DeviousMe

Gee Rebel, thanks a lot.

Actually though, I've been getting overwhelmingly positive reviews for them. People seem to think they're "slimy little dirtbags, hateful as can be - and we loved it". I've also been told that it's nice that they can and will end drain you, but unlike Malta Sappers need to stack their drains in order to do so, which is exactly the force multiplier effect I was going for. Alone, they'll slow you down, but to be really dangerous, they need each other.

Also adding another to this list:

Meet the Air Guard

Sadly, I haven't had the chance to see the whole arc, but what I have seen so far is impressive. Not overly fancy, but excellent writing, solid mission design, and definetely fun.

Oh, why not? Here are some I think are really good:

To Hell and Back.

Welcome to Architect Entertainment.

"Sure thing." Sarah told Akemi as she headed back to the couch to have her own look at Pik, just in case there was something Bill had missed.

"Aye, we hav' you cover'd." he in turn added to Sam with a confirming nod before following the purple-haired girl out the door, "So den, and what's your name...?"

Bill and Kia alike felt a bit put off, but opted not to say anything about it, instead returning their own waved goodbyes. Then the one-horned dragon finally got a chance to greet the house's owner.

"You must be Sir Winston 'en." he gave a warm nod to the man, "A pleasur'. William Brown, but everyun' calls me Bill. Forgive me if I don' shake yer han', but..."

He lifted the red dragon in his arms up a bit with his shrug, "...as you can see, I kinda got me arms full. One moment."

With that, he stepped inside, finally doing as Kia had asked, in the process catching the tail end of the conversation with Akemi, which due to its main subject being food got his attention almost instantly. He was starving.

"Aye, an' a lot more than just drinks a' tha'." he answered eagerly while carefully laying his charge upon the sofa, then putting his own backpack down before bending rearward and stretching his back and wings, "Ohhh, da's muuuch better...so, wha' be this I'm hearing about food?"

"Pizza and wings." Sarah answered, finally locating her wallet while Kia sat down by the water dragon's head. The Tornado motioned to Akemi, "Miss Akemi here offered to-"

"Ah, say no more." Bill stopped her with a hand held up and a confident smile, turning to the mountain dragon a moment to ask, "The usual then? Pik too?"

"...yeah, I think so." Kia nodded after a short debate in her head, "He'll be hungry when he comes to."

"Rite then." was Bill's retort, and then he turned to Akemi, "You dun' mind if I come with, do you...?"

((Probably not, but one that would've been funny in its awkwardness. ))

Staetlov Research Institute
Level P-3

No dice.

"Hey, you!" Egregore heard the metal Tsaiv's voice lash out at him like an unseen whip, anchored and thrown perhaps at and by the stylus once more in her hand, "How many times must I repeat, no staring at my [rear]. Quit sneaking around and get back to work."

What she meant by that, the woman of course didn't say, assuming the 'third-generation cyborg' she spoke to knew. Stepping to the blast door, the gate opened without her even making so much as a motion or commanding it verbally, as if the thing just came open completely by itself.

This was only partially true of course, the door's mechanism keyed to respond to authorized Standard Life Implantates and free the way for them. On Esertos, the world these guys came from, this was standard practice because everyone had one. Here the story was slightly different, what with humans now serving in the Pozemna Armada, but in places like this facility, which played host almost exclusively to military personnel, the principle of doors taking SLIs instead of things like numeric codes, keycards, fingerprints, et cetera, worked out just fine. Best of all, an SLI could not be lost.

For Egregore, however, this presented a fairly perilous problem, especially since he very likely didn't know SLIs existed, let alone what they did. If he tried to walk through a door that scanned for these, and the mechanism didn't find one, a silent alarm would instantly be issued. Thankfully, he did at least get a clue: it was an active system. Just before the door had opened, it had sent an electronic signal to the metal-clad Tsaiv woman.

As if that granted him any amount of safety. Naturally, Murphy got in the way, for beyond the blast door lay nothing short of fully stocked armory. Specifically, it held weapons and equipment intended for infantry, from rifles to grenades to spare parts for field armor, like communications gear and MPDAS armor plates. In other words, military hardware. A whole slew of military hardware.

And as if that hadn't been bad enough, the cyborg turned her attention to him not half a second after the reprimand.

