Without even looking back, Nirix knew her bullets had been lethal. If she had any more time, the stealthy assassin would've tried to do more, killed more to help eliminate the threat that would no doubt be awaiting Kete and now possibly her for her involvement. But time was a lurxy that she didn't have right now, no matter how fast she could execute people. Kete would be getting away and Nirix had to be on his heels if she was to do anything to remotely provide any help.
When her ear twitched at the sudden high pitched beeping of electronic-paralization grenades, Nirix knew she had to make her move once more and moved swiftly some distance away and edged closer to the fenced ridge. Peering through the metal fence, she saw that it dropped down about 20 feet, a rocky and most definitely painful jump for her to make.
Unfortunately below was her objective. An objective that seemed to slowly impress her with each new way of the Vir Banal'ras that he displayed.
To say that Nirix was impressed, was putting it lightly. A plan of full distractions, of utter chaos and confusion played out in front of her and she knew whether or not to smile or be fearful. It had occurred to her that she knew nothing, that everything that the Half breed had told her could've been a lie. Not that Nirix hadn't lied to him as well, well partly. But that was besides the point. She knew nothing about him and a twinge of envy swelled inside of her. Indeed, Ketin had mastered the Vir Banal'ras quite faster than Nirix had thought.
Or maybe he had always been a master at this art and she had just been blind to see it.
Just like he had blinded the people that were pursuing him. Another brilliant display, a supposed hand gun that actually fired some form of blinding fireworks. His plan had worked and his captors were stunned and before Nirix had knew it Ketin was gone once more. Around another bend disappearing from her line of sight. With a sigh, she thought through the adrenaline that flowed in her system. Nirix needed to get the lead on this chase before the others did. It wasn't going to be easy. But challenges was what made it this so interesting.
Following Kete's pattern, Nirix was on the move once again
When her ear twitched at the sudden high pitched beeping of electronic-paralization grenades, Nirix knew she had to make her move once more and moved swiftly some distance away and edged closer to the fenced ridge. Peering through the metal fence, she saw that it dropped down about 20 feet, a rocky and most definitely painful jump for her to make.
Unfortunately below was her objective. An objective that seemed to slowly impress her with each new way of the Vir Banal'ras that he displayed.
To say that Nirix was impressed, was putting it lightly. A plan of full distractions, of utter chaos and confusion played out in front of her and she knew whether or not to smile or be fearful. It had occurred to her that she knew nothing, that everything that the Half breed had told her could've been a lie. Not that Nirix hadn't lied to him as well, well partly. But that was besides the point. She knew nothing about him and a twinge of envy swelled inside of her. Indeed, Ketin had mastered the Vir Banal'ras quite faster than Nirix had thought.
Or maybe he had always been a master at this art and she had just been blind to see it.
Just like he had blinded the people that were pursuing him. Another brilliant display, a supposed hand gun that actually fired some form of blinding fireworks. His plan had worked and his captors were stunned and before Nirix had knew it Ketin was gone once more. Around another bend disappearing from her line of sight. With a sigh, she thought through the adrenaline that flowed in her system. Nirix needed to get the lead on this chase before the others did. It wasn't going to be easy. But challenges was what made it this so interesting.
Following Kete's pattern, Nirix was on the move once again
In probably the single most masterfully played example of the easiest way to enrage and infuriate someone, Aelyn gave an almost mischievous smile and glanced to his side. He said with a half-laugh starting out the word “Pfft-I think we made him angry.” And then he disconnected…right as Lord Kampfer was raising his voice. The screen blipped off halfway through the word ‘experiment’…And if there was one thing that could drive an already angry person into a more maddened rage it was being brushed off like nothing.
“Alright, let’s do this!” He raised his voice, spinning around to face the control room. “Proceed with planet-busting!”
“You really like that term the Ranger used, don’t you?” Alexa said dryly – even in a tense moment like this she was incapable of not uttering some satire.
“It’s very fitting.” Aelyn replied.
When one of the many lookout sensors that lined the outer shell of the Stella detected something that it did not like, it beamed the image straight to Aelyn’s BrainPal, where he could subconsciously decide if it was worth looking at.
It was.
Some kind of luxury starliner was drifting toward the Flying City, and it was clearly ‘infected’ by something. He could only assume it was the Dendril. He was displeased with this fact. He flitted the image to the entirety of the crew on the bridge, marking it as ‘emergency’ so they would all ‘see’ it regardless of subconscious decision making.
“Disconnect the Command Module. Send Stella to a safe-zone and be absolutely sure it’s untraceable. Prepare the Warship and get ready to jump to a safe distance once we’re disconnected. We’re facing a new enemy here. We know virtually nothing about these Dendril so every precaution must be taken. Take no chances and be ready to retreat further at your own discretion. Out.”
With that Aelyn strode from the command deck, Alexa in tow. They did not speak until they were alone in the hallways, walking with purpose.
“The fool can’t see what’s right under his nose.” Aelyn expressed, with some frustration. “Unless he’s already taken the magnetosphere into account, which I doubt…But what I really don’t understand is why he can’t seem to grasp the true nature of the Stella’s tech.”
“Well, didn’t Paeryc say he was sure that the ‘real’ Dimensional Lords were fundamentally incapable of recognizing The Plane as existing at all? Presumably anything involving The Plane is fundamentally non-existent to them as well.” Alexa replied, studiously.
“That would make sense. He said we’re using ‘forbidden technology’. Maybe it’s ‘forbidden’ because it’s Impossible?”
“His versions are superior though, aren’t they?”
“Yes, a great deal. But his are also Possible, within the laws not only of Reality but in terms of Dimensional Forces as well. What we’re using is Impossible by either standard. Maybe it’s forbidden because it can’t be explained?”
“Maybe the Lord of Tech Support wants to figure it out?”
Aelyn shook his head. “No. Because it’s Impossible. Unless you’re connected in one way or another to The Plane the Stella’s tech is fundamentally a paradox. He might think he understands it, but if he actually got his hands on it and studied it in depth he’d run into a logic barrier. It breaks the rules of both Real and trans-Dimensional space.”
“Right, right.” Alexa looked downward thoughtfully. “I guess he wouldn’t be trying to destroy it if he wanted to learn about it anyway. So you’re right, he must have no Possible way of knowing that it’s that special.”
“I wonder if the Dimensional Lords will be able to recognize the existence of The Plane once it returns to Reality?” Aelyn mused, “Either way they wouldn’t be able to touch it once it was gone again.”
“It’d sure be a shocker though, huh?”
“Certainly. Despite what they may think, no creature in any Universe or Dimension knows everything.”
MEANWHILE, IN SIBERIA
“Our father-men, they die because of stupidness, Draskolomolotovnakash. Why we must fall to same fate?”
“Because, Krovenskishnovalashka, because is terrible world, struggle never over.”
“Why not can struggle be over? Is world all such many coldness?”
“Is principle!”
“Is bull!”
“No, is potato! Why not you listen?”
“I am listen! I am listen to ancient call of snow angles what calling for stopping stupid. Father of me, father of you, they fight for potato, die for potato! Is no good! Is stupid!”
“Is no stupid, is potato!”
“Potato is lie!”
“You is lie!”
“I am hate Draskolomolotovnakash! Potato is my potato!”
“Is no potato, Krovenskishnovalashka. Is rock!”
“Is potato!”
“Is rock!”
“Potato!”
“Rock!”
Unfortunately neither of the young men were ever able to come up with a conclusion as to whether the object in question was actually a rock or a potato, because it was at that very moment when the heavens split apart above them, and from the sky shot a black bolt of death incarnate which blasted the snow and wedged itself firmly into the ground beneath. They gazed upon it in wonder, all their problems seeming trivial before the strangeness of it.
Shortly thereafter they both died of hypothermia.
“There, that should just about cover every potential function.” Dr. Dorin Harkahn said, standing up straight once more and setting the sensitive tools down onto a counter. “You’re good as new, Ranger. For the most part, anyway.”
He turned to do…some science thing or whatever, and mentioned offhandedly “Oh, and I, uh, I installed a BrainPal receiver in your glove. Nothing too invasive. It should pick up on BrainPal transmissions and relay them to whatever kind of communicator you’ve got in that helmet.” He pointed to a tiny, paper-thin square of metal that had been embedded into the palm of The Ranger’s left glove. “Just tap it like Spider-Man if you want to send anything. Limited connectivity though since it’s not actually a BrainPal but rather a satellite, so only Aelyn, Alex, Aleessa and myself will get them. You’ll hear incoming stuff in a sort of robot voice…”
“Harkahn.” A voice demanded from the doorway. It was a woman’s voice, strong, indicating of the kind of woman who didn’t take no guff. Serious business type. “Set to move.”
Dorin looked to her with a slight uneasiness. In truth he didn’t really want to go along on this endeavor, but Aelyn insisted that Drakis remain on the ship in case repairs were needed in the coming conflict. Plus it was probably for the better, since he probably would have been dead by The Ranger’s gun within minutes of planetfall.
“You are ready, aren’t you?” She persisted, with a sense of frustrated skepticism.
It was obviously Aleessa Rivierre. Clad in an advanced looking suit of ballistic-weave fiber, darl, tanned skin and dirty blonde hair, with a bust and figure that was all woman. Over her shoulder was a snub-nosed rifle, but the weapons enthusiast might have been able to recognize the telescoping barrel which would extend for aim, and retract upon fire to create a devastatingly powerful shot. There was a silencer clipped to the side which could be attached at will, turning it from a virtual scoped artillery cannon into a precision instrument of subversive assassination and swift, silent demise. The hypercarbon-fiber material it was made of was incredibly light. At least, much lighter than it looked.
Still Harkahn looked uncertain. He was, after all, not a fighting man. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to anticipate that he would be needing some protection. In response, he spread the white coat some at the lapels to reveal a simple, but very effective ballistic-weave vest. In a shoulder holster there was some variety of energy pistol. “Got my favorite sweater-vest and trusty old Arcade Cannon.” He said with a fantastic tone of droll satire. “About as ready as I’ll ever be for something as stupid as this.”
Satisfied with the answer, Aleessa glanced to The Ranger. “So you’re The Mad Ranger, huh? I’m looking forward to seeing if you’re really the hotshot the stories tell you are.” Then back to Harkahn. “Let’s move. @#$%’s going down out there and we don’t want to keep things waiting. The shuttle’s ready to go.”
