ALSO 2, how the fuck 4 mole tanks got in a tree house, WHO relaxed in their service this much
Ms. Marlowe is on the tree platform performing. You are on the roof of a shuttle in hover mode nearby. The monsters are attacking the audience on the ground. Monsters did not did up into a treehouse.
Let's go fight. These particular civilians might be worthless, but we don't want them to know that, nor do we want the rest of the colony to hear that we just left them to die.
We gotta put up an appearance of giving a damn about the common folk, and then they'll be more likely to do what we need.
+1 to sending Elke with the Sirens, but without draining her sanity. To protect the Siren, the colonists, and Lady Mercury herself, I'm inclined to armor up and engage the creatures alongside her.
"Negitive Brother Karl. We are going in. I can't afford to look cowardly at this juncture, and I've got a Chrono-Siren on the ground I need to make sure extracts. Besides, I've got to give the lady what she wants on the date, no?"A look of dismay briefly crosses the large Transhuman's face, before it resets to a neutral expression.
"Understood. M'lady, if you insist on fighting up close, take the plasma caster. I don't know anything about these creatures, but they seem organic and should be susceptible to melting or carbonization."Lady Mercury nods, and the nanites begin assembling a second structure on her back, seperate from her jump pack, which she connects to a large gun via a standard 8cm Plasma Pipe.
As this happens, the roof hatch of the shuttle pops open, and Sister Daisy pops out. The Chrono-Siren slides you the pack containing your combat gear. You press a button on your wrist interface to connect with your armor. You then spend a few seconds browsing local networks until you find Lady Mercury's tessellating armory.
"Autumn, what is the armory passcode? I can get in the fight quicker if I use the nanites."Lady Mercury steps forward, grabs your hand, and holds your wrist interface up to her face.
"Biometric, gotta scan my right eye."She squeezes your wrist to initiate the scan, and then gives your hand a quick kiss before a visor slams down over her face.
"See you out there!""No! Wait for m-"Lady Autum triggers her jump pack, and launches from the roof of your shuttle to the ground.
"Oh Terran God Dammit! Why can she never just stick with the group? I'm coming m'lady!" Brother Karl triggers his own jump pack and vanishes as well.
The nanites begin to assemble your armor onto your body, as they work, you speak with your Chrono-Sirens.
"Either of you girls equipped for this?" Chrono-Sirens can carry some weapons that may be of use against larger targets, but they chaffe at uniformity and usually conceal their loadouts under their illusions.
Sister Shelly allows her disguise to drop, revealing what appears to be a stolen Judgement Department rifle is strapped to her back, and the hilt of some energy based melee weapon at her waist.
"Dunt think this gun is the right calliber for the job, boss. Could give em a nice poke with a blade if I'm crazy enough to get dat close, but I'd rather not."Daisy offers you a sheepish look.
"Sorry boss. All I brought is me claws... And I just dropped half a gallon of Mars Juice to enjoy the concert, so I'm a mite buzzed, yeah?"You take a moment to consider your own loadout. Your grenade launcher would be perfect for this job if you can live with some collateral civilian deaths. Built by the Chrono-Sirens expecially for you, it fires five types of grenade: fragmentation, demolition, slipstream, stickstream, and acceleration. It holds six rounds in a way that interfaces with both your memories and universal laws of uncertainty: as long as you don't know what type of grenade is next in the chamber it can be any of your choosing. Demolition would likely kill the target, but would require a direct hit. Acceleration would age it 1200 years, likely killing the beast you shoot at and everything else within 10m. Slipstream or stickstream create 30m zones that increase or decrease the speed of everything inside them; The sirens are trained to fight at abnormal speed, and most other beings are not, giving you a great support tool. In addition creatures that charge out of the slipstream zone at full heightened speed maintain their momentum but are instantly affected by all the forces of normal space, and thus usually wipe out and break at least their legs.
Your Bluewave Shotgun could also be effective if you get close enough to land a shot. Bluewave slugs house 12 laser emmiters facing in multiple directions, which turn on for a fraction of a second while the fired round is in contact with flesh, effectily shredding the target within a half meter of the wound. Your bluewave sword can likewise cut through anything organic like a stick of butter, but getting close enough to do so to the monsters would be more than a bit nuts.
You suppose you could give one of your weapons to a Chrono-Siren, or order the girls to raid the armory Lady Mercury abandoned. As you ponder, you are briefly covered in darkness as the nanites apply your helmet. Then the viewscreen with the hud flickers on, restoring your sight. You peer over the edge of the shuttle to see what has transpired while you were gearing up.
Lady Mercury and Brother Karl have somehow gotten separated from each other, with each attempting to take on a single mole monster on their own. The transhuman makes a big show of his incredible strength as he attempts to wrestle with the beast in front of him; You can't tell who is winning. Lady mercury, meanwhile, hops back and forth around her monster with her jump pack. You assume she is trying to find an angle from which she can cook it with plasma without also frying up innocent concert goers; The creature pays her no heed, and instead focuses on trying to scoop up less agile prey.
A third monster seems to be moving in slow motion, leading you to believe that Sister Beatriz is engaged with it using some sort of magic, but you can't be positive as to what is going on as the sensors on your helmet can only see through Chrono-Siren illusions at close range. It is likely Beatriz isn't carrying anything to effectively harm the beast.
A fourth monster continues to rampage and feast on civilians, completely unhindered.
Should you order them to gear up and join the fray, the Chrono-Sirens on your shuttle have the phyiscal endurance to just jump to the ground and charge in, but you lack a jump pack, or the transhuman height or agility to effectively move through the paniced crowd between you and the monsters. You will likely have to fly the shuttle low to wherever you want to enter the fray, and jump for it. You doubt you will have the chance to significantly reposition or pick a second target unless you are willing to order your shuttle to land on top of civilians so you can board.
How do you proceed?