The Den Games Network Forum RPG
Page 19
Game Masters:
virtualoctopus, CKW, Wesforce, Nyerguds
(CKW)
"Frag... Neurostun".
Alex whispered, before searching anxiously for a mask in his gear. He found it, and putted it quickly. But... Rei had no mask.
There was only a solution. He dragged the unconscious marine and snatched his mask.
"For me...?"
The girl asked. Alex nodded. Rei felt funny with such a plastic piece on her mouth, but if what Alex said was true, he would need it.
As the linesight stretched into a line, with everything blurry, Iceman had found something. A gas mask. But he was under the effects of the gas...
"Must... must... awake..."
He had heard many times of how to stay awake in these situations.
An extreme pain could serve as stim, producing adrenalin to neutralize the stunning state. He sighed, with the mask on.
This is gonna hurt
He said to himself, while he grabbed his finger...
and dislocated it.
"YEEARGHH!!! WOOOAHHH! I AM AWAKE!!!"
It had worked.
But he had noticed something else. Company. The door had just opened.
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(LeFire)
"We're in business!"
Chance called as the doors began to slide open, a long chain of corridors revealed all the way to the control room doors. The soldier trotted ahead, pausing to salvage gas masks from each unconscious Marine that sprawled in the corridor. A hearty kick to every head with a combat boot also lengthened each (meta)human's stay in Dreamland.
Crystal slinked off shortly afterwards, signalling to the others with a wave of a detonator... sooner or later, something was going to go bang. Chance planned to be on the way out of the building by the time that happened. The rest of runners jogged rapidly to the Control Room, hoping that the control of the UCAS building would last long enough for them to accomplish their mission.
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(Wesforce)
Crystal rushed - She could hear people bagning and shouting on the tough section shutters as she ran headlong down the corridors towards her goal. She wouldn't have done something as foolish as separate herself from the others unless she had good reason - And she had every reason to believe time was of the essence here: There was no telling how long it could be before UCAS special forces decided they wanted back in, or before the Rigger regained control of the building.
She Took the elevator down to the power room, breath coming in ragged gasps,submachinegun pointing into the darkened corners, jumping at shadows.
Come on now... Hold it together. We're almost done here... Just need to prepare a little going away present.
The doors whooshed open: Immediately a tinny rattle of gunfore came sailing on the air intoher elevator - She dropped to the floor before realising that the sound was a distance away.
Time... Time... She reminded herself, goading herself into action.
It was dark down here. The air became thick with an almost tangible tension. And it was fragging hot. Hair became damp and clung to the sides of her pale, perspiring face. Still she crept forward. A buzzing, humming sound became louder, and she headed for it.
She slung her SMG, not trusting herself with that weapon, and instead grabbed a flash grenade and pulled down her therm-goggles.
She found the power-plant in no time: She couldn't miss it. She flicked her goggles up to examine the Buclear warning signplates.
No worries, I'm not going to set off a buke, just take out the power couplings.
And then: Broad swathes of warm liquid splattered liberally across walls, floor and ceiling. And then colling orange blolbs that just had to be the right size and shape for bodies,
She flipped up the goggles gain.
UCAS Marine guards, obviously posted here just in case someone gained access to the generator. They wopuld have killed her outright, had she come across them groping in the dark. Now they were dead, messily: Intestines and entrails lay all over the place, on a handrailing, hanging from a burnt-out light-fitting... Everywhere but in the bodies they'd once belonged to: Sliced wide open by some large-bladed edged weapon.
A rifle lay, warm from firing. No sign of what it had been fired at, though.
Suddenly Crystal bolted upright.
Something ruffled her hair, like a breeze - A breeze in an unnaturally hot, still room.
She backed herself into a corner...
***
AlL DoNw herr... ComiN bCk up N0W - Crys
"Odd, her typing's even worse than normal." Ash noted, upon receiving Crystal's ePad message.
"She's spooked by something..." Chance said. Something fell from his combat jacket as he ran, clatteri ng to the floor.
"Will ye watch where ye're droppin' me ye we fecker!"
It took Chance a moment to realise he'd dropped the gun he'd taken from the room they;d found Werrick in. The fall must have switched it on!
"Uh-oh..." Werrick muttered.
