The Bane spider responded to the attacks in a completely unexpected manner.
He turned into a pile of sludge on the ground which slurped over to one of the Arachnos minions and suddenly shaped into a Shivan Decimator...around him.
Moment laughed in the deep roar of a Shivan and gathered a glob of Radiation, hurling a Neutron Bomb at the Arachnos forces.
The rest of the Malta Operatives stuck to their cover, blind-firing in support of Moment, keeping Arachnos heads down just long enough for the shapeshifter to get off his attacks.
((Well, I wanted to wailt for Khell and Krazy at least, but since it's been demanded I post here... 
))
Acid didn't need to be a study of human psychology to filch the stress from Sheldon's tone. Things were getting dire, and everyone knew it - including the Malta.
"Just start jumping people aboard!" the reptilian yelled into the channel, his loud tone necessary to overpower the thunderous explosion of another SAM site, not to mention the chatter of gunfire all about him. The Engineers manning the AA weaponry had been warned quickly, and now made life extremely difficult with perimeters of automatic gattling cannons. Sure, the Khelari could command energy shields into being, and his skin wasn't exactly soft, but those rounds still hurt like hell.
"Set the shield to standby!" he advised the inventor, hoping that the Drop Ship's computers were fast enough to raise the barriers to deflect incoming missiles, but also drop them again to allow Wallace to use the vessel's teleporters to evacuate their teammates, "Then jump whoever you can! If that doesn't work, shoot 'em down...!"
--------------------
_
_
EMERGENCY POWER UNIT_
The crimson lenses of Delta 5 glimmered to life once again.
WARNING! MAIN BATTLE COMPUTER OFFLINE. SWITCHING TO AUXILIARY BAERROR8VG+@BE(M2-3SYSTEMCORRUPTION9&9O%L4=2A*D/8EV*DS44^45D-DANGERET=+35*4K/?3TEV-*D4SV76EFATALERROR+DV*++-RBG&^4B5F225-*/^%5DEGB
PRIMARY SYSTEM REINITIALIZED.
UNIDENTIFIED PARAMETER DETECTED IN ALL CORE FUNCTIONS. UNABLE TO DELETE. OVERRIDE INEFFECTIVE. TOTAL SYSTEM CORRUPTION IMMINENT_
With the mechanical grind of damaged joints, the Delta Titan rose from the ground like a great mythical beast, the chaos of raging combat all about not quite enough to hide the event.
A staccato of energetic hums rang out, the machine's plasma generators powering back up, feeding their sun-hot ammunition to the Titan's arm cannons. Within moments, Delta 5 had raised its fire-ready cannons toward the sky.
TARGETING.
TARGETS LOCKED_
With the characteristic echo of a Zeus' quad plasma blast, the Delta's cannons roared their bright-blue streams into the sky and into the midst of the missile flight approaching the Drop Ship, utterly annihilating every single one in their fully encompassing arc of sweep...
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters
Blasts of energy were fired at the Shivan Decimator, most likely to no avail. Most were simply getting out of its way before it irradiated them, nearly killing them instantly with mutation and cancer.
Suddenly, one had a though, and, as he relayed his thought to his comrades, dozens of grenades, incindiary, biological, and good ol' shrapnel based alike, all flew toward the being at once, lodging themselves in his gelatinous interior. Seconds remained before they exploded.
The gathering of dark energy reached its apex and was unleashed.
Jake, his bots, the zombies, the Arachnos troops, the Arbiter...everyone who was not a knife or Malta was blasted before they cold react. The wave of energy blew through every defense-Including Jake's personal forcefield-paralyzing nerves, freezing vital muscles, and killing off more than a few brain cells. The sheer magnitude of the soul transfer wold have knocked out an elephant and better.
And in the center of it all, Silver Meniscus arose. Brimming with stolen life-force, she had more than she could actually use, so the surplus was diverted into a powerful shell that would make her invulnerable for around 20 seconds before vanishing. Not that it mattered, because she had 0 intentions of letting any of her opponents live through the next 10 seconds. Taking a death-leap at the Arbiter, she rammed another grasp of darkness, pitch as midnight, at the fault in his armor.
