If the creature was resistant to being repelled, it was in luck. The force bubble seemed to act a lot like a stream of jello always moving away from the Commander. It wasn't rigid, but it wasn't very flexible either. It was like corn starch and water-Perfectly balanced between being a solid and a liquid. If one was resistant to the effects of the bubble and could move through it, it wouldn't inconvenience the Commander.
This left all of the creature's soon to be meals within easy reaching distance. Now if only they'd sit still and let themselves be torn apart into easily chewed bits-
"Aim for the mouth." Cynic ordered. No such luck. His six personal drones opened up with energy bolts, photon shots, seeker drones, thermal blasts, and oblivion rays. The Bane Spiders all mimicked them and fired their mace blasts at the beast's face, trying when possible to hit the mouth. This had the general benefit that shots that were off still had the chance of hitting part of the creature's face-Eyes, nose, whatevs. The storm of firepower being focused there possibly also made it bloody hard to see anything if it left the eyes intact.
"Boyfriend, get behind that thing. I don't value your lame chances of winning in a straight-out fight. Everyone knows how underpowered DM is these days." He said to Tamesis, putting some more power into his staff to keep the detention bubbles perpetually running until further notice. It wasn't like he couldn't afford to do so, since he didn't think any of his Night staff's assault features would do ANYTHING to the creature except annoy it, even if he did aim for a weak spot. Best to just let the drones and troops do the work while he maintained the shielding and such.
Tamesis nodded and teleported directly to the side of the creature's head, choosing to ignore Cynic's insulting orders. Encasing himself in black flame yet again, he began to wail on the right half of the creature's face. While its effect would be questionable, at least it gave him something to do.
-----
"You rang?" Jake said, teleporting into the base with another batch of Bane Spiders and his Attack Drones to boot. Following suit as he appeared, all fire powered was directed at the creature's mouth, while Jake personally glanced around in order to get a quick view of the situation.
In any case, even if hte creature was as powerful as it looked, it was certainly going ot be feeling a literal wave of plasma and laser fire hitting its face.
((Hm, was hoping our AA battery would come in, but I guess not. 
))
Questionable effect wasn't as questionable as questionable judgment, which was quite questionable indeed. Not only had Tamesis placed himself right in the line of friendly fire (if the scatter was great enough, that was, and Cynic's armaments of course not accounted for in this respect), but there was also the matter of a certain arm not far from him that carried a literal handful of rather nasty claws.
At respectable speed.
Indeed, the Ultra wasn't as slow as its size suggested. Though of course it was by no means comparable to a martial artist, it could definitely move with speed comparable to an average-sized human, but logically with a good bit more force. The Ultra's right arm came at the Arbiter like a hydraulic ram, and the blade bunker upon its wrist didn't hesitate to hew its Kaiser blade at Tamesis as this took place.
Still, the Arbiter's immediate assault bore fruit. The Ultra's blood-red scales scorched and rotted under the assault of fire and nether, showing quite clearly that the monster was indeed not immune to attack.
At least not all sorts.
The energetic assault met a radically different fate, ricocheting from the Ultra at incident angles, meaning anything that described a ballistic arc almost certainly came straight back at the Arachnos forces one way or another.
The Ultra's armor was a reflective assembly - and not only that, but the composite of material and immaterial also brought its energetic workings to bear where matter did not. Finding a way through this defense would be very difficult indeed.
Or not.
Tamesis had already proved the material fist could handily accomplish it. The smell of cordite still hung heavy in the air, and gutter wounds could be observed on the Ultra's body here and there - well, if the smoke and flashes didn't obscure everything, that was. The monster certainly didn't seem to have any problem seeing its opponents even in the flashpulses of the seeker drones.
Then again, it wasn't exactly relying on its eyes.
The left arm wasn't idle either, its blade bunker crackling with violent energies before a fist crashed into the floor with thunderous impact, sending its charge rocketing across the ground, just like before. Yes, the Ultra had been the source of the energy wave that had bowled everyone over and reduced the auto turrets to slag.
The blue-scaled draconian and his robed compatriot, however, had no intention of joining the fray. They were already on their way out, using Cynic's detention fields to keep them safe from stray fire.
"Always complications." the dark saurian hissed despondently, and decidedly not in English. He had no intention of letting everyone in earshot knew what had transpired, "I've half a mind to toss a shield disrupter back there."
"No worries, it's just a delay." the draconian retorted, towering over the other as they walked beside one another, "They usually set the backup timers for four minutes. That's more than enough time to get to an open space and take off. They won't be here in time..."
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters
Cynic spat as he watched most of the blasts bounce off of the creature. It was a good thing he had that handy friendly fire feature turned off. Cynic was slightly surprised the mace blasts had been deflected. If physical blows could damage the creature, why couldn't kinetic blasts? That's what the mace blasts were, really. Just focused kinetic energy, not at all too different from long range punches with extra bite in them. Even so, the deflected blasts that were sent straight back were mostly negated by the oodleplex of shielding surrounding everyone. Cynic didn't think too hard about it though, thinking instead it would be a good idea to get some more manuverability. Cynic activated his Night staff's flight aura ability, and everyone excluding Tamesis floated up a good 10 feet off the ground. As luck would have it, the creature had just decided then to use its ground strike, which passed harmlessly below.
Cynic was about to utter new orders when he spotted his detention'd guests exiting stage right.