Within ten minutes the trio had boarded the little black shuttle, and used the beacon which had previously been teleported to the last known location of the droid Bravo to teleport instantly planetside. They would step into the cold and wind, where to one side was the small crater created from the beacon – which had been apparently placed a few thousand feet in the air, luckily there was still no reason for anyone to detect it – and toward the other edge of the treeline where what appeared to be the corpses of two quite frozen young men, half-buried in the snowdrift. Nobody was particularly interested in them.
It was time to find that pesky robot.
The Stella Viventium disappeared from the sky as instantaneously as it had appeared. IT was there, then it was not. No sound, no flash, nothing. Where it had gone was a baffling mystery – but strangely enough not all of it had disappeared. The bulk of it, sure – but there was one blocky part still floating there. Still large enough that a railcar trip across would be some thirty minutes, but still nothing compared to the whole of the Flying City. Then another vessel, still smaller – much smaller, perhaps the size of a small aircraft carrier and with a crew of two – detached from the underside, floated some ways away, and allowed the larger part to snap into nonexistence and reappear a few planets away. It was armed to the teeth with all manner of devastating weaponry, all trained on the Dendril infected ship and ready to let loose a barrage of hellfire unto it. Then, with weapons still focused and ready to fire at the Dendril, it unleashed all manner of absolute chaos onto the whole of the planet without the slightest indication.
Bang-POP!
SRSLY BRUH
Bang-POP!
NOT COOL MAN
Unfortunately Kete was running out of nifty programmable firework-shots, but by shooting them into the air in random directions at random intervals he could make the messages appear spontaneously all over the park – within a reasonable range – and further confuse the pursuers.
Bang-POP!
WUBALUBADUBDUB!!
He swore to himself as the eyes of two women of which he desperately did not want to see popped into his head. One was closer than the other. Miserably it was the worse of the two.
Bang-POP!
ERROR 404, FOX NOT FOUND
After all, he didn’t really have any solid evidence that the assassin woman was Imperial. But then…she was chasing him, and he had been too far to see her shooting the soldiers. He had to be cautious.
By some mindboggling coincidence, he happened to be fleeing past the general vicinity of that weird halfie guy from earlier when it happened. He had half-noticed his presence in his mind when Kete’s head exploded.
Or, at least, that’s how it felt. He half whimpered, half screamed and mid-stride collapsed to a rolling heap on the ground, clutching his left eye and that general vicinity of his head with both hands. White knuckles, probably too much pressure but there was no stopping the reaction, the pain was so intense.
What was it?! He was barely even thinking on that curiosity, curled up on the ground there he was pretty worthless and overall incapacitated, which was not good.
It was something electromagnetic, that much was certain. It had something to do with the interference that had been bothering him earlier. Something to do with how all those ships were crashing into the jungle earlier – though Kete was unaware of this particular connection. He was unaware of everything except the feeling of his head violently imploding and expanding into a universe of misfortune and agony, only to re-condense into a marble with the pressure of a few dozen suns.
This was not good for him for many reasons, not the least of which was that a certain woman in a black trench coat had managed to catch up to him thanks to this strange happening.
It didn’t bother Kallenger that all of her electronics and tech had suddenly gone out. She was too busy taking the first chance she’d gotten in ages to get her hands on that little @#$% - and so she did.
Using the momentum of her sprint Kallenger grabbed the curled up halfie by the back of the collar and flung him to his feet – or in that general direction. He stumbled pointlessly into a tree, still too preoccupied with the furious agony in his brain to resist in the slightest.
How she hated him! So many times had the little @#$% evaded her, made a fool of her. Payback time! Pinning him to the tree by a forceful hand at his neck, Kallenger deftly drew the knife from behind her, spun it to be held reverse in the hand, and plunged it through Kete’s right ear and a good two inches into the tree. He let out an agonizing cry, having at very least the sense not to move his head tried to sort of scuff his feet at the base of the tree in an unnecessary effort to keep himself from tugging on it.
The shock of it all had not numbed him, but it had altered his reaction slightly. Too weakened from it to really do anything his arms fell limp to his side, the small thing looking up at the Imperial agent who had after all these years managed to catch her target for good. He seemed so very small there. Smaller than usual, even.
Though only one eye was really looking up at her, and that even wasn’t looking at anything. Left eye still closed tight from the furious pain, but other reactions suddenly required too much movement so he was at last reduced to a fearfully trembling ragdoll, staring half-glazed and teary-eyed in the general direction of the woman who would suddenly deliver him two intense gut-punches, followed by a much more intent grabbing of his throat which adequately cut off his air supply. After ten seconds or so the lack of air was already still worsening whatever horridness was plaguing his brain and eye.
High above the surface, Aelyn-Paeryc Petrovalyc’s warship hung in the sky, orbiting the planet known as Earth, but was not Earth. A vast assortments of weapons were preparing to release total devastation upon the Dendril infected ship – to whatever end that might bring – but another operation within was engaging something on a much larger scale.
This planet had, after all, been largely engineered by himself. Just like the other three planets that were called Earth but were not Earth, the planet was equipped with a built-in electromagnetic field that vastly trumped any natural configuration. It had taken centuries to accomplish, but eventually they had been coordinated together so that – ideally – they would reveal the location of something. A machine on a scale even more vast than the Stella, a machine which required entire planets to operate, and yet it was so very simple.
Yet an interesting byproduct of all that nonsense was a delightful level of control over the electromagnetosphere of said planet by the creator of the phenomenon. That was, of course, A.P. Petrovalyc in his little Warship. A few dials and the push of a button, and he had completely destroyed the electromagnetic balance which kept the planet functioning as normal. A surge of power, chaotic redirections of motion.
It was devastating.
Anything electronic or with electromagnetic properties – anything technological – was going to feel the effects. They were not uniform, but they were vicious. Anything in orbit around the planet within range of the magnetosphere (with the exception of the warship, which was specifically designed to resist this exact kind of thing by the same man who created this exact kind of thing in the first place) was likely to go completely out of commission, at least temporarily. This included the space station and likely the Dendril infected vessel.
On the surface things were not much better. There were power surges and outages all over the planet, throughout all the cities. Being the most technologically bustling, Earth City was particularly affected. A few hovercars crashed. One railcar derailed and knocked over a small building. Out in the park the most one would see was a number of streetlamps surging and blowing out all at once.
Robots were badly affected too, but obviously that had been the exact reason that Aelyn had invoked this chaos. It was going to be a vicious blow to Kampfer’s force – not only for the extensive damage it was likely to do on the majority of his robotic and technological army, but also for the fact that it was going to linger for quite some time, making Kampfer’s operations on the planet that much more hindered and difficult. It was too basic a force to resist – anything that existed in the form of Possible matter was going to be subject to the effects.
Was it going to be the deathblow that Aelyn had wistfully hoped it would be? No. Would it probably come back around to bite him in the ass? Yes. Especially since he was planning on going down to the surface soon to further pursue the droid with the trio who had already been sent in undercover – with electromagnetic shields that would be able to ward off the effects, but only under the condition that they had already been activated before it all started.
He knew that going planetside, especially to the Kampfer-controlled Kartupelis, was going to be dangerous. That would probably be where the madman would get back at him for it. His armies would be hit hard but far from destroyed. It was probably only going to make him that much more intent on getting back at the Captain.
Still…he wished he could have seen the Lord’s face.
Totally worth it.
Pressing his luck and hoping for two victories in a row he simultaneously fired his entire Warship arsenal at the Dendril infected vessel which hopefully had been largely disabled.
“Alright, let’s do this!” He raised his voice, spinning around to face the control room. “Proceed with planet-busting!”
“You really like that term the Ranger used, don’t you?” Alexa said dryly – even in a tense moment like this she was incapable of not uttering some satire.
“It’s very fitting.” Aelyn replied.
When one of the many lookout sensors that lined the outer shell of the Stella detected something that it did not like, it beamed the image straight to Aelyn’s BrainPal, where he could subconsciously decide if it was worth looking at.
It was.
Some kind of luxury starliner was drifting toward the Flying City, and it was clearly ‘infected’ by something. He could only assume it was the Dendril. He was displeased with this fact. He flitted the image to the entirety of the crew on the bridge, marking it as ‘emergency’ so they would all ‘see’ it regardless of subconscious decision making.
“Disconnect the Command Module. Send Stella to a safe-zone and be absolutely sure it’s untraceable. Prepare the Warship and get ready to jump to a safe distance once we’re disconnected. We’re facing a new enemy here. We know virtually nothing about these Dendril so every precaution must be taken. Take no chances and be ready to retreat further at your own discretion. Out.”
With that Aelyn strode from the command deck, Alexa in tow. They did not speak until they were alone in the hallways, walking with purpose.
“The fool can’t see what’s right under his nose.” Aelyn expressed, with some frustration. “Unless he’s already taken the magnetosphere into account, which I doubt…But what I really don’t understand is why he can’t seem to grasp the true nature of the Stella’s tech.”
“Well, didn’t Paeryc say he was sure that the ‘real’ Dimensional Lords were fundamentally incapable of recognizing The Plane as existing at all? Presumably anything involving The Plane is fundamentally non-existent to them as well.” Alexa replied, studiously.
“That would make sense. He said we’re using ‘forbidden technology’. Maybe it’s ‘forbidden’ because it’s Impossible?”
“His versions are superior though, aren’t they?”
“Yes, a great deal. But his are also Possible, within the laws not only of Reality but in terms of Dimensional Forces as well. What we’re using is Impossible by either standard. Maybe it’s forbidden because it can’t be explained?”
“Maybe the Lord of Tech Support wants to figure it out?”
Aelyn shook his head. “No. Because it’s Impossible. Unless you’re connected in one way or another to The Plane the Stella’s tech is fundamentally a paradox. He might think he understands it, but if he actually got his hands on it and studied it in depth he’d run into a logic barrier. It breaks the rules of both Real and trans-Dimensional space.”
“Right, right.” Alexa looked downward thoughtfully. “I guess he wouldn’t be trying to destroy it if he wanted to learn about it anyway. So you’re right, he must have no Possible way of knowing that it’s that special.”
“I wonder if the Dimensional Lords will be able to recognize the existence of The Plane once it returns to Reality?” Aelyn mused, “Either way they wouldn’t be able to touch it once it was gone again.”
“It’d sure be a shocker though, huh?”
“Certainly. Despite what they may think, no creature in any Universe or Dimension knows everything.”
