Oh come on, convoluted is normal here.
- Somewhere in the world, a dwarf sits behind a desk. While his attire is crisp and quite well made, from silver-dyed giant cave spider silk, he seems a touch annoyed, and appears to be waiting for something when a voice crackles on from a speaker in his desk.
"Contractor T5-3-2367 Has regained consciousness and is coming to your office sir." The voice said in a distracted way. Likely the technician in charge of the mission going over accounts from other contractors. "I know his name Cavernsearched, you can just use that. How long must I wait?" The dwarf said back after pressing the response button. "Five minutes sir, the hospital is on the ground floor remember?" The hint of insolence was noticable, and the dwarf didn't take kindly to it, but he ignored it all the same. "Fine. Casualties from the misson?" "34 contractors dead, 17 wounded, one Octavia in need of repairs and three Octavias lost. Enemy was killed to the man, a total of seventy bodies from the NPSC gatherd up." Cavernsearched paused for a moment, the sound of slurrping being heard. "But, thier mission was successful if thier misson accounts are anything to go by. Timestream Scanners show no abnormalities aside from weapon development picking up coinciding with the bioenginner's arrival a few years back, so any traces of our contractors or the enemy have been retrieved or destroyed, as ordered." Cavernsearched finished.
"Good. I want Response Team 3 to remain on alert status." the well-dressed dwarf said almost automatically. He needed his best Contractors available to take care of something. A few moments later, the double doors to his office opened and a man in equipment of Ballpoint Technologies origin, though he lacked his helmet and body armor, along with his midsection being bandaged. "You wanted to see me Mr. Bronzeclasped?" The man said, standing at attention as best he could with his injuries. "Yes, I did. Mission went well I take it?" Bronzeclasped said, gesturing to Ecem's injury. "Appearently, since I'm alive. If we'd failed none of us would have come back at all." Ecem responded. "Good, good. Well, I want you to get a new suit of armor and resupply. I need you and your Response Team to do a little scouting mission for me." Bronzedclasped said in a polite tone. Ecem knew upmanage better. He had basically said his team was going on a joyful little skip into Parasol territory, or gods forbid, Joseph's. With a 50-50 chance of death for him and his fellow Contractors. "Of course sir. What is it?" Ecem replied, trying to maintain composure though he wanted to tell what amounted to one of his bosses to go fuck himself with a rusted iron spike. "Well we seem to have hit a little.... Snag with a former 'employee' of ours, and things have continued to sour. He seems to be collecting certain person for something, And I'd like to know what." Bronzeclasped said, focusing his gave on Ecem's eyes, as if he was peering into his soul. "You can count on us sir. Where are we heading?" As if on cue, a map appeared on the desk. It showed the entire northeast hemisphere of the world, and Bronzeclasped pointed at the former site of an old dwarven fortress. Labeled only as "Lokumokab." "Oh no...." Ecem said aloud. "Not there... ANywhere but there... That madman will kill us all no matter what countermeasures we have short of neutron bombs!" He said, not wanting to go where he'd set up his base. Sure it had once been a Parasol Industries dumpsite, but now you would have never known better. The fortress ruins were buried well away from the site proper, but still. Ghost stories from merchants who had to pass through the area sounded too convincing for even the most level headed national army troops. "Oh, if you went with a full 22 man team certainly. You'd be found and killed no problem. But I'm sending you and three contractors of your choosing, along with an outside contractor to deal with any unforseen occurances." Bronzeclapsed said, keeping up his polite mask.
"Now I cannot stress how important it is you at least go undetected. Killing half of thier engineering department would be fine and dandy so long as nobody notices until you leave. I am sending you out to gather information on the sit's layout, and if you can, find what's left of Lokumokab. A friend of ours assures us that there are a few old escape tunnels from the facility's construction that come out in the ruins. They're in a rather sad state so getting in from there should be no issues with optical camo." Bronzeclasped said, turning off the map. "And transport?" Ecem said quickly. "An undesiganted Mog Hopper will get you there and remain at the dropzone with the rest of your team besides those that go with you." Bronzeclasped replied matter-of-factly. 'Completely denaible.... Our markings will get incinerated and we'd just look like a band of thugs if we get shot down...' Ecem thought it was clever, sort of. At least he was using some logic, which is something for a dwarf. "Anything else we need to know?" He asked, trying to avert his gaze from the dwarf. "Not at all Ecem, good hunting." He said, lifting a mug to him. "Thank you sir. We'll be back quick as we can."
'So a joyful skip into a lunatic's backyard. Just great.' Ecem thought. "Just fucking great." he said under his breath as he walked down the hall to the lift.
I felt the need to do something and until we get a more detailed update, These storeis will have to do. SUCKAGE AHOY! THEY NAME IS ABOVE IN STORY FORMAT!!!