"Jack or whoever the hell you are, give me that teleport suppression device I ordered you to bring, and FAST. Bring down big and ugly while I make sure our prisoners don't escape, meet back up with me outside." Cynic shouted at Jake. Cynic's drones had ceased firing their weapons, and the Bane Spiders figured out their mace blasts were useless after a few more seconds and followed suit.
[ QUOTE ]
Nyx looked over the airfield, "So what are we looking for here anyway?"
[/ QUOTE ]
No sooner had the words left her mouth then
[ QUOTE ]
The helicopter's rear went up in a brilliant fireball, shrapnel speeding away in all directions as the fuselage spun madly out of control, trailing a long plume of thick, black smoke as the aircraft hit the tarmac in flames, its main rotor chewing into the ground and right through a support van, utterly shredding the hapless vehicle.
[/ QUOTE ]
Acanous gestured with his thumb.
"I'm pretty sure it's that."
Stepping slightly out of balance with the world, Acanous became rather difficult to see, appearing more as a two-dimensional shadow than a three-dimensional person. His words seemed slightly distorted by the Cloak of Darkness.
"Come on, let's have a look at what caused that explosion. If we're in luck, it hasn't moved."
Activating more of his extradimensional shielding, he jumped from the rooftop to the tarmac, pressing himself into a crouch.
Looking through the window, Acanous was glad he was shrouded with so much negative energy- looking at that much burning Plasma would propably blind someone whose eyes were un-shielded. Even so, he could catch glimpses of energy blades and moving plated musculature through the smoke and fire.(The Ultra is 5 metres tall, after all.)
Gesturing for his allies almost absentmindedly, he tried to get a better look inside the building. The Shattered windows and Force Fields helped, offering the smoke an exit and shunting it away from the troops.
He could see at least 2 full details of Bane Spiders, as well as various robots and an Arbiter- maybe two? (Yes I know there's 3).
He appraised the situation as "Stupid", with a low survival rate for anyone who walked into that firestorm.
Still, he really diddn't intend to walk. Knowing that Anthius would already assume he wouldn't wait, Acanous jumped over the broken window and into the building, behind the majority of troops. He was already hard to see, toss in the smoke and the monster, and he assumed nobody would notice the moving shadow at the back of the room.
After all, it woudn't be prudent to start swinging untill he was sure he knew what side he was on.
You can't spell Slaughter without laughter
All your gonna do is just farm behemoths anyways.
My thoughts on November 30.
Tamesis was thrown back, not nearly having expected such speed and force from such a creature. The force of the blow blew through his forcefield, and the razored hand made mince of his armor and, now exposed, torso. Even as he flew toward the ground, his med-porter activated, teleporting him away to the nearest infirmary before he even touched the ground.
-----
Jake nodded, not necessarily in Cynic's direction, but certainly to his plan of action. "Jammer's operation, by the way." He shouted, definately to Cynic, this time.
Anyway, after his evaluation, it was rather obvious that the Ultra was the largest threat, by far, in the immediate area. In addition, his visor filtered out much of the debris that would otherwise obscure his vision, revealing that all ranged attacks had failed. He almost shouted in frustration until, miraculously, he noticed a few gashes on the side of the creature's head where Tamesis had made contact.
Jake Walsh was not a stupid man. It was obvious that this creature had a similar sort of shield around him, deflecting all things energetic, much like Jake's own. However, this creature was subsceptible(sp?) to one major energetic force that literally almost every living organism had at its disposal.
"Switch to bullets!" He barked, his bots already rotating their firing arms to accomodate the new ammunition. He smirked.
"Fire at will."
The creature would have found that not only Jake's bots, but any soldiers who were still bothering to fight the Ultra, had switched to regular lead bullets. From all barrels focused on the beast, aerodynamic pieces of metal flew toward it at top-speed.
"Right then, good luck." Cynic and his bots, along with his squad of Bane Spiders, flew around the Ultra, taking care to keep their distance, and flew down the corridor in pursuit of the two detention'd beings. Jake and his group fell to the ground as they left the range of the Night staff's flight aura.
***
Cynic and his group caught up with Ken and the blue scaled draconian almost instantly. "You two, halt! Surrender or be dramatically destroyed!" Cynic shouted at them.
Not a moment later, Commander Cynic felt the heavy tap of a back-armored finger upon his shoulder. Silence fell dramatically as the man prepared to turn about.
Or at least, that was a way things could have gone - the odds against this possibility were, however, quite staggering indeed.
The Ultra had no inclination to let anything by in pursuit of the Chief, and since its bulk filled most of the command and control center's entryway, getting past it would be no simple feat.
As everyone took to the air to avoid the heavy infantry's ground-based strike, the cannon mount atop its back sprang into action, plastering the gathered forces with an airburst munition that contained a rather dynamic adhesive - in other words, a glue grenade on steroids.
Luckily, the unexpected projectile assault didn't allow for an immediate follow-up, the Ultra instinctively raising an armored arm to ward the nettlesome material munitions from the gaps in its compound helm. The effect didn't last long though (but perhaps just long enough for its adversaries to figure a way out of the gunk that stuck them to the ground by their shields) and it quickly became apparent standard-caliber bullets weren't going to cut it. True, the things hurt, but they wouldn't be enough to cause any debilitating damage - at least not so liberally applied.
