ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

[cross_grave]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

During the charge, Grave's mind was focused on the target. There wasn't any cover he could use to shield himself, and even though his barrier would probably allow him to avoid dying, the sheer number of bullets made it impossible to stop every single one. His speed allowed him to outmanouver the bots and their targeting systems, but their erratic aim was a problem - he couldn't effectively predict the shots. As a result, one of the bullets grazed his shoulder, barely reflected by his shield - without it, the damn thing would have probably gone deeper, instead of leaving a painful and bloody, but harmless scratch. Supressing a wince and a curse (Those were new clothes, dammit!), Grave noticed that Sin and Suri managed to distract the metalheads, who tore one of them apart in the confusion. And that was exactly what he was waiting for. Changing his course, the darkling dashed straight at his enemies, hitting them like the wrath of an angry god.

His first victim didn't even notice what hit him. Before it even managed to register the fact that Grave was next to him, the darkling was already finishing his swing, the enchanted blade striking the bot straight in the chest. The mage was pleased that his weapon managed to hold the enchantment - natural elements were somewhat tricky to use compared to heavily processed materials, like steel. However, they often gave great results, and it seemed that the stone sword didn't need much to show it's power. Grave knew that longswords were supposed to crush through armor using their mass, but this old fellow took it a little further. The blow basically turned the bot's chestplate into iron shavings, mangled it's insides leaving a total mess and nearly bisected the damn thing with it's sheer force. The darkling didn't let his suprise distract him, but even as he prepared to engage the others, his mind could utter only two words. 'F***ing. Metal.'

The other two bots put up pathetic resistance. One tried to actually PUNCH him, instead of trying to use the gun, which saved Grave most of the trouble. He lunged forward, ducking under the clumsy blow and ripped it's legs of with a single strike, the stone blade crashing through armor and machinery like through wet tissues. Watching it drop to the ground had been incredibly satisfying, but the mage was already turning to face the one behind him, already transfering his momentum into a devastating uppercut swing that beheaded his opponent before it had a chance to take aim. The darkling prepared himself to turn around and finish off the crippled bot, knowing that the other two were no longer able to pose a threat, when he noticed something out of the corner of his eye - a second group of bots, aiming their weapons at him. And he had nowhere to hide. On top of that, the one behind him was most likely still able to use a gun...

And on top of everything else, it sounded like he couldn't count on backup. The rest of the team got jumped by melee bots and if Host's scream was any indication, he took the first blow. Stomping down on the satisfaction of knowing that the demon was in pain, Grave decided to heed Sin's order and retreat. Just as the second group of bots let their bullets fly, and his crippled opponent aimed at him, the darkling quickly turned, mana surging around his feet as he cast another movement spell, propeling himself back towards the rest of his squad. The defensive field he kept up changed form, turning from a full-body armor into a black wall suspended behind the mage, all of it's power focused into protecting Grave's rear during the retreat. There was also the matter of the bot on the ground. Deciding that swinging the stone sword would take too much time, he simply used his left arm, claws of darkness extending from his fingertips and joining each other, forming an energy blade. He intended to quickly disarm the bot with one blow while passing over it, then dash back behind the corner, staying low and praying that the shield holds...

 

[Shrike7]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Shrike turned in time to see the robots land, the first one slamming it's mace-like appendage down on Host's shoulder. She sized up the opposition in a few seconds, then started towards the robot on top of Host. "Aim for the hydraulics, that should put it out of comission!" She hollered, briefly slapping her hands together then separating them again by a few inches, her blades turning sideways in her hands and connecting, forming a single blade nearly her height with her hands in the center. She reached the bot and swung carefully, avoiding the reptile's flailing while taking the bot's arm off at the shoulder, on the side Host hadn't been wounded on yet.

 

[Pale]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

After the initial surprise of having a bot -jump- from the roof onto Host, Rapture shrugs. Ah. Well. Perhaps a broken arm would dissuade him from more of those suicidal rushes in future. The CO steps neatly back out of the way of Shrike's slash, and raises an eyebrow at the arm that lands beside her feet. The bot, however, seems to still be very much alive, and attempting to bash its way through Host.