"Actually," she told Egregore, not stopping her inspection walk of the armory to do so, looking up and down the walls and along the shelves, "since you're already here, come over here and give me your report. What does your sector still need?"

She tapped the touchpad, indicating the displayed parts list upon its screen, assuming Egregore knew what she spoke of. Sadly, he couldn't actually see it from his current viewing angle...

--------------------

Štátna Zbrojovka
Tower Hospital

"Wakey wakey, sleepy-head."

Vlasta's eyes came open. Like so many times before, the first thing they saw was Wolfgang, the source of the voice.

"One of these days..." the Tsaigon groaned and let his head slump further back into the pillow, breathing out the jumping question, "What happened?"

"Oh, nothing much." the metal Caldok replied as a white-coated doctor stuck a small flashlight annoyingly close to Teivos' eyeball, "You got smashed, zapped, and poisoned...you know, the usual consequences of your carelessness."

Vlasta tried to chuckle, but instead got out only a cough.

"Okay, so maybe a little worse than the usual." Wolfgang added, noting his friend's surprise at that, "How are y-?"

"I feel terrible." came the answer before the question could be finished, a scowl on the Tsaigon's orange face, "Casualties?"

"Heavy." was the cyborg's solemn retort, Wolfgang looking to the many other filled beds. He didn't beat around the bush though, informing Tevidos candidly of the loss of the forward complements of two Panzer divisions, two M7A7s, several Kazbeks, and a shockingly great number of Verejná Bezpechnost. In their effort to safeguard the civilians from the devastation of virtually the entire Perez Park zone, Public Security had paid dearly for their valor.

That got the Tsaigon up and out of bed before Wolfgang had even finished, Teivos caring neither about the residual pain nor that he wore little more than underwear right now. Several patients' eyes got big as they saw his artificial spine, silver-gray vertebrae fused to the athletic muscle beneath his orange skin, cybernetics and organic tissue forming the balance that allowed Vlasta to still lead a normal life.

"Someone has my clothes?" he inquired as he inspected himself in a nearby mirror, noting with intrigued satisfaction that the front of his throat was no longer blank metal, but now had a coat of orange skin that felt very natural to the touch. Taking his fingers from it, the Tsaigon queried of a Tsaiv doctor, "Is this real?"

"Yessir." the green-skinned Esertosian in the while coat gave a nod, motioning to Teivos' arms, which stood oddly free of any scars, "We've made a little progress in tissue regeneration again and thought you could use a pick-me-up. There will not be any scarring."

Vlasta smiled. The doctor was right. It did make him feel just a little better.

"What about him?" he looked in Burning Brawler's direction as someone arrived with a pair of leaf-green military fatigues and a black, sleeveless shirt. He quickly set about slipping into them.

"We are not sure." the doctor meanwhile brought forth a touchpad, looking upon its display with concern, "The damage is very extensive. We may have to resort to stripping off the entire skin and applying a complete cybernetic replacement."

"May have to resort..." Wolfgang mimicked in a high-pitched, nasal tone, then returned his voice to normal, "Pfff. As if it's so bad. Still, though...why didn't my nanobase work? It usually does."

"Oh, it did." the Tsaiv replied, "Your nanobase exactly worked as it should. Or rather, tried to. Something else stopped it. We're thinking magic."

Wolfgang gave a nod. It wouldn't have been the first time. At its very core, the process of magic may have been exceedingly basic...but just as with anything in hyperphysics, interaction and application was extremely difficult from a detailed, scientific point of view. This in turn often led to confusion and unexpected, generally unforeseeable consequences.

"Do what you have to, then." Teivos affirmed after lacing up a pair of combat boots, testing their soles for good measure, "I'll be in my office. I've got a few things to look over that don't add up..."

"Huh?" Sarah took a moment to connect the dots, then realized what the peacebringer spoke of, a hand quickly atop her head and an embarrassed grin on her face, "Ohhh, right...sorry about that. I meant to tell you, but then the robot came in and everything, and I didn't really get a chance to. Kind of forgot about it after that."

It was true, of course. When the Tornado had said 'what if I told you' earlier, she really had just wanted to see Pax's reaction - of course, with the kind of reaction she'd had there, things had taken a very unexpected direction then, and one after another, further factors had added themselves to the mix until it had simply no longer held enough immediate importance to keep recalling.

