(( I finally finished this, it's been going since before Christmas and has finally been pushed into the light because I have something else in mind and wanted this out of the way before starting something vaguely similar.
Anyway, this is a sort of signature story for Nitoichi, who's name means 'Two Swords as One.' For those unaware, she has a split personality, the fighter, and the socialiser, but at around the time she hit level 50, the two really got their act together and began working together in the battlefield. On with the fiction... ))
Indestructible December 2008. Somewhere under the Rikti War Zone, Paragon City.
The Malta Group, a collection of black ops specialist, spies, infiltrators, and assassins. Their presence in the War Zone was an insult to just about everything human, since their purpose there was likely to be nothing more elevating than profit. This forward base was an example of just that kind of ethical endeavour, it had been placed to allow the operatives running it to infiltrate the Vanguard base, listen in on communications, and steal any Rikti technology they could get their hands on. In its two weeks of operation, the base had proven quite profitable. No useful technology had been uncovered, but several groups within the war zone had paid large amounts of money to get their hands on troop movement reports and Vanguard assault plans.
Black-Omega-Nine, the Special Qualification Marksman in overall charge of the site looked around at the dozen or so engineers and tactical operatives manning the consoles of the main control chamber and allowed himself a small smile. Being given this mission had been a coup for him, there had been a number of other contenders for the job and it had taken some manipulation to ensure that he was named leader.
"Sir?" One of the engineers spoke and Black-Omega-Nine turned to look at him. He was manning the internal security desk. The base had been constructed over the course of two months and equipped with every security measure Malta could come up with. This was the man currently overseeing the operation of all that equipment and he looked slightly concerned. "Unit Four-Alpha has failed to report in..." he paused, touching his hand to his ear. "False alarm. Battery failure in their field radio."
Nodding, Black-Omega-Nine cursed the rock the base was sunk into. It worked well to conceal their equipment from the Vanguard spooks, lead by Gaussian, but it also required them to use field radios linked through static relays mounted in the cavern ceilings. It was a new design and worked well, but the batteries had proven to be a major failing. He would mention it in his next report. Someone would be demoted, possibly finally, for that.
Nitoichi dropped the field radio handset onto Unit Four-Alpha's body. Well, at least the dopes don't seem to be using call signs, Annette remarked from within their joint head. Ni nodded and scanned the room they had come across with vision enhanced by a visor which had become more and more complex as time had gone on. When she had built the existing system into a helmet which could incorporate far more computing power and a more complex neural scanner, she had opened the door to both personalities using the systems, and that had made her that much more of an effective fighting machine.
In the vast darkness the two still used as their mindscape, Annette stood beside a glowing, holographic map table, plotting out the route they had so far taken through the base and the known courses they could take forward. "I see two possible exits," she said. "Right and straight on." Gaussian's instructions were pretty clear, Ni's voice echoed from the darkness. "Yeah, so it doesn't matter. None of them get out alive. Hit the right passage first. I have a feeling about it."
Nodding to herself, Ni re-engaged her stealth system and loped toward the corridor Annette had indicated on the map.
Unit Seventeen-Delta checked his Bio Energy Feedback Inducer for the third time in ten minutes. His colleague, Gamma, looked at him with an element of pity, somewhat hidden by his light intensifier goggles, and patted his assault rifle. "Look, Jake, between that toy of yours and my BFG, plus the two engineers and their turrets, even if some meta were to find this place, they'd be toast before they knew why they were lying on the floor."
Delta shrugged. "Pays to be ready, Mike. I figure Vanguard will be pretty [censored] if they ever find this place, and they'll send more than just one meta in to take us out. We're light on guards, you ask me."
"You're right," said a female voice from directly in front of them, "you are light on guards." Delta started raising the sapper unit to fire at the shape which was materialising out of thin air, it seemed. "But Vanguard didn't need to send more than one person," the voice continued. "I'm quite enough."