MEANWHILE, IN SIBERIA
“Our father-men, they die because of stupidness, Draskolomolotovnakash. Why we must fall to same fate?”
“Because, Krovenskishnovalashka, because is terrible world, struggle never over.”
“Why not can struggle be over? Is world all such many coldness?”
“Is principle!”
“Is bull!”
“No, is potato! Why not you listen?”
“I am listen! I am listen to ancient call of snow angles what calling for stopping stupid. Father of me, father of you, they fight for potato, die for potato! Is no good! Is stupid!”
“Is no stupid, is potato!”
“Potato is lie!”
“You is lie!”
“I am hate Draskolomolotovnakash! Potato is my potato!”
“Is no potato, Krovenskishnovalashka. Is rock!”
“Is potato!”
“Is rock!”
“Potato!”
“Rock!”
Unfortunately neither of the young men were ever able to come up with a conclusion as to whether the object in question was actually a rock or a potato, because it was at that very moment when the heavens split apart above them, and from the sky shot a black bolt of death incarnate which blasted the snow and wedged itself firmly into the ground beneath. They gazed upon it in wonder, all their problems seeming trivial before the strangeness of it.
Shortly thereafter they both died of hypothermia.
“There, that should just about cover every potential function.” Dr. Dorin Harkahn said, standing up straight once more and setting the sensitive tools down onto a counter. “You’re good as new, Ranger. For the most part, anyway.”
He turned to do…some science thing or whatever, and mentioned offhandedly “Oh, and I, uh, I installed a BrainPal receiver in your glove. Nothing too invasive. It should pick up on BrainPal transmissions and relay them to whatever kind of communicator you’ve got in that helmet.” He pointed to a tiny, paper-thin square of metal that had been embedded into the palm of The Ranger’s left glove. “Just tap it like Spider-Man if you want to send anything. Limited connectivity though since it’s not actually a BrainPal but rather a satellite, so only Aelyn, Alex, Aleessa and myself will get them. You’ll hear incoming stuff in a sort of robot voice…”
“Harkahn.” A voice demanded from the doorway. It was a woman’s voice, strong, indicating of the kind of woman who didn’t take no guff. Serious business type. “Set to move.”
Dorin looked to her with a slight uneasiness. In truth he didn’t really want to go along on this endeavor, but Aelyn insisted that Drakis remain on the ship in case repairs were needed in the coming conflict. Plus it was probably for the better, since he probably would have been dead by The Ranger’s gun within minutes of planetfall.
“You are ready, aren’t you?” She persisted, with a sense of frustrated skepticism.
It was obviously Aleessa Rivierre. Clad in an advanced looking suit of ballistic-weave fiber, darl, tanned skin and dirty blonde hair, with a bust and figure that was all woman. Over her shoulder was a snub-nosed rifle, but the weapons enthusiast might have been able to recognize the telescoping barrel which would extend for aim, and retract upon fire to create a devastatingly powerful shot. There was a silencer clipped to the side which could be attached at will, turning it from a virtual scoped artillery cannon into a precision instrument of subversive assassination and swift, silent demise. The hypercarbon-fiber material it was made of was incredibly light. At least, much lighter than it looked.
Still Harkahn looked uncertain. He was, after all, not a fighting man. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to anticipate that he would be needing some protection. In response, he spread the white coat some at the lapels to reveal a simple, but very effective ballistic-weave vest. In a shoulder holster there was some variety of energy pistol. “Got my favorite sweater-vest and trusty old Arcade Cannon.” He said with a fantastic tone of droll satire. “About as ready as I’ll ever be for something as stupid as this.”
Satisfied with the answer, Aleessa glanced to The Ranger. “So you’re The Mad Ranger, huh? I’m looking forward to seeing if you’re really the hotshot the stories tell you are.” Then back to Harkahn. “Let’s move. @#$%’s going down out there and we don’t want to keep things waiting. The shuttle’s ready to go.”
Within ten minutes the trio had boarded the little black shuttle, and used the beacon which had previously been teleported to the last known location of the droid Bravo to teleport instantly planetside. They would step into the cold and wind, where to one side was the small crater created from the beacon – which had been apparently placed a few thousand feet in the air, luckily there was still no reason for anyone to detect it – and toward the other edge of the treeline where what appeared to be the corpses of two quite frozen young men, half-buried in the snowdrift. Nobody was particularly interested in them.
It was time to find that pesky robot.
The Stella Viventium disappeared from the sky as instantaneously as it had appeared. IT was there, then it was not. No sound, no flash, nothing. Where it had gone was a baffling mystery – but strangely enough not all of it had disappeared. The bulk of it, sure – but there was one blocky part still floating there. Still large enough that a railcar trip across would be some thirty minutes, but still nothing compared to the whole of the Flying City. Then another vessel, still smaller – much smaller, perhaps the size of a small aircraft carrier and with a crew of two – detached from the underside, floated some ways away, and allowed the larger part to snap into nonexistence and reappear a few planets away. It was armed to the teeth with all manner of devastating weaponry, all trained on the Dendril infected ship and ready to let loose a barrage of hellfire unto it. Then, with weapons still focused and ready to fire at the Dendril, it unleashed all manner of absolute chaos onto the whole of the planet without the slightest indication.
Bang-POP!
SRSLY BRUH
Bang-POP!
NOT COOL MAN
Unfortunately Kete was running out of nifty programmable firework-shots, but by shooting them into the air in random directions at random intervals he could make the messages appear spontaneously all over the park – within a reasonable range – and further confuse the pursuers.
Bang-POP!
WUBALUBADUBDUB!!
He swore to himself as the eyes of two women of which he desperately did not want to see popped into his head. One was closer than the other. Miserably it was the worse of the two.
Bang-POP!
ERROR 404, FOX NOT FOUND
After all, he didn’t really have any solid evidence that the assassin woman was Imperial. But then…she was chasing him, and he had been too far to see her shooting the soldiers. He had to be cautious.
By some mindboggling coincidence, he happened to be fleeing past the general vicinity of that weird halfie guy from earlier when it happened. He had half-noticed his presence in his mind when Kete’s head exploded.
Or, at least, that’s how it felt. He half whimpered, half screamed and mid-stride collapsed to a rolling heap on the ground, clutching his left eye and that general vicinity of his head with both hands. White knuckles, probably too much pressure but there was no stopping the reaction, the pain was so intense.
What was it?! He was barely even thinking on that curiosity, curled up on the ground there he was pretty worthless and overall incapacitated, which was not good.
It was something electromagnetic, that much was certain. It had something to do with the interference that had been bothering him earlier. Something to do with how all those ships were crashing into the jungle earlier – though Kete was unaware of this particular connection. He was unaware of everything except the feeling of his head violently imploding and expanding into a universe of misfortune and agony, only to re-condense into a marble with the pressure of a few dozen suns.
This was not good for him for many reasons, not the least of which was that a certain woman in a black trench coat had managed to catch up to him thanks to this strange happening.
It didn’t bother Kallenger that all of her electronics and tech had suddenly gone out. She was too busy taking the first chance she’d gotten in ages to get her hands on that little @#$% - and so she did.
Using the momentum of her sprint Kallenger grabbed the curled up halfie by the back of the collar and flung him to his feet – or in that general direction. He stumbled pointlessly into a tree, still too preoccupied with the furious agony in his brain to resist in the slightest.
How she hated him! So many times had the little @#$% evaded her, made a fool of her. Payback time! Pinning him to the tree by a forceful hand at his neck, Kallenger deftly drew the knife from behind her, spun it to be held reverse in the hand, and plunged it through Kete’s right ear and a good two inches into the tree. He let out an agonizing cry, having at very least the sense not to move his head tried to sort of scuff his feet at the base of the tree in an unnecessary effort to keep himself from tugging on it.
The shock of it all had not numbed him, but it had altered his reaction slightly. Too weakened from it to really do anything his arms fell limp to his side, the small thing looking up at the Imperial agent who had after all these years managed to catch her target for good. He seemed so very small there. Smaller than usual, even.
Though only one eye was really looking up at her, and that even wasn’t looking at anything. Left eye still closed tight from the furious pain, but other reactions suddenly required too much movement so he was at last reduced to a fearfully trembling ragdoll, staring half-glazed and teary-eyed in the general direction of the woman who would suddenly deliver him two intense gut-punches, followed by a much more intent grabbing of his throat which adequately cut off his air supply. After ten seconds or so the lack of air was already still worsening whatever horridness was plaguing his brain and eye.
High above the surface, Aelyn-Paeryc Petrovalyc’s warship hung in the sky, orbiting the planet known as Earth, but was not Earth. A vast assortments of weapons were preparing to release total devastation upon the Dendril infected ship – to whatever end that might bring – but another operation within was engaging something on a much larger scale.
This planet had, after all, been largely engineered by himself. Just like the other three planets that were called Earth but were not Earth, the planet was equipped with a built-in electromagnetic field that vastly trumped any natural configuration. It had taken centuries to accomplish, but eventually they had been coordinated together so that – ideally – they would reveal the location of something. A machine on a scale even more vast than the Stella, a machine which required entire planets to operate, and yet it was so very simple.
Yet an interesting byproduct of all that nonsense was a delightful level of control over the electromagnetosphere of said planet by the creator of the phenomenon. That was, of course, A.P. Petrovalyc in his little Warship. A few dials and the push of a button, and he had completely destroyed the electromagnetic balance which kept the planet functioning as normal. A surge of power, chaotic redirections of motion.
It was devastating.
Anything electronic or with electromagnetic properties – anything technological – was going to feel the effects. They were not uniform, but they were vicious. Anything in orbit around the planet within range of the magnetosphere (with the exception of the warship, which was specifically designed to resist this exact kind of thing by the same man who created this exact kind of thing in the first place) was likely to go completely out of commission, at least temporarily. This included the space station and likely the Dendril infected vessel.
On the surface things were not much better. There were power surges and outages all over the planet, throughout all the cities. Being the most technologically bustling, Earth City was particularly affected. A few hovercars crashed. One railcar derailed and knocked over a small building. Out in the park the most one would see was a number of streetlamps surging and blowing out all at once.
Robots were badly affected too, but obviously that had been the exact reason that Aelyn had invoked this chaos. It was going to be a vicious blow to Kampfer’s force – not only for the extensive damage it was likely to do on the majority of his robotic and technological army, but also for the fact that it was going to linger for quite some time, making Kampfer’s operations on the planet that much more hindered and difficult. It was too basic a force to resist – anything that existed in the form of Possible matter was going to be subject to the effects.