"But yeah, that's what that thing's for." Sarah motioned to the large, long bag she'd carried in earlier, "We call it the space bazooka."

Naturally, that's when things skewed from the expected yet again, Pax snatching and pulling a Houdini before the Tornado could even say anything in that regard, left there with naught but a very puzzled look on her face - and Johnny's as well.

"That was weird." he remarked to Sarah, still on her shoulder, turning his head look up at her, "What was that all about...?"

((I would say its perfectly legit since those are her powers, but...how do we interrogate a time-frozen man? Or did you mean to say 'four' there earlier, as in the driver's exempt from the freeze too?))

I know several people are, but I forget exactly who. But I've seen it, so I know it's sometimes accepted.

Not really. I find that if I don't embrace a balance, I tend to start feeling really funky, so going somewhere dark isn't something I have much of an aversion to. That said, the thing with Tyrant and Domi is more of a societal dark than a 'oh, that's so evil' dark. Not sure if I'd read a story about it. Would probably have to have a really good beginning that made me care, otherwise I'd likely just ask myself 'why?' and move on.

"Oh, how rude of me." the skeletal man performed a curt bow, whipping his sizeable black top hat from his blank, bleached skull for a moment before putting it back just as crooked as before, "Gentleman Bones, necromancer and master of the dark arts..."

Arek leaped off the man virtually the instant his own warp equipment's alarm went off, for as much as he desired some answers, he wasn't desperate enough to trust himself to human teleportation technology. Besides, he could just track the guy's jump and follow on his own, which carried a whole lot less risk to his person.

Imagine thus his surprise when the driver reappeared right down the street and on the sidewalk, making the draconian's previous thoughts more than just a little obsolete.

Gentleman Bones, however, reacted immediately, throwing a gloved hand in the downed man's direction and warping space-time about him in such a subtle fashion as to jam nearly all commonly used means of teleportation.

"My word." remarked the skeletal necromancer thereafter in his usual British accent, straightening his monocle again, "I do say, what's with all the sudden ruckus? That chap there some manner of archfiend? Doesn't really look the part, does he?"

"Debatable." the Sky Commander answered with a sideways glance as he walked, attention still visibly focused on the driver, his intent to lift the man up by his collar and get the answers he desired...

--------------------

"Trrryyying...fffffailing...wwwwould you..." Drago attempted to get out many a thing during the process, not to mention get away, but circumstances being, his efforts amounted to about nil.

Thankfully, the intrepid bumblers did at least remove the shell, and with the source of the Venom gone, his body no longer had to face the constant stream of reinforcements, so to speak. Regrettably, it had also labeled the concentrated dose of morphine under 'foreign contaminant', attacking it as well, but at least the drug couldn't really defend itself. Gradually, the pain ebbed to manageable levels, and Drago's high pain tolerance would allow him to soon regain enough coherence to figure out what was actually going on around him.

In the meantime...

Dangit, how am I never in time for these impromptus? Any chance of there being one tonight?

((Geez Dogma, you're just hell-bent on not having Egregore run into Valerie, huh? ))

The Egregore Device reappeared in an intersection that much resembled those of the 'generic high-tech labs' employed by many a group in Paragon City and the Rogue Isles alike back on Primal Earth. The corridor that ran to the left and right wasn't quite as high, and maybe less than two thirds as wide, not to mention that the blast door he'd materialized in front of looked more like a closed hazard zone gate than those convex-concave, 4-part whatevers, and the floor plating lay continuous, but still it probably felt like at least a semi-familiar environment.

Having arrived with his back to the gate gave him an immediate view of the intersection formed by the main corridor and the much shorter one (maybe 2 or 3 meters on each side) that connected the blast door behind him with what appeared to be a freight elevator across the hall, the large transparent door allowing view to a free-floating platform that could've easily carried a pair of tanks.

Currently, however, all it held seemed to be a welding crew, a Tsaiv and two humans in blue engineer's overalls working in a corner to repair what damage had been done by the rebel attack the night before. Down the left hall, others installed what looked to be the last in a row of light fixtures, one human handing halogen rods to his partner, who stood atop a CANINE unit in order to reach the insides of the open fluorescent compartment in the ceiling. The robot didn't seem to mind this, holding still dutifully and letting the two work.