"Feck!" Said the artificially-intelligent gun, recognising it's one-time business partner. It's powers of movement were almost non-existent. It's targeting chips, however, and semi-smart GM Ammunition, were worth more than their weight in gold. It fired once, a richochet that drilled neatly into the top of Werrick's head.
He dropped like a ton of bricks.
"Sell me out, ye fecker? We had a deal!" Said the gun.
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(LeFire)
"Shit shit shit shit!!!" Chance cursed as he virtually leaped over to stamp on the gun. He had violated two rules of weapon use... Not properly securing a gun while running, and while he had ejected the pistol's magazine, he had clean forgotten about the round left in the chamber. And now Werrick was dead.
Not that he cared too much about the spy anyway... But the breach in his own professionalism pissed him off no end.
The gun couldn't fire anymore... not without ammunition anyway. Chance couldn't see how he could strip the slide from the pistol, but he did the next best thing by shoving a bunch of cigarettes from a nearby unconscious Marine down its muzzle.
"Oi! You Fecking... Mmmphhh!!!"
"Stow it." Chance told the weapon as he shoved it back into his combat jacket. Striding over to Werrick's corpse, he grabbed the papers that the spy had gotten from the office... While useless to the dead, the runners might be able to cut a future deal with the late spy's employers.
"Comon, let's go to the control room, get the others out of there, find the thrice-accursed contact, collect Crystal, and get the heck outta here!"
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(Nyerguds)
"Ah'll take dot." Alanya smiled at Chance and grabbed the gun. "Owner's dead... mah toy now." she grinned.
"Mrgh! Pmt mm dmwn ym fat broad!" the gun protested.
"Oh, don't worry... ah got a li'l surprise for yoo..."
She grabbed a smartlink cable, plugged one side in her 'deck and the other one into the gun.
"What are you doing?" Chance frowned, glancing at the dead body on the ground.
"Gettin' a new friend." Alanya smiled, and plugged an empty data card into the 'deck.
"Hmh! Ym cn't cmpy mm!" the gun said.
"Hehe." Alanya said, pulling some customized connectors out of her backpack."We'll see 'bout dot. 'Sides, who said anything 'bout copyin'? Yu'r far too dangerous in dot gun."
***
Silvia opened her eyes, and looked around. The first thing she heard was a single gunshot echoing through the corridors.
She got up, grabbed her sword and ran towards the origin of the sound. It didn't take her long to catch up with the 'runners.
"What happened?"
"Werrick shot 'imself again." Alanya grinned. Silvia looked a bit pale when seeing the man's body... it was pretty obvious he didn't just 'shoot himself' in the top of the head.
"That sleggin' gun again?"
"I love this thing!" Alanya grinned, while trying out some of her cables to plug into a second data port she found. The smartlink port turned out to be useless for real data transfer. She hoped one would work better... she didn't have the material to break open the gun to get straight tot he electronics.
"Fmck mff!" the gun replied.
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(Wesforce)
The gun managed to dislodge some of the crap obstructing it's speech receptors, just enough to make itself heard.
"Don't ye be doin' that lass. I'm hardwired onto this baby: You can't get me outta here. And don't ye be pryin' neither. Ye don't me to detonate me c-12 charge now do ye, eh? It'll give ye more than a bloody fecking nose and no mistake!"
The red LEDs along the gun's handle started to blink on and off in sequence... Faster... Faster
"Hunh" Grunted Alanya "Yer'll be destroyin' yaself.
"Maybe so pet, maybe so" The gun drawled in its digital brogue "But I'll be takin' you and all yeh bleedin' mates with me!"
The gun continued, now it had stopped Alanya prying... For now.
"Look, can we stop fecking around I've been here long enough to knoo there's nee time te waste. Trust me, that pointy-ear fragger is better off dead. Now I presume ye're going to teh control room?"
The 'runners decided that would be for the best.
When they got there, they heard furious shouting from inside the room, then a burst of heavy automatic gunfore, suspiciously like a Russian with a light machinegun...
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(Wesforce)
"YOU!" Alex yelled. Groggy Iceman tried to raise the machinegun to fire again, but Alex rifle-butted it out of his hands, then leapt back and trained the rifle on the Giant.
Rage boiled up in him. Part of him said 'pull the trigger', right now. His training told him never to leave a dangerous enemy like this as a threat.
