RP: OIF Atuan [OIF Atuan] Episode 7: Mine

Re: Episode 7: Mine

"Aww, you still have food Lucien?!" Yoshiko yelped in shock. "No fair!....I gobbled all mine up already..." she mumbled to herself. Meanwhile, the wounded team leader tried in vain to find something more comfortable.

"Yeah, it doesn't look so hot now that I'm not anemic," the Nepleslian remarked to the Neko of their team. "And No idea man, no idea," Kelly replied to Mark's question. The dark skinned Nepleslian tried to slip around in the tight, confined quarters to see just how much he would, but quickly grimaced in pain. "Yeah, I don't think so," he grunted. "Yoshiko, get us started would you?"

"Yeah, yeah! And good idea Victoria - point defense team, hang back and let us go down first. Leap right down if you see we're in trouble and can't scratch our backs, ok?" the Ex-Neko ordered the people about with plenty of pep. "Everyone else, we're going in!"

It was a much more boring affair than they all thought.

"All passengers, please keep your hands and feet inside the elevator at all times," came a rather neutral voice from above. "HIGA Industrial Corporation does not hold itself responsible for injury, loss of limb or life resulting from failure to comply. Have a nice day." From their perspective of the slow moving, rumbling elevator, the outlook for the company and its employees seemed rather grim even before the Origin Team arrived. But before anyone could comment though, they all got their first glimpse of it all.

The elevator car descended down onto an eerily quiet scene - rows upon rows of assembly lines stood, all cold and motionless. Numerous half built frames could be seen partly completed as they had been built piece by piece, part by part. Torsos, arms and limbs hung suspended overhead, while others sat on the paths they were to travel. Several of them were of the Ashigaru design, some seemingly partly built as close as possible to original standards on the assembly line before it was, for some inexplicable reason, shut down.

Yet, other designs could be seen too, as the scissoring doors slid open. There were the numerous chicken-walkers that they had seen earlier, and even a few lonely lines for Zilant class frames which loomed, even half built, like the giants they were. Those seemed long untouched, their production ceased long ago and dusty. Yet, there was something newer than all of this - shining, glistening like the hide of bugs.

Out of the many lines of Ashigaru, each line more and more simplified and streamlined for production, stood these eery things. Black insectid like plates made of ADNR, smooth featureless faces without eyes and hands that ended in sharp clawed fingernails. These half completed hulks were perhaps the very beginning of something else entirely, and they were there to see it.

"Ok everyone, let's fan out and go down all the aisles - it's pretty pointless to just blow it all up if we don't even try to scrub their systems of the prints," Yoshiko spoke, the following Impulses landing behind the team of Frames as they filed out. The power armors quickly did just that, dashing past their legs like knee high action figures. "We need to find a control center or something I think." As she said this, Kelly only wondered one thing.

'What happened to the team that was supposed to have done all this while we were making a mess?'

Re: Episode 7: Mine

"This is so obviously a set-up. I mean, they're clearly going to have something horrible activate straight off the production line, and then we'll have to fight through it and take even more damage than we already have. Mark, keep an eye on those production lines - especially those weird looking ones. I wouldn't trust them further than Kelly's dirty thoughts can reach. Oh wait, he's in here with us. Sorry, Kelly."

The neko's words rattled off quickly as a machine gun, as if there was no time to lose. To be fair, there was a massive horde just upstairs, but there was no real immediate threat. A reloading of her 75mm rifle took place while she spoke, preparing for the most assuredly imminent and sudden encounter to take place in the near future.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

Mark complied, and ran a full sensor sweep of the entire plant from either side of Kelly's bloodied body.

"Oh yeah, honey, and we gonna be like, 'Dayum. If dat's what one of these suckahs does... and they're mass-producing the sons of bitches... hell no.' all over the place." Mark agreed. His hands did things to buttons while his spoke, squeeze a knob here and there while he speculated. "And, and maybe later, later we get ourselves one of them and it's like, 'BAM! Muthafucka's! Have a taste of your medicine!' and shit."