She sighs. One booted foot lifts, and, without hesitation, punts a brutal kick into the bot's midsection, that, impossibly for a blow from such a slight woman, knocks it -off- Host. A swift burst of assault rifle fire, straight over the lizard's head into the still-squirming bot, and she jerks a thumb over her shoulder.

"Shrike, if you would..? Shade, if you can heal, we're going to need you down here.."

Not a hint of panic in her voice, with the situation under control.. and stepping neatly -over- Host, the Operative makes her way with smooth, patient steps to the corner.. and squeezes another burst of three rounds towards the -still- advancing bots, before finally glancing back to Host as their return fire crunches into the concrete beside her.

"So... you ready to stop fighting the war by yourself yet, reptile..?"

 

[Host]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Host snapped his head to the right as the bot’s hammer-fist came down where his face had previously been. It was hard to tell if the demon was actually panicked, or totally unconcerned with his situation as he kicked at the bot, trying to get it off, but the blows weren’t dislodging the bot enough that Host could get his hand free, or struggle out – the broken arm really wasn’t helping things. His expression became considerably more readable as Shrike appeared, sword ready to strike; Host froze, eyes widening with a wavering grimace as he realised at least part of what she was about to do. The bot drew back its arm piston for another strike, but the psionic interrupted the machine by taking the offending arm off… without taking any of the Lurker with it.

Rapture’s kick at the bot was aided by Host’s own, rolling it off him; the reptile stayed down while she finished off the bot. “…That’s potentially one way of putting it, yes…” He answered the squad’s commander, grimacing as he simultaneously explored the extent of his injury. With gritted teeth, his shoulder moved slightly, but all but the slightest part of his upper arm was left where it was, revealing the break where his arm bentunnaturally. He cried, “Doc, I’m hurtin’ real bad!” his smile fighting a grimace of pain. “…I think it might be a terminal disease!”

The bots had initially all been heading for the closer target of Rapture’s group, but Sinful and Suri’s gunfire had attracted two of them, causing the machines to switch targets and head for the other group instead. With the big fists up and the way they kind of bounced as they walked, the machines kind of resembled boxers. They were slightly harder to hit than the previous bots, but not incredibly so; while the armour was more intelligently designed with curves, to reflect bullets rather than take the full impact force, assault rifles still put holes in them, as Sinful and Suri found. The bots also moved in a more intelligent pattern, one behind the other; the front one took all the hits, while the back one was relatively safe. They had to be quite light, for things made of metal; the armour seemed to be quite minimalistic, not even covering the extremities, and fairly light besides given the way they bounced while moving. As the first one collapsed, its body torn open, circuitry shredded by combined fire, the second one leapt – to a superhuman degree, directly at Sinful. She might have had reason to dodge… if Grave hadn’t been as timely as humanly possible, returning in time to catch the bot with his sword in a mana boosted leap of his own. The machine didn’t exactly land gracefully. It rolled, and true to bot programming, absolutely failed to get up with anything even approaching a practical speed. Having balls for hands probably wasn’t helping, nor was the large tear into the top of the machine from Grave’s blow.

The third melee bot went for Rapture’s group, jogging to the nearest target – which proved to be Shrike - and took a leap of its own, wrecking-ball fists retracted to hit her. It seemed the things were designed to leap right before an attack… of course, that meant it had to commit to the attack, leaving it with little to no follow through if the target actually dodged, likely making it ineffective against the telepath.

 

[cross_grave]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Grave was quite relieved when he managed to get behind the corner. His shield managed to save him from the shots, altough it had been a bit closer to comfort than he'd have liked. However, once he managed to get back to his teammates, he already found himself in a scenario that was, indeed, right up his alley - melee fighters. Or rather, one fighter, seeing as the rest of the bots went for Rapture's team and was about to go through high-speed deassembly, seeing as they were in Shrike's attack range. He focused on the one that was leaping at Sin instead and intercepted it mid-air. It was too focused on it's target to properly react and as a result, it took a particularly nasty hit to the upper section. Of course, the darkling wouldn't let it end just like this - seeing as the damn thing appeared to be still struggling, he quickly appeared at it's side, body already twisting as he transfered the momentum of his spin into a a wide, devastating horizontal slash aimed at the chest. From the look on the mage's face, he seemed intent on making the thing resemble a cellphone dropped into a blender.

