was being held.

Clint stopped and looked back at the man, huffing, "Are you really going to delay our inspection like this, sir?" He asked, sounding weary.

Alexandria continued to provide commentary for their supposed 'inspection footage' as they proceeded farther into the museum. It was all part of the disguise, of course, but she still felt like a crazy person nonetheless. At least it might help Mercy stay awake. Staying awake in a pilot's seat with little to do was hard. She knew all about that. Captain May probably did too, considering she'd never been called out for playing mahjong on her computer tablet on the bridge.

"..for the record we are now five and a half minutes behind schedule. But we are almost to the new wing, which has not seen a proper inspection since its construction. I wonder, are we to be told that this is mere coincidence? The saga continues..." Alexandria continued, not stopping or even slowing down. Her shoes were starting to hurt a little, but were certainly not more than she could handle. After having had many, if not most of the internal organs in her body removed and replaced, she was not one to complain about sore feet.

"Yes, yes, of course." The security guy tried to catch up but looked back again, "I'm sorry. I'm sure you can finish the inspection on your own." The back and forth over the comms was starting to intensify and it was clear that they needed all the people they could spare in the main lobby as things were starting to get out of control.

"I'm sure we can," Clint replied, sarcastically, as the guard quickly departed. Once he was gone, Clint turned back to Alex, "Show time," He whispered, grinning at her, "Lead the way, Inspector. I believe we wanted to investigate the adjoining wall to the new wing of the museum as there was some concern about the structural integrity after the new construction?" He offered, motioning for them to head that way.

Alexandria stood there for a moment as Clint grinned at her. She tried to hide her disbelief. How had that worked? Whatever Captain May and the rest of the crew were up to, it had to be causing quite a scene for security to just leave them unattended. It was good that Clint had stayed in character though... mostly. Even though they appeared to be alone, that didn't mean that no one was keeping tabs on them.

"Yes, lets, before we are forced to endure yet another delay." Alexandria said, moving on in the direction Clint had indicated. She tried to continue at an even brisker pace, as if to make up for their claimed lost time, but her heeled shoes made that difficult. She didn't think about taking them off though, as they were better off maintaining their disguises for as long as possible. And while they had to move fast, they also couldn't risk rushing things to the point of carelessness.

"One can only wonder what sort of disturbance has transpired..." Alexandria continued with her commentary, as absurd as it sounded with the two of them alone "...that would require every available member of security. Some drunken fool perhaps, wandering the corridors in search of a restroom, leaving a trail of tripped silent alarms in his or her wake. One can only hope they aren't coming our way." In there was a veiled warning to Clint, to be on guard for silent alarms. She adjusted her eyepiece and subtly activated one of its built in sensors, which would hopefully pick up any invisible security measures, such as force fields or laser beams. It was a crude sensor though, and used up so much power it would drain the device in only a few minutes.

Clint looked back and gave her a wink and a nod, he caught her warning and had already been looking for the small sensor work you'd expect to see on the walls, floor, or ceiling for that type of setup. With any luck, they'd be disabled for their inspection, but too careful was never a thing, "Crazy drunks," He replied, waving off the whole imagined ordeal.

All the people were in place, the pieces were moving, the board was set and more various spy movie bits of jargon. Mercy couldn't help but be amused, thinking of the whole situation like that. She'd seen enough holovids old and new to know the basic tropes and living them in the moment tickled her sensibilities. Time to test the equipment. "Bitch dog to Eyes," meaning Alexandria, so callsigned because she was providing the vision. Never a bad time to doublecheck equipment functionality. "Equipment check. Glance left if you can hear me." Beat. "Glance right if you can't."

Alexandria quietly sighed, and almost turned her head right. What did it matter? If she couldn't hear, she'd continue to look forward... or wherever she happened to be looking. But she did look left to appease the engineer. Mercy had yet to do or say anything that was threatening, but she had teeth like pocketknives and a full meter over her in height. Words and actions didn't quite compare to that sort of latent threat. Plus it was never wise to piss of the getaway driver, or pilot... whatever. The view to to the left was a series of ancient paintings, likely depicting even more ancient events, drawn by people who probably weren't even around... or alive to witness the thing they had painted.

The navigator didn't recognize any of the pieces of art on display. History had never been her strong subject, and few would call her cultured. She could remember numbers and facts better than many, if not most other humans, but she preferred to devote her talents to learning skills that were more in demand. Every ship had a pilot. but who really cared about history? Half of the people currently in the museum probably didn't. A lot of people just liked to surround themselves with rare and old things so they could call themselves cultured.