Delta's eyes filled with a flare of blue-green light as a Talsorian sword ignited into deadly life in front of him. The blade swept upward, slicing through the barrel of the sap-gun, and Delta's wrist. Delta screamed, spraying blood over Gamma's goggles even as bullets began to spew from the barrel of that man's rifle. Ni ducked under the stream, sweeping Gamma's legs out from under him and then slamming the back point of her left sword down through the Tactical Operative's Kevlar vest. Turning smoothly, she looked up at Delta and saw the look of horror on his face just before her other sword cut his throat. He fell, looking at the blank, featureless 'face' of Ni's visor, and then Ni was moving up the slope toward the sandbags the two Engineers had employed to try to provide some protection from attack.
They had already deployed an auto-turret which was spewing lead in her direction, and a pair of grenades landed to either side of her as Annette plotted a course through the tunnel which gave Ni the best chance of avoiding most of the bullets.
She could hear one of the Engineers on his radio, calling back to control, "confirmed, meta-human incursion. One female. Melee combatant..." He was cut off as Ni vaulted the sandbags and drove a sword through his chest.
"One female," Black-Omega-Nine snapped, "a lone fighter has been sent in here?"
"That's what the report said before Seventeen-Alpha was cut off, sir," the engineer replied.
"Deploy teams Nine and Sixteen to junction twenty-eight," the Gunslinger ordered. "Team Five to corridor fourteen, and get teams One, Six, Eighteen and Twenty in the marshalling room to set up a defensive perimeter." The engineer set about issuing orders while Black-Omega-Nine sat down at his desk and began to check his pistols.
I make that eight of them, Annette reported, Ni nodding in agreement, two Sappers, which is a bit of an irritation, and we're going to get at least one auto-turret deployed.
Ni appeared beside Annette in their shared mental space and examined the map. Annette smiled slightly and waved a hand, zooming the hologram in to show a 3D model of the junction they had come to. Ni pointed at the sandbag and rock emplacement one of the teams had formed. "If I go in over that, and take them out, what d'you think the chances are that we can get enough cover to regain stealth?"
Annette appeared to consider it. "Better than even. Best plan we've got anyway."
Ni nodded and faded back into the real world again. Talking a couple of loping strides, she dived forward, over the wall of sandbags, rolling once before igniting her two swords and plunging them through a Sapper's rib cage. Around her, all hell broke lose.
"Did the sensors detect nothing?" Black-Omega-Nine asked as the sounds of battle echoed down the tunnel toward him. "Did they pass their last calibration check?"
The engineer was busy, and rather irritated that his boss was asking useless questions while people were being slaughtered. "They passed this morning on the four-thirty standard equipment check. They detected nothing. She's a baseline."
Snarling, the Gunslinger pointed down the tunnel toward the battle. "Does that sound like a baseline human?"
"Nevertheless..." He paused and looked at a secondary monitor. "Positive ID," he said, "she's in our files: Nitoichi. As I said, baseline."
"A human with a pair of swords is ripping us apart?!" his shriek was made all the more harsh as the sounds of battle cut off suddenly just as he shouted. Engineers looked up at him from their consoles. Thumbing a button he roared into a microphone beside the engineer. "This is Black-Omega-Nine, I want Nitoichi stopped at all costs. Destroy her!"
The marshalling room lead directly to the control room, and it was crawling with Malta operatives. Gun turrets were already deployed, three Sappers stood at strategic locations where they could cover as much of the room as possible. The remainder were lower ranking gunslingers, and tactical operatives with a few engineers manning the turrets.
How many do you think? Ni asked silently.
Um... All of them? Annette replied.
You're a lot of use. Suggestions?
We've got those frag-grenades Vanguard keep handing out that we never use...
Ni smiled inside her helmet and began marking out target locations on the HUD, each one circled by a probable kill and stun radius. We're going to have to pull all the stops out, Annette remarked as she checked Ni's work.
I know. Are you ready? There was a little hint of challenge in Ni's voice.
Of course, this is what we trained for. Two Swords as One, remember?