Meanwhile, the Ultra didn't step off the offensive, the second barrel of its artillery mount roaring forth a coherent beam of bright-orange energy at its opponents. It was a thermocannon, and though normenergetic, could be utterly devastating simply due to the sheer power the raw reaction that spawned it could transfer. The metal of floor and walls ran to slag, then vaporized within mere moments of contact, leaving behind an irregular trench of liquefied and re-hardened material wherever it made contact in its broad arc of sweep.
Still, the Ultra didn't leave its position, blocking the path with the same efficiency as before. It was now quite clear its mission wasn't just to strike at the enemy, but primarily to prevent them from pursuit. Considering how cocky the two intruders had been just seconds before, this didn't leave very many conclusions...
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters
As the lazer barrage and plasma volleys cycled into scattered automatic gunfire, Acanous got a better look at the creature blocking off the corridor, and surrounded by Arachnos troops.
The Gluenade had the decency to spatter it's gunk only in a localized area. That made Ac phenominally happy. He hated being webnaded with a firey passion.
That Thermocannon, however, was getting uncomfortably close with it's broad sweeps.
Acanous wished that the situation diddn't call for stealth and tact, he had the best pun saved up for "Uncomfortably energetic" situations.
The loss of a good pun paled to the carnage before him. Arachnos troops were getting rather ripped up by energy fire.
Just in case he ended up having to fight the thing, Ac started counting the seconds between bursts.
Just then, a voice piped up in his ear.
It was the good doctor again, snooping in on the fight.
[u]"Get me a zample off zat zing. Ve could clone it, study it, Use it for our ends."[u]
He breathed an elongated sigh as the mission objective appeared on his HUD.
'Capture sample of strange creature- Don't let Arachnos agents escape with sample!'
At least now I know what side I'm on
Hopefully, the thing and the Arachnos troops would weaken each other enough that Acanous would be able to slip in and finish off the winner.
Either way it went, he'd wait for Anthius before going in. That hail of bullets was just as stupid and painfull as the plasma that preceeded it.
You can't spell Slaughter without laughter
All your gonna do is just farm behemoths anyways.
My thoughts on November 30.
The steroid glue aimed at Cynic's group was almost completely ignored. That just wasn't how the shielding worked. Either something registered and 'hit' or it missed completely, even things that should have normally reacted with shielding, like webbing for example, back when Cynic had been attacked in the Arachnos fort. The majority of the time, the steroid glue just hit its targets and fell off their shielding like wet crap. But it still got through on a few occasions. Three Bane Spiders and Commander Cynic all plummeted to the ground.
"Ok, fug it. I don't need to put up with this." The Commander growled. He quickly tapped on his hand gauntlet and summoned up another Ouroboros portal to replace the one that had just vanished moments before. All his drones immediately piled in as if guided by some unseen command. Then the Ultra started waving its big orange beam around, and Cynic had to shout for the Bane Spiders to get the idea and move. Cynic kicked the last one through the portal by his rear, and followed through just in time for the beam to catch his trench coats tail on fire.
***
Ken and the blue draconian's detention fields vanished, but whether they could still be recalled while said features were now being jammed was questionable. If they had an on-site portal though, they could still use that.
***
Cynic stamped the fire in his trench coat out. "!@#$&%+ deus ex machina monster thingie."
"What now sir?" One of the Bane Spiders asked.
"Go to Grandville and get some more reinforcements. Make sure to get a better mixing this time, not just you lousy freaks. Get some of those chicks in the purple get-ups and a few of those floating gimps."
"Sir, we don't really have enough time for that. Our targets will have likely escaped before we get back." The Bane Spider said. Commander Cynic just laughed.
"It's called [censored] time travel. If you go and get those reinforcements NOW, we can capture them almost at the same time we left. So go, and take your time. We have all of it in the world."
The Commander's plan all hinged on one thing though-That the tp jammer WORKED. It had been activated just after Tamesis had been medi-ported, and even now with the detention fields down, the two shouldn't have been able to escape using recall. Or could they?
Much like Cynic's shielding, the web-nade simply hit the shield and slid down, doing very little to actually detain anybody. The thermocannon, on the other hand, was quite a different story. Literally dropping everything else, including the gun he himself was using, he began to focus his suit's energy into a rather large forcefield, which, thankfully, albeit with some difficulty and wavering, deflected the vast majority of the beam. This wasn't to say that not all of it got through, but not nearly in the amount and with the speed needed to keep any one of them from simply stepping out of the way.
After this, he barked yet another order, something about getting a railgun from the armory. Gifting a Battle Drone of his with a personal forcefield, it followed his orders to the letter. Stepping out of the protective shielding, hoping that its own would be enough, it rushed off the scene, straight to the nearest storage room the base had.
((Well, it wasn't literally glue, but whatever. 
))
Jake's bet went sour, without warning and form one moment to another. The Ultra lashed out at the drone as it attempted to get past, spearing a Kaiser blade through the shield and into the mechanoid's guts. Apparently, the blades were disruptive in nature, and carried a sharpness that allowed them to cut a great range of normally very solid materials if enough force went into the cut - and the Ultra had plenty of force in its swing.
At the same time, the projectile barrel of its artillery mount fired again, and this time the airburst munition didn't go for its opponents...at least not directly.
Instead, it went for their shields.
Crackling energies surged through the chamber in wide arcs and fully visible fields, filling the place with a disruptive influence. It wasn't quite enough to fully demolish the multi-layered energetic barriers, but there was a good chance whatever it had in mind to dish out next would be capable of finishing the job and then some.