 

[Shrike7]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

((Ah, the smacky-bots, alrighty then. Last post of the week, methinks. See ya people!))

Shrike nodded and smiled as she passed rapture and took position between her squad and the three melee bots. The other squad drew two of them away, leaving her with just the one to deal with. It jumped at her, and she jumped as well, a tall backflip to move her back a few feet as well as put her above the lunging bot. Her arms flashed out of her spin, removing it's arms as it was liftint hem to hit her. Her feet landed on it's back and she rode it as it landed, taking a half spin and removing it's feet as she stepped off of it. Looks like Grave's assumption of a rapid deconstruction was right on the mark, after all.

 

[shadearion]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Shade sprints for Host and Rapture, hoping that he wouldn't get shot, sensing the urgency of the situation and not bothering to respond to the radio. Arriving at where they are pinned down, and glanced at the injury, surveying the damage quickly.
"Nice trophy, Demon," he says, grinning at Host and letting the energies flow through his hands, first numbing the arm and then slowly repairing the break, wincing a little as the bone makes a meaty pop, resuming its position in his arm.
"Commander, I would greatly appreciate you keeping them off of us while I do this," he says, not looking up from his healing work, focusing his being on Host's reptilian arm.

 

[S u r i]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Suri looked was about to intercept the melee bot's attack on his own, but, luckily, Grave had came it at the right time. Letting Grave has his way with the already grounded bot, Suri turned his attention to the other one that they had attracted. He pulled up both of his handguns and aimed at it, with his right weapon in front of his chest and his left extended out. Both weapons pointed at the bot, he continuously pulled the trigger on his guns. A barrage of red energy shot out toward the bot with a deadly speed. There was a little spread to his fire, but they were all basically converging on a single target -- that bot's mechanical torso.

 

[Pale]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Host on the ground, the medic running to his aid, Shrike neatly intercepting a charging bot.. and various sounds of chaos echoing from Sinful's group, none of them faze Rapture in the slightest. She waits, back against the wall, listening to the gunfire of the approaching bots, knowing there -had- to be a reload coming soon..

And when it does, she takes her opportunity, snapping round the corner and firing. Two concise, three-round bursts, before she's lowering the rifle to her side.

"All down this end. Status report."

((So sorry this took me so long..! Kinda had a memoryfail!))

 

[Sinfulwolf]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Sin moves away from Grave as he clashes with the melee bot, before turning around the corner, seeing only one last standing bot stumbling around. She quickly gave it a double tap, both rounds hitting it through the torso, punching through the armour and bashing around inside its chassis.

"Clear," Sin said over the radio.

 

[Host]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Shade sprints for Host and Rapture, hoping that he wouldn't get shot, sensing the urgency of the situation and not bothering to respond to the radio. Arriving at where they are pinned down, and glanced at the injury, surveying the damage quickly.
"Nice trophy, Demon," he says, grinning at Host and letting the energies flow through his hands, first numbing the arm and then slowly repairing the break, wincing a little as the bone makes a meaty pop, resuming its position in his arm.

“This thing?” Host replied, mild derisiveness in his voice. “You think this is a good one, you should have seen the time I broke my neck. The Lurkers had to carry me around a battlefield for most of a day, while I kept back-seat driving on their tactics…” The claim was fairly outrageous – or would have been, if Shade hadn’t been able to notice a few things. The break was healing itself at a superhuman rate; without Shade’s healing, his arm would have probably been workable in maybe only half a day. Though he might look quite humanoid on the outside, Host’s biology was totally alien; it was a good thing the wound was in his arm, because Shade, despite all his worldly experience, would have had trouble trying to figure out what the hell the rest of Host's body was even supposed to be.

Though he had not used any diagnostic magic to have a look at the reptile’s insides, Shade could feel that his anaesthetic spell was pointless – despite fairly convincing theatrics, Host couldn’t feel any pain from the break at all. The demon could still feel that his bones were in the wrong place – but no pain registered. This did not, however, stop the full pain of a broken arm from reaching Shade through is healing magic, taking all the agony that Host would have suffered, if he could have felt it.