Further down the hall, another one stood with several more humans, the black overcoats and Steyr AUGs of the two VB officers instantly differentiating them from the half dozen lab-coat-sporting scientists they conversed with, too far away for Egregore to gain anything useful.

Well okay, so that may not have been entirely true, but even if he could hear them down there, the conversation being held down the right-hand corridor was not only closer than even that of the technicians repairing the lights, but also much more interesting. The reason for this was quite simple, for the participants were none other than another duo of VB officers, a Caldok woman in a myrtle military uniform (not to mention that metal covered the right half of her head and then some; the cybernetics extended over lower jaw, throat, upper lip, and even onto the upper half of the Caldok's large left ear), and a full-metal cyborg that looked a whole lot like Wolfgang.

Unlike Teivos' guard, however, this one was a Tsaiv, head having the shape of one and lacking the large fangs characteristic to Caldoks, and the 'ears' more resembled flaps, what had once been connective tissue between spikes of cartilage now metal as well, though painted azure. Furthermore, the distinctly female frame visibly identified this one as a woman, as did her voice in the conversation. A touchpad clipboard in her hand, she presently tapped the pen-like silver stylus thoughtfully against her lower jaw.

"Dobre." she gave an approving nod to the other three, returning the writing instrument to its slot on the pad, the Slavic accent in her voice much the same as Teivos' and Wolfgang's, "Looks like things are getting back to normal. Take the portal to Štátna Zbrojovka as soon as you are ready then. The CoLeader will want it on the Myjava as soon as possible."

"It was nice to catch up again, but now I must go check next sector." she then told the Caldok, who smiled in return. The cyborg gave a brief salute, "Nadpráporèík, officers."

The gesture was returned, and then the metal Tsaiv turned about, taking another look at her clipboard...

...and set course right for the blast door beyond the corner that Egregore had arrived at...

--------------------

Hotaka, unfortunately, stayed behind. The hovertank had gotten the better of the large green dragon, and hovering at the very edge of consciousness, he couldn't really do much wanting.

Still, as the reinforcements closed in to secure their latest captive and the gentle, comforting darkness of unconsciousness gradually overcame him, Hotaka did manage to get out one more call.

To the red dragon he'd arrived with.

Even with Sun Tzu's spell still on her, it caused a stir, a black, plated eyebrow shifting uneasily. Though it would take several minutes, soon a large, yellow eye would open...

Unfortunately, Drago was no regular Crab Spider. He wore the backpack, but none of the usually accompanying armor, choosing instead that of the Wolf Spider. The button on the pack was there still - it just wasn't hooked up to anything. That's why he'd tried to get at that injector earlier.

In addition, though chances were rather remote due to several inhibiting factors (such as the blood of the wound, and of course James' hand presently on it), by now someone might have taken note that instead of the soft, lightly hair-covered skin that one would've expected from a human's abdominal area, a tough, rigid material that could've been keratin lay in the hole the bullet had torn through Drago's armor. Indeed, the only main difference was that it wasn't mostly transparent, but rather opaque and of such a dark hue of blue that even the term midnight blue no longer described it.

Due to the hole's relatively small size, it of course wasn't immediately apparent whether or not this belonged to something like an insectoid exoskeleton, but lifting up that portion of the Wolf Spider armor would certainly reveal it to be a plate that wasn't very large, only spanning about enough area to cover the abdominal muscle that lay beneath. This it of course no longer accomplished, cracked and shattered by the bullet, exposing the bloody flesh beneath. The round had gone deep, this stood without a doubt.

Whatever he was though, this guy wasn't at all happy, shakily turning his head to Mark with the grated words, "Drrrropped...injector...gggeeet back..."

--------------------

((Gonna hold off with Arek and Gentleman Bones until Rebel posts in regard to the seekers.))

"Actually, you mind adding mushrooms and olives to that?" Sarah remarked, her free hand digging about in her pockets, "I've still got some money left over...if I can find my wallet..."

Outside, the one-horned dragon now set down, traversing the final distance to the house on foot, Kia already glaring that characteristic look-of-impending-doom at him. Standing straight again, once he got close she added that familiar growl, "Billyyyy..."

"Now, now, jus' one moment before y' tear me apart." he grinned innocently back at her, moving the red water dragon in his arms somewhat, "I can explain, really I can."