But he couldn't kill him. Not like this.
"Get the gun, Rei." He said, not taking an eye off the swaying Iceman. The former soldier looked ready to fall - And woe betide anyone he landed on top of. He must have gotten a breath of the gas. Even small doses would put an average-sized man out of action for hours - He looked at Plugin in the corner, dozing next to an obese rigger. He saw a female Navy Officer - She looked alive. There were dozens of corpses all over the place - Console operators, technicians, Sailors, all messily dead. Iceman's work.
Rei leant to get the gun. Alex wiped the sweat from his brow. It was getting unbearably hot in here. His hand came away-
Damn.
Iceman had a Knife to Rei's throat, and had her in a pretty secure grip. He certainly didn't look as woozy as he had a moment ago.
"He was so fast..." Rei wailed.
"Shut it, stupid bitch! I'll cut you ear to ear!"
"Let her go." Alex murmured, not being able to think of anything less trite in such a desperate circumstance.
"I give the orders here, 'Colonel'" Iceman spat. "Drop the rifle. Kick it over here."
"Alex did so. Iceman snatched up the colt in one hand commendably swiftly.
"Superb, Comrade!" Iceman yelled, throwing Rei forward. She stumbled and he gave a hefty kick to her backside, sending the poor girl flying, sprawling onto the floor. He fired a full-auto burst at her, one-handed. Recoil and his mental state threw his aim off - bullet-hits impacted all around her, blowing holes in the floor, consoles, bodies...
"NOOOOOOO!" Screamed Alex, causing Iceman to turn the gunfire on him instead. The Unarmed soldier charged the other - Alex just inside Iceman's arc of fire.
"DIIIIEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!! FRAGGER!" Alex screamed, a blood-curdling scream that made Rusty, Chance, Ash and Alanya (who had just arrived) dive for cover.
Iceman saw waht was coming. He droppe the gun, awe struck. He started murmuring, begging tobe killed - A real soldier's death. Yes, he deserved this. He knew it.
There was a blinding flash. Everyone shut their eyes.
When they opened them, Iceman was gone.
"Holy frag..." Panted Alex, sagging, exhausted from the involuntary spell he didn't even know he was able to do. (Some power of the sword, perhaps?).
"I didn;t mean to... Mean to..."
He sunk to his knees, next to Rei.
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(Nyerguds)
Silvia ran towards Alex and pulled him back. "Oh my Goddess... what the sleg did you do?!?! You vapourized him!"
"I... didn't mean..." Alex replied, shocked.
"You need to control your slegging power!" Silvia yelled at him. "You could've killed us all with that!"
She looked at Alex' pale face.
Good... that'll do the trick. she grinned inside her mind.
It had cost her some trouble to get it all right... but Iceman was saved, and their vendetta wouldn't compromise the mission any further.
Silvia was lucky Alex was about as magically capable as VOES without the guidance of his mother's spirit. The spell he had focussed with his anger might have been deadly, but it was easy enough to stop.
After that, it had been a matter of timing... the deliberately messy shield she cast to protect Iceman went with a big flash, confusing Alex and the others, and giving Silvia time to cast an invisibility spell on Iceman.
She just hoped the remains of the blast had been enough to knock him out... if Iceman would start talking now the whole scheme would have been for nothing.
She quickly checked his astral form. Yep, he was out cold.
She walked forward, kicking the invisible Iceman out of the way without the others noticing, and then cast a Sleep spell on him to make sure he'd stay out.
"Nothing." she said, as if explaining what she was doing. "Nothing left. Can't sense a single thing. You even robbed him of his afterlife."
She saw Chance frown and look in the direction of Iceman's invisible form.
Sleg. He can sense him.
She knew how Chance felt about Iceman, and shot him a cold look as a warning not to do anything.
It's under control. she mouthed to him.
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(Master Chris)
Rusty spat on the ground and snarled;
"All for the best, it was him of us, nice work Alex."
The silence that followed his cruel words shocked Rusty. Didn't the others recognise that the best possible outcome for the group had eventuated? Rusty reflected upon that thought, sometimes the best outcome was still pretty awful. A lesson every soldier learns at some point. Suddenly ashamed of himself, Rusty took a spontaneous interest in his feet and began to stare at them, waiting for someone else to speak and draw attention away from Rusty...