“Thanks, mate.” Host said as he clenched and unclenched his fist on the now mended arm, then patted Shade on the back with it. He got up, heading to Rapture, who downed the last two bots of the front group, still engaged in friendly fire with the other group of bots behind them.

The group cleaned up the remaining bots; with the surprise melee group out of the way, and the two groups of bots near the wall done in, only eight bots were left, one group of four on either side of the wall, quite far away from the group. Cleaning them up was a threatless task, and Host spent most of it in conversation through the radio, continuing to duck out from cover and fire on the last of the bots purely on instinct. His only piece of advice actually related to cleaning up the last of the bots was “Don’t go for the eye. Take it out and they just get more annoying.” The rest of his time talking was speculation about the bots they had been fighting.

“So, tell me what you’ve learned from these bots we’ve taken out. I, personally, see several things worth noting… for one, how outdated they are. No skin, primitive designs, only one eye- on these ones, none on the melee bots -… I haven’t seen bots with a design like this for the better part of a decade. And yet, Toonpimp had modern, skin-covered bots galore when we attacked the palace. Then there’s the programming… they didn’t react when Grave blocked the lights, which were newly added to the perimeter, if I remember Rapture’s video right. Their combat protocols were also ‘incredibly primitive’, and that’s putting it nicely. If we assume that the lights and patrol were a serious attempt to keep enemies away, it should hopefully mean that nobody in this building had the skills to program them better – if we’re lucky. Unlucky, of course, and we’re just walking into a trap, but for trap-bait, they certainly didn’t do a bad job of incapping one of us.”Host rolls his shoulder, pointedly. “What it could mean, I don’t know. But there are enough pieces here for me to realise we’ve got something to puzzle out...”

After a few rounds of leaning out of cover and firing, the remaining bots joined the rest of the building’s patrol, as scrap littering the ground.

“Okay… anything else jumping out at anyone? No? Right, onwards and inwards, then… fearless leader.” Host remarks, walking to the side of the doors and gesturing towards them. He gets a little less cheerful when he actually takes a good look at the doors, though. The double doors were solid metal and windowless; the lock on the door was fairly complex, and probably quite strong. “Hmm. Breaching charge, maybe…? Noisy, though…-“ A sly look crosses his features. ”Aaahhhh.. But I’m getting forgetful; we have the greatest skeleton key of them all with us. Shrike, if you would?”

For all the solidity and integrity the complex’s walls and doors had, it was still physical – and still cut-able, as the telepath’s two-dimensional blades proved. She simply carved a very door-like shape out of the existing entrance, and voila. Almost the whole above ground building was taken up by one room. It was mostly empty; certainly, at least, there were no bots, creatures, or other active defences attacking them. there was a fairly wide path, marked with white lines on the ground, and a bank of trolleys to the left of the entrance. A lift waited in the right wall at the end of the path, with a parallel set of stairs next to it; both headed down. Other than white lines, the ground was also stained with splotches of black, and the occasional piece of metal; one corner of the room was particularly covered with dark greases, and tell-tale signs of it also littered the trolleys. The smell of oil permeated the air. On a wall opposite the entrance, a small, faded-black door led into the only other part of the surface building; a window in the top revealed the edges of a few shelves with vaguely mechanical parts, all looking rather oil-splattered, and typically more than a little mangled.

Host was the first to actually enter, stepping through the new opening – and immediately stopped, his mouth curled in a grimace. “Oh, bugger… Shrike is right, there’s definitely someone here; a techie, somewhere in two hundred… a hundred and fifty meters? Below us, though I can’t really get a better direction than that at the moment. Looks like we really are going to have to play nice…” the prospect clearly thrilled Host about as much as it did Grave. Still, in a moment he was humming quietly to himself as he walked around, calmly eyeing up parts of the room. “Might want to stay off the path, by the way…” He points out casually as others begin to enter, absorbed in looking at one of the trolleys. “There are a couple of pressure pads lined up on parts of it. They probably won’t drop the ceiling on us, but they might alert whoever lives here that they’ve got guests – assuming they didn’t already notice our fire fight, that is.”