Re: Episode 7: Mine

"Keep all arms 'n legs inside th' ride 'cos we're too cheap t' replace yer body if ya lose it." Lucien mimicked the speakers in falsetto, crossing his eyes and sticking his tongue out.

"Then its logical aye? Blow up the factory, not the shit its makin'." Lucien shrugged and failed to see what the big deal was about smashing an assembly line. After all, if one part of the line failed the product would not work as intended. It would have missing parts, overtightened/loose bolts, incorrect wiring, or the AI is programmed to sing nursery rhymes rather than combat data.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

Viktoria took her own assembly-line and slowly walked along it. With one of her sensor-eyes damaged, she was limited. But her optics were fine so she could still notice things with her good old abwehran eyes. Stuff like explosives, traps, wires and enemy mecha on ceiling. She was rather limited with movement between the assembly lines and clattered half-finished mechas around. That was reason why she decided to hold one of the small 50 mm gausses and chain-straight.

"Diese platz is creepy is it nicht?" She said to others, looking around for any threat. "Also, warum we just take this place over. Money to be had ist here. Origin could upgrade und manufacture the giants."

Re: Episode 7: Mine

Kelly himself reached into the kit that Mark had handed him - since it was actually his own, from when he was originally piloting it himself, the medications inside were a prime selection that went above and beyond the standard. Or, so the supply clerk said. The dark skinned Nepleslian reached in and grabbed something to ease back the pain that was rapidly climbing again and injected himself.

Just in time to reply to Taela.

"Naaaaaaaaw!" he started, voice drawn out uncomfortably. "I'm not perverted - I mean uh, why would I be interested in you Taela? Your chest is a pirate's dream. Sunken, yaknowwhatImeanyeah?"

"K-Kelly?" a voice came over the comms. "Are you ok? You're broadcasting some...really weird stuff," Yoshiko commented. Her frame's hand gestured, pointed out over an area further back for the power armors to move towards as she worried over endless line after line of puppets hanging on strings.

"It'sallwriiiiiiiiiiiight!" Kelly went on. "Yeahhhhh...we're going to blow this place up, yeah guys - bam, mothafuckahs! Jam it all up so the things they make look like one of those Mr. Macho-Spud toys!" He crowed.

"Uh....Maaaark!" Yoshiko yelled, instinctively doing so over her shoulder. "Switch over with him or something fast!" the Ex-Neko suggested. "He might accidentally - "

"We've found something!" yet another voice called over the comms. The transmission came from the Impulse escorts she had sent into the deeper confines their frames couldn't get to at all. "It's the Infiltration team, they're right in the building somewhere!" he went on in shock at the coordinates displayed. "They're in the network with us - I'm patching them through!"

"Sshahasfashk - Executive Floor, we're in the Executive Floor in the tower!" a woman's voice yelled at them all, her words instantly making them recall the scout which had previously followed the apathetic Sgt. with a hot poker. "We're corned and getting pushed into the saferoom, but as soon as they get us in there, we're just some fancy canned sardines for them, but look at what we found! Take this, and go! Just get out of - " the video cut to static, but another one quickly took its place.

"Good. That's good," Muramaki Kensuke started. "If you successfully lower the worth of Origin's stocks, Origin Armor Works in particular, we will be able to manage a split off and merge with your company."

"Yes, and if we're lucky, we'll even soften up Origin in the process, letting us get back into the market all that easier," a woman's voice commented. "Leave the stealing of the initial test models, as well as the destruction of the pursuit team to us. It should be no problem considering they're the first of the series anyways," the HIGA representative remarked casually.

And with that, the transmission of the recording ended, and the facility came to life. Just as Taela predicted.

"Ha-HA! Pettanko-Neko called it! She gets a tuna when we get back!" Kelly laughed, high and off his rocker on pain-meds. The very first jet black frames were already starting coming off the line, six in total in these close quarters. Lined up neatly at the end of the line, their heads all turned in unison to face the pilots of Atuan, pinning them between the small control center the power armors were in, and the drones themselves.