***
Another UCV (Urban Combat Vehicle) rolled by silently. It was a low slung, heavily armoured behemoth, painted in jagged black and white stripes, very zebra-esque. What made it terrifying was how Jessica never knew it was there until it right next to her. Jessica Hayes had watched an awe inspiring number of men, mages, and machines encircle the complex. Something was up. Jessica gave the situation thought. IF the runners had made their way in and collected the spy then they needed an exit plan, and Jessica suspected that they weren't aware of what awaited them outside.
Hayes was faced with a dilemma. She could stay relatively safe where she was in her garbage fort or risk her neck in order to help evacuate her fellow runners, who may or may not already be dead and thus needlessly sacrifice her own life.
Although, she had witnessed their superb survival skills during the Transys accident and it was possibly they had defied the odds again.
Then again, maybe they had finally run out of luck and Jessica was the only one left. Jessica knew that Alexiev and Rei were dead, they had been body-bagged sometime ago.
Jessica felt horrible, there was so much she had wanted to tell Alexiev. How his bravery had inspired her to join the armed services. How she had dreamed about his masked visage complete with scar almost every night of her life. How he was the only reason Jessica was alive today. He had risked his own life to save hers.
Then Jessica knew what she had to do, whether or not anyone else was alive, she had to go in and get them out. Alex would have done it, it was her way of honouring his memory. Hayes started seriously examining her surroundings, looking for a way to get her fellow runners out. Her gaze rested upon one of the black and white UCVs that was parked nearby, all of it's armaments directed towards the complex, and thus away from Jessica. Her delicate fingers wandered up to the base of her neck, to the datajack that had been implanted there. The Red Dawn was a special craft, with an interface that was a composite of both a MATRIX-net and a Rigger-system. Would Jessica be able to jack into the UCV? If she couldn't, she was deadmeat. First thing's first, getting into the Urban Combat Vehicle in the first place...
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(Wesforce)
Alanya looked down at Plugin, sprawled next to the Rigger. First she jerked the rigger out of his seat, pulling the plugs from his neck.
Can' risk the fragger waking up and turning all hell loose on us again... Pity Plugin got KOed... he could have Decked in with me. What's he doin' here anyway?
She booted up her deck, clicked the plug into her datajack and another into an important-looking console's port.
Fade to black...
DINA5's digtal eyes opened, she stood there, a piece of paper, fluttering in a non-existent breeze.
A granite faced Stickman in UCAS Navy uniform Sailor suit stood in front of her, in front of a heavy metal vault door with spoked metal wheel.
The guy was stone-effect all-over - Obviously a program and not a Decker. Hopefully.
"Welcome unauthorised user. As there is a security alert in progress, please exit the system immediatey, or I will be forced to set black Ice on you."
Behind him a porthole in the dull metal wall opened, immediatelt swelling to incredible size - Over twice the size of theroom, in fact.
Behind it swelled a perfect digital replica of the USS Arizona, bobbing on a silver ocean - It swung it's multiple 12-inch guns and banks of 5-inch secondaries to bear on her.
THAT's an Ice? Uh-oh...
***
Crystal rushed into the Control Room on Chance's guidance, looking more pale and drawn then ever. She was out of breath and sticky with blood.
Not mine she mouthed, waving to show she was okay.
Rusty stooped looking at his feet.
Crystal pointed at him and then at the unconsious rigger - She didn;t know if Rusty had any experience rigging a building. Maybe he could see through the external cameras and get some idea of what was happening out there, or maybe control a few of the drones.
Crystal was going to go over to Alex, who was sobbing over Rei - And almost tripped over the machinegun discarded by Iceman. She eaxmined the large, smoking weapon, cradling the bulky hopper-fed weapon in both arms - It was all she could do just to life the thing.
Where is Iceman, anyway? She thought at Silvia.
***
"Hands where I can see them! NOW!" Boomed a voice from the UCV.
They'd seen her. Jessica realised they must have Infra Red gear to see in this darkness. The Gun turrets started turning, and she froze still.
But they were turning away from her, at something - someone - unseen.
"I said still! Frag it, FIRE!"
Miniguns opened up, ultra high-velocity fire split the air, and the tracer rounds made the stream of fire into a veritable death-ray.
A UCAS marine stood up in the cupola to pump grenades out from his automatic grenade launcher.
