GET HOME, NOW.
[Urist Come Home: 3+1]
You've had just about enough of this, you say to yourself as suddenly you find yourself harmlessly and darkly aflame, pausing in your escape attempt to stop, drop and roll before realizing that it doesn't seem to be burning
you, only some other kind of damned soul. Filing this issue away at a lower priority for later, you dive for the nearest gutter - home isn't very close from here at all, but you've got much better chances underground than you do in the middle of all this shit.
With a Herculean effort you rip the grate out of the gutter and slide in, greased by fear and desperation as you slide down the tiny shaft and into the cramped sewer, made just large enough to inconvenience a sewage worker in their daily grind. This proves to be a pretty good decision on your part, as no sooner have you done this than you hear the deafening roar of an alleyway exploding up above you, artillery reducing it to dust within seconds.
[Footsteps In The Dark: 1]
As you wedge yourself into the service passage, you hear a sound from the direction you're fairly sure home was in - it sounds like whispers, the beating of soft and membranous wings, and of course the unquenchable spite and bloodlust of many millennia. Seems like someone else had the same idea as you!
Cazin looks for some debris (shouldn't be hard to find) and hides under it.
[Gimme Shelter: 6+1]
You cast a critical eye around the tilted room as the dwarf on the throne continues to cuss and fidget with his setup. There's a lot of debris, sure enough, but very little of it seems like it'd protect you as opposed to just crush you under it when the next artillery salvo comes in. Fine line to walk with debris, you recall from your mining days. Not nearly as good as-
-hang on, you wonder as you look at the throne, noticing a sparking component slightly poking out. Is that... you walk closer up, unnoticed by your host, and put your hands solidly on it. Looking up, you see he's still busy with his interface, and proceed to yank it out of its slot. Your friend immediately turns around - hey, that's his-
There's a pause as he looks at the module in your hands, and you simultaneously push some very particular buttons. A gauss turret levels with your head and fires off a salvo. The rounds fly through the air and stop about five feet from you as a resonant hum kicks up from the module in your hands, then fall to the ground.
Holding the spy-grade advanced vehicle shield module in your hands, you start grinning. This thing won't last a long time, maybe ten minutes, but it will protect you from anything short of a tactical nuke during that time period.
The other dwarf starts fidgeting rapidly with his controls in response, and you feel the room start to hum under your feet as generators kick into high gear.
Sorry for my absence.
Cast Protection From Holy Weapons (a very useful spell for an undead creature to have) on myself (and on Enir and the weird dwarf-guy, if they want to receive the spell as well).
Then make a wall of spooky ghost-flames that can't actually harm anything (but are supernaturally scary) across the entrance to the alleyway.
[Save Me, Dark Powers: 1+1]
You summon the powers of darkness itself to fortify your essence and fill you with resolve in the face of sanctified arms, and from your arms spring black flames that travel all around your body until you seem to be entirely on shadowy fire, smoke billowing from you in the shape of scenes of wild depravity beyond the wildest imaginings of mortal minds - it jumps to Enir first, then to the fleeing miner as he topples out of his trash can and begins to beat a hasty retreat, silhouetting all three of you in the alleyway even among the myriad disturbing shapes of demonkind swarming all around you and rendering you completely immune to any kind of religious iconography.
Sadly this does not at all apply to the napalm, high explosives and burning plasma also included in the munitions likely coming your way, but you figure the thought counts as the salvos draw closer and you aim your palms at the entrance of the alleyway.
[Wall of Fire: 2+1]
The fire jumps off your body and straight forward, spilling into a semicircle along the entrance to the alleyway before proceeding to rise in dark flames in its own right, filling the air with horrendous screams and snippets of the furthest reaches of experience, alien torments unknowable by earthbound intellects!
Needless to say, the demons
love it, a bright spot in their day immediately interrupted by the artillery barrage to come.
[Brace For Impact: 3]
The building to your right is there one moment and gone the next as it is consumed in a sudden rising explosion of triple-threat artillery that forces you back to the other side of the alleyway, rolling along the ground as you come to a rest at the very trash can the escaping dwarf attempted to hide inside of, a timely counterexplosion of necromantic energy seemingly the only thing that stood between you and vaporization, or at least burns that'd take at least months to heal.
Peering over the ruins, you see the batteries the police have set up in the distance over five blocks of corpse-strewn rubble, the sudden demon infestation apparently having been taken as a priceless opportunity for urban redevelopment by the Houses of Commerce. You see a few demons taking flight in the distance and getting shot down by gauss snipers, magnetically propelled explosive smart rounds turning their skulls into red-green mist and sending them plummeting back down.
The wall you're resting up against has also seen better days - specifically it has seen them ten seconds ago, when it wasn't about to collapse on top of you any minute now.
"Hwaaaaaak... Ptoooo!" spits into glowing pit
Dig in my six inch heels and brace for impact.
Also, graciously accept the spell from Jal.
You dig in your heels as dark flames start rising from your back and the demons begin to party around an unholy fire barrier, gauging the direction the sounds are coming from - uh-huh, seems about right, so you need to face this way, strike a cool pose, look like this, and...
[Die of Fate: 4]
The salvo hits, and you are spontaneously vaporized - fortunately, you had the good judgment to also be vaporized the previous second, having taken the shape of a gentle darkly flaming mist as the shockwave briefly scatters you across the winds, and you momentarily resemble a plume of smoke before coming together all at once at the top of the cavern about a hundred feet up. You get a wicked rush of energy as your molecules rejoin and your body eases instinctively into a 5:1 glide, blazing a black trail in the air as you look down on the destruction below.
You enjoy the moment, mildly cognizant that you'll likely draw sniper fire from the security teams in maybe ten seconds at the latest.
Jalormis, Extremely Undead Guy
Too Slow: 2
Alternatively Souled: Vampire
Money: 2
Old Yeller: A Horrific Debt
Evil Minion: the Honorary Zombie
The Abyssal Players: Escaped Instrument
Too Close: 4
Ancient Words of Protection: Unholy Ward
Enir Nazush, Barmaid of the Night
Alternatively Souled: Vampire
Weapon of Choice: Fire Axe
A Pair of Beat-Up Roller Skates (worn)
Outfit: Post-Nuclear Stripper Getup
Personal Therapy Assistant: Overjoyed
Green-Eyed Lady: Worthy Foe
Old Yeller: Left To One's Devices
Break Yo Shins: Down Payment
Loot: Concert Night's Earnings From Death's Gate
Good Luck Flashbang
Fresh Lipstick
All-Purpose Cleaning Solution
Plastic Raincoat
Nice Comb
Too Close: 2
Money: Flat Broke
Ancient Words of Protection: Unholy Ward
Urist mac Slughterfiend, Miner on the Edge
Money: Flat Broke
Gruesome Insolvency: Surreal Debts
Eyes of the Butterfly: Foiled!
Green-Eyed Lady: The Hunt Is On
Too Close: 4
Ancient Words of Protection: Unholy Ward
Cazin Crundle-Smasher, Uncanny Bookkeeper
Money: Nominal
Old Yeller: Hopefully Dead
Too Close: 2
Closed-Circuit: Crashing At The Pad
The Threadspinners: Indicated
Spy-Grade Vehicle-Sized Shield Module (active, 10 minutes of juice left!)
Author
Topic: Cyberdwarf: Concession and Cancellation in a Far-Future Fortress (Read 15128 times)