They charged, wrist autocannons blazing and claws extending into wickedly long lengths.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

"Kelly, if this mission doesn't kill you, I WILL!" Taela snarled, glancing back to the nepleslian just as the broadcast came in. Of course, she was right. She hated being right. She hated a lot of things right now.

When the production line started up, Taela was prepared for this nonsense and fired as the machines were starting up, hopefully causing some lines to collapse.

"Stop this stupid BULLSHIT!" She snarled over comms. It was at this time that her elbow slipped and hit a button on Mark's side of the console, causing a certain song to play, not only on their comms, but on all available radio frequencies.

Utterly, eerily calm for just a moment, the neko whispered, "I'm not going to ask about why that song is there. I will just kill everybody now."

Re: Episode 7: Mine

"Sorry, sugar," Mark moaned, though he didn't make any effort to lower the volume of the music, "I got eclectic tastes, cutie-pie, and this song is one of my Yamataian favorites."

The lower-half of the chocolate Siamese twin wormed his arms around his superior and twitched a finger across the sensor display, searching for any basic idea of the enemy sensor configuration-- after all, they didn't seem to have windows on their cockpits. Any little trick might be worth trying once.

"Don't feel so bad about it, anyhow," Mark encouraged Taela as she went about her spree of destruction, "You got a great body, Kitty, just b'cause it's yours. You should love the way you look and be proud of all them curves-- no matter how big or small. In case you hadn't peeked back here, both of us a flatter than you, Kitty."

Some device in the back of the cockpit beeped its agreement loudly and repeatedly until Mark attended to it and adjusted his settings. With his eyes now fixed firmly on the controls, he mumbled, distractedly, "Don't 'chu worry yo pretty lil' head, now. You got this."

Re: Episode 7: Mine

Viktoria manoeuvred her frame behind piece of heavy machinery that was part of the assembly line. Her sword went back to her side as her smaller gauss weapon in her hand fired at the nearest enemy. Her other hand meanwhile armed itself with the large pump-action gauss beast.

"Ja, ja," Viki replied over the line. "Size of breasts does not matter meine liebe Taela! You can do really well in bed with small breasts too. I had many liebe frauen with small breasts in my time. They were all delicious. Just ignore picky bastards who like big ones."

Nothing like talking about tits, when bullets were streaming by. Hosltering her smaller gun, Viki peeked out with her 300mm gauss shotgun ready, aiming it well at the nearest enemy Frame and firing. Viki started playing her own song as she started sending large caliber projectile after projectile.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

He recognised that voice. Wasn't that the voice of that guy who gave them the briefing?

"Ae Kensuke ya rat bastard its gunna be yer funeral now ya top knot fuckwit wiv an arse 'o grass 'n..." Lucien's voice went from coherent swearing to incoherent swearing to something that was just plain Neanderthal as his accent became thicker and thicker as he was addressing the Origin leader directly.

He watched the facility start up and the lights come on and something turned in his mind, and he snapped his fingers as he watched his companions attack the frames - but not where they were coming from. Instead he opted to start firing at the production and supply lines that assembled each HiGA knockoff that Kensuke could throw at them.

Eventually his voice bent back around from being Neanderthal to plain Scottish again as he was cleaving through a conveyor line of half-assembled somethings. His nomenclature was eluding him as he continued streaming babbling profanities.

"...they'll sodomise ye with a fockin' melon!" Lucien might have been either referring to Aerin Tatst and her vengeance, the rest of the Origin board when they found him, the rest of the Frame Team or the NMX - all were likely candidates for delivering the aforementioned melon sodomy against Muramaki.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

Unlike in the movies, the factory machines didn't explode in fireballs when Taela and Lucien fired - they shattered as autocannon rounds smashed through the machinery. Half built frames remained half built, the upper, completed torsos dropping to the floor as they came to life. Like the undead, the newly made, bisected frames started to crawl across the floor at the frame team!