Coincidentally, as well as simultaneously, the Black Hawk outside had picked just these moments to return to its former place by the wrecked window gallery, a Malta Operative whistling with downright piercing volume to get the Arbiter's attention. Beside the blue-uniformed man were two more: one perched in the harness of the helo's port gun mount, which carried a minigun capable of taking out light armored vehicles; the other standing in the doorway with a line to the aircraft, multiple belts of grenades slung across his arms.
Without hesitation, the man leaped from the Black Hawk and toward the building, the one who'd whistled gesturing to Jake in a direct and uncompromising fashion: 'grab those and get down'...
--------------------
"Convenient." the Sky Commander remarked as the fields disappeared, the pair taking a quick right down another passage. Ruined and strewn with bodies, the battle for this corridor had already concluded a while ago, "I don't think we'll be fast enough, though."
"Probably." the black-scaled saurian agreed, placing two fingers to his temple, "The ATCs won't be able to take out the Flyers. Alpha 9er, scramble."
"Roger, Control." crackled the reply through the microscopic hypercom, followed by a cutoff confirmation beep.
The corridor didn't go on for much longer (or at least it didn't now), a gaping hole in the side wall not far ahead leading out to the roof. It seemed fairly certain that would be the exit point of the two reptilians. With chaos raging in both field and sky outside, the tower subsection made a fairly decent extraction zone...
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters
[u]Ouroboros[u]
"-e and flame, of the 11 methods of time travel, allows us to travel further and more precisely than any of the other methods."
Cynic gave the generic Mender in front of him a cool look that suggested, quite possibly, that Cynic thought the man was off his rocker. "Last I checked there were a gabillion different methods of time travel?" He asked the statement. "Whatever. So I can go ANYWHERE, at anytime?"
"Provided it's on Earth, and as long as you don't extend your tether too far." The mender replied, choosing to ignore the first statement.
"Good then. In that case, I'd like to request 4 portals please." Cynic requested.
"We don't really do that kind of thing..." The mender said uncomfortably, rubbing the back of his neck.
"Well look. From what I hear, standard teams of people usually go up to a max of 8." Cynic said, switching on his 'reasonable' voice. "As you can see, my group consists of my men and myself, and that is not counting my drones. Which means we need 4 portals, get it?"
The mender stared at Cynic, and then at the huge mob of Arachnos troops standing behind him, trying and failing to be discreet. "Besides, I believe your leader, Mender Missilehair, said that he asked NOTHING of the rogues or heroes in return for access to his time travel oxymoron sculptures. I say I want 4 portals, I get 4 portals."
The mender gave up. "Fine." He said wearily. "FINE. Where and when did you have in mind?"
"Ah, this lovely lass here will assist you with that with her projector mind." Cynic said, motioning for a Night Widow to step forward from the throng. "While you set everything up, I'll just be taking care of some last minute details." He turned away from the mender, and issued his final orders.
***
[u]Weaver Airfield[u]
The Sky Commander and the Draconian would find that reaching said hole in the wall was not going to be easy. 2 Ouroboros portals suddenly opened, One immediately in front of them, one immediately behind them. Arachnos troops-Bane Spiders, Night Widows and Mystics, all came pouring out, surrounding the two in an instant, those who required weapons having already raised them and had them aimed the moment they came out from the portal. Cynic himself emerged with them, minus the force bubble and the flight aura, followed by his six personal drones.
"Blah blah blah, surrender." He growled at the two, now fully encircled. They had tried to time it so that there was more than a reaching-distance between the two reptillians and themselves, but nobody was perfect. The rear group had come in too close, within easy striking distance of melee attacks.
Cynic's gamble had succeeded; or at least, so it appeared. His forces had indeed managed to surround the two before the Sky Commander could reach anyone with his odd staff, and they weren't betting that the ones pointing weapons at them wouldn't hesitate to use them if they came any closer. The two stopped.
Still, they didn't seem very concerned with the situation. But why?
Cynic's first clue might be the lack of focus from the Night Widows. Sure, they still moved relatively normally, but there sat a lack of precision and coordination in their motions - like they'd all suffered a punch to the head at the same time.
The truth was of course nowhere near this lenient. Like their predecessors, those psychics that had been part of the guarding force here at the airfield, the Night Widows' mental talents had cut off from one moment to another. Not even their collective link functioned any longer, making each of them somewhat shaky on their feet, having lost the minds support of the others in the squad.
The second stood a little more obvious. Instead of a fine detail, it came in the form of blatant words, stemming from the black-scaled saurian with mocking tone, "You know, it's nice we can at least rely on you to appear on schedule."
And the third, fourth, and fifth clues were all clear indicators that the Commander's intended surprise attack had run headlong into a trap from hell. Almost simultaneously, three gasps of shock and pain gurgled from the living of his group, accompanied by the sickening sounds of tending flesh and cracking bones, not to mention the soft patter of blood upon a metal floor.
The warm, crimson fluid trailed from the masks of three in a scene that could've sprung directly from a cliché sci-fi horror flick - impaled through their torsos by long, bony tails of black, the three had roughly all of a microsecond to contemplate the large terminator spikes that jutted from their fronts before being savagely yanked from the floor and into their comrades with downright vicious force.