Now was Jessica's chance...
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(Desolator12)
*After a while, the Neuro-stun started to dissipate in his system, and his mind re-activated... and Plugin started to dream while his brain ran a self-diagnostics of sorts...
He dreampt that one of his friends had attacked Iceman and, apparently, vaporized him... then he saw jessica, standing almost completely still while the UCAS fired at another being... invisible apparently.... then he saw somebody... someone with a gun in his hands, wait.. there were a few more people... each of them chanting something that looked like "do it... do it...." (if my info is out of date, tell me... this has to do with Raven)... just as the person leveled the gun to his head, his brain finished the self-diagonstic and turned on the rest of his body functions, awaking him with a jar and a headache*
"uhh.... i has the strangest dream....frag my head hurts...."
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(Nyerguds)
"Execute Scan program."
A set of sunglasses appeared on the piece of paper.
Hm... that's not too bad. Only level 1 ICE. But I don't want to start this decking with fighting an ICE... I'll need a disguise to get past it.
Alanya exited the system, and looked around. She saw Plugin was awake, but he looked far too dazed to go decking right away.
She walked towards one of the corpses in the room, checking for a datajack. But the guy's head was one bloody pulp. Alanya sighed, and walked towards another one. The young woman had a datajack. Alanya quickly checked her pockets, and found a key.
Ash walked over to the main computer and plugged the key into a special slot. On the screen, the dead decker's name appeared.
Alanya smiled, and plugged her 'deck into the computer. With the ID key she could access the dead woman's decker interface... and that included her persona.
She plugged the dataplug in behind her ear.
***
Silvia walked over to Crystal. "Come outside." she whispered in her ear.
Crystal frowned. "What's going on?"
Silvia walked through the corridors, Crystal following her. "Where are you going?"
"I'm going to retrieve Alex' sword."
She looked at Crystal. "Alex attacked Iceman... with magic. He's got a fragload to learn about magic though, so it was easy to block the spell. But the whole sleg was getting on my nerves, so I made Iceman invisible."
She grinned. "But Alex is convinced he vapourized him."
"Invisible? Isn't it enough to just have the madman walking around anyway?"
"Don't worry. He's knocked out. And I made sure he will stay out for at least half an hour, or until I wake him up."
"No, seriously... why the frag did you stop Alex?"
Silvia looked at Crystal, and sighed. "I- I didn't want..."
She brusquely turned away. "Ah, sleg. I don't enjoy killing, or seeing people being killed."
Then, she was reminded of what she saw in Iceman's mind. "I know... Seems to be a stupid contradiction when talking about Iceman... but I just don't want him dead."
She stopped walking, and looked at a door in the corridor. "Ah. Here it is."
She grabbed her sword, cut the door open and walked inside.
"Ooh, you're gonna like this, Crys." she said to Crystal, who was still standing in the corridor. "It's a weapons storage room."
She found the sword right away; now that she knew Jade's spirit was in it it was easy to trace.
"Hello, Jade!" she smiled as she grabbed the sword.
"I never told you my name..." the spirit replied.
"Really? Odd. I... I just knew." Silvia frowned. "Maybe I can read minds of spirits too. Or maybe Alex thought it a bit too loud, I dunno."
"Silvia?" Crystal asked mentally. "Who are you talking to?"
"Just Alex' sword." Silvia smiled, and walked back to the door. "You coming?"
"Eh... Just a minute." Crystal replied; she had found the explosives section.
Silvia grinned. "OK, I'll wait."
***
Alanya was facing the battleship again.
"Welcome back, unauthorised user." the guard program greeted her again. "As there is a security alert in progress, please exit the system immediatey, or I will be forced to set black Ice on you."
Ah, shaddup stupid thing. Alanya thought, while sorting out the dead decker's data.
ID: Ruth Arani
Clearance: Level 4/5
Persona: Cyclonias
"Right. Now... Execute Disguise program."
The piece of paper folded open, doubling its size. Then, it folded again, and again, until it was roughly the size of a door.
A metallic blue, female looking robot walked out of the paper, that immediately disappeared behind the new persona.
"Welcome, Cyclonias. There is a security alert in progress, so all normal access will be restricted to level 3. For higher levels, additional administrator passwords are required."
"Specify access restrictions, please." Alanya replied. "Print out all clearance level information."