Was it going to be the deathblow that Aelyn had wistfully hoped it would be? No. Would it probably come back around to bite him in the ass? Yes. Especially since he was planning on going down to the surface soon to further pursue the droid with the trio who had already been sent in undercover – with electromagnetic shields that would be able to ward off the effects, but only under the condition that they had already been activated before it all started.
He knew that going planetside, especially to the Kampfer-controlled Kartupelis, was going to be dangerous. That would probably be where the madman would get back at him for it. His armies would be hit hard but far from destroyed. It was probably only going to make him that much more intent on getting back at the Captain.
Still…he wished he could have seen the Lord’s face.
Totally worth it.
Pressing his luck and hoping for two victories in a row he simultaneously fired his entire Warship arsenal at the Dendril infected vessel which hopefully had been largely disabled.
Kmapfer felt a sting on the back of his neck, a feeling that is been awhile since he felt last, but he knew what it was though. "An EMP?" he said to himself as he walked into the command center to see what's happen. "No zis feeling is too great...it's too large...planet-side EMP?" he still continued to think as he entered the center. "Sir we have some news to tell" the operator side looking at Kampfer, is eye twitched a little which called attention to Kampfer as he nodded at the operator to continue. "Sir the Stella teleported and we are now trying to track it will appear next...and we have detected a total collapse of the electromagnetic atmosphere of the planet, which has caused damage to a few of our sensors, but hasn't damage the energy reactor of any of our bases scattered on the base" he gave out his report as he physically handed the report to Kampfer to see. "Only Aelyn vould be zis stupid to use zis his technology to try to hurt me, zis vill only track more Dendril's now...anyway it's a valiant effort going against a technologically superior opponent, but of course zis von't effect ze Z-bot's because of a simple zing called skin" he explained to himself as he looked at the smile of the operator, seeing it hasn't effected too badly. "Lucky our experimental veapons are deep underground, so zis won't affect zem...ze Doc-bots vill be affected by zis only a bit from some shortages to some minor parts but not zat bad" he said still looking at the report. "Sir whats the plan?" the operator asked
"Vell lets appear zat ve been hurt hard...no aircraft and shutdown main communications and use auxiliary communications, also shutdown zings like mains lights and power and use secondary lights and sub power...ve need to appear hurt by zis event" he commanded to the operator. "Yes,Sir, but we have one more report...the Dendril cruise liner has been destroyed by a warship from the Stella and we lost communications to the starport" he replied as he returned to his post and started to shutdown systems. "Zat doesn't matter, it did it's job, ve won't go after ze warship just yet and don't worry about ze starport...ve need to focus on appearing zat ve have been hit so ve can influence Aelyn to come down to ze surface. "Vith the droid in our possession, ve vill attract someone from ze Stella to valk into our heavily defended city and capture zem" he said telling the operator of his plan.
As the liner took a lot of hits from the warship, it sent out a massive signal into deep space, a signal that everyone can see and it was a request of reinforcements from a planet known as Gyros. If anyone has any aware of the Dendril presence, then they would easily conclude that Gyros is a Dendril held planet...maybe its home-world. Before the liner can get into crashing distance it exploded into many tiny little pieces, anything on it, would be dead.
Before communications were purposely severed, the last massage to the Kartupelis forces were "Dig in, and wait for potential incoming forces...major communications will be operational in 72 hours or less" Commander Louie took this order seriously, despite a bit frigidity from the collapse of the electromagnetic atmosphere, he issued his forces that to be on high alert on any suspicious looking individuals and have the guards looking outside of the city look for any individuals approaching the city, from machine gunners, snipers and even basic foot soldiers to be on high alert for any incoming individuals.
"Vell lets appear zat ve been hurt hard...no aircraft and shutdown main communications and use auxiliary communications, also shutdown zings like mains lights and power and use secondary lights and sub power...ve need to appear hurt by zis event" he commanded to the operator. "Yes,Sir, but we have one more report...the Dendril cruise liner has been destroyed by a warship from the Stella and we lost communications to the starport" he replied as he returned to his post and started to shutdown systems. "Zat doesn't matter, it did it's job, ve won't go after ze warship just yet and don't worry about ze starport...ve need to focus on appearing zat ve have been hit so ve can influence Aelyn to come down to ze surface. "Vith the droid in our possession, ve vill attract someone from ze Stella to valk into our heavily defended city and capture zem" he said telling the operator of his plan.
As the liner took a lot of hits from the warship, it sent out a massive signal into deep space, a signal that everyone can see and it was a request of reinforcements from a planet known as Gyros. If anyone has any aware of the Dendril presence, then they would easily conclude that Gyros is a Dendril held planet...maybe its home-world. Before the liner can get into crashing distance it exploded into many tiny little pieces, anything on it, would be dead.
Before communications were purposely severed, the last massage to the Kartupelis forces were "Dig in, and wait for potential incoming forces...major communications will be operational in 72 hours or less" Commander Louie took this order seriously, despite a bit frigidity from the collapse of the electromagnetic atmosphere, he issued his forces that to be on high alert on any suspicious looking individuals and have the guards looking outside of the city look for any individuals approaching the city, from machine gunners, snipers and even basic foot soldiers to be on high alert for any incoming individuals.
With a steady motion, the Ranger carefully moved his arms around with an surprising robotic steadiness. He pulled out his Revolver, holstered it. Pulled it out again along with his knife this time, stashed both away. Drew the gun once again, pointing it straight between Harkanh's eyes in a fraction of a second. Let out an ironic chuckle from under his mask and finally ceased his 'play'. The new device didn't had the pioneering quality and features from an ERIS hardware but it definitely had it's advantages.
With Harkanh's finishing his explanation on the BrainPal, the Ranger immediately took it out from his left gauntlet. "Quite the stuff, Doc..." - Scoffing, the Masked Man coupled the BrainPal unto his antenna, instead. - "But that's won't last long in here..."
The Ranger lifted his forearm, pressing some buttons over it. Shortly after, it's mechanical frame emitted a soft hum as a clear blue glow slowly started to take over it. "... Think of this as, uh, a EMP field emitter-disperser of sorts. I wouldn't like to have that precious BrainPal over here once I activate it, Gotcha?"
The Ranger let out his sarcastic chuckle again. That's when another crew member from the Stella popped in.
"We're going down there in the blind, miss." - He answered right as Aleessa had finished with Harkanh. - "That's not the **** I usually do, but it ain't stopping me from putting my best on the show. I'll go by the code name of CL, by the way."
The Ranger, 'CL', just went ahead of the duo into the shuttle. All of that time, the Ranger struggled to adhere to his personal code of conduct: "Ask no questions. The shortest of briefings is enough." But the Stella Viventium and it's crew was surely remarkable. After the top quality refurbishment on his equipment, the Ranger felt that there was something... Fishy, in a lack of better words, about this colony. Almost like something inside of it would lead him straight to his intended destiny: Sol System, Planet Earth.
Perhaps ... This thing was Captain Petrovalyc himself.
With Harkanh's finishing his explanation on the BrainPal, the Ranger immediately took it out from his left gauntlet. "Quite the stuff, Doc..." - Scoffing, the Masked Man coupled the BrainPal unto his antenna, instead. - "But that's won't last long in here..."
The Ranger lifted his forearm, pressing some buttons over it. Shortly after, it's mechanical frame emitted a soft hum as a clear blue glow slowly started to take over it. "... Think of this as, uh, a EMP field emitter-disperser of sorts. I wouldn't like to have that precious BrainPal over here once I activate it, Gotcha?"
The Ranger let out his sarcastic chuckle again. That's when another crew member from the Stella popped in.
"We're going down there in the blind, miss." - He answered right as Aleessa had finished with Harkanh. - "That's not the **** I usually do, but it ain't stopping me from putting my best on the show. I'll go by the code name of CL, by the way."
The Ranger, 'CL', just went ahead of the duo into the shuttle. All of that time, the Ranger struggled to adhere to his personal code of conduct: "Ask no questions. The shortest of briefings is enough." But the Stella Viventium and it's crew was surely remarkable. After the top quality refurbishment on his equipment, the Ranger felt that there was something... Fishy, in a lack of better words, about this colony. Almost like something inside of it would lead him straight to his intended destiny: Sol System, Planet Earth.
Perhaps ... This thing was Captain Petrovalyc himself.
True to her prayer, Nirix moved swiftly through the city park and became one with the shadows. The few guards that attempted to follow behind Kallenger were cut down, either literally by her blade or by a single bullet to a vital organ. Their deaths were swift and she had tried to make it painless but that wasn't her main objective. She had almost lost sight of the chase, the random firework messages throwing her off just a bit but Nirix relied on her instincts to help her find the correct path. Now she was close, nearing the location of Kallenger and Kete with each passing second. Though something didn't feel right, the air was static and sharp.
Taking a step, her cloaking device suddenly timed out with a disheartening sizzle. That was unusual; Nirix knew that she had at least three minutes until it had to shut down for recharge. Her only tech item was down for now, but her eyes weren't focused on that for now. Lavender orbs stayed firmly locked on the two people in front of her.
Ketin was pinned by his ear, a knife holding him to the bark of the tree. His left eye, the unusual gold one, was closed tight. His arms were limp and unmoving, while Kallenger's hands squeezed with a vice like grip around his neck. From her knowledge, he had only mere 10 seconds before he either blacked out or died, and even that was generous. Though right now, Nirix didn't have time to guess. She had to react.
Using her hand gun, she fired a bullet into Kallenger's shoulder to disorientate her. With one swift movement she charged at her, tackling the short haired human to the ground. Before a word was uttered, Nirix's blade was at her throat and her knee on her ribs to pin her down.
"Release him, Shemlen or I'll end you where you stand. Ma halam, you're finished. Your back up is dead and just like me, your tech is down. You have nothing left but to choose" Came the lowly hiss from The Eoclu
Taking a step, her cloaking device suddenly timed out with a disheartening sizzle. That was unusual; Nirix knew that she had at least three minutes until it had to shut down for recharge. Her only tech item was down for now, but her eyes weren't focused on that for now. Lavender orbs stayed firmly locked on the two people in front of her.
Ketin was pinned by his ear, a knife holding him to the bark of the tree. His left eye, the unusual gold one, was closed tight. His arms were limp and unmoving, while Kallenger's hands squeezed with a vice like grip around his neck. From her knowledge, he had only mere 10 seconds before he either blacked out or died, and even that was generous. Though right now, Nirix didn't have time to guess. She had to react.