"Go on." she motioned with a hand right away, having long since gotten used to Bill's heavy, quasi-Irish accent, "What did you do to him?"

"Well actually, it wan'n so much me as th' dirigible." he answered, quickly going on when he saw the raised eyebrow, "See ther's one on over in Atlas Park, an' when I saw it, I had the same idea as you did with Player. Only I thought you know, mebbe if he can' see he was off the ground, he won' have anything' t'be scared of. Weeeyll...me hypoth'sis sank. Real fast."

This seemed to get Kia calmed down again, "What happened?"

"Same thing as with you an' Player." Bill replied with a shrug of shoulders, "Lot of screaming, lot of squeaming...aaan' then he went an' faint'd."

The mountain dragon only let out a long sigh with a pleading look to the tops of her eyesockets, then motioned to the house, "Okay, fine, go get him inside. I think one of the couches is free now."

"Rite." Bill gave a nod before he proceeded, then a genial smile to Darren as he did, "Guess we were headed to the same place. Y'sure you don' wan' me t' take a look a' that? I am a doctor, y'know..."

((Um, Cham...I did already boot this along. The humongous explosion was your Raiden Spirit going boom. Vlasta's back at Štátna Zbrojovka by now. Also, did your evac take Hotaka too?))

((Considering he conquered a planet because they wouldn't let him go back home, I'd say that's a fair statement. Well okay, maybe...nah, Imma leave that behind the curtain still. Also happy birthday. ))

((M'kay.))

A titanic explosion rocked the ground. There was simply no other way to describe it. Pressure, heat, energy, crackling, toxic electricity, it all blasted out in all directions with due fervor, drawing a terminator beneath the matter.

Teivos found himself on his back at the edge of yet another large crater, head throbbing and wondering what by Zar had just happened. A searing jolt of pain upon his first movement (the practiced 'check' tensing of muscles) told him he was still alive, at least. He pushed past the pain and rose onto his elbows, giving the area a look around.

His bodyguard lay scattered, but moving, their Kazbeks having protected them more than his lighter armor had him, Vlasta only now noticing the mostly shredded remains of the loose black overclothes. The torso armor beneath was decidedly no longer silver, and judging by the stabs of pain and trails of blood coming from the patches of orange that showed through his hole-filled sleeves and pants, he'd taken quite the beating from that. Still, the question remained: just what had 'that' been?

The barrel of an M7A7 emerging from the crater's rising smoke gave him the answer, and he took it with a grim smirk. The hovertank looked dilapidated, but apparently it had triumphed over its opponent in the end, and just in time to give the CPSR's latest monster what-for and take it out.

As the characteristic beat of large rotor blades came closer, Teivos closed his eyes and let out a relaxed sigh, soon feeling the wind of the first descending Molvia cascade across the ground, through his clothes, and over his skin. Despite the many particles it carried, and his body's general state of pain, the net result felt somehow soothing.

All about the sector, in the air as well as on the ground, the forces Toy had seen dispatched from the State Weapons Factory came in with the same manner, engaging the CPSR's operatives. As he had ordered, the air superiority craft went in first, and though they hadn't yet been updated, their spell-countering abilities packed enough punch to match the field attempting to nullify their weapons. This time, they'd be getting through to Yinglong - and their orders stated shoot to kill.

Even Sun Tzu now had problems of his own, the attacking craft more than enough to not give him the chance of just hovering there unbothered anymore, even if he considered himself 'intangible'. If he could still maintain a direct sense of the power going to Teivos' Odcarovat, however, the fact that it had ceased operation would be self-evident. If he was looking for some manner of visual sign though, he'd have to toss his spell and just hope for the best. In either case, he had to do it before that Molvia set down, the man-portable unit on that helo still carrying the old code. If it got Teivos under the range of its protection, the sorcerer's chance was up.

Already, his guard formed up around the Sovereign, two taking him from either side as the machine came down, rear ramp coming open to deploy a division of Gerlach-armored infantry and a light tank. Covered by the vehicle, the soldiers joined Teivos' guard in retrieving those about and taking them board the aircraft - including on the Sovereign's orders Griffin, the strain of attempting to protect himself and those around him having knocked him out cold. Anyone else unable to move on their own received the same.