Ni pulled four grenades from the back of her belt. I remember, she thought, and pulled the pins on the grenades.
The turrets opened up a second before the grenades went off and Ni launched herself forward through a hail of flying 7mm bullets. Annette tracked the fire streams and marked them off on the HUD for ease of avoidance. Ni charged into the room with, as far as the soldiers could tell, total disregard for the lead flying her way. Then someone yelled 'Grenade!' far too late and four loud blasts ripped through the room.
Two Sappers down, one turret badly damaged, most of the ground troops are stunned, Annette reported. Bullets whistled past Ni's ear, one whining off her shoulder armour. Not all of them, obviously.
Ni, took off from a container, leaping high into the air over the troops below. She twisted in mid-flight and tossed a fifth grenade down toward the man who had fired at her, but did not wait to see the result as she tucked quickly to avoid a stream of blue-white energy that missed her by a matter of inches. Then she was dropping to the ground again directly behind the Sapper who had fired it. He snarled and switched the weapon to taser-mode, drawing it back ready to drive it toward her as he turned. Ni's right-hand sword swept upward, carving through the power feed to his gun. The light in the firing chamber died and he struggled to get to his sidearm, a struggle which ended abruptly as Ni's sword punched through his body armour.
They're starting to come out of it, move! Ni was already moving. She charged into the group of stunned Malta, swords darting left and right. There was still at least one active turret, which Annette was keeping track of, and she had marked up the biggest remaining threat, a gunslinger who was coming out of the stun fast and already firing off some of his specialist munitions. Ni spun, her blades taking the legs out from under five tactical operatives and then rising to take the throat out of an engineer.
The gunslinger watched her move, trying his best to get an accurate target. It was not easy. Somehow a girl in some fancy, unpowered armour was avoiding almost everything that was thrown at her. He saw his shot and took it, two heavy slugs hitting her squarely in the lower ribs. She turned with the impact, her sword cutting through the flack jacket of one of the operatives behind her, and then just continued coming, totally ignoring having just been shot. He raised his pistols one more time, and Ni's sword appeared between them, heading straight for his face.
Rolling backwards, Ni came up in a crouch under the last gun turret and slammed her swords up through it. She was thankful of her helmet, which took most of the blast.
One last room, as best I can tell, Annette said. They are so going to be waiting for us. Probably at least a Hercules in there.
Yeah, and that hurt like hell, Ni replied. This isn't going to be easy. She stood, slowly, and edged toward the last tunnel section leading to the control room.
Wait up! What's that?"
What?
The box, there, beside that Sapper you wasted. Open it.
Ni knelt down beside the long, thin container, unlatched it and pushed the top open. She grinned. Oh cool, can we keep it?
Nah, it deserves to be set free, dontcha think?
Black-Omega-Nine looked over at the reassuring bulk of the Zeus Titan standing near the control consoles and listened to the silence.
Beside him, the engineer picked up his rifle and set it to full-auto. "Our turn," he said.
"She won't find it quite so easy to get in here. Are the Claymores armed?" the Marksman asked.
Nodding, the engineer checked the camera in the tunnel one last time before shrugging and walking toward the Titan. Behind him, the camera screen suddenly whited out and then went black. He turned his head, frowning, at a sound a little like cloth being torn in two.
Something moving very fast, and trailing smoke and flame, came out of the tunnel entrance headed straight for the Zeus. The cyborg tank began raising its arm canon, but it was far too late and the rocket smashed into its chest. Most of the blast was directed straight through the robot body, blasting a huge cone of molten metal and shrapnel into the control room consoles, wiping out everyone in its path. The blast, however, smashed the engineer into a wall, threw the gunslinger off his feet, and set off the claymore mines around the entrance.