The 3 remaining Hands of Artemis, after making sure their sister's medi-port had kicked in, all descended on Jake with headsplitting techniques, while the rest of the knives fell upon the medical platforms which they started to dismantle.
25 second remaining...
A dull yet juicy thud can be heard as a bullet enters the forehead of one of the zombies; brain matter erupts from the back of its skull. It paused for an impulse before continuing its carnage. Another was decapitated but didn't stop it's movement until it was literally torn apart by bullets from the Malta barrage of concentrated gun fire. Those fallen seem undead no more, and none of the other deceased seems to rise to join its unholy vanguard.
20 seconds remaining...
The two Grave Knights lasted as long as they could, but could not out match three Knives. The Lich and Dark Servant held the line. Tendrils appeared from the shadows cast by the Malta and Knives themselves, wiggling through their boots, ripping through the clothing and finally piecing through the skin painfully holding their Achilles Tendon to the floor. Even under the concentrated fire which took out the zombies, the two managed to remain nearly unharmed as the dark servant heals the ally force around them and the Lich steals the life force to replenish its own.
15 seconds remaining...
Jason walked casually over to Jake. There's nothing he can do but warn him of the skull-ripping headache poor Jake's about to receive. Here, take these... this is gonna hurt, she's about to go boom!
He dropped two of his H-packets on the floor, leaving two left for himself. The wonderful thing about phase shift is anything small dropped seems to return back in sync with reality. A small pink packet also dropped, commonly refer on the street as a break-free. He's pretty much running on empty now, Jason knew he should of stocked up before heading out and strangely blames the television although he can't rationalize why.
10 seconds remaining...
Everything went black, screams of confusion mixed with pain erupted all around. Light returned, slowly at first after the dark explosion, as Silver Meniscus rose from the stolen life-force. The last of the Zombie was gone, as with most of the Arachnos forces. Some were emerging from the two remaining med ports, but there were simply too many defeated to process. How the Lich and Dark Servant managed to survive is beyond Jason's guess, but there they are, and within seconds, those near the Dark Servant were near combat ready condition.
Jason was mildly impressed, it was flashy, effective in getting her message across. But what ever golf-clap he may be performing in his head, his expression was a mask of perfectly sculpted blasé.
Amateur... he just couldn't help himself as he shot that line toward her.
5 seconds remaining...
Jason calmly walks toward the pile of fallen Arachnos, he maneuvers around a bit until he found 'the sweet spot' as he slowly counts in his head how much time he has left.
3 seconds remaining...
Jason cleared his throat as he raised his hand like a conductor. He pauses, a few second left before he falls back in sync with time and space. There was a fearful moan from Jason's right, a soldier of Arachnos had somehow survived.
2 seconds remaining
Jason raised his hands like a conductor at an opera.
... please, help... me...
1 second remaining...
Jason looked down at the solder, then gently placed his heel on the soldiers adam's apple. There was a slight tingling sensation signifying he's now back in normal universe. He steps down hard and snap the soldiers neck. This will set Jason back a moment, but it would be inefficient to let the soldier live.
His hands back up in position, he clears his throat.
Screams and howls fills the room. Not from the voices of the living, but from the dead on the other side. A chorus of tormented pain, each voice slowly tearing down the barrier between worlds; the room went black for the second time. Coldness numbs the remaining Malta and Knives, their bodies suddenly sluggish and slow, their mind assaulted by the unholy aria, building more pain with each crescendo causing further lost in equilibrium and disoriention. As the netherworld opera fades, light returns but not to its original brightness, everywhere seems darker... more sinister...
Semi-transparent vapors seem to float out from the nose and mouths of the Malta and Knives, their life forces escaping and floating toward Jason, dancing around him like will-o-wisps. Slowly consumed as the fallen Arachnos rose en mass, not in the animated undead manner but truly brought back to life.
As Jason finished conducting Howling Twilight, he surveys the condition. Knives almost all disoriented and helpless for the moment, with the exception of Silver Meniscus with her excess of life energy protecting her. The Malta were immobilized and slowly being slaughtered by the sudden surge of Arachnos soldiers returning to the front line. With less defeated, the medical bay worked more efficiently, those who were too far to be brought back by Jason were now emerging and attacking helpless sisters.
