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Toxic

  • Thread starter Thread starter Zack
  • Start date Start date
Eternal Pilgrim Exterior --> Interior
Having grown impatient with his 'helper's' inactivity Spacecase would reenter his ship through the side airlock and start up the scanners again. Now fully calibrated he could scan in the harsh environment albeit at a reduced range. He would quickly scan the readings before stating his findings over comms. "I got some readings finally. Looks like we have an airlock after that hatch which shouldn't be a problem give one of my Junkers about a minute and I'll have it open. Just have to get that hatch off first which I could have a junker weld through. On another note we might have company I have a weird signature here below my ship but it could just be interference. Also I have a read on anything within 10 meters of my ship for now but I'll get more as we wait the scanners are still calibrating. Found Quartz sending coordinates." Everyone would get a bright yellow indicator that read "Your one job" above an arrow that pointed to Quartz's location.
 
Exterior

With the new information in hand, Terrins diverted his course slightly so that it would intercept with the yellow signal - the fact he hadn't been that far off in the first place filled him with a small bit of pride that he managed to swallow before approaching the signal, hoping for the best.

He thought about acknowledging the 'spacer's work and maybe even complimenting them for it, but he'd save that for after Quartz had been scooped up and brought back to the ship's relative safety.

"Quartz, miss, are you alright?" the Minkan called out to her as he rolled up to the ping's location.
 
Outside, by the door

Despite Frank's best efforts, the door only budged slightly. Even with his enhanced strength, the outerpost door was still too heavy to lift with just one person. It was also quite difficult to grip, as he would have to dig down into the dirt around the door just to get his fingers around the edge so that he could lift. The hydraulics of the door itself also resisted motion, dampening his attempts to pry it open.

Thad did not fair much better. Stabbing the sword into the ground would reveal about a foot or two of 'dirt' below them. There was a concrete structure below that, though it looked like the nearby door was the only one in the immediate area.

Silver seemed non-reactive to the whole thing. Staying in place as she watched Thad go about his work. "Green-Horn. I assume you can handle recovering Quartz?"

"Yeah! I mean, She was right here... totally going to find her one sec..." Green-Horn was doing her best to focus on the sensor systems, trying to pick out which direction Quartz had used to head out into the storm.

Green-Thumb would be the next to exit the ship, having helped Z-9 prepare their outfit for going out into the muck. It looked like Green-Horn had lost their VIP again. Perhaps it would be better to assign that task to someone else. The tall Nepleslian woman's yellow armor was similar to the other members of her squad, including a large back pack and a rifle that seemed to have a number of tools attached to it in such a way as to make any good firearms instructor complain.

"Silver, Frank, Z-9, Terrins. Please bring Quartz back. Silver, please keep her within arms reach going forward. Everyone else, lets get that door open!"

---

Outside, looking for Quartz

Elsewhere, Quartz was starting to realize just how lost she was. She had lost sight of the ship... and Green-Horn... and everyone else for that matter. She could hear them calling for her over the radio too. Daddy had always said not to talk to strangers, and she could feel that resistance keeping her from opening her mouth. Instead, she crouched down, covering her head with her arms as the wind and elements continued to push against her. The shards of metal in the atmosphere slowly starting to chip away at her suit's skin.

A strong gust would knock her over onto her back, the puffy suit helping her roll a few more meters away from the group before she was able to steady herself.

Frank,Tecuma and Terrins[/b] would also find themselves in a similar situation... rushing out into the storm and finding themselves losing sight of the rest of the group.

"Hey... I'm over here..." Quartz said, her voice fairly low... though 'over here' didn't really help anyone with finding her. It would at least give them an indication she was still nearby, holding up her arms to cover her helmet a bit as she picked a direction and started walking, trying to hunch down so that the storm was easier to manage.

Z-9 would find that their infra-red sensors were washed out by all of the latent heat nearby. There just wasn't enough of a contrast between the surroundings and Quartz' suit for anything to really show up. The X-ray vision on the other hand peirced right through the clouds. Though that vision was a bit staticy thanks to the metal particles in the air, it was a lot easier to see the big metal blob that was Quartz's suit standing out in the sea of static using X-rays. She had not gone far from the group, and Z-9 would be the first to approach Quartz herself.