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(LeFire)
Chance didn't know why Silvia wanted Iceman alive... and he didn't like that as well. No one else noticed his uneasiness, except of course, Ash.
He told her about Iceman. She didn't say whether she approved of Silvia's restraint or not, but kept her cool all the same, her thermo-rifle's barrel now pointed in the correct direction.
Leaving Ash for the moment together with the others in the control room, Chance headed for the ammo store in search for Silvia or Crystal. He had a lot of questions... Like what the heck did Crystal see downstairs that spooked her out so badly? And just what was Silvia's reason for sparing Iceman? And where the heck was the contact they were supposed to meet?
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(Wesforce)
**News Just in** Alert All Personnel**
"Hmm?" The Cyclonias persona looked up at the big words writing themselves across the sky: The 'roof' of the construct she was in had suddenly vanished. Obviously this was a priority message, and it didn't matter who read it.
With a rapid series of morse code bleeps, the words continued appearing:
**REBEL CANADIAN COUNTERPUSH STOP US/COL FORCES HARD PRESSED IN MAINE AREA STOP NAVAL FORCES REQUESTING INTEL STOP PRESIDENT UNREACHABLE STOP**
Meanwhile, archived information spewed from an antique tele-typewriter that had appeared in front of her, on an oak table that had risen from the virtual floor (or 'Deck', she reminded herself, using naval terms).
She scanned through it quickly - Various useless tidbits of information about the war situation, reams of verified and unverified statistics on everything from Rations consumed by US/COL Naval personnel last month down to the cost of repainting USS Wolverine in Lake Michigan.
There seemed to be, disappointingly, no information on anything to do with the Terganon incident. Sure, she hadn't expected this tobe easy but... She felt crushed. To have come all this way, to have gone through hell getting in here, the bloodbath this operation had begun... And now this?
Something clinked against her leg. She looekd down.
A glass bottle, bobbing up and down in the deck as though it was made of water.
Some kind of localised memo program... She quicky realised, opening the bottle and tipping out a scrap of paper. The paper immediately unfolded to form a 3D character: Another unremarkable US-Uniformed sailor, like the entrance program.
This was a different beast, as she quickly realised. A decker using a standard, unmodified Persona for the sake of anonymity while projecting himself as a 'memo'.
"You! You're one of them, right?" It said, anger somehow coming out in the words, not the monotone of the program's speech.
"What?"
"Where's the fragging Russian guy! He told me to meet him in here! Where the frag are you all? AND WHAT THE FRAG'S HAPPENING?"
Must be our contact She realised. He proved that when he said:
"And it's no use searching there. I got everything you want Downloaded when I saw the fragstorm coming down. I was afraid they might purge the system."
"Can you send me the data?"
"Yeah right. And lose my insurance? That data's my only ticket outta here, so come and get me!"
Cyclonias traced the signal with the tap of a key - Came up with a location, not far from the control room. 'Security Room 3', about 200 metres from here.
***
Alanya relayed this information to the others. With the Rigger still out of action, it was up to Rusty to try his hand at 'building-rigging'. It was tough-going at first - The manic flow of information proved too much, and they had to jack him out. Crystal cracked open a field-dressing to staunch the blood that had started flowing from the Auzzie's nose.
Eventually, he'd brought up a camera-feed, and opened doors leading to sec-room 3.
A group of Five UCAS soldiers in black fatigues stood at strategic points in the room, not quite relaxed but at ease, submachineguns in their hands, well armoured. A suitcase stood in the corner, propped up.
They were wearing their gas masks - Apparently they'd gotten a gas warning.
"Our contact's in there?" Chance questioned.
"So he says... Don;t see we've got much of a choice but to trust him. If that fragger Iceman were around, maybe we could have asked him."
Everyone stared at Alex, but then they really couldn't blame him. Most of them would have killed Iceman too, given half a chance - After all the rough treatment he'd given.
"I can't unlock the door." Groaned Rusty. "Independant keycard lock. Also, there aren't any other bloody systems in there I can activate that migth take the buggers out."
Crystal got up to run for the door, beckoning everyone close to her to read her ePad.
I can cut the power. That should unlock the door. I'll rig a breaching charge too - Then we'll flashbang 'em and our assault specialists should be able to do the trick.