Nitoichi came through the fog of smoke and grit like an avenging angel, 'wings' of energy trailing behind her, ready to sweep forward and deal death. There were only two targets remaining, and one of those, the engineer, was eliminated by a thrown, metal spike which punched through his left eye. She landed, moving rapidly toward the base leader as he swung his guns up and fired. A bullet smacked into her helmet and the HUD inside flickered as her head was thrown back. Two more gunshots. One round hit her chest plate, throwing her off-balance and sideways, while the other caused a screaming track of pain through her left side. She tumbled, landing on the floor in a crumpled heap and remaining still.
Rising to his feet, Black-Omega-Nine drew a bead on her prone form, squinting. She remained still, his helmet sensors informing him that she had no heartbeat, and he lowered the guns, moving backward toward a console. He took his attention away from Ni's body to push several buttons, trying to get the communications system active enough to call for extraction.
"How bad is it?" Ni said, standing beside Annette in their war room.
"It would've been a through-and-through if the armour hadn't stopped it going out," Annette replied. "We've had worse, but we may need to visit the med bay when we get back."
"We going again then?" Ni smirked.
"I think we've got the energy for a little payback," Annette replied, grinning. "Reboot in three, two..."
Ni pulled herself slowly to her feet, adrenaline pumping through her body like a drug as she rose from the apparent dead. The HUD image kicked back into life with a flicker and she located the leader, beside a console. She turned, activating her swords.
Black-Omega-Nine's eyes widened as he saw her turn toward him. "You were dead!" he yelled, raising his pistols. "Why can't you just die!"
Ni stepped forward, pushing her arms toward him in what seemed like slow motion. The two swords slid between his raised arms, through his body armour, and into his chest with no obvious effort. He coughed and spat up blood. Then she ripped the blades out sideways and he crumpled to the floor, his pistols firing wildly at the rock walls of the room.
"I can't do that," Ni said to the cooling body, "Linda would kill me."
Disclaimer: The above may be humerous, or at least may be an attempt at humour. Try reading it that way.
Posts are OOC unless noted to be IC, or in an IC thread.
Posted
((Don't know if you want comments, but I thought that was bloody fantastic!
Posted
(( Always happy to get comments. And thank you. ))
Disclaimer: The above may be humerous, or at least may be an attempt at humour. Try reading it that way.
Posts are OOC unless noted to be IC, or in an IC thread.
(( I finally finished this, it's been going since before Christmas and has finally been pushed into the light because I have something else in mind and wanted this out of the way before starting something vaguely similar.
Anyway, this is a sort of signature story for Nitoichi, who's name means 'Two Swords as One.' For those unaware, she has a split personality, the fighter, and the socialiser, but at around the time she hit level 50, the two really got their act together and began working together in the battlefield. On with the fiction... ))
Indestructible
December 2008. Somewhere under the Rikti War Zone, Paragon City.
The Malta Group, a collection of black ops specialist, spies, infiltrators, and assassins. Their presence in the War Zone was an insult to just about everything human, since their purpose there was likely to be nothing more elevating than profit. This forward base was an example of just that kind of ethical endeavour, it had been placed to allow the operatives running it to infiltrate the Vanguard base, listen in on communications, and steal any Rikti technology they could get their hands on. In its two weeks of operation, the base had proven quite profitable. No useful technology had been uncovered, but several groups within the war zone had paid large amounts of money to get their hands on troop movement reports and Vanguard assault plans.
Black-Omega-Nine, the Special Qualification Marksman in overall charge of the site looked around at the dozen or so engineers and tactical operatives manning the consoles of the main control chamber and allowed himself a small smile. Being given this mission had been a coup for him, there had been a number of other contenders for the job and it had taken some manipulation to ensure that he was named leader.
"Sir?" One of the engineers spoke and Black-Omega-Nine turned to look at him. He was manning the internal security desk. The base had been constructed over the course of two months and equipped with every security measure Malta could come up with. This was the man currently overseeing the operation of all that equipment and he looked slightly concerned. "Unit Four-Alpha has failed to report in..." he paused, touching his hand to his ear. "False alarm. Battery failure in their field radio."