In the gloomy rafters of the ceiling, the movements were unmistakable now: the reptilians had backup, and in the form of at least three Antis, maybe even more.
Not that they had time to contemplate upon the number. The two they'd attempted to corner hadn't hesitated to make use of the shock moment the spearing had brought about, the Sky Commander bolting forward to ram his staff into the gut of the keystone soldier that blocked their path, tossing the man to the side and into the crowd akin to the manner of the Antis.
In mere moments, the pair was out the gap in the now disheveled cordon, even as the Arachnos troops still tried to get their bearings on what had just happened and how to counter it - and they'd have to somehow, otherwise the Antis wouldn't hesitate to quite literally tear them apart.
That of course didn't mean the two reptilians didn't expect some of them to favor pursuit over survival instinct. A seemingly harmless and barely noticeable metal ellipsoid, roughly the size of a human, had had been left on the floor not far from the former cordon's edge...
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters
The Arachnos troops fighting the Ultra had been quickly cut down to a third.
What few remained were huddled in Jake's dispersion bubble, frantically blasting the thing.
With a good deal fewer bullets than 5 seconds ago.
What troops haddn't already fallen or run into the golden glow of O-portals earned some measure of respet for thier bravery.
Well, either that or some ammount of caution, as you'd have to be insane to keep up against something that big when it just wiped out half your force, and ranks were already breaking.
He ran a count of the Arachnos troops still standing and combat ready. 4 Bane spiders, 3 Malta, 1 Arbiter, 5 Bots of verying stature.
wonder what's keeping Anth and the girl? Eh, she's propably slowing him down. That and the chopper might have something to do with it...
Smoke clearing, he shrugged. Opportunity like this rarely presented itself so readilly.
Tapping on his HuD, he spoke quickly and softly.
"Doc, This thing is GM Level. Requesting a tactical missile strike at my location."
U.L.T.R.A. Base, Warburg
Monitors hummed and computers beeped, processing the request and calculating damage to the area. Given the recent attack, and the military lockdown currently at the airfield, the likelihood of civillian casualties was nil. Any structural damage could be blamed on the creature, and the chances that the thing could be brought down without ballistic support, given TacCom data accrued from Ac's HuD were- to a word- Nil.
The Launch codes were entered, missile sequences started, and the Warburg missile shot into the sky, trailing black smoke.
It never made it to orbit. Dissappearing in a black-on-black sphere, it simply reappeared inside the Weaver Airfield terminal.
Weaver Airfield
From Acanous' viewpoint, it looked surprisingly like a missile had just appeared from his chest, blossoming into a purple cloud with an explosion that would have shattered the windows- had any remained.
Chemical agents specifically designed to weaken armour and energy fields settled over the battle like a hurricane, the high winds boring acrid chemicals into cracks in armour and shorting out equiptment. Anyone with skin exposed would be having a rather bad day, as the stuff itched and burned to boot.
Acanous looked rather grim. It was too bad they decided to use the Chemical agent. He was really hoping for some large-scale destruction. Ah well, the cloud would persist for a good 3 minutes or so, and wouldn't touch anything negatively shielded.
Propably why Von Auger chose it. That, and deniability. Arachnos might get world-stomping pissed if they had fired a nuke, even a small one.
The problem with such clouds was that if you WERE negatively shielded, they drew a rather detailed outline of you in purple mist. Shrugging, Acanous lept into the group of Arachnos on the floor, and began absorbing all the ambiant energy he could get from them.
Noticing that the arbiter was the same one as before, he cracked with the wise.
"Fancy seeing you here. One more rescue from giant unstoppable forces today, and you get a fourth one free!"
You can't spell Slaughter without laughter
All your gonna do is just farm behemoths anyways.
My thoughts on November 30.
Deus Ex Machinas. They were very funny things. Cynic was a very adaptable person. He had set limits that he always obeyed. Sometimes though, he had to put up with people who went far above and beyond their rights, and so Cynic didn't mind doing it from time to time himself, in order to level the playing field.
He had ordered 4 portals. Not 2.
Both of the escapees were immediately jumped by the other 2 completely untouched Arachnos groups, both of whom had gotten their bearings straight before their prey had broken loose from the encirclement, and both of which had come right out of Ouroboros portals LITERALLY the second the 2 had made their moves and started running. They were attacked mercilessly from all sides, blasted from above by dozens of arcs and bolts of vicious Mu magicks, accompanied by a huge assault by Bane spiders striking from every direction, maces flashing through the air, and aimed at with precise blows from the deadly Night Widows who had moved literally like shadows that greedily devoured retreating light, and who did not appear to be perturbed in the slightest by the sudden cut in their mental powers. Night Widows were famed for their physical prowess, after all, not just their psionic capabilities. The various magical attacks from the Mu Mystics channeled around their allies almost as if the attacks themselves were alive, making it impossible for friendly fire to occur.
That wasn't all though.
Who else should decide to emerge from a brand new Ouroboros portal except Commander Cynic, his drones *minus the assault bot*, and the pissed off survivors of the Antis attack? Well, them, obviously. That was the thing about Ouroboros portals. They stuck around, ready to be used at a moment's notice. When everything had gone to hell, Cynic and his crew had just slipped back through the portals, spent a good 10 minutes patching up back at Ouroboros, and come out the other side completely refreshed and ready to step right back in front of their targets. The drones all immediately opened fire, their odd friendly fire feature allowing them to assault the two freaks of nature without harming their compatriots. Cynic even tossed in an energy burst from his Night staff.