Victoria's three hundred millimeter cannon boomed once at the leading frame as it charged her - the Black Ashigaru's autocannon arm deftly moved over its chest, sacrificing the limb so it had time to get even closer. Like obsidian, the armor shattered at the wrist, the entire limb being blown off as the round continued on through both faces of armor before detonating on the other side, sprinkling the hard, brittle hull with fragments.

As her gun cocked, the devilish machine leaped forward, the woman's cannon booming - a large hole materialized in the machine's chest, but it lashed out with its insidiously long claws, skewering Victoria's frame at the waist with several of the fingers before it died at her feet. Hull punctured, tritium fuel started to slowly leak inside the Abwehran woman's frame!

To her credit, Yoshiko burst forward, kicking the dead enemy out and away from her teammate while extending her own blades. The pink frame quickly lashed out and parried two of the charging Black Ashigarus, holding them up with her wild strikes, but three more slipped by her. "Look out! I can't stop them all!"

Taela's frame, holding all three of the hapless pilots, was quickly set on by on of the enemy mechs - she swung the rifle back in its direction, as its autocannon got her attention, but only ended up blocking a slash of its vicious claws. The machine instead grappled with the Neko's frame, seeking to tear her weapon away. Face to face, a faint glow of a single eye could be seen through under its faceless helm. "Aw shit man, I don't like this movie - I want my money back!" the anesthetized Kelly yelled in panic, one of his hands hitting a button.

A lonely Kirin Feather fell to the ground with a ground shaking 'KLONK!'

Lucien found himself set on by the remaining two frames as they jockeyed to get a good angle on him to cut and tear - having the machine pistol in one and the sword in the other, he was barely able to keep them back! As his sword parried, the Actor-Turned-Mecha-Pilot's aim floated about at the constantly shifting enemies, the crosshairs on his HUD shifting from Red to Green, back and forward as both friend and foe came and went across his sight!

"Dance fuckers!" a woman's voice yelled over the comms at them all.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

"I'll dance, you stupid bimbo!" Taela ineffectually spat, shifting her grip on the gun. One hand held the front while the other let go of the handle, allowing the enemy's hand to accidentally slip forwards. The freed hand tracked the arm until it was extended, then slammed it's claws into the elbow, effectually breaking the straightened limb like some sort of wrestler would in an arm hold. The difference was, instead of one sweaty man holding another sweaty man's outstretched arm on the ground, it was one maching using a gun to straighten the offensive limb.

Meanwhile, the pulse weapons, phased array visor, and autocannons plowed into the Ashigaru in front of her.

"Mark, if you've got anything left of those feathers, now would be the time to use them!"

Re: Episode 7: Mine

"Yeah!" Mark shouted over the din, "Let's drive it home with some fuckin' suicide shit!"

And then, he smacked the same button Kelly had, this time running his fingers across a series of sliders on the other side of the cockpit. The Feathers fell out and darted forward before hitting the ground. Even in the tight space of the factory, there was enough wiggle room to make one run in a given direction before being forced to hit a wall, or so Mark figured. He directed each Feather right at the chest or back of the nearest black Death-frame, all with instructions to unload all ordinance and the die for The Cause-- planting themselves into the monstrosities with their deadly blades.

The lonely Feather on the ground wiggled and rolled about as its brothers made their way to their deaths.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

"Ae tha's jus' not right." Lucien mumbled as he watched the half-built knockoff frames crawl towards him - all they really had with them was half a power supply, no mobility and they were guided by a suicidal artificial intelligence - perhaps intentionally so. At least Lucien had some cold comfort in knowing that there'd be no more fully assembled frames to harass them.

One tried to crawl up his leg, he stomped on its face before moving ahead to engage the remaining, upright and standing frames, mostly to support Taela because she had two other handfuls of problems to deal with and not enough brain cells between them to help. Kelly was as high as a kite on rocket boosters and Mark was still cloying to grips with the controls.