Nodding, Black-Omega-Nine cursed the rock the base was sunk into. It worked well to conceal their equipment from the Vanguard spooks, lead by Gaussian, but it also required them to use field radios linked through static relays mounted in the cavern ceilings. It was a new design and worked well, but the batteries had proven to be a major failing. He would mention it in his next report. Someone would be demoted, possibly finally, for that.
Nitoichi dropped the field radio handset onto Unit Four-Alpha's body. Well, at least the dopes don't seem to be using call signs, Annette remarked from within their joint head. Ni nodded and scanned the room they had come across with vision enhanced by a visor which had become more and more complex as time had gone on. When she had built the existing system into a helmet which could incorporate far more computing power and a more complex neural scanner, she had opened the door to both personalities using the systems, and that had made her that much more of an effective fighting machine.
In the vast darkness the two still used as their mindscape, Annette stood beside a glowing, holographic map table, plotting out the route they had so far taken through the base and the known courses they could take forward. "I see two possible exits," she said. "Right and straight on." Gaussian's instructions were pretty clear, Ni's voice echoed from the darkness. "Yeah, so it doesn't matter. None of them get out alive. Hit the right passage first. I have a feeling about it."
Nodding to herself, Ni re-engaged her stealth system and loped toward the corridor Annette had indicated on the map.
Unit Seventeen-Delta checked his Bio Energy Feedback Inducer for the third time in ten minutes. His colleague, Gamma, looked at him with an element of pity, somewhat hidden by his light intensifier goggles, and patted his assault rifle. "Look, Jake, between that toy of yours and my BFG, plus the two engineers and their turrets, even if some meta were to find this place, they'd be toast before they knew why they were lying on the floor."
Delta shrugged. "Pays to be ready, Mike. I figure Vanguard will be pretty [censored] if they ever find this place, and they'll send more than just one meta in to take us out. We're light on guards, you ask me."
"You're right," said a female voice from directly in front of them, "you are light on guards." Delta started raising the sapper unit to fire at the shape which was materialising out of thin air, it seemed. "But Vanguard didn't need to send more than one person," the voice continued. "I'm quite enough."
Delta's eyes filled with a flare of blue-green light as a Talsorian sword ignited into deadly life in front of him. The blade swept upward, slicing through the barrel of the sap-gun, and Delta's wrist. Delta screamed, spraying blood over Gamma's goggles even as bullets began to spew from the barrel of that man's rifle. Ni ducked under the stream, sweeping Gamma's legs out from under him and then slamming the back point of her left sword down through the Tactical Operative's Kevlar vest. Turning smoothly, she looked up at Delta and saw the look of horror on his face just before her other sword cut his throat. He fell, looking at the blank, featureless 'face' of Ni's visor, and then Ni was moving up the slope toward the sandbags the two Engineers had employed to try to provide some protection from attack.
They had already deployed an auto-turret which was spewing lead in her direction, and a pair of grenades landed to either side of her as Annette plotted a course through the tunnel which gave Ni the best chance of avoiding most of the bullets.
She could hear one of the Engineers on his radio, calling back to control, "confirmed, meta-human incursion. One female. Melee combatant..." He was cut off as Ni vaulted the sandbags and drove a sword through his chest.
"One female," Black-Omega-Nine snapped, "a lone fighter has been sent in here?"
"That's what the report said before Seventeen-Alpha was cut off, sir," the engineer replied.
"Deploy teams Nine and Sixteen to junction twenty-eight," the Gunslinger ordered. "Team Five to corridor fourteen, and get teams One, Six, Eighteen and Twenty in the marshalling room to set up a defensive perimeter." The engineer set about issuing orders while Black-Omega-Nine sat down at his desk and began to check his pistols.
I make that eight of them, Annette reported, Ni nodding in agreement, two Sappers, which is a bit of an irritation, and we're going to get at least one auto-turret deployed.