This time, with intent to kill, or at least sufficiently maim. And THIS time, the Antis would NOT be coming to the aid of the Sky Commander unless they were as fast as light-Cynic had trapped one in a normal detention field that wouldn't cease to expire and ran a normal life of about 15 seconds, more then enough time for the prompt mauling-and the other two had to put up with the assault bot he had left behind who had started shooting off missiles and oblivion beams at the attackers the moment they had made their moves and made themselves known. In an absolute worst-case scenario, there was nothing stopping Cynic from placing anything that wasn't larger than an Ultra inside a detention field and just letting it stew.
Cynic was getting completely fed up with the entire thing-Giant monsters, THINGS that couldnt be dodged, aliens that were completely impossible to kill-He felt like he was stuck in a rut. And he hated it. There wasnt any reason he needed to chase these 2 this far, if only to try and prove that there were consequences for everything. But he was there, so Cynic was going to put absolutely EVERYTHING he had into this last assault, using every last available resource to kill off his opponents-hopefully even permanently. He couldnt go any further then this. This was the final limit to the resourcefulness and power that could be unleashed by the outclassed Commander. He merely hoped it was enough.
He also vaguely wondered if Tamesis was ok and whether or not Jake's battle with the Ultra was going well. He had a feeling that any of them would be lucky to get out of this damned rigged situation in one piece.
((Hey, Ac, I think there's a TP jammer field up. Just saying.))
((I dunno, that black sphere sounds like a dark gate to me. Could be wrong though, so up to yalls there. ))
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters
OOC: Gates are fine, it's only the *pop* kinda teleports that are being blocked right now. On-site gates and portals should still work.
((Yup, it's a Gate.))
You can't spell Slaughter without laughter
All your gonna do is just farm behemoths anyways.
My thoughts on November 30.
((Ah, well, OK then.))
Jake's shields were not to be taken lightly. They were possibly the most advanced portable technological method of defense in the world today. However, even they couldn't keep up their full effectiveness under the strain of both an energy disruptor, and a chemical explosion. The shields wavered under the stress, and, while they didn't give out completely, bits of the chemical explosion did get through. This was no problem, though. Very little skin showed on any Arachnos soldier, and in addition to their individual shields, no harm was done.
Jake pulled out six more of his small disk-like devices, throwing it on the ground and porting in a railgun himself. The combined portal and teleportation technology in the device allowed it to bypass the jamming field and bring in the heavy artillery. Soon enough, without the hail of bullets ever ceasing, Jake and his minions were operating the deadly weapons.
Without ever missing a beat, the sea of bullets changed to six identical rails flying toward the Ultra.
"Shut up. Less talky, more fighty."
The leeched energy washed over his outlined form, making Acanous glow an odd white-purple-black. He leaped for the Ultra's head, which seemed to be the only place that thermocannon wouldn't be able to hit (As it's back mounted >.>
He had seen it's startling resilliance, and so diddn't pull his punches- When he attacked, he tried pulling on every otherworldly energy he could find, slamming the Ultra with a few quick blows
(Shadow Punch, Smite Shadow Punch-Buzzsaw with Chance for NE and Chance for Lethal on Shadow Punch, and chance for NE on Smite >.> Works pretty well in game 
)
With the extra energy from the Soul Drain along with the chemical burns AND the chance of pulling extra damage, there was a pretty good chance the Ultra would feel this.
You can't spell Slaughter without laughter
All your gonna do is just farm behemoths anyways.
My thoughts on November 30.
"Holy...!" the Malta Operative barely managed to cry out before the tactical warhead detonated, showering the man with its chemical spray. It didn't take him but a moment to notice that the stuff ate right into his uniform and underlying ballistic armor, roaring into his radio as he dove for cover behind a control panel, "MHI! MHI!"
The crew of the Black Hawk hanging outside seemed unsure of what to do. They couldn't hose the place without annihilating Walsh as well, and that really would've put a dent in the success rate of a rescue operation - but neither could they allow some upstart meta to crash the party and perhaps nail the Arbiter.
Thus as the preparations of Acanous and Walsh took place, the operatives aboard the helo passed one of their own a long-barreled sniper rifle. It'd take them a few seconds to line up though, especially in the sickly-cyan fumes in there.
From just said haze suddenly roared a series of truly horrific sounds, a sickening staccato of squealing metal and popping weld seams. The obscurity didn't last long, however, and not a few moments after the rail guns had discharged, six metal rods could be seen reverberating in a huge tangle of metal in the manner of tuning forks.
The Ultra may have not been fast enough to do anything about the sudden rocket strike, but a quick analysis had showed the called-for weapons a potential threat. Rather than wait around for them to fire, it had torn a section from the floor and created a makeshift barricade of twisted metal, which had sucked the energy from the rods quite nicely simply by deformation.
A postmortem quickly showed this to be a grievous error, however, underscored by Acanous leaping forward. The rail guns had been but a distraction!
Battle conditions Veccer exceeded. Switch to reaction scenario Ivus.
Taking a step back to throw Acanous' arc out of whack, the Ultra intercepted the man with a palm strike, sending the hero so focused on offense that he'd neglected his defense right into a suspended monitor bank. It followed this up with a slice to the makeshift wall from its other hand's Kaiser blade, causing the amalgamation of warped metal to come crumbling down in the direction of the Arachnos forces. Corroded by the chemicals, there wasn't any way the barrier would hold up to another attack, and so it was likely put to better use as a weapon itself.