So, Lucien thrust his blade towards one of the charging Black Ashigaru to intercept and spoil their charge by breaking their ranks with a broad backswing, going over the heads of his comrades, but hopefully into the necks and shoulders of at least one of the Black Ashigaru.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

Viki kicked off the dead body as Yoshiko was helping her. She was quickly pushing the right buttons to stop the bloody fuel leak. Her frame was bleeding and it made her angry. She quickly checked her sensors and saw everyone had troubles, except her. She needed to help and Yoshiko was closest to her.

"Yoshiko when I say 'Now' try to boos back and I will shoot those dumkopfs." Viki commed and aimed her rifle. She could not get too close with Yoshiko's long, long claws. Viki would be in the way. When the rifle was aimed and ready to shoot, Viki shouted "NOW!" into the cooms.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

Taela's move jostled the Black Ashigaru about, her blow coming in fast and hard, shattering the mechanical elbow.

The machine reeled back from the blow, its black, glassy hull rapidly becoming riddled with molten holes and pockmarks as the energy weapons dug into the armor. Superficially. Before Taela could even bring her newly freed rifle to bear, the Black Ashigaru grasped its dangling, useless arm by the wrist and tore it out in a sudden blow - like a Samurai slashing out of the sheath, the forearm turned bludgeon knocked the Neko's weapon out of her grasp.

With a resounding crash, the rifle fell atop crates of components, its noise drowned out in the din as the Black Ashigaru raised the severed arm high and sent it smashing down onto Taela, Mark and Kelly's frame like a brutal hammer! Armor groaned and buckled where it pummeled over the frame's collar and chest, rattling the crew and pushing them back - the faceless frame stepped forward, raising its cruel cudgel high for the finishing blow and was assaulted from every direction as the Kirin feathers smashed and punched into its black crystalline hull.

It feel at their feet, Kelly, for once in his useless high, was silent.

Meanwhile, the ankles and shins of Lucien's frame were slashed at and cut into by the crawling frames' claws as he stood rooted in terror or shock at the relentlessness of the machines - the heavily armored foot rose and descended down on the leading crawler's head with all of his frame's weight. An explosion of obsidian like glass showered out like a crystal ball being smashed into oblivion as the aggregated diamond shattered.

Backing off from the crawling horde that grew larger by the second, the Actor-Turned-Frame-Pilot swung his sword about to keep the enemy frames at safe distance, but cleaved deep. One of the two Black Ashigaru attempted to parry with its finger-blades, but the heavy mass smashed through and sliced half way into its chest through the bicep. Lucien quickly found the blade stuck as the second came right at him.

Charging, fingers lancing out in a stab, Lucien couldn't dodge with his hand still tightly gripping the sword. The machinepistol in his off hand harshly barked incessantly as it spat out a torrent of fifty millimeter rounds. The impacts, solidly placed, sent spiderwebs across its black armor like bullets pummeling bulletproof glass - but it didn't howl in pain. It didn't stop. Inside the cockpit, Lucien watched as a long back lance well thicker than his own arms came straight though the volumetric viewscreen, straight at him.

Skewered across its length, bleeding, bloody, dead - the horrific images flickered across his mind as the pinkie of the enemy frame just barely grazed the top of his helmet as his frame was stabbed in the neck. Viewscreens flickered in and out and washed with static as the frame grappled with his own for the machine pistol in a life or death struggle. Pressed up close, Lucien's eyes could just barely see through the faceless visor and see the remorseless mono-eye beneath.

"Wha - no!" Yoshiko cried in panic.

Her pink frame leaped out of the way as Victoria yelled, her heavy cannon booming as she said it would - the massive round caught one of the black frames right at the heart! In a blink after penetrating, the naval shell exploded from the inside. The blast blew out most of what would have been its left ribcage, but the monstrosity heartlessly ignored the pretty Abwehran and charged the off balance Yoshiko, rapidly driving her back in a flurry of blows.

