"The Ladlemonger has arrived! I have vanquished the roc!"
Go inside the building and look for the one they call O'Greenahan. Should I notice something hostile (which would mean the lighting spiders and the spotters that Beirus mentioned) - let it feel the wrath of Caladlebolg. If I see something weird - throw a ladle at it and apply Caladlebolg if it proves necessary. But before doing any of that, cast "12 otrm".
[COMP: 17/7] Spell.
That familiar black oil pours from the palm of your non-dominant hand, swirling outwards. It expands to approximately one meter in diameter. Pausing time, you see that it will react to your movements. Should you try to cover yourself with your arms, it will flow over them like armor; if you two-hand Caladlebolg, it becomes wreathed by the spell; and if you summon your other bound weapon, the assault rifle, it will form a shield expanding from just over half-way along its length.
Well, looks like you've figured out a defensive spell. One that uses Static Defense, you know? That stat that none of the the active PCs actually uses?
You walk into the building, nonchalantly killing two spotters via corrosion without even pausing. Hugging a wall, you manage to get past the elevator without getting electrocuted or flashbanged by the angry spider within.
Broadcast with speakers if I have external ones, use radio if not: "Greetings, Ao Shi is back. I see party started while I was getting the big guns. Now let's pull the plug from these party lights!"
Start shooting strobes with the turret. If Red can assist with targeting (Bio scan) to measurable degree, then use it too. Objective is to eliminate as many strobes as possible to give soldiers better change to see actual enemy.
Time holds and eight silhouettes appear, overlayed on top of the target area. Seven strobes, loosely clustered.
After running over the procedure a few times, time resumes and you input the seven into the assisted aiming system of the frame and open fire on the strobes.
[UTAR vs. SDEF: 6 vs. INEFFECTIVE] Machinegun attack.
The Bio Scan doesn't really show you much beyond their initial positions, so it still comes down to a bit of spray and pray, but seeing as, after an initial burst of light, there's no clusterfuck of lights remaining, you're reasonably certain you hit all seven of them.
A blur of motion. Amongst six soldiers. During your attack, the spearmonster moved into action deciding to throw in it's lot with a flank rather than waiting and getting shot at (go figure).
[LTAR vs. MDEF: 3 vs. 0] Spearman attacks soldier.
[LTAR vs. MDEF: 0 vs. 0] Spearman attacks soldier.
[LTAR vs. MDEF: 3 vs. 0] Spearman attacks soldier.
[LTAR vs. MDEF: 0 vs. 0] Spearman attacks soldier.
[LTAR vs. MDEF: 1 vs. 0] Spearman attacks soldier.
[LTAR vs. MDEF: 2 vs. 0] Spearman attacks soldier.
With a single wide sweep, four are doomed. Flames formed of shadow dance along their writhing forms, their edges delineated by a brilliant neon, its radiance rivaled only by the sheer sleaziness of its ever-changing color scheme. Screeching maggots of hellfire erupt forth, both from their wounds and the concrete around them, as spasming tendrils of rusted barbed wire precipitate from the flames.
Its armor is streamlined and unpainted. Its weapon is shifting, growing further now.
"I... I... yes. A first aid kit would be wonderful right now."
James pauses for a moment, then gathers up several wolf head shards. His employers might find them interesting. Afterwards, he follows his handler's guidance to find a first aid kit.
Wolf shards gathered.
You creep deeper into the facility, hugging the walls as suggested by your tradecraft, and doubling back a few times, avoiding the nearing sounds of gunfire. You arrive on the factory floor and find one of the first aid kits in a convenient wall-mounted cabinet. It contains the usual assortment of bandaids, cotton balls, cotton swabs, iodine, bandages, hydrogen peroxide and comes with an inbuilt button to call an ambulance. Not that you think any ambulances will be willing to come anywhere near this floor for the foreseeable future.
Retrieving it, you walk along a path a few steps away from the cabinet and stand there, that specific spot apparently safer than most of your surroundings. Bullets begin whizzing past at infrequent intervals. Oh.
Heavy footfalls follow. Two soldiers, NEE by the looks of it, are running your way, firing apparently at random. They don't really seem to see you, and zig-zag hap-hazardly with seemingly no pattern, sometimes even bumping into the factory equipment and walls in their haste.
Beirus takes a moment to look at the symbols before speaking to Jus. "Jus, you have any idea who that new guy is? I figure he's one of us, but who is his handler? And do you know anything about these symbols?" Beirus asks before turning to call down the hallway.
"In here. Take the first left, then down the hall. Watch out for the spider in the elevator. Oh, and kill any of those watery guys you see, they're spotters for the rest of the storm."
Use Equipment Check on the symbols if I can. They're sort of like deployed equipment, right? Look outside if I can to take stock of the situation, and double check my gear to make sure it's in working order. Gotta take advantage of down time.
Edward 'Ladlemonger' Whitmore, a fellow NEE Armor Frame pilot. He and his squad were killed in action by a LANDSKNECHT frame earlier.