Ni appeared beside Annette in their shared mental space and examined the map. Annette smiled slightly and waved a hand, zooming the hologram in to show a 3D model of the junction they had come to. Ni pointed at the sandbag and rock emplacement one of the teams had formed. "If I go in over that, and take them out, what d'you think the chances are that we can get enough cover to regain stealth?"
Annette appeared to consider it. "Better than even. Best plan we've got anyway."
Ni nodded and faded back into the real world again. Talking a couple of loping strides, she dived forward, over the wall of sandbags, rolling once before igniting her two swords and plunging them through a Sapper's rib cage. Around her, all hell broke lose.
"Did the sensors detect nothing?" Black-Omega-Nine asked as the sounds of battle echoed down the tunnel toward him. "Did they pass their last calibration check?"
The engineer was busy, and rather irritated that his boss was asking useless questions while people were being slaughtered. "They passed this morning on the four-thirty standard equipment check. They detected nothing. She's a baseline."
Snarling, the Gunslinger pointed down the tunnel toward the battle. "Does that sound like a baseline human?"
"Nevertheless..." He paused and looked at a secondary monitor. "Positive ID," he said, "she's in our files: Nitoichi. As I said, baseline."
"A human with a pair of swords is ripping us apart?!" his shriek was made all the more harsh as the sounds of battle cut off suddenly just as he shouted. Engineers looked up at him from their consoles. Thumbing a button he roared into a microphone beside the engineer. "This is Black-Omega-Nine, I want Nitoichi stopped at all costs. Destroy her!"
The marshalling room lead directly to the control room, and it was crawling with Malta operatives. Gun turrets were already deployed, three Sappers stood at strategic locations where they could cover as much of the room as possible. The remainder were lower ranking gunslingers, and tactical operatives with a few engineers manning the turrets.
How many do you think? Ni asked silently.
Um... All of them? Annette replied.
You're a lot of use. Suggestions?
We've got those frag-grenades Vanguard keep handing out that we never use...
Ni smiled inside her helmet and began marking out target locations on the HUD, each one circled by a probable kill and stun radius. We're going to have to pull all the stops out, Annette remarked as she checked Ni's work.
I know. Are you ready? There was a little hint of challenge in Ni's voice.
Of course, this is what we trained for. Two Swords as One, remember?
Ni pulled four grenades from the back of her belt. I remember, she thought, and pulled the pins on the grenades.
The turrets opened up a second before the grenades went off and Ni launched herself forward through a hail of flying 7mm bullets. Annette tracked the fire streams and marked them off on the HUD for ease of avoidance. Ni charged into the room with, as far as the soldiers could tell, total disregard for the lead flying her way. Then someone yelled 'Grenade!' far too late and four loud blasts ripped through the room.
Two Sappers down, one turret badly damaged, most of the ground troops are stunned, Annette reported. Bullets whistled past Ni's ear, one whining off her shoulder armour. Not all of them, obviously.
Ni, took off from a container, leaping high into the air over the troops below. She twisted in mid-flight and tossed a fifth grenade down toward the man who had fired at her, but did not wait to see the result as she tucked quickly to avoid a stream of blue-white energy that missed her by a matter of inches. Then she was dropping to the ground again directly behind the Sapper who had fired it. He snarled and switched the weapon to taser-mode, drawing it back ready to drive it toward her as he turned. Ni's right-hand sword swept upward, carving through the power feed to his gun. The light in the firing chamber died and he struggled to get to his sidearm, a struggle which ended abruptly as Ni's sword punched through his body armour.
They're starting to come out of it, move! Ni was already moving. She charged into the group of stunned Malta, swords darting left and right. There was still at least one active turret, which Annette was keeping track of, and she had marked up the biggest remaining threat, a gunslinger who was coming out of the stun fast and already firing off some of his specialist munitions. Ni spun, her blades taking the legs out from under five tactical operatives and then rising to take the throat out of an engineer.