 

[cross_grave]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Grave let the ones with the guns take care of the remaining bots, devoting his attention to ensuring that the melee fighters would stay down. He took his time to muse over Host's observations. He couldn't help but agree with the demonic reptile - either no one in the facility could properly take care of those slagheads, or this was a trap. Right now, it was hard to tell what was true, though. The group had no choice but to move on. With their way cleared of enemies and the door into the base wide open, nothing stopped them from continuing the mission. Grave went into the building right after Host, weapon in hand and ready to strike. His eyebrows went up in suprise when the lizard mentioned the existence of a living being in the building, even if there was no one in sight. For now, however, he was more interested in locating and coming up with a route that'd allow him to evade the traps. "You think they wouldn't?"

 

[Shrike7]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Shrike would open the door only after Rapture's go-ahead. She was the one in charge, after all. Even then, the door came off slower than expected, in two chunks. The first was around the area where a peephole usually sits, and she put her head through to see if there were any sensors visible from the inside. If there was, she cut the rest of the opening to leave them in place, if not, she's cut almost the entire door out to make it easiest to pass, leaving what looked like a second doorframe hanging in it's place. "Mind the edges." She points out as the teams started to file through. Grave was one of the first through, so she waited until near the end, just on the off-chance that anything else was around outside.

"Pretty sure theis place isn't worth visiting if they can't notice a commotion like that outside. Best be ready for anything." She comments quietly, looking around the two rooms carefully once she made it inside.

 

[shadearion]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Shade throws the hood of his cloak back on, the swirling patterns difficult to focus on, as he wandered in toward the back of the group He made a mental note to examine Host's physiology later, curious as to the way it worked, the rapid healing reminding him of someone, the old memory causing him to smile slightly. He watched where the others put their feet, matching them to avoid any sensors that might be hidden. He had, however, noticed several things about his companions, particularly the wise-cracking reptile, and he resolved to learn more about them, while keeping his own past as much of a secret as he could.

 

[S u r i]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Suri entered the complex, looking around as he did so. Before delving too far in, he took heed of what the reptilian humanoid said. He watched where everyone was stepping, taking care to step in the same pattern so not to set off any pressure plates. He still had his handguns drawn, just in case anything decided to pop out at the group. Remaining cautious as he looked at everything in the room, he felt the same thing that Host did -- the presence of someone very powerful. He gritted his teeth a bit, remembering the last time he had seen a hacker or even a programmer in battle. It wasn't exactly a pretty picture painted in his mind.

"Being friendly...is probably the best idea," the bespectacled male sighed.

 

[Host]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Rapture entered the building far less nonchalantly than Host had, about to hit the reptile over the head and drag him back out when he distracted her by pointing out the pressure-plates on the loosely-marked path. After she had taken a moment and spotted the things, the demon had already moved out of reach, and the room had proven itself to be fairly lacking in dangers. Still, it didn’t stop Rapture from letting him know how much rope he had, the ULMF agent quickly scanning the room as she crossed it to the door on the other side. “Reptile, if you walk blindly into a room like that again, I will shoot you in the legs, drag you to the entrance, and leave you there until we decide to leave. Do you understand?”

“Yeah, fair enough.” – It’s a strangely serious reply for the Lurker, but Rapture didn’t dwell on it. She looked through the door’s window into the room beyond, her gun at the ready. “Bots, but not hostile ones. Looks like they’re moving scrap and sheets of metal to- cover your ears.”

Rapture’s warning was immediately followed by the sudden, painfully loud din of what could only be a very powerful, very large buzz-saw cutting through something, coming from the room Pale has been looking into. It wouldn’t burst your eardrums, but anything below a shout was inaudible - you could probably sue Toonpimp for noise pollution, to go on top of his attempted-genocide charges.

Being the only one in a position to do so, Rapture shouts some clarification down the radio waves before people started throwing fireballs in a panic. “NOTHING SERIOUS, THEY’RE USING A MACHINE TO CUT UP METAL SHEETS.”