He has a penchant for magic, particularly that of a necrotic nature. One of my other recent acquisitions here.
Autonomous weapons systems. Embedded into the walls.
Outlines enter your vision, tracing in a vaguely rectangular region around each symbol, almost like a primitive mask.
They generate regions of distorted reality that produce an unnatural force. One that lets it levitate itself and its surroundings.
Think of them as antipersonnel mines, one that can chase their victims. And yes, you are in their activation range.
I'm picking up one-way communication from the storm to them. It's directing them.
I'm picking up more of your "spotters" ahead. So keep them in mind before you engage.
Good news is that I've got a read on them. More automatons, these ones with two-way communication.
They transmit target locations to the storm, so try not to stay any longer in their sights than they have to.
This storm is awfully good at focusing its energy so a repeat of that rain trick it did would be best.
All in all, very human in design. Our uninvited guest seems to have a taste for human tech it seems.
Oh, and, try not to die. Or at least, leave no body behind. Those spotters have the hardware to salvage corpses and extract data from brains.
So ice zombies. Murderous ice zombies.
You check your gear but well, it isn't looking too good.
ZGMF-SOL:18I and IW05-ALCYONE are fully operational.
The MA07-KIANG is fried however. The plating take a few more hits, but you'll be stuck lugging it around.
Do a more mundane spell, 22 ixc, fight the guards.
[COMP: 8/6] Spell.
[UTAR vs. MDEF: 3 vs. 0] Spell Attack.
Your spell activates with a flash of Bremsstrahlung as brilliant blue streaks spray into the warehouse, impacting with craters the size of golf balls in anything particularly sturdy and punching straight through anything else. Your target, a soldier with a rifle isn't even able to react in time.
The difficulty in hitting really only came from how awkward it is to aim, seeing as the spell comes from a point in front of your sternum rather than anywhere more convenient. Had it been your revolver instead, you could have read out your shots in excruciating detail beforehand - medulla oblongata, C1-C2 vertebrae gap, C3-C4 vertebrae gap. Here, you can't, but you could still tell they'd hit.
And they do, leaving for a brief instant what looks like a modern art project made out of burnt and perforated meat that promptly collapses to the floor. One of the soldiers returns fire, pale lines tracing forth in stopped time.
((Just a reminder that you can split your UTAR or LTAR pool between multiple targets if you like your odds of hitting them.))
As for fighting, uh, could you please be a bit more specific? Do you wanna run up and stab them? Shoot them? Use those matches? Use their tradecraft to start a heated argument about their private political views? WHAT DO YOU WANT FROM ME?!
((Also, in future, you may want to specify what to do when they start firing back at you. Because we have no idea which direction you want to dodge in, or if you want to start trying out SDEF or something, so now there's a timestop while you figure out what to do about the bullets flying towards your face.))
LUCK POWERS, ACTIVATE!
Cast "22 03 sabb" (full COMP) thinking of and aiming at either whatever guards are standing closest to one another or the furthest guard. If the TRAN roll succeeds (and if I get one) direct thy new noble beast to ATTACK!
Direct my follower (on horse or not) to also join the fray, and to help us murderise guards as he sees fit
"Remember what you said about taking the fight to their chattels etc? Your time has come!"
Ready my blade, take a deep breath and once my and my ally's spells are cast... !!CHARGE!! at the nearest enemy! (and you know, kill/incapacitate them. The usual)
[COMP: 11/6] Spell.
[TRAN: 0] Synchronization.
[UTAR vs. MDEF: 3 vs. 0] Flying boar.
[UTAR vs. MDEF: 2 vs. 0] Squire attack.
You summon a robotic boar with razor sharp tusks and fine musculature made of metallic wires leading into elegant shining joints. It appears to the left of your shoulder and launches in that direction, straight into a group of three guards, crashing into one of them.
You charge at one of the guards and suddenly begin to see the flaw of charging those with guns while wielding a sabre without being too hot at Static Defense. Three of the six upright guards turn to face you, six which rapidly becomes four after a burst of something from your partner turns one into mince and your squire's mad spray finds its mark on another.
Time stops as two of the remaining soldiers begin firing, pale lines tracing all around you, their projected trajectories ending with starbursts of shrapnel, probably not the most legal of ammunition. You know that depending on where you attempt to move you may get caught in a corner, which, evidently won't end well, even with your supernatural agility. Especially not when a robotic boar is charging at you, murder its lenses. Two guards are on the roof of the glass building while the other two take cover behind pillars in the arcade between the warehouse and the glass building, the fifth one is near them, getting back up off the floor.
[MDEF vs. UTAR: 0 vs. -1] Shotgun soldier fires.
Judging by the predicted images coming off of Ropey, they'll be able to keep itself and its rider safe from the incoming slugs.
((May want to specify a defensive action next time, helps get more done in the turn.))
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Topic: Perplexicon - Down the Foxhole - Raining Mecha (Read 177470 times)