"Ah, moving on to a less... family friendly exhibit, I see." Alexandria said, as the paintings of battles and coronations and myriad other landmark events transitioned into portraits and sculptures of people in varying states of undress. "For the record, I'm also seeing a distinct lack of clearly marked exit signs." That may have actually been a code violation. Alexandria had done some research into the role, if only to sound moderately capable at the job.

The public announcement system switched on, "it seems that some of our guests' personal effects have gone missing. We will be locking down the exits until such time that these personal belongings can be located and the culprit apprehended." There were sounds around them of doors closing and locking down. "Please be aware that if you're found outside of the designated area of the gathering that you will be held and turned over to the police for further questioning."

Alexandria very nearly missed a step, and by the way her gaze started to subtly dart around it wouldn't have been a stretch for anyone spectating via her eyepiece to question her composure. The announcement was ominous, enough so for her to start to feel the trap being sprung around them. Yes, she'd taken the heist seriously before, but now there was no question that she was committed and that it was for real. She picked up the pace, as there was now no reason not to, and soon enough they reached the point of no return.

"Amatuers..." Alexandria said with a shake of her head. It was tough to tell if she was still in-character or not. "They've added all this extra security, but they're too cheap to re-space their light fixtures." Force-fields would have been the better option, but laser detection grids used much less power. The grid in front of them was so tight not even a child could've slipped through it. And it was almost a meter deep. But there was a break, about four.. almost five meters up, where the lighting hung down from the ceiling like beams. They were spaced close enough together that the gaps between them were too narrow to accommodate the laser detection grid. That wouldn't have been a problem if the lighting didn't move, but the one overlapping the grid appeared to have a climate control unit just overhead that probably made it sway ever-so-slightly, just enough to trip the grid alarm.

That was their way in. If Alexandria could get up to that light fixture, she might be able to shimmy along it, through the gap in the detection grid.

First thing first, she started to ditch her costume. She stepped out of her heels, took off her jacket, and unzipped her skirt. For a moment she probably had Clint wondering if she'd lost her mind, but underneath the clothes she had on the thin, black onesie she sometimes wore under her clothes, or as pajamas. Normally it was too thin for modesty, but for this purpose it would serve as the perfect cat-burglar suit.

"Can you give me a boost up there?" Alexandria asked as she pulled down her onesie's legs, which had been folded up to show the pantyhose she wore for her disguise. "There's a control panel on the other side. We'll alert security for sure if we shut down the grid for more than a few seconds, but this power cell here should have enough energy to trick the grid's power sensor into thinking its working long enough for you to run by it.

As she waited for a reply, Alexandria couldn't help but worry about what they would do if there were security guards personally standing guard ahead. None of their gadgets would fool them, and with the lockdown in effect there was no longer any reason for them to be there. Maybe she should have packed a weapon... something with stun.

"Yup," Clint replied, clasping his hands low in front of him, "Step up," He said, giving the woman a nod.

Alexandria managed to get a firm grip on the light fixture as she was boosted up. She fought the urge to try and swing to gain momentum to reach for a better position, as that could trigger the sensor grid. Gripping the long, beam-shaped light fixture on each long side, she pulled herself up and flexed her torso up to get her legs up as well. Her vision flashed with spots and stars as her photosensitive eyes were only mere centimetres from the lights as she hung from fixture like a sloth. She was forced to close her eyes, otherwise she might get disoriented and fall. She felt parts of her bodysuit catch on the metal fixture as she flexed the muscles on her right side to pull herself on top of the fixture. It felt like it took forever, and her muscles were quick to remind her that she needed to start working out more if she wanted to do more things like this.

On top of the light, Alexandria opened her eyes and adjusted her eyepiece, which had almost come loose. The grid was right in front of her, with only a very narrow gap above the lighting. She had to slither through like a snake, which took even more precious time. But she got through. Everything went well, except for the landing. One of her feet slipped upon landing... stupid pantyhose and poor traction. Her knee banged into the tile hard. With much grumbling and a few moments of limping she made her way to the control panel and lowered the sensor grid just long enough for Clint to get through. Hopefully they wouldn't have to to that again.

The two made their way through the secured wing of the museum and got to the prize, the dress itself was very poorly protected. They must've figured it was safe with all the security staff and laser grids and pressure plates. The dress was easily lifted out of its protective case and as they stood in the middle of the hall there was a moment of silence before the alarm started to blare. That was the cue to drop the teleporter pattern scrubber. With that in place there was no way the authorities would be able to trace it back to them. That's when the blue light lit up the room and the two 'inspectors' disappeared without a trace, and with them, a priceless artefact from Earth's history changed owners.

[OFF]

Alexandria Farron
Navigator

Clint Westbrooke
Quartermaster

&

Mercy
Engineer

S.S. Fawkes