Of course, that didn't mean the Ultra's counterattack stopped there. It knew well the rail guns would be reloaded whether Jake and his robots ran from the wall or not, and still had a few tricks up its proverbial sleeves.
Such as a demagnetizer.
The projectile cannon gave report yet again, its shell bursting in a rather disappointing crackle after the brilliant fireworks of the last. Still, the effects wouldn't be any less visible - if the rail guns hadn't fired by now, they wouldn't again for a long time...
--------------------
Cynic had assumed too much. There was no deus ex machina here - just foresight, which came in many forms. One such form was of course having backup on call whenever one planned to be deep in hostile territory. It was common sense, really. The nature of said backup was of course not, but in terrain as gloomy and complex-looking as an Arachnos installation, backup that blended into such an environment was a choice of decent quality. Black on black could be hard to track, especially of it moved fast.
Another such form took the shape of a certain little device on the ground.
Still, Cynic's thoughts were completely correct in one point: foresight only went so far. Something was happening here that he hadn't accounted for - and if he didn't do so quickly, it might cost him much more than just victory.
By the time the pillar-powered portals had fully opened to disgorge their passengers, the two they pursued were already past them (though not by much), and the ellipsoid gave a sudden, high-pitched squeal. The sound persisted for all of an instant, then moved beyond the range of human hearing. Still, its apparent effect persisted in the visible realm - a pale-blue barrier of energy had jumped across the corridor, splitting the Arachnos attack force not quite down the middle, but still cutting those still near the portals off from the relatively few that had managed to make it across the device's imaginary demarcation line in time. Cynic and his drones were of the partition on the other side, and as his personal entourage fired, their blasts merely splashed into the shield.
The forces on the other side of course suffered no such impingements, though the blue-scaled draconian's weapon sought out its first target with eerie accuracy; like the guy had known his target would be there.
Said target was a Bane Spider, who really didn't much appreciate being so rudely used as a bowling ball as he went into a Mu mystic. This arcanist was of course even less appreciative, but oddly enough, the floating man didn't go zap-happy at the collision. Indeed, there didn't seem to be any spell-fueled lighting coursing about whatsoever. This was strange, to say the least. The mystics mumbled their spells no different than usual, but the desired responses to their words of power seemed to have a taken a five-minute break.
The staff-like weapon of course didn't stop there, describing an arc tilted toward the floor at a high angle. Propelled by two strong arms, this allowed for a quick and forceful sweep to both maces and legs, causing several Bane Spiders to tip like dominoes, their tight clustering only making this process easier.
The Night Widows might have been a problem, however. Even if hypothetically one knew where one's enemy would strike, if said enemy wasn't entirely herself, there really weren't any reasonable ways of predicting just where that strike would end up - and the Night Widows certainly weren't performing as Cynic would have wanted them to. They'd been conditioned to link with the minds of all about them, to use their mental prowess to gather information from both their allies and enemies, not to mention communicate with one another to form those incredibly efficient assassination squads the whole world feared.
All alone, sure they were competent martial artists and covert operatives, but their present situation could've been compared to any regular human having suddenly lost one of their most vital senses. After all, to them, that was what their minds stood as: another sense, and the one they relied upon most heavily.
In short, they could've been put side by side to blind snipers right about now, though if this made them less or more dangerous was up for debate.
A pained roar reverberated through the corridor as a toxin-laced blade gouged deeply into the blue-scaled hide of the Sky Commander, causing the draconian being to drop to his knees. By the closed eyes and clenched teeth, it was plainly visible he wasn't happy - and neither was his compatriot.
"Can I borrow you a moment?" came over the dark saurian's lips like a single word as he applied a dagor grip to the Night Widow's wrist, using the resulting leverage to catapult her into the tangle of Bane Spiders, eliciting several aggrieved gasps as the woman's blades made contact.
Still, that didn't account for the two other Night Widows that had slipped past the barrier before its activation, and the black-scaled saurian was still only one person. Luckily, he still had backup.
The Antis struck from above at the same time with horrific fervor, and the scene that presented itself to Cynic wasn't something for weak stomachs. They...wait a minute - hadn't the Commander trapped one in a detention field and given order to blast the others? Yes. Yes, he certainly had.
Looking up where he knew his detention field, Cynic saw only a steel girder in the thing. Why was there a girder in his field and not an enemy? Moreover, if there was an inanimate object in his detention field, what were the assault bot and survivors of the initial strike team shooting at?
The answers themselves were relatively obvious. First: the Anti he'd intended to trap hadn't been where Cynic remembered when he'd placed the detention field there after stepping out of his portal. Second: the jumble of 'efficiency is overrated' machinery that ran like overdimensional black spaghetti below the ceiling. Hopefully, said gnarls of metal were forgiving and wouldn't collapse on top of everyone. The Antis clearly hadn't stuck around to find out, and black on black was difficult to track, to say the least.
Of course, that hadn't been all. On the far side of the shield now dropped no less than fifteen Antis from the ceiling, the animalistic creatures moving like a pack of snakes that'd taken guidelines from wolf pack manuals. Peculiarly enough, they didn't actually strike at anyone, using only their presence as a weapon of shock and surprise. Like a gun barrel to the head of a human, the message was quite clear: 'move and we tear you apart'. Surely the Arachnos troops weren't about to forego their survival instincts and move with something that vicious-looking practically in spitting distance.