Arachnos forces slowly regains the upper hand and Jason had did it with style...
Wallace gasped as he noted the carnage taking place below. The Malta Group, Arachnos, and his friends and allies, all fighting for an upper hand that likely wasn't there.
"I don't know if-"
The energy beams erupted from the wrecked robot and started intercepting the incoming missiles. Knowing this was the opportunity he needed, Sheldon started plugging in the targeting coordinates for his allies and what looked to be his allies.
"I hope I've got this right," he breathed before hitting the teleporter's activation button.
My Stories
Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.
The Arbiter was now in no condition to be fighting, no only his life force having been drained, but also with several faults in his armor plating. As Silver Menicus lunged at him, he slowly attempted to move out of the way, however, failed, and ended up only deferring her blow to his abdomen, whose armor plating also fractured, fell apart, and exposed a weak point on his ventral side. For the next fifteen or so seconds, the Arbiter could be equated to a turtle on his back.
-----
Jake, in plenty of difficulty, despite his, albeit weakening, constrictments, managed to grasp the break free, and eagerly ingested it moments before Silver Meniscus's Soul Transfer went off. He smirked in triumph, momentarily shouting a thanks to the man who had handed him the life-saving drug before reactivating his Repulsion Bubble, causing the three Knives that would have otherwise cut Jake to shreds flying several dozens of feet back into a (what appeared to be steel. One can never be sure on Rikti Earth.) plated wall.
Hopefully, anyway. One never knew exactly what these girls had up their sleeves.
-----
Jake's minions, not affected by the Soul Transfer as biological lifeforms were, were not too concerned about its effects, and, on an order from Jake, who had recently come to the conclusion that to multi-task at this point would be death, began to download a very special experimental software in the sudden decrease in fire. Oh, sure, the half-dozen still fought back, but it was solely defense during this period.
Right as the blast reached its apex, the download completed with just enough time to barely register the sensation of siphoning power. This only, however, took power from them. Power in biological creatures and power in mechanical creatures are two very different things. In humans, for example, the loss of power is like a declining slope, until one finally has the need to sleep, eat, or whatever it is one does to sustain oneself.
Machines, however, are more like a cliff. Performance is always at its peak until there's just no more power left to supply, after which they shut down. Jake's bots were no exception to this rule, and they kept on doing what they did best even after the transfer of energy, with only a slightly more rapidly decreasing battery bar to show for it.
However, this didn't account for the sheer stunning force of the drain. All robots were temporarily frozen in place, their sensory devices being overwhelmed by some dark force. If the Knives were going to act, they had better act now.
OOC:
Check again, Krazy. My soul transfer blasted your bots as well. Just because they aren't alive doesn't mean they aren't susceptible.
((Gah, sorry. My bad. >.<
)
Sheldon gritted his teeth and hyperventilated a little as he brought the ship to hover over Acid Zero's position. Again, he was faced with the peculiar conundrum of seeing two signals that indicated the reptilian's presence, but at least they were in the same vicinity. He also noted the signals of his friends either with or getting close to Acid.
"I'm in position!" he announced.
With trepidation, he looked to the alarm klaxon and interpreted the message being beamed into the air.
Alert: Missile Lock. Alert: Energy Buildup. Alert: Missile Lock...
----------
Cedric dropped the last of the decimated robots on the floor and looked about. Electrical sparks erupted from the broken bodies and Kip, gasping, pushed a large hunk of wreckage off of himself. Nester was busy moving about and making sure everyone was alright.
"That was unsettling," Roland growled at his brother's elbow, "What the Hell were those things?"
"Robots," Ryat99 answered as he fitted his arm back on, "Cheap, disposable, infinitely customizable... It's things like this that Ryat Prime uses to build his own personal entourage."
"So, where do we go from here?" Sarah asked.
"I think this will tell us," Matt tossed a disk to Kip, "It's got info on the Slinger, but that's the only thing that wasn't garbled up in some weird cipher."
"We'll get it to Indigo, then," the other scrapper replied, "We better get moving."
My Stories
Look at that. A full-grown woman pulling off pigtails. Her crazy is off the charts.