Host looks to Grave, hands over the side of his head, where his ears presumably were. “SOMEHOW, I DON’T THINK THEY HEARD THE GUNFIGHT IN HERE.”

It doesn’t last too long, but it lasts long enough for it to be a relief when the whirring ceases. “They just finished that one, but it won’t be too long before another sheet is ready to be cut. Looks like they’re fixing new bots together out of old parts.”

“I had the same thought the moment I saw inside this room.” Host agrees, nodding. “I once had the pleasure of being hired by the... good and just Lord Bane, as he fought against some… Lich King or other. Their border armies practically pissed undead at each other, until both sides were pretty well depleted. They didn’t have the time or resources to make new undead out of idle townsfolk, so both sides ended up digging bones and carcases out of the sites of their old battles, and re-reanimating them as weaker, but plentiful undead.

This feels like much the same thing. Normally you would get a self-replicating bot to turn scraps into more bots, but, if you don’t have a script, that takes a good deal of time. If you just drag up some trashed bots, though – and there are enough around, if you know where to look – a lot of them need little more than a bit of spit to get working again. Of course, they would all be old, and you wouldn’t have a way to re-program them without at least a hacker… in other words, exactly like the bots we just faced.”

Rapture had waited a while after Host’s mysterious declaration that someone else was in the building, even though no-one else could be seen or sensed. Then she waited some more. Finally, no-one else having taken the bait, she sighed. “As much as it pains me to play into your hand like this, I need to know how reliable our intel is, so – ‘Host, how could you possibly know that the person in here is a tech?’”

The reptile, still looking over the room, spun to face Rapture with a boastful leer.
“I’m GLAD you asked! I know that there is a techie in this complex somewhere, the same way that I was able to pick out the worthwhile weapons from the trash in ULMF’s armoury…” His arms spread as he bowed his head slightly, taking an even showier tone. “One of Host’s Great And Useful Demonic Skills: ‘The extrasensory ability to detect virgins’ – asterisks –‘within 500 meters’ – smaller text – ‘to 100 meters, depending on terrain interference.’ Several blank lines, second asterisks, very small text – ‘Includes several non-literal interpretations of the term.’”

Rapture was far from overwhelmed. “Ah, then we don’t actually know that they’re non-threatening.”

Host dispelled the criticism with a wave, as if it were smoke in the air. “Call it DEMON’S INTUITIO- OKAY,THAT’S GETTING ANNOYING.” Host shouts, the saw starting up again. “CAN’T WE JUST KILL THEM?”

“NO. IF THEY STOP WORKING, WHOEVER RUNS THIS FACTORY WOULD NOTICE. ASSUMING THAT THESE BOTS WEREN’T PROGRAMMED TO DETEct intruders, we would be exposing ourselves without reason.”

 

[cross_grave]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Grave glanced at his CO as she threatened Host, one of his eyebrows raising as he wondered how long it'd take until she finally snapped and kneecapped the bastard. He returned to watching the room, sheathing his sword, until Rapture's warning snapped him out of it. He barely managed to cover his ears in time before the noise hit, an annoying and painful din. It sounded very much like an industrial machine, probably because it was an industrial machine, at least according to his commander. His attention was focused more on Host, though, and the darkling quickly shouted a reply to the reptile. "NO SHIT, SHERLOCK!"

Eventually, the noise died down, much to the darkling's relief. Rapture's suggestion made a lot of sense, and Host little exposition was quite interesting and a little amusing, if somewhat morbid. Grave had a feeling that a couple of his "old friends" would have gutted the reptile as soon as they heard about this. Another valuable piece of blackmail material to be saved for later. His second speech, though, was - putting the theatrics aside - pretty damn bizzare, once again getting a look of suprise - in the form of a raised eyebrow - out of the mage. He was about to sigh when the noise hit again, much to his annoyance, but fortunately it did not last long. Once the higher-ups and demons stopped talking, the swordsman spoke up. "So in other words, this is a recycling facility with some kind of maintenance guy watching over things, right? More importantly, what do we do about him? I understand that we're not supposed to... Hurt him, are we?" The last bit was delivered in a tone that was almost emotionless. He didn't like his orders, but he was certain that everyone knew about this by now.