As Victoria racked the slide to load the next round, Yoshiko's second frame was already charging, barreling straight down at her like a bloodthirsty psychopath.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

Taela barely managed to keep her focus during the onslaught, but she realized that she had lost control far too many times already, so any more would probably cost her her life. Thankfully, during the neko's inactive "Keep control" phase, Mark took care of the enemy Frame. A new though occurred and she grabbed the crumpled machine by its back with her left hand, then dug her mecha's claws into it. A body-shield. A quick strafe boost pulled her to where her rifle is, all the while firing her frame's built in lasers at what she could.

As the neko snatched the weapon, she asked Mark, "Any chance you can get that recording of Kensuke to the Atuan from here?"

She had very little confidence in them getting out alive, at this point.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

"Denied!" Shouted Viki. Already as her hand was pumping the large gauss shotgun cannon, its barrel was moving to aim at the Frame that was about to charge Yoshiko. And as it started charging, Viki's sights were on it and she pulled a trigger. She had to put it down, before it could get to Yoshiko after all.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

Optics Damaged!
Cockpit Breached!

A volumetric panel tried its best to cover the flow-through air conditioning that'd been graciously donated by the Black Ashigaru. Shards of metal splintered inwards and bounced around inside Lucien's cockpit, and he shielded his eyes from it, keeping his other hand firmly on the control sphere as his body was thrown around inside the confines of the safety belts on his chair.

And then he put his arm back down from his face and looked at what'd missed him by a few feet. He coughed and followed the lance through the hole it caused to face his aggressor. The volumetric concealment was unable to mask the sight of the Monoeye staring into him behind it.

And then he remembered something he saw just a moment ago - their fingers were like paper. They were deadly, but fragile, like scalpels against the weight of his longsword. It was as though time had slowed down for the moment to savour the attack. All of them were shattering apart like glass against him - even the half built ones on the ground.

So he did something completely irrational in a regular combat situation as he tried to vie for control of his machine pistol. He released his grip on the longsword and decided to twirl like a gymnast and lever the weight of his entire Frame's body against the lances impaling him - effectively using his body as leverage to disarm the black frame, swinging his right arm in a hook beneath him and attempting to punch the midsection of the frame on the way out.

And he was hoping that he'd grab and retrieve his sword once he'd completed a rotation - he might not have needed it immediately as he threw down with the Black Ashigaru, but he needed it so he could attempt to dislodge it with his momentum.

Also, because it'd look wicked.

Re: Episode 7: Mine

For the briefest of moments, Taela and company were somewhat safe, but this was soon over as crawling half-built frames clawed and slashed at the mechanical corpse she held like animals.

"Yeah, we already got it in the mission recorders," a voice behind her answered. Kelly looked down at the Neko with dilated, wide eyes as he said this, the silence awkward. "I, uh, almost shat myself by the way. I think that did the trick," he sheepishly explained to her, just starting to slowly shake off the worst of the drugs' effects. They all rocked as the black machines crawled over one another, the first reaching the sides not protected by the corpse.

Meanwhile, Victoria's 'shotgun' boomed, the massive slug plowing its way into the black frame obsessing over Yoshiko. The side of its hip was completely blown out, staggering the enemy frame long enough for her to counter-attack! In a desperate blow, the zesuaium claws cleaved it across the chest from hip to shoulder, the black matter crackling and shattering as the edges cut their way through.

At the same time, black claws shattered, but only as a sword clattered to the ground. Lucien's twirl was stopped and turned into hard jolts and twisting as the black frame grappled with his own, but the sharp jostling back and forward temporarily broke its grip. The thing was relentless however, and lunged again, a swift kick from the man's frame adding a few more precious seconds to the distance between them!

Several missiles streaked in from the catwalks above - the power armors escorting as point defense weren't out of the fight! Several single shot RPG tubes had discharged into the cockpit block from the angle they had, knocking it out. In the distance, the heavy gates to another elevator opened up. "We're overriding the executive commands with a local one - there's your escape route if you're getting bored!" one of the Impulses spoke over the comms.

The intact frames were now all dead, but the undead crawlers were still coming, numbering a dozen and climbing.