No sooner had the Molvia taken all those willing (or perhaps unwilling, but unable to do anything about it) on board than came the yell for immediate teleport back to Štátna Zbrojovka. In a flash of light, accompanied by a clap of thunder from air collapsing into the vacuum it left behind, the helicopter disappeared.

Its arrival at the State Weapons Factory proceeded to logical protocol. Like Teivos, all those injured were rushed to the hospital. Somehow, this also included Burning Brawler, whom Wolfgang had by sheer luck been quick enough to stuff onto the helo...

((And yes, I am trying to kill (or if practical, capture) Yinglong. I'm not going to say why, just that I am. ))

You'd be surprised.

"Be glad they didn't drag Ace and Player along too." Sarah retorted with a somewhat fiendish smirk and a glance to Sam, "Otherwise, you'd probably have a bunch of metalheads popping off your roof already."

"Hey, I resent that!" came Kia's shout from outside, causing the Tornado and Johnny alike to snicker.

"And no, it's not a spirit." Sarah went on, tapping the thing with a finger as if to demonstrate its solid nature, "Which makes that a very good question then...because as far as I know, we're the only ones from the island with means to come to this world, and I really doubt the other Ace wouldn't have told us if that were different..."

((M'kay, gonna give Cham just a little more time then. And since everyone seems to have missed it anyway, just ignore Wolfgang sniping the spirit earlier. This is working out better anyway, so it's one retcon I actually don't mind. ))

--------------------

There were indeed people in the warehouse, which like the one he'd come from carried difference mostly in its security measures, intended to keep criminals from making nests of the things when someone wasn't currently looking. Currently however, the bulk of them stood inactive, what with workers and forklifts moving things to and fro throughout the warehouse. Apparently, in this world it belonged to some appliance firm, and they were doing a pretty brisk business. Not quite as much as the construction companies, but still - new buildings needed new appliances, and rebuilding a city meant there would be a lot of new buildings.

Military hardware, however, that Egregore wouldn't find here. Stuff like that was, naturally, stored in military installations. The closest one here happened to be a certain research institute in the Staetlov District, this Terra's version of Galaxy City...

--------------------

Wolfgang didn't even take note of Valerie, his cloak disrupted when he picked up Burning Brawler as gently as he could to minimize any further damage. This was of course mostly because once he had the man in his arms, the cyborg didn't stick around, high-tailing it back to the approaching tank formation to get the VB officer into medical care. Fortunately, every division's support group carried at least two field hospital vehicles.

Seeing this, Valerie waited until the cyborg had passed, then wrenched the lid off the manhole and climbed inside, of course making sure to close it again afterward. She was quite familiar with the sewer system's security measures, which thankfully were limited to checkpoints and robotic inspectors, neither of which posed enough of a threat to anyone competent enough to evade a few 'electronic eyes'.

Barring any hellaciously bad luck that might cause her to trip and fall right into a trip beam (virtually the same type used to make sure garage doors didn't close on stuff in them), the woman would be able to make her way through the sewers just fine so long as she didn't get careless. Who knew, with any luck she may even have picked up some trace of the Egregore Device, and been able to follow him to the Kings Row district...

I'll take your vote, sure - especially if it means Foo's mind gets blown twice as much with it.

Still an awesome piece. Vroom vroom, keep goin'.

Gentleman Bones was quite surprised at the man's appearance, and in fact to such a degree he didn't even react until a shell whizzed right through him, the undead man staggering back a step with a cringe, a pair of gloved fingers immediately at the front of his sizeable hat to ensure it didn't fall.

"Uy!" the points of light in his dark eye sockets narrowed, the necromancer unused to anything being able to do him true harm, and though he quickly stretched his other hand toward his attacker, the shadowy blast gathering between his fingers never got a chance to leave them. The reason for this was fairly simple.

A Dragon suddenly plowed the gunman into the ground.

"I disagree." Arek stated in his deep, dry tone, standing on the man's back, and knocked the grenade away with a swipe of his force lance before locking the gun-wielding arm down with the staff-like weapon. The other he restrained with his own, keeping nearly his full weight on the man through his large, clawed feet, even though now he of course crouched.

Though not impossible to knock off, with the armored guards and other equipment, the Sky Commander easily weighed more than 200 kg, a significant load even for most metahumans...

Since I requested this for a friend's character who has no art, am I allowed to cast a vote there, or does that fall under the 'myself' category since I'm the one who posted the request?