Chance: "Rusty, can you call their locations for us?"
"You got it, mate." He wheezed. He didn't sound too hot.
Right then who's up?
Crystal threw and caught a flashbang, impatient.
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(CKW)
"I'll do it."
Alex finally reacted. He stood up.
"It's time to make up for mistakes and get things solved for once. We got some wounded effectives."
His voice had returned back to normal, emotionless. He knew this was no time for cries. They still need a job to be done.
He looked back to Rei. He had been staring at her a while longer, examinating her. She might had been taken down, but she was still alive... and she would live through it.
"If you don't mind, I'll assume command from now on. Any objections?"
Alex stood up. He grabbed Iceman's knife, and looked carefully to its edge...
Then it mirrored the movement of Crys Flashbang.
"Ok.Crys, This is the deal.Rusty, get used to be Big Brother. I want you to lead in case something happens to us.Sil, stay with him and take a close eye on Rei... Alanya and Plugin. Just stay out of trouble. And if you need to fire a gun, don't think twice: do it." He pointed at the behemoth gun that Iceman had dropped earlier, a bit burnt, but still useable.
"Chance, Ash, you are the escort of the Queen of the Mischief. Crystal, do what you like to do most: blow stuff up. I'll lead and soft a bit the things for you. Let's kick some yankee ass!"
He stopped for a while.
"I almost forgot. Can anyone locate where hayes is?"
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(Wesforce)
Crystal jogged down the corridor, Alex in tow. The fact that the guy had just taken over her plan rankled her. The fact that the guy had just imposed himself - Almost as complete a stranger as Iceman had been - on the group in a commanding role also rankled. In fact it plain sucked.
This fragger and Iceman were made for each other, it seems, She thought. The only reason she was going along for now was that to back out first would be counter-productive. And besides, an Epad isn't really a good way to shout someone down. She sighed.
Chance sideld up to her. She knew he wanted to know what she'd seen in the underground power level. He'd have to wait. Crystal had to concentrate her mind on the jobat hand - It was the only thing stopping her shaking like a leaf.
Truth was, she didn't really know herself.
She just wanted out of here, now...
The group slinked quietly up to the sec-room's door.
"All...nngh...Clear so far, mate..." Came Rusty's voice.
"Fix a breaching charge, Queen of Mischief." Winked Alexiev, even though Crystal was already doing so. She finished, then backed away to the rear of the others, pulling her Thermographic goggles down.
"What are they for?" Asked Alex.
Crystal gave everyone time to get ready, not answering Alex, then pulled out two detonators.
She pressed one.
Everything went dark - The power was cut as the charges she'd placed on the generator panel went off. Rusty was dumped from the rigger system, and breathed a sigh of relief.
The whole building went dark - Completely dark. No-one without astral perception or thermographic goggles would be able to see a thing. Even Night-Vision goggles don't work in complete darkness (though they can function off such little as a pen-light's illumination...).
There also came the 'clunk' as the sec-room's door unlocked. Angry shouts issued from inside as the occupoants charged their weapons.
Crystal pressed her second detonator - The door blew clean off it's hinges and sailed across the room, breaking a man's ribcage and flattening him. He;d been directly behind it when it went off.
---------------------------------------------
(CKW)
Alex knelt down before Crystal. He whispered, carefully to not be heard by the guards.
"You know I have taken over your plan... but... hey, you really need to buy a voice-epad or something."
He pointed out. Unlike what it may seemed at first, he had taken over just to be Crystal's voice.
"Anyway, if you have something to tell or order, I am at your disposal".
---------------------------------------------
(Nyerguds)
Silvia looked at the astral forms of Alex and Crystal.
"And how is she going to do that, in this darkness?" she whispered to Alex, slightly annoyed about the way he talked to Crystal.
She sighed. "Let's get this over with."
She grabbed her sword, and sent a burst of mana through it.
Immediately, green sparks appeared around the sword, slightly lighting up the corridor.
"...sleg."
Silvia threw the sword to the side and dropped to the floor, as the appearance of the light was immediately answered by a burst of machinegun fire.
The sparks on her sword disappeared.
She quickly crawled away and grabbed her sword. "Ain't gonna work this way..." she whispered to Chance. "Can't we just take them out in the Astral?"
She smiled. "Ghosts in the dark."
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