The gunslinger watched her move, trying his best to get an accurate target. It was not easy. Somehow a girl in some fancy, unpowered armour was avoiding almost everything that was thrown at her. He saw his shot and took it, two heavy slugs hitting her squarely in the lower ribs. She turned with the impact, her sword cutting through the flack jacket of one of the operatives behind her, and then just continued coming, totally ignoring having just been shot. He raised his pistols one more time, and Ni's sword appeared between them, heading straight for his face.
Rolling backwards, Ni came up in a crouch under the last gun turret and slammed her swords up through it. She was thankful of her helmet, which took most of the blast.
One last room, as best I can tell, Annette said. They are so going to be waiting for us. Probably at least a Hercules in there.
Yeah, and that hurt like hell, Ni replied. This isn't going to be easy. She stood, slowly, and edged toward the last tunnel section leading to the control room.
Wait up! What's that?"
What?
The box, there, beside that Sapper you wasted. Open it.
Ni knelt down beside the long, thin container, unlatched it and pushed the top open. She grinned. Oh cool, can we keep it?
Nah, it deserves to be set free, dontcha think?
Black-Omega-Nine looked over at the reassuring bulk of the Zeus Titan standing near the control consoles and listened to the silence.
Beside him, the engineer picked up his rifle and set it to full-auto. "Our turn," he said.
"She won't find it quite so easy to get in here. Are the Claymores armed?" the Marksman asked.
Nodding, the engineer checked the camera in the tunnel one last time before shrugging and walking toward the Titan. Behind him, the camera screen suddenly whited out and then went black. He turned his head, frowning, at a sound a little like cloth being torn in two.
Something moving very fast, and trailing smoke and flame, came out of the tunnel entrance headed straight for the Zeus. The cyborg tank began raising its arm canon, but it was far too late and the rocket smashed into its chest. Most of the blast was directed straight through the robot body, blasting a huge cone of molten metal and shrapnel into the control room consoles, wiping out everyone in its path. The blast, however, smashed the engineer into a wall, threw the gunslinger off his feet, and set off the claymore mines around the entrance.
Nitoichi came through the fog of smoke and grit like an avenging angel, 'wings' of energy trailing behind her, ready to sweep forward and deal death. There were only two targets remaining, and one of those, the engineer, was eliminated by a thrown, metal spike which punched through his left eye. She landed, moving rapidly toward the base leader as he swung his guns up and fired. A bullet smacked into her helmet and the HUD inside flickered as her head was thrown back. Two more gunshots. One round hit her chest plate, throwing her off-balance and sideways, while the other caused a screaming track of pain through her left side. She tumbled, landing on the floor in a crumpled heap and remaining still.
Rising to his feet, Black-Omega-Nine drew a bead on her prone form, squinting. She remained still, his helmet sensors informing him that she had no heartbeat, and he lowered the guns, moving backward toward a console. He took his attention away from Ni's body to push several buttons, trying to get the communications system active enough to call for extraction.
"How bad is it?" Ni said, standing beside Annette in their war room.
"It would've been a through-and-through if the armour hadn't stopped it going out," Annette replied. "We've had worse, but we may need to visit the med bay when we get back."
"We going again then?" Ni smirked.
"I think we've got the energy for a little payback," Annette replied, grinning. "Reboot in three, two..."
Ni pulled herself slowly to her feet, adrenaline pumping through her body like a drug as she rose from the apparent dead. The HUD image kicked back into life with a flicker and she located the leader, beside a console. She turned, activating her swords.
Black-Omega-Nine's eyes widened as he saw her turn toward him. "You were dead!" he yelled, raising his pistols. "Why can't you just die!"
Ni stepped forward, pushing her arms toward him in what seemed like slow motion. The two swords slid between his raised arms, through his body armour, and into his chest with no obvious effort. He coughed and spat up blood. Then she ripped the blades out sideways and he crumpled to the floor, his pistols firing wildly at the rock walls of the room.
"I can't do that," Ni said to the cooling body, "Linda would kill me."
Disclaimer: The above may be humerous, or at least may be an attempt at humour. Try reading it that way.
Posts are OOC unless noted to be IC, or in an IC thread.