 

[shadearion]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

After the first round of the noise pollution, Shade rubbed his ears, filtering out the noise from the machines. He chuckled at the reptile's virgin speech, wondering just how long it had been since he had been one. "Damn I'm old..." he muttered, sighing and wondering when someone would actually do something. Instead of complaining, however, he just stood there with his arms folded, seeming to the world as if he wasn't paying attention, though his mind was active with thoughts and plans, inwardly cursing his lack of knowledge about these new subjects.

 

[Shrike7]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Shrike covered her ears for the first round of screeching, looking mildly annoyed at the fact that the nuisances shouldn't be disposed of. She listened to Host's explanation, thinking back to some older times herself before focusing outwards again and trying to better locate the presence(s?) she had detected before, while she waited for Rapture to move the squad further into the base.

((Kinda meh for inspiration lately, sorry bout the delay.))

 

[Host]

Re: ULMF the Third (RP Thread)

Host developed a small, conceited smile after announcing his atypical ability, surveying the various looks of bemusement it garnered. “It’s a demon thing. Presumably, you need to know what the most innocent things are to know what you’re going to corrupt… not that I’ve ever used it for such. Still, it’s remarkably useful -” you can almost hear the *snrk* as Host’s smile turns markedly more rictus – “For instance, it should be hard for me to get separated from this squad.”


Later, when Grave surmised the nature of the complex, the Lurker’s 'good' humour became considerably dampened. “Yes, it would certainly seem that way. Unfortunately, that just makes one fact about this place stand out all the more… why did they build it so close to ULMF? I could stand on your forum’s wall and spit on this building’s roof- not quite the best tactical placement for someone about to declare war on you lot.”

With that, the reptile left Rapture to answer the darkling’s actual question. “We don’t have many options if we run into a living creature, the one Host and Shrike feel or otherwise. We –can- kill them… if they attack us, we warn them that if they continue, we will fight back... and they continue to fight – and then, we have to be humane about it. Before that, we can subdue them humanely – which does not include shooting them or breaking bones. Yes, even by accident, air quotes around the word or otherwise. They could surrender, if we’re lucky enough. Preferably, it should be one of the latter two, so that we have the chance to get information out of them. We might not be authorised to do anything beyond asking nicely, but with Shrike's help, that should be all we need.”


Rapture moved away from the second room, and towards the stairs down into the belly of the complex, keeping off of the path and its pressure pads. “Alright. Group up. Shrike, Host, our group will take the front; a psychic, trained spec ops agent, and apparently keen-eyed Lurker should make a good spearhead. Sinful, Grave, Suri, keep us guarded from the rear. Shade, stay in the middle where you can reach whoever you need to. We might have gotten lucky with tripping alarms so far, but down there things aren’t likely to be as simple. Gunfire will likely give us away. If what Host said is right, the bots outside probably weren’t networked, but the ones inside might be. If they are, and we’re spotted, all the bots will know at once. Move fast, but stay quiet.”

That said, the group moved out. The stairs spiralled around and down, nothing more than a concrete maintenance shaft following the elevator that the inhabitants of the base probably used. There was only one door out, on the bottom level about fifteen meters down, and it proved to be perfectly safe to use. The complex below the building was all incredibly sterile; the walls, ceiling and floor were all white, though the floor was quite peppered with soot, ash, and occasional bits of oil. Only the greys of metal nailing the walls to the ceiling and floor broke the monotonous lack of colour. Presumably, not many humans lived here, because not many humans could probably stand to exist in such a bleak environment.

The elevator’s entrance was to the left of the stairwell the group exited, while hallways of the complex branched off forwards and to the right. Deciding where to go might have been challenging, but the team’s living radar pinged – the Lurker announced; “Aha… I’m close enough to get the general direction the techie is in, now. We should probably be heading for them – if anyone in this machine-staffed building is going to be holding the kind of evidence we’re looking for, it’s the one apparent human. He’s staying in the general direction of ‘somewhere ahead of us’, so with any luck this hallway in front should be the quickest route to the human…”

Rapture nodded, beginning to head forward. “Alright. Guide us in, then.”