Quartz wouldn't see Z-9's body until it was up close to her. Earlier, when she had seen Z-9, the spacer had a cute face, some humanoid parts, and a cute voice. Now Z-9 was jet-black with a glowing red eye that backlit the beaky helmet. Hazy blue lights mixing with the yellows from the storm. The whole thing reminded Quartz of a mosquito... only large enough to suck out all her blood.

Maybe this is what father was warning her about!

"AHH!" She yelped, turning away from Z-9 and running as fast as she could, shooting right past Tecuma and Terrins!
 
Terrins' knife-tipped ears had been strained as they tried to pierce the smog, twitching underneath his helmet when Quartz called back to them - at least she sounded alright-

Then the yell came, one of fright that sent the fit Minkan after their VIP once more, it wouldn't be hard for him to catch up considering she was stumbling around in that adorable and puffy she had been crammed into while he was in a mobility-enhancing suit of power armour. The rifle was slung over his back mid-sprint as Terrins caught up to Quartz and tried to wrap her up in his arms, being careful to not hurt her with his strength as he dropped to his knees and half tackled half hugged the frightened girl.

"Shhh hey, it's the redhead guy - you're good now, I won't let anything get you," Terrins tried to speak soothingly to calm her down before remembering he was wearing a suit of armour, it wasn't like he could risk exposure in such a harsh environment so he'd have to do the next best thing.

He reached out for a digital mind he could relay the memory to but found none, that made things a bit more difficult but nothing was impossible if you tried hard enough.

"The redhead guy that winked earlier, that's me - are you okay?" was what he came up with under the circumstances, hoping it would be enough to trigger the memory from a calmer time.
 
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Outside, by the door

After a few minutes of playing in the sand Thad had enough of trying to find another way in. He overheard chatter on the comms indicating something had been found. He let out a sigh of relief. Least they were going to get paid for this part of the mission.

He walked over to the door and gave it a big thud using his boot. "Daddy, were home big boy. Kindly open the door before I have to open it myself." Thad should with a laugh as he walked back to the ship. He went back up the ramp and into the ammunition storage area. It did not take him long to find some explosives. This should about do it. As he tried to keep from smiling too big. He did enjoy a big bang.

He walked back out of the ship and over to the door. "Now this here door seems to need an operation. And being the doctor I am should be able to open this up like I am doing open heart surgery." An evil sounding laugh went out over the comms.
 
Eternal Pilgrim -----> Outside
Spacecase would jump down and head over to the door. Seeing Thad he would throw his hands up and yell. "Hey bud lets not possibly blow up whatever that door is guarding with the corrosion we don't know how thick or strong that thing might be. Just give me a few seconds with a datapad or a few minutes with a plasma cutter and I can get us inside without breaking the things airlock mechanism." He would pull out his plasma cutter to show that he did, in fact, have one. "Also that's just a waste of explosives they'd get corroded before you could finish setting them up. I'll have to check them later to make sure they'll still work now thanks."
 
Raven nodded as Spacecase let her know she could press the button before reaching out and... wait, which button? She frowned, trying to remember, and was about to try a random button when she heard something. She turned, gasping and pressing herself back against the control board behind her. She watched the... thing with wide eyes. It seemed to be some sort of huge robot? She couldn't remember seeing anything like it before, and she watched it carefully as it passed her.

By the time the shock of a giant robot monster thing wore off and she was able tp stop staring at the door, Spacecase had come in and pressed the button himself, leaving her once again useless. Though, it was likely for the best considering she had no idea which button she should have pushed. She gave him a sheepish, apologetic look and put her helmet on, following him out of the ship. "Ok, how can I help?" She asked, looking around at the chaos.
 
Tecuma would growl as she saw the girl dart past her, angry she was being such a pain in the ass as she turned to lug after both her and Terrins. This whole shit show was just a pain in the ass as she fought through the storm to catch up. Terrins would get to Quartz first before her, and as such she just opted to stay silent.

She kept an eye around them for whatever that mattered before she spoke up.

"Just throw her over your shoulder and get back to the group dammit. Its a shit show out here lets move." She sais to Terrins.
 
Franked looked at raved "get the bag of commercial grade demilions out of the ship I'm going to need your help setting them up to blow open this door unless everyone likes being outside here"
 
Spacecase would facepalm, or about as close as he could what with his helmet being in the way. "Don't grab anything. The corrosion will be a problem and this is probably hard to open for a reason like say keeping out this atmosphere. Let's wait and see what others want to do and if there are no good options I'll cut through it so that we aren't wasting expensive demo charges."
 
Outside, by the door

Extending its shields appropriately, the SRSS Yggdrasill then extended its grapplers. Reaching out with what appeared to be simplistic but jointed arms with five-fingered hands on the end, the graft adjusted a hand and reached over. It made a fist and started to knock on the door. Rather than being a simply knock, it was a sequence which those versed in such might recognize as Morse Code.

<STAND BACK>

After giving this warning, and giving a bit of time for people on the other end of the door to find safety, the fingers opened and adjusted their grip around the hatch. However, what happened wasn't a lift and tear, but rather the sound of cutting and the light of a torch. The ship got to work, cutting into the door...before smaller tools extended from the fingers...starting to disassemble the hatch's internal mechanisms. It seemed to be done with the intent to be easily repaired later.

Finally, the craft opened the door with a groan of metal...ready to use its other hand's grapplers to grab hostiles or shock them.

The door would lift off its hinges, remaining suspended a few meters above the ground. It was covering a passage that would decend downward at an angle for a few meters before ending at a smaller airlock door. This door did appear to have some kind of sensor near the top, as well as a control panel that was covered up by a clear plastic hatch off to one side. It seemed large enough for two of the bulky suits that Quartz was wearing to pass through shoulder to shoulder, but not large enough for vehicles.

Green-Thumb would take a look at the door that had been lifted up, and then looked over at Toshiro. She certainly didn't want to get in the way of the heavy machinery.

"I take it we are clear to move in?"

Toshiro, in his Kylie, gave a nod. "Yes, you're clear. The other door skill needs opened though. It shouldn't be as heavily armored, but it may well be designed with measures to counter a breach. We should certainly be careful. We're getting to where we could easily be considered hostiles or contaminants. We should not, under any circumstances we can reasonably avoid, remove our power armor or expose the internal atmosphere to our own life support systems or flesh. That'll at least give us a chance of saying we didn't contaminate anything."

"Right." Green-Thumb said, nodding along... though with her power armor that motion may be easily lost as a visual cue. Internally, she was frowning of course. The group seemed to be running around, doing their best to get ahold of the girl they were trying to safely bring back. "Green-Horn, Launch Drones, scout it out."

"uh, Yes Ma'am!" She shouted, her attention drawn out from her sensor readouts that were looking for the rest of the group. She would unholster the launcher on her back, and pick out a magazine with blue tape on it.

*THUNK*

One round would fire out, the device no larger than a fist would unfold a set of fins behind it, slow down, and then duck down into the passageway, relaying back a video feed as it approached the door. As soon as it got close, the door would open up automatically, allowing the drone to zip inside to an entry chamber. There appeared to be another interior door, along with another set of sensors and a large display mounted over the door. Some vents along either side of the room seemed to house some atmospheric processing 'stuff'... likely used to clean out anything that was brought into this air-lock.

"Alright..." Green-Thumb said, sounding non-plussed at the reading sent back by the sensor, "I will head in first. Assuming I don't explode, the rest of you can follow..."

"I feel obligrated to remind you that if this remotely guided Power Armor is destroyed, I will not suffer any form of loss or death." Yggdrasill said, reminding Green-Thumb that an immediate sacrifice not be needed.

"Yeah, but I can't exactly let the hired help get blown up... " Her voice lacked a certain seriousness as she stomped forward, choosing to side down the hole rather than trying to use the stairs, letting her momentum carry her through the door and into the interior chamber. Sure, letting the Yggdrasill go first was probably the better choice... but she didn't come all the way out here just to stand back.
 
Spacecase would waste no time as he hopped into the open hatchway and made his way to the first airlock door and used his datapad to start getting through the doors security systems so that he could open the door. "This'll be slower than jacking directly in but I'm not going to risk catching something or any residual corrosion. Also does this feel like a trap to anyone else what with the locked door and our VIP running off. I'll take a look while I'm plugging through the security to see what I can find. Door will be open in 5 you might want to get Quartz before I get through."
 
Outside

Z-9 kind of just landed and pointed at the fleeing girl, sending an x-ray camera feed to both Tecuma and Terrin's communicators, and then telemetry data to the rest. They were not exactly surprised about making the weird native dirtballer run away, since they'd had that effect on many Neps and humans, too...

What exactly was that emotion, though? They made noise, but it was not happy. They ran very fast, but did not wait for Z-9 to cover their eyes before they hid. Quite perplexing.

Bumbling back over to the doors instead, they observed the panels being stripped away, enjoying basking in the blue glow of those great big welding torches. The big Ygg was really quite impressive.

A lone woman... 'Raven', was it?... Still standing around with no job?... Well, they were on the spacer ship, so did that mean they were a spacer too?...

"Greetings, fellow folk!" They came up rather rapidly, not realising the woman probably had a harder time seeing in all the dust. A spindly black mecha-claw patted them on the right shoulder lightly. "Organic friends are finding the organic girl! Perhaps you would prefer to assist them?... Inside could be dangerous. There could be traps... Z-9 would put traps, they would..."
 
Frank nodded at spacecase "it looks like the beginning to a trap but I see several issues with it, one if it was the airlock were in would have been compromised and booby trapped, secondly think for a moment if it were a trap the trappers would be talking to us or something I personally think something might have happened inside before we look at the door let's look around the airlock for any forms of foul play" Frank said as he cocks his gun arm and puts it back on safety "I'll cover the door besides if it is a trap I'll go threw first I'm armord enough to were if there is a trap I have the highest possible chance of servicing the first hit"
 
Raven looked between the men as they gave her conflicting instructions, but they seemed to move on quickly, and she was simply glad it didn't result in some sort of power struggle, as it seemed everyone was on their last nerve, snapping at each other more than what she would deem usual. She stepped back, watching as the door was finally opened and stepped to the edge, peering inside as a couple others went in. She nodded in agreement to the whole trap prediction, something not feeling right about the situation.
 
Thaddeaus wasted no time to strap the explosives he had brought to himself and move out of the way of the door. He was slightly sad he did not get the chance to blow a hole in this door but also happy too. It was early in the mission to start blowing things up. At least this was what he told himself.

Not one to allow his team mates to venture alone into the dangerous unknown followed along.
 
Well she looked okay to him at least, so Terrins hauled the girl up over his shoulder as Tecuma had suggested, making sure he had a firm grip on Quartz as the Minkan made his way back to the bunker and spoke into his helmet's mic, "Well a bit of little physical activity never put me off a job before, plus I don't think she is going to be able to wriggle free from me any time soon."

"Well I've got the girl so I can't exactly go first," Terrins spoke once more as he approached the airlock with the others, giving Quartz a re-affirmative pat on the back as if she were some pet draped over his shoulder.
 
"I'll take lead. Not a problem." Tecuma offered as she strode forward. Her mini-gun came to bear down the path laid out before them as she started in slowly. She made sure to scan the area as best she could with her trigger finger pressed slightly in, ready to spin up at a moments notice.
 
Franks eyes gave off red glow as his gun arm was extended following tecuma he covered her flank watching and walking Frank called over his comms to raven
"Ok rookie keep your mavric ready, we don't know what's down here so keep your gard up" Frank said as he activated his tactical visor
 
Raven rolled her eyes at the term rookie and slipped into the space behind the others. She did as she was told, pulling out and clutching her mavric, making sure it was loaded and ready to rock and roll if needed as she peered through the tactical visor attached to her helmet.
 
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