The two reptilians, however, were under no such restrictions. Though the Sky Commander's wound sat deep enough to force the use of his weapon as a crutch and the arm held over his side couldn't prevent a respectable trail of blood from following him, he reserved will enough for both to make it out the now nearby hole. Three of the Antis followed like greased lightning, but the twelve that remained didn't look like they had any intention of departing.
Whatever happened now, the ellipsoid emitter would reach its threshold in about two more seconds under the sustained fire of the Arachnos forces...
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters
The meaty metal-clad hand swatted him into the wall with the irrisistable force that reminded Acanous of Jack-in-irons back in Croatoa.
Absentmindedly he wondered who would win if the two of them got in a fight.
Still, that did little for his situation. Trusting his combat training, he spun a little in the air, connecting feet-first, using the momentum to bend his legs. Like a spring, he kicked out at the wall, taking some impact damage, but propelling him forwards.
The metal wall behind him cracked at the stress of Ac hitting it with a good deal of force in such a small area. Propably would have been fine if not for the chemicals eating away at it, but as it was, the pitted wall started to crumble.
Acanous, however, was watching for another swat attempt- or worse, that big heat cannon. His leap from the wall was a 70 degree angle from the Ultra, and he'd timed it so he could react with the next blast.
catching the floor only briefly to correct his angle, he tried coming at it from the most unexpected direction he could think of- below it.
Punishing his sore feet, he sprung low, like a baseball player. It looked like he was aiming for it's belly, but he was intending on pulling a slide to end up behind it.
You can't spell Slaughter without laughter
All your gonna do is just farm behemoths anyways.
My thoughts on November 30.
"What, you think your gear can prevent us from leaving?" the dark-scaled being retorted bemusedly, but his smile quickly disappeared as he saw the Sky Commander was still there.
"Uma Rom." the towering draconian answered the questioning look, which caused his black-scaled comrade's smile to somewhat return - as did the sudden and unorthodox of a Bane Spider Decimator.
With a loud, drawn-out scream, the powersuited man rocketed into and through the chamber in a course that could barely be recognized as a ballistic arc, tearing through Cynic's force bubble thanks to his still-active suit shielding. In less than a second, he'd cleared the CC center and crashed out the last intact window, then speared the tail of the Black Hawk that had been descending outside in twain.
The helicopter's rear went up in a brilliant fireball, shrapnel speeding away in all directions as the fuselage spun madly out of control, trailing a long plume of thick, black smoke as the aircraft hit the tarmac in flames, its main rotor chewing into the ground and right through a support van, utterly shredding the hapless vehicle.
Outside, the newly arrived heroes likely stood in perfect view of the spectacle, and thus may also have born witness to the second Malta helo pulling away from its cousin's fiery demise, the gunners partially out the main side doors hanging on by the skin of their teeth. The pilot had pulled a harrowing maneuver, heaving the heavy aircraft back up and skyward by a truly mad tilt of its main rotor that caused the craft's machines to echo within the CC with even more horrid tones than before.
Inside, however, the helicopters come to bail them out were now the least of the villains' worries, for in the entryway to the chamber now stood a monster.
Truly, the Ultra couldn't be described as anything else. Rising to nearly five meters, the armor-plated giant caused even the Sky Commander's stature to appear quite small, possessing almost twice the height of the blue-scaled draconian - and that was with the large, leathery wings, which the Ultra certainly didn't have any of. Indeed, the barely two meters of the dark saurian seemed almost dwarven in comparison to this thing.
If it hadn't stood hunched over forward, the Ultra might very well have had something in common with a certain Field Commander; double-sized to boot. It probably carried just as many spikes in about as many places, and the scales that more resembled a further coat of armor than anything else carried an almost blood-red hue.
However, that didn't mean its posture was the only difference to Groul. This thing wore more than just a sword strap and a few limb guards, and the pieces of protective plating that covered the Ultra almost like medieval armor could have stemmed right from the House of the Dead.
Though clearly artificial, the sections of armor bore an almost organic, flesh-grafted appearance that could very well have turned a weak stomach - and if that wasn't enough, chances stood high that its armaments certainly were. The dual artillery mount upon its back didn't sting upon the eye nearly as much as the blade bunkers that sat on the wrists of the Ultra's four-fingered hands; not to mention the piercing glare of its four pupilless eyes, arranged in pairs above one another where one would have expected single, normal oculae. Held in proportion, they appeared almost as slits through the sockets of the thing's scalp-guarding helm.
With no hesitation, the monstrous creature bellowed a titanic roar into the chamber, rattling anything not firmly attached to the floor in a seeming attempt to intimidate Cynic and Tamesis. A droplet-storm of drool thrashed from the gaping, tooth-rimmed maw, and not a second later the Ultra thrashed forward and into Cynic's force bubble, ignorant of the consequences.
What would happen now? Was the bubble rigid as a wall, or could it flex and give? Could the field even hold its own against such momentum? And if so, would the Commander be flung into the air as said momentum transferred to him?
Or would something entirely different come to pass...?
"If I had Force powers, vacuum or not my cape/clothes/hair would always be blowing in the Dramatic Wind." - Tenzhi
Characters