Using her hand gun, she fired a bullet into Kallenger's shoulder to disorientate her. With one swift movement she charged at her, tackling the short haired human to the ground. Before a word was uttered, Nirix's blade was at her throat and her knee on her ribs to pin her down.
"Release him, Shemlen or I'll end you where you stand. Ma halam, you're finished. Your back up is dead and just like me, your tech is down. You have nothing left but to choose" Came the lowly hiss from The Eoclu
Captain Petrovalyc stood with hands behind back, scowling through the primary monitor at the scant remnants of what had only moments before been a Dendril-infected vessel. Alexa stood similarly beside him, though with an expression more in thought than displeasure.
“I don’t like it.” The man said after some time. “It was too easy, on both parts.”
“What I want to know is if the Lord of Tech Support knew we were capable of blowing it so easily out of the sky.” Alexa replied.
“I didn’t even know we were capable of it.” The Captain admitted, humorlessly. “I was certain there’d be some kind of special defense…Either he underestimated us – which I hate to admit that I doubt – or he intended for that vessel only to act as a call for more of them. That’s the more likely case and if so then it worked spectacularly. I wonder how long it’ll take for them to get here…?”
“At least Stella will be safe.”
“Yes, there’s no way they’ll be able to find it now. Though the Command Module is still in danger, they won’t have much trouble finding that.”
“We should probably have them join the Stella then.”
Aelyn-Paeryc mulled this idea over, then nodded, with a huff. “I suppose we should. No need to go taking chances.” A finger to the ear and he gave the order, which was hesitantly obeyed. The Command Module of the Stella Viventium disappeared from reality, ceased to exist.
Another long moment of silence, the couple watched the infinitesimal bits and pieces of Dendril ship go out in all directions. Some fell to the planet and would burn up harmlessly before so much as being seen. Others began a billion year journey through the blackness of the Universe.
Then the Captain smiled suddenly. It was a wicked little smirk. “Alex. Are you aware that our teleportation matrix is down?”
She hadn’t been, but a quick BrainPal scan proved him to be correct in his realization. She looked surprised.
“But…you know more about this than I do, but isn’t that the same tech that…”
He nodded in reply to her drifted words. “Yes, but the machine itself hasn’t been affected. I think we let loose such an intense EMP collapse that we distorted spacetime coordinates. I can’t imagine that having any serious effect other than making travel by any means except through space as normal impossible.”
Alexa looked dubious and put a hand to her chin, thoughtfully. “That means…” She brightened up with the realization – Aelyn looked curious. “That means Kampfer won’t be able to do it either, right?”
The Captain had actually failed to consider this possibility. He thought it over and broke out once more into an almost sadistic grin. “Yes, yes that’s exactly correct. Unless he can squeeze himself through unreality or reinvent the entire system of spacial manipulation, the only way he’s getting off this planet is the old fashioned way. Rocket or starship or the like.”
“He wouldn’t be able to tell either, would he?”
“I doubt it. The only way to notice the effect would be to look for it or to try teleporting, and he’d have no reason to look for it…” But again, A.P.’s words drifted off, and he returned to scowling. “But I still don’t like it.”
“Why not? It looks like we’ve got the guy pretty much cornered.”
“Exactly. We know he won’t be able to teleport, we know his forces have been hard-hit according to the Command Module reports before they went off. All that plus erasing that Dendril ship so easily. Something’s wrong here.”
“I suppose you’re right. It does all seem too good to be true.”
“And we won’t be able to know what’s not right about it until it smacks us in the face.”
“Maybe the EMP didn’t work as well as we hoped it would, but he’s shutting down his stuff to try and trick us?” Alexa suggested, to the Captain’s immediate reply.
“No, he wouldn’t do that. Or, at least I doubt he would. It doesn’t seem like the kind of move a man like him would make. Not that I haven’t been wrong about people before, but no, I think the EMP was effective enough.”
“Well. I guess we’ll find out soon enough.”
And another long moment of silence.
Aleessa Riverre, Dorin Harkahn and The Ranger stepped out of the tiny teleportation-dropship just in time for the planet’s magnetic field to go wonky and shut everything down. Their tech would still work of course – all except for the dropship, which would be quite unable to teleport back and had no propulsion systems.
The icy Siberian winds hit hard, though only the Doctor was really wishing that he’d brought a thicker coat. The snow was thick and deep but icy and easy to walk on if done so with care.
“Alright boys. Captain says shoot to kill.” She glanced to ‘CL’ with a rather devious smirk. “Oh, and we’re not subject to ‘local laws’ so don’t worry if you end up shooting a non-combatant. They’re expendable.” She said, factually. “Kartupelis is about three miles to the west. We get into the city, grab that robot and get out. Harkahn’s got some codes and @#$% that will get the robot to our side. We’ll also do some damage to the enemy presence if we can, since that EMP should have put them in a bad way.”
“Might even be able to get it to fight for us.” He chimed in.
“But as of now we’ve got to assume that it’s been reprogrammed as hostile by the enemy.”
A pause as she switched gears.
“CL, I want you to take point. I’ll focus on covering fire and protecting the Doctor. Questions?”
Of the original twenty soldiers, only two remained. They were 13/20 who had taken an ambush position up on a rise too far ahead to be seen, and 4/20, who had been staying so far behind that his presence was undetectable.
For a miniscule moment, Royanna Kallenger felt the distinct and heart-sinking feeling of something about to beat the snot out of her. It was an accurate intuition. She got to “Oh, son of a-“ before the bullet tore cleanly through her shoulder and splintered the wood just beyond. She had moved to draw her own blade – also monomolecular and therefore would have probably provided Nirix with the best swordfight in ages, since the things were expensive and only popular among those who preferred eclectic weaponry – but before she could clear leather the attacker was upon her. She hit the ground hard with a distinctly unhappy grunt.
By some miracle of self control however, she managed to retain her composure. Looking annoyed, she said with a choppy emphasis ”But. I’m not. Standing.” and gave a moment before continuing in a more direct voice, avoiding the decision. (She would have gotten along great with Captain Petrovalyc, if they had ever met.) “So are you one of his accomplices, or do you just go around killing honest men in droves to protect criminals who can make themselves look innocent?” She glared into Nirix’s eyes. “It’s the latter, I can tell. You’re not the first, you know. Others have pulled this same nonsense. You’ve got no idea who he is and yet you’re assuming that we are the ‘bad guys’. You know nothing and yet the lives of men are so worthless to you that you’ll dispatch them over a hunch? They had families, but you’ve gone and let that depraved criminal pull his ‘innocent kid’ act, and now he’s getting away again.
She was right. Breathing rapidly and heavily, hands shaking, he had managed to think straight enough to get a vague grip of the situation and took action. He steeled himself, gritted his teeth and reached up with both hands to grab the knife and yank it out of the tree – and out of his ear – with all his might. The force of it made him stumble forward, but by the time Kallenger made her observation to Nirix he was already stumbling desperately into the cover of thicker flora, clutching agonizingly onto one flattened ear as he moved. He stumbled into a tree trunk, but recovered quickly and proceeded with doing his best to disappear. Progress would be slower now and the kid might end up passing out somewhere along the line – but at the moment he was doing pretty well, especially considering the damage. It showed a surprising endurance that the little thing wouldn’t be expected of having.
Kallenger was glaring exasperatedly up at her attacker. “Now what.” She demanded, after a moment.
“I don’t like it.” The man said after some time. “It was too easy, on both parts.”
“What I want to know is if the Lord of Tech Support knew we were capable of blowing it so easily out of the sky.” Alexa replied.
“I didn’t even know we were capable of it.” The Captain admitted, humorlessly. “I was certain there’d be some kind of special defense…Either he underestimated us – which I hate to admit that I doubt – or he intended for that vessel only to act as a call for more of them. That’s the more likely case and if so then it worked spectacularly. I wonder how long it’ll take for them to get here…?”
“At least Stella will be safe.”
“Yes, there’s no way they’ll be able to find it now. Though the Command Module is still in danger, they won’t have much trouble finding that.”
“We should probably have them join the Stella then.”
Aelyn-Paeryc mulled this idea over, then nodded, with a huff. “I suppose we should. No need to go taking chances.” A finger to the ear and he gave the order, which was hesitantly obeyed. The Command Module of the Stella Viventium disappeared from reality, ceased to exist.
Another long moment of silence, the couple watched the infinitesimal bits and pieces of Dendril ship go out in all directions. Some fell to the planet and would burn up harmlessly before so much as being seen. Others began a billion year journey through the blackness of the Universe.
Then the Captain smiled suddenly. It was a wicked little smirk. “Alex. Are you aware that our teleportation matrix is down?”
She hadn’t been, but a quick BrainPal scan proved him to be correct in his realization. She looked surprised.
“But…you know more about this than I do, but isn’t that the same tech that…”
He nodded in reply to her drifted words. “Yes, but the machine itself hasn’t been affected. I think we let loose such an intense EMP collapse that we distorted spacetime coordinates. I can’t imagine that having any serious effect other than making travel by any means except through space as normal impossible.”
Alexa looked dubious and put a hand to her chin, thoughtfully. “That means…” She brightened up with the realization – Aelyn looked curious. “That means Kampfer won’t be able to do it either, right?”
The Captain had actually failed to consider this possibility. He thought it over and broke out once more into an almost sadistic grin. “Yes, yes that’s exactly correct. Unless he can squeeze himself through unreality or reinvent the entire system of spacial manipulation, the only way he’s getting off this planet is the old fashioned way. Rocket or starship or the like.”
“He wouldn’t be able to tell either, would he?”
“I doubt it. The only way to notice the effect would be to look for it or to try teleporting, and he’d have no reason to look for it…” But again, A.P.’s words drifted off, and he returned to scowling. “But I still don’t like it.”
“Why not? It looks like we’ve got the guy pretty much cornered.”
“Exactly. We know he won’t be able to teleport, we know his forces have been hard-hit according to the Command Module reports before they went off. All that plus erasing that Dendril ship so easily. Something’s wrong here.”
“I suppose you’re right. It does all seem too good to be true.”
“And we won’t be able to know what’s not right about it until it smacks us in the face.”
“Maybe the EMP didn’t work as well as we hoped it would, but he’s shutting down his stuff to try and trick us?” Alexa suggested, to the Captain’s immediate reply.
“No, he wouldn’t do that. Or, at least I doubt he would. It doesn’t seem like the kind of move a man like him would make. Not that I haven’t been wrong about people before, but no, I think the EMP was effective enough.”
“Well. I guess we’ll find out soon enough.”
And another long moment of silence.
Aleessa Riverre, Dorin Harkahn and The Ranger stepped out of the tiny teleportation-dropship just in time for the planet’s magnetic field to go wonky and shut everything down. Their tech would still work of course – all except for the dropship, which would be quite unable to teleport back and had no propulsion systems.
The icy Siberian winds hit hard, though only the Doctor was really wishing that he’d brought a thicker coat. The snow was thick and deep but icy and easy to walk on if done so with care.
“Alright boys. Captain says shoot to kill.” She glanced to ‘CL’ with a rather devious smirk. “Oh, and we’re not subject to ‘local laws’ so don’t worry if you end up shooting a non-combatant. They’re expendable.” She said, factually. “Kartupelis is about three miles to the west. We get into the city, grab that robot and get out. Harkahn’s got some codes and @#$% that will get the robot to our side. We’ll also do some damage to the enemy presence if we can, since that EMP should have put them in a bad way.”
“Might even be able to get it to fight for us.” He chimed in.
“But as of now we’ve got to assume that it’s been reprogrammed as hostile by the enemy.”
A pause as she switched gears.
“CL, I want you to take point. I’ll focus on covering fire and protecting the Doctor. Questions?”
Of the original twenty soldiers, only two remained. They were 13/20 who had taken an ambush position up on a rise too far ahead to be seen, and 4/20, who had been staying so far behind that his presence was undetectable.
For a miniscule moment, Royanna Kallenger felt the distinct and heart-sinking feeling of something about to beat the snot out of her. It was an accurate intuition. She got to “Oh, son of a-“ before the bullet tore cleanly through her shoulder and splintered the wood just beyond. She had moved to draw her own blade – also monomolecular and therefore would have probably provided Nirix with the best swordfight in ages, since the things were expensive and only popular among those who preferred eclectic weaponry – but before she could clear leather the attacker was upon her. She hit the ground hard with a distinctly unhappy grunt.
By some miracle of self control however, she managed to retain her composure. Looking annoyed, she said with a choppy emphasis ”But. I’m not. Standing.” and gave a moment before continuing in a more direct voice, avoiding the decision. (She would have gotten along great with Captain Petrovalyc, if they had ever met.) “So are you one of his accomplices, or do you just go around killing honest men in droves to protect criminals who can make themselves look innocent?” She glared into Nirix’s eyes. “It’s the latter, I can tell. You’re not the first, you know. Others have pulled this same nonsense. You’ve got no idea who he is and yet you’re assuming that we are the ‘bad guys’. You know nothing and yet the lives of men are so worthless to you that you’ll dispatch them over a hunch? They had families, but you’ve gone and let that depraved criminal pull his ‘innocent kid’ act, and now he’s getting away again.
She was right. Breathing rapidly and heavily, hands shaking, he had managed to think straight enough to get a vague grip of the situation and took action. He steeled himself, gritted his teeth and reached up with both hands to grab the knife and yank it out of the tree – and out of his ear – with all his might. The force of it made him stumble forward, but by the time Kallenger made her observation to Nirix he was already stumbling desperately into the cover of thicker flora, clutching agonizingly onto one flattened ear as he moved. He stumbled into a tree trunk, but recovered quickly and proceeded with doing his best to disappear. Progress would be slower now and the kid might end up passing out somewhere along the line – but at the moment he was doing pretty well, especially considering the damage. It showed a surprising endurance that the little thing wouldn’t be expected of having.
Kallenger was glaring exasperatedly up at her attacker. “Now what.” She demanded, after a moment.
Kampfer looked at a map of Karutpelis in the slightly dimmed command center, only light by secondary lights. "I vonder, vhat vill you do now Aelyn" he said to himself looking at the map trying to see potential strike points of entry into the city itself. Of course it's pointless since the communications are shutoff, but to buy time he does it anyway. The operator was doing is job the old fashion way with analogue mechanics and paper. "Operator, until the stella team strikes the city, don't turn the systems back on" he let the operator know on what to do for the time being. In the back of his mind the purpose blackout will eventually attract the rest of his fleet to investigate and see what has happen, hopefully they don't bring the usurper-class battleship or in Kampfer's mind a tactical disaster in his plan's. Also on Kampfer's mind is how much time does he have until the Dendril's arrive? A few days, hours, weeks, months, who knows, it all depends on how fast they arrive. For the case of Kartupelis, Kampfer will just have to rely on Commander Louie and Maria Lockheart to defend against the potential attack.
Commander Louie stood on the city hall steps, a little nervously since he is expecting an attack with a lot of unknown factors in it, from which direction, how many, what they are equipped with. This all went through his head but one thing he does know is that they are after the droid that is under Maria's care in the tent only a few steps away from him. That is something he knows definitely, but the unknowns keep him on edge. He soon retreated back into the city hall building and reminded the troops looking outside the city to keep on eye on any suspicious activity. The city was silent as usual but the troops limited there movements around on the streets. Only a couple at a time to be on the street. Doc-doc bots stand on corners like guards and few looking out windows. Z-bots hanging around inside or near buildings. Some looking out the windows with laser based machine guns and others with sniper rifles and the rest with there standard issue assault laser based rifles. It seems to be, that anyone wishing arm upon the city is going to have the fight of their lives to whatever objective is.
Commander Louie stood on the city hall steps, a little nervously since he is expecting an attack with a lot of unknown factors in it, from which direction, how many, what they are equipped with. This all went through his head but one thing he does know is that they are after the droid that is under Maria's care in the tent only a few steps away from him. That is something he knows definitely, but the unknowns keep him on edge. He soon retreated back into the city hall building and reminded the troops looking outside the city to keep on eye on any suspicious activity. The city was silent as usual but the troops limited there movements around on the streets. Only a couple at a time to be on the street. Doc-doc bots stand on corners like guards and few looking out windows. Z-bots hanging around inside or near buildings. Some looking out the windows with laser based machine guns and others with sniper rifles and the rest with there standard issue assault laser based rifles. It seems to be, that anyone wishing arm upon the city is going to have the fight of their lives to whatever objective is.
The Z-Bot army and the dropship weren't the only ones affected by the planet-scale EMP. Even though it was fit with a modern protection against it, CL's cybernetic equipment weren't spared from the surge. Immediately popping into his visor's hud, an alert announced a massive destabilization over the planet's magnetosphere. He knew it was one of The Captain's tricks far above into Stella Viventium, but the Ranger was still bothered with it's inconvenient timing, right when he landed unto the planet. He shrugged it off, however, for the sake of his concentration on the mission.
"I've met the thing." - CL interrupted the duo. - "I crashed my ship here before Captain Creep plucked me out from an imminent KillSat. He attempted to repair my ship, for reason that devil-knows-why, but it just ended rigging the nuclear device inside it. Blabbered about some ~creators of the universe~ ********..." - Emphasis on the mocking tone. - "... And ran away. It'll probably fetch some millions. Reverse engineer it and you got an army of haywire, outdated androids as well."
Pulling out his Type 72 Sniper, the Masked Man pressed a single button on his mechanical wrist. Withing moments, a small surge of lightning surrounded his frame and when Aleessa and Harkahn figured out what happened, the Ranger's image was replaced by a transparent mockery of his 'old' form, rendering him virtually invisible. Ignoring Aleessa herself as he hurried on his march forward, CL preferred to speak with her through the BrainPal.
"Will be there roasted potato once we get back to HQ?"
... For some reason... Kartupelis brought him a foreboding urge to munch on anything made with the round, yellow vegetable. Potato salad, potato puree, roasted potato, french fries, potato snacks. Hell, it was a paradise to get to eat your favorite stuff in a far away Rimworld. Every. Freaking. Day.
REACTOR: ONLINE
SYSTEMS: ONLINE
WEAPONS: ONLINE
All systems nominal... 👌
Photon Bending Module: Activated
BrainPal Addon: Activated
Armor Integrity: 100%
Battery Power: 99%
Compressed Hydrogen Storage: 3,500 Kilograms
"I've met the thing." - CL interrupted the duo. - "I crashed my ship here before Captain Creep plucked me out from an imminent KillSat. He attempted to repair my ship, for reason that devil-knows-why, but it just ended rigging the nuclear device inside it. Blabbered about some ~creators of the universe~ ********..." - Emphasis on the mocking tone. - "... And ran away. It'll probably fetch some millions. Reverse engineer it and you got an army of haywire, outdated androids as well."
Pulling out his Type 72 Sniper, the Masked Man pressed a single button on his mechanical wrist. Withing moments, a small surge of lightning surrounded his frame and when Aleessa and Harkahn figured out what happened, the Ranger's image was replaced by a transparent mockery of his 'old' form, rendering him virtually invisible. Ignoring Aleessa herself as he hurried on his march forward, CL preferred to speak with her through the BrainPal.
"Will be there roasted potato once we get back to HQ?"
... For some reason... Kartupelis brought him a foreboding urge to munch on anything made with the round, yellow vegetable. Potato salad, potato puree, roasted potato, french fries, potato snacks. Hell, it was a paradise to get to eat your favorite stuff in a far away Rimworld. Every. Freaking. Day.
REACTOR: ONLINE
SYSTEMS: ONLINE
WEAPONS: ONLINE
All systems nominal... 👌
Photon Bending Module: Activated
BrainPal Addon: Activated
Armor Integrity: 100%
Battery Power: 99%
Compressed Hydrogen Storage: 3,500 Kilograms
Nirix half-heartedly listened to the woman's tirade. She did not believe that the lives of those men were worthless. Oh, yes, she knew that they most-likely had families or some special individual that would now mourn their deaths when they did not return. Yet still she had drove either bullet or sword through them all the same. Her curiosity into their lives was a liability, an unfair judgment that would've hindered her work. It was all about your perspective, if she saw them as an none existent threat, Nirix would be the one lying on the ground in a pool of her own blood. That could not happen, she had to do the task the divines had giving her.
For now, anyone that was threating Ketin could not be redeemed in her eyes.
"You misunderstand, Shemlen" The edge from her voice had lessened and she too, adopted an almost posed and neutral manner. "You are seeing what you want to see. However what I see, is different. I see fear, years of running and looking over your shoulder at the thought of someone watching your every move. Carrying distrust in anyone you happen upon, watching and waiting for them to stab you in back" At this her blade was pressed even harder against the neck of Kallenger, most likely drawing a thin line of blood.
"Though how I see you, you are a threat. Someone I might actually enjoy killing, for once. The Da'len may be using me for now and he may be a criminal, but I will be there to defend him regardless of what you think or do"
With that being said, Nirix removed her blade as well as her weight from off of Kallenger and stood upright. Lavender eyes bore an intense gaze into the women who was still on the ground. The thought of killing her right then, crossed her mind but the Eoclu decided against it.
"Come for us if you wish, but I can't say that I'll let you live"
Sheathing her blade, Nirix was gone before another word was said. Her sights set on following the frantic half breed.
For now, anyone that was threating Ketin could not be redeemed in her eyes.
"You misunderstand, Shemlen" The edge from her voice had lessened and she too, adopted an almost posed and neutral manner. "You are seeing what you want to see. However what I see, is different. I see fear, years of running and looking over your shoulder at the thought of someone watching your every move. Carrying distrust in anyone you happen upon, watching and waiting for them to stab you in back" At this her blade was pressed even harder against the neck of Kallenger, most likely drawing a thin line of blood.
"Though how I see you, you are a threat. Someone I might actually enjoy killing, for once. The Da'len may be using me for now and he may be a criminal, but I will be there to defend him regardless of what you think or do"
With that being said, Nirix removed her blade as well as her weight from off of Kallenger and stood upright. Lavender eyes bore an intense gaze into the women who was still on the ground. The thought of killing her right then, crossed her mind but the Eoclu decided against it.
"Come for us if you wish, but I can't say that I'll let you live"
Sheathing her blade, Nirix was gone before another word was said. Her sights set on following the frantic half breed.
"For all intents and purposes I must return there at some point anyways to recover something for my creator" The droid said as he opened a port on his front end and a bunch of tangled wires came popping out "Oh dear, that's unfortunate" Bravo stated poking at the wires and mix matching until he accidentally disconnected his visual sensor and was unable to see "And this is worse..." He stopped poking at the tangled wires and instead stood completely still "If you could do me a favor and untangle as well as reactivate my visual sensor that would be great"
"Sure, I can do that for you, Bravo" Maria said as she got in front of Bravo and started to fix his wires. "Hey, why not I I optimize your visuals a bit so you can see better" she suggested as she finishes up untangling the wires with in impressive speed, evidence of her very high perception and dexterity and obvious intuition about robotics from her father. "Yeah, once my job here is done here, you and I will go to that moon and get what your creator wants" she said as she starts to finish up fixing Bravo's wires.
"If you think you can upgrade my systems to remain compatible with my systems by all means" Bravo stated "For now I give you authorization to all my subsystems, and I am under your orders until further notice" Bravo stated as his little blue light flashed for a moment next to his visual sensor. The rotary socket holding his head began rotating "My lack of visual on anything disturbs me!" he said head spinning in circles
"Alright, alright hold your horses, I'm almost done" she said as she still configures with the wires. "Okay, your visuals should be fixed now..now let me get here..." she continued as she tweaked some circuits from where the wires are connected too. "Now you are fully done, your visuals should be up and operation, with a some improvements on clarity and I think also may extended the range a bit too" she said as she closed up his chest.
Then it hit her. The ominous silence of the city, she usually hears the soldiers having a good time and walking around, but now the town seemed so very silent and a bit creepy to be honest. The air seemed still and foreboding. Maria looked at Bravo and said "I think the party is about to start" she peeked out of the tent and looked around seeing any form of life, but was only greeted by a few Doc-bots that guarded the corners of the buildings standing perfectly still and a few Z-bots hiding in the building windows. "Alright Bravo, I don't know but do you have by any chance like a short ranged radar that scan the outside of the city by any chance?" she asked as she came back inside the tent and drew out her modernized Lematt revolver, checking how many rounds were in the chamber, making sure they were 9 before she spun the cartridge back into the gun.
Then it hit her. The ominous silence of the city, she usually hears the soldiers having a good time and walking around, but now the town seemed so very silent and a bit creepy to be honest. The air seemed still and foreboding. Maria looked at Bravo and said "I think the party is about to start" she peeked out of the tent and looked around seeing any form of life, but was only greeted by a few Doc-bots that guarded the corners of the buildings standing perfectly still and a few Z-bots hiding in the building windows. "Alright Bravo, I don't know but do you have by any chance like a short ranged radar that scan the outside of the city by any chance?" she asked as she came back inside the tent and drew out her modernized Lematt revolver, checking how many rounds were in the chamber, making sure they were 9 before she spun the cartridge back into the gun.
"I have a form of sensor that can pick up other radio communications, but for chances on a radar that's beyond me, I did not come with that attachment" Bravo said as he mimicked the action of shrugging shoulders and shaking his head "I do however have some knowledge on the Viventium however it is extremely limited" He stated Grabbing his Pulse rifle from his back "Setting prejudice to maximum" And his small blue lights all changed to deep blood red lights in a matter of moments
"Wait, wait, wait, hold calm yourself, Sputnik, it's pretty damn obvious anyone going to attack this city is after your head" she said she raised her hands with gun in hand but not pointing at him trying to calm Bravo down. "I have a plan, that can possibly resolve by you not having to show up and with this" she said as she raised a regular old USB stick. "What my plan is that, if they get close to the square, I'll offer them the USB, which would have your personality, memory and encrypted data-banks on here, in reality it won't be on here since all this USB has on here is various forms of Potato on Potato action" she said with a much wider smile on her face, since that's what's literally on the USB stick. "I'll make up some story that the your body was completely fried or something so they won't have any reason to go after you, but all else fails, you can pop out go guns blazing" she said to Bravo hoping it is a sufficient plan that he would agree too.
"hm... Very well if it is sufficient for you then might as well" Bravo said and his lights returned to their bluish color, flickering and placing his pulse rifle back onto his back panel. "If things go sour, I will rush out guns ablazing as you put it" he repeated and kept himself stood right where he was. He replicated a state in which his body were to be fried as he had a false wire in various places of his mechanical body just to do so and they all began sparking as Bravo fell to the floor with a metal thud and his rotors began twitching as the false wires were sparking.
"Excellent Bravo" she said to him as he fellow on the floor. "Lets, put you on the table, then" she said as she lifted him up onto the operation's table to give an authentic look that Bravo was beyond repair. As she finished raising the heavy metal body up onto the body, Maria left the tent and stood outside in the frigid cold and looked around. She saw that all the Z-bots are holed up in the buildings while the doc-bots were by the walls or on the ground floor of a building. She immediately identified various energy based machine guns and sniper positions. Maria seemed impressed by the large amount of defenses that are set up for the attackers. As she went back into the tent and sat on the the chair in the corner closest to the entrance, she tilted her hat forward and said "Good Luck, boys, you gonna need" wishing the defending troops well as she rested her eyes until showtime
Will there be roasted potato when we get back to HQ? Rivierre relayed the question to Mr. Petrovalyc on the band which connected them all. It didn’t seem necessary – but the answer came promptly and factually.
Yes.
With an equal lack of necessity, Rivierre again relayed the answer to The Ranger, who had clearly heard it himself. Captain says yes.
This was probably some variety of humor, though it was hard to imagine the stoic woman – and impossible to imagine the Captain having anything like a sense of humor.
BrainPal had that effect on people. Since it was so very easy to use – all one had to do was think what they wanted to say and to whom – it made communication incredibly rapid. Transmission was instantaneous and the words could be formed and comprehended immensely faster than speech. To some in fact, speech seemed dreadfully slow – if they used the thing that much. Nevertheless, the rapidity of communication allowed for one to say things that they might ordinarily not devote the time, energy or thought to saying if they were using those inefficient ‘words’. They could also tend to have a peculiar effect on the words since the words were not ‘words’, yet still they carried the user’s intended inflection. Difficult to describe, easy to understand.
Another fantastic advantage of BrainPal transmission was that without another BrainPal© brand BrainPal it was thoroughly impossible to intercept it. The fundamental nature of the transmission of thought, plus the encryption which was already unnecessary, yet still tangled and layered and secured to the point of invulnerability. The bottom line was that it was not really a machine, nor electronically operated. Very advanced stuff. Hard to grok, easy to use.
Doctor Harkahn fell into position some fifteen feet from the mostly-invisible Ranger. While Rivierre had made it clear he was not CL’s responsibility, it was still better for him to stick close. At least he had the sense to not stick too close, and would likely have no effect on the Ranger’s stealth.
Rivierre herself fell back, moved silently off to the side – always sure to maintain a line of sight on the Doctor and ideally any likely lines of attack.
The city is two miles west of us. she said, If what recon we managed before the tech went down is good, looks like we’ll be coming in through a scrapyard. Can’t be sure, but there appears to be some kind of drain pipe to the far west side that might prove easy access to the inner city.
Come to think of it,Harkahn added, If we can get under wherever Bravo is being kept, I might be able to bridge a secure, closed network connection directly to him. Basic enough that the residual EMP shouldn’t hinder it, and secure enough that it’ll take a long while to break it.
You gonna’ try and reprogram it?
Not unless I have to. Ideally I can convince it to come willingly. All I have to do is provide a convincing enough case that I’m an Earth authority, part of whatever organization built him. I’ve got a list of names, governments, all sorts of stuff believed to be from Earth. One of them must be Bravo’s.
Sure enough, it wasn’t long before the trio Was faced with a chain-link fence, wrapped around the perimeter of a scrapyard. Rusty old cars, heaps of metal in tremendous quantity, the place seemed as big as the city itself. Of course it was not actually as big as the city itself, but it was plausible to wonder if every car in the city had been scrapped here.
The cover from sight was an advantage, but better still was the relative ‘camouflage’ that all the metal would give them against various forms of detection. Not foolproof, but every sandbag counted.
Getting through the fence would fall to Cl. Once he was through, Harkahn would wait for him to secure a better position within, then follow through. Rivierre cut herself a separate entrance a ways away, and continued her overwatch.
Doctor, where are they likely to have taken the thing?
City Hall, probably – that is, of they actually took him here. Or at all.
The ghost signal put him somewhere in this city.
Yes but it was a ghost signal. Not reliable.
So he might not even be here?
He’s most likely here.
We can hope. I see City Hall fr- oh, F-[CENSORED]
There was a pause before she continued.
Rivierre had made her way up one of the taller mountains of scrap – that particular one being mostly composed of old ‘Atomic Superphone©s’ which were inexplicably the size of refrigerators. Apparently this was where they dumped every single one of them after the product’s devastating and somehow unforeseen failure – and when she reached the top, settled down to peer just arely over the top. It provided an excellent view and equally excellent cover, for the position.
They’re not just in[/] the city. They’ve got the whole f-[CENSORED] city locked down.
Kampfer had done an excellent job of making the city look harmless. In fact he had done too well. As his personnel had noted earlier, the streets were practically deserted save for the occasional bot, soldier, or group of soldiers. She spotted one doc-bot in a window, managing to duck down again before its’ scanner was able to sweep back in her direction. Nobody had expected the city of Kartupelis to be bustling with activity, but no city should look that deserted.
Bottom line, unless we can find us some kind of back door we’re not getting anywhere near that bot. We won’t stand a snowball’s chance in Hell on a frontal assault.
And even with the EMP, they still might have some method of communication…If you’re seeing a bot in a window that means that the EMP might not have worked as well as it should have…Or they’ve already recovered from the effects, which seems unlikely. Dorin added. But defending against an EMP like that would be a hell of a feat, I don’t see how that could be possible. I don’t know, none of this makes any sense.
Well we need to assume the maximum threat. As far as we’re concerned the EMP did nothing and the Lord of Tech Support has got the place locked up tighter than a Sin Station virgin.
“You remember well what you did here when you find out the truth.” Royanna Kallenger hissed, just before her attacker stood. Knowing that sudden movements could cost her her life, she stayed where she was. “He’s a murderer of more innocent lives than you can imagine. I’m appalled that someone of your skill should be so unbelievably gullible.”
But that was the end of it. The assassin gave her informal ‘goodbye’ and was gone without another word.
Kallenger knew she wasn’t going to be back for her. The woman was blinded by that stupid, immaculate charm that he always managed to maintain. The façade that made him look so much like some poor, helpless kid who was running from a big, scary evil Empire.
They hadn’t seen the footage! They hadn’t seen the video documentation of what he did to those people. To this day it made Kallenger sick to think about it, to see the look in those peoples’ eye just prior to meeting their gruesome deaths at the hands of the Old Empire’s most vicious, relentless, bloodthirsty monster-soldier. If only that stupid woman could see that!
But Royanna Kallenger was one of exactly 12 people who had seen that footage. It was the most securely kept secret in the whole of the Galactic Empire. Recorded on specialized disks that could not be copied or transmitted, locked away deep beneath the surface of Ardella in a vault fit for all the wealth in the Galaxy. Infuriating as it was, Kallenger knew that even if she could manage to show someone that footage in an effort to convince them of his evil, she would be quickly executed for it. It didn’t matter how loyal she was to the cause – they wouldn’t hesitate for a split second.
After a few minutes of lying on the ground and trying to cope with the increasingly painful feeling of her shoulder opening up and falling away in blood, Royanna groaned and heaved herself into a sitting position. Eventually she managed to climb to her feet, grab her knife, reach behind her to confirm that yes, the bullet had at least gone through her. She pinged for her remaining troops.
There was no response. Instantly her heart sank and her chest turned to ice at the realization that they too were dead. But shortly thereafter a sense of bittersweet half-relief came to her with the remembrance that some kind of EMP had gone off and disabled her tech.
-Lord Kampfer may not have been affected, but he and his forces were about the only ones. All over Earth City there were constant power outages, electronic malfunctions. Each time they got the power back on in one part of the grid it went down in another. The stock market exploded with errors in the favor of every which way but logical.
-Earth City Mayor Halderwell McCready suddenly found himself with stocks valued at over 1. X 10100000 Standard, which was immeasurably more money than existed in the entire galaxy. The otherwise honest local leader was run out of office within fifteen minutes under the largest and most absurd charge of embezzlement and fraud ever issued in the history of mankind.
-Tertville Marselbross was stripped of his title of “Earth’s Favorite Man”, and subsequently replaced with Falawack Morbledross, who was scheduled to be put to death tomorrow on 12 counts of Murder in the First Degree.
-Ratings for the hit sitcom “How I Squanched Your Mother” inexplicably plummeted.
-Mayor of Kartupelis (A small city on the northern continent known as ‘Siberia’) Vladimir Sviestmaize was stripped of all records of his title from the only functional computer terminal in the city, and susequently replaced with a moose.
-Up-and-coming evil mastermind Hadolf Jalin was completely thwarted by the malfunctioning of a malfunctioning sex robot.
-Special Agent Royanna Kallenger’s instruments and techology were completely disabled, along with that of her two remaining soldiers. This was frustrating, but it was also the reason that she experienced a bittersweet sense of half-relief, shortly following her initial panic over their potential deaths.
-A writer huddled in the back of the cab of a tractor trailer somewhere on the small island of ‘Illinois’ at last refrained from word-vomiting pages upon pages of worthless, unrelated filler, and decided to get on with the story proper.
It occurred to Agent Kallenger that if her two remaning men did die, she wouldn’t know it. But she tried not to think on this, and instead focused on the task at hand, which was stopping the lifeblood from trickling down her back.
In another sudden revalation, it occurred to Agent Kallenger that the bitch had put a hole in her beloved trench coat. She swore in colde rage to one day enact her revenge – but again, the stabbing pain brought her back to the aforementioned task of not bleeding to death. Or doing something about it, anyway. She found it was rather difficult to figure out her next move with so many objectives completely extinguished. She couldn’t even call for support or evac. She was lost in the jungle.
Well, maybe not lost, but the little brat had managed to scamper a good ways back into the thickness before she had fleetingly grabbed him. For that one, glorious moment.
With a huff, Royanna began to make her way...somewhere.
It wasn’t long before she noticed, in a small clearing, lying face-down in the underfoot brush with his face resting unflatteringly upon an exposed tree root, a person.
Or...or something. It looked like a person – a familiar person. Not one of her men. Someone she had met breifly in the jungle before everything really went to hell. Yeah. That kid. Her sight was going in and out of focus a little – absently she was ashamed for handling this wound so badly – but the person lying apparently dead on the jungle floor was definitely that kid she pointed her gun at earlier. The one with the alien thing.
She gave it a moment’s thought, then cursed herself for that remaining sliver of humanity that so barely hung onto her blackened heart, mustered her strength and picked him up. Or, tried. That didn’t work out too well and almost resulted in a much more serious headwound on his part. She tried moving him again, but this time dragging him instead, face up and from behind with arms locked up through his and feet dragging on the ground.
Once she had gotten him so that he was leaning unconscious up against a tree in a sitting position, Royanna herself sat heavily on the ground beside him and dug around in her coat, eventually producing a very compact medical kit. Very compact.
From it she took and proceeded to apply a furiously painful antiseptic to her wounds, having loosened the black tie and unbuttoned the collar of the dark buttoned shirt beneath her coat to do so. With that out of the way she applied a good layer of newskin – also very painful – and repeated the process on a smaller scale with the hairline cut along her throat.
If the kid had not come to yet, she would begrudgingly take from the very compact medkit a very compact phial of smelling salts, waved them under his nose to see if it would rouse him from whatever had put him as such in the first place.
With her mild delerium from the shock having faded, it occurred to her that he looked a little...different than he had last time, but she was still too cloudy to actually figure out what it was. Even if it was obvious. It should have been obvious, she thought. What was it?
He was usually so much more nimble than this! He was ashamed of himself, or he would have been if he had the mental capacity at the moment to think about anything else other than the concepts of „OW” and „RUN”. He kept stumbling, stumbling over little obstacles he usually would have bypassed without a second thought, stumbling over his own increasingly clumsy feet. Stumbling aimlessly, as good as blind without any eyes near him to look through –
But wait! That shouldn’t be the case. He knew how poorly his escape was going. They must have been hot on his trail, so why couldn’t he see through them?
In reality it was because they were dead, but he didn’t know that.
Still, he couldn’t see through the eyes of that woman anymore either. He seriously doubted he’d been able to outrun her. No, not a chance. So why couldn’t he see?
Once his brain had finally registered that the eye, so much a part of him, had been mostly shut down, that’s when the claustrophobia began to kick in. That black, smothering feeling which came from the inability to extend his mind along the electromagnetics around him. That horrific confinement to his own head, where his thoughts screamed to be let back into their space which was no longer there.
Now he wasn’t just trying to escape Kallenger – if she was still alive – Kallenger’s men – if they were still alive – and that bounty hunter, he was also trying to keep at bay a total panic. He wasn’t making very god process in any of the fields. It was hard to control his breath when running, hard to control himself when in the state he was in.
For these combined reasons it wouldn’t take Nirix very long at all to catch up with him.
Somewhere – not the vaguest idea as to where – he tripped over something – not the vaguest idea as to what – and fell hard – with a vague idea as to just how hard, since things were spiinning now. Not good.
Scrambling hopelessly to a sitting position, leaning up against a large boulder which now had a small bloodstain on it, he pulled his legs in, pulled his knees up, kept both eyes shut tight and gripped his wounded ear with both white-knuckled hands.
Granted, by the time he would be found the Fox would have gotten some degree of control over himself. The eye was not completely disabled, at least not anymore. Just very, very foggy. He still had no hope of actually seeing anyone come.
Following that he decided that he was not trying to hide at this moment. He wasn’t expecting or even hoping that they would overlook him if he curled up against a rock or even if he crawled under one – which he did not do – and he wasn’t using the broken logic of ignoring the threat to make it go away. He couldn’t decide what he was doing and he wasn’t really thinking about it, either. Too focused on the tasks at hand of holding his ear, maintaining his sanity, and trying to breathe.
Kete was usually so good at thinking ahead – or at least, sometimes. But not this time. He hadn’t given up, but he wasn’t still trying either. It was a moment of limbo that he knew he would regret no matter what the outcome.
The so called 'smelling salt' did indeed reach the boy, deep inside, he'd wake up from his passed out state, slowly, holding over his head as he felt an agonizing pain going through it... Christofer leaned on his hand, taking some support from the ground with his other one. The dizziness was overpowering, it hurt...
The boy regained his memories quickly, but he couldn't still attach them all to the big picture. He knew he was in a park, that there had been some people with him, both of them had left all of a sudden and then there was a raid. He felt empty... Was there something else he was supposed to remember? And what was he raid..? What.. Why...
As he headache eased up a bit, the German would try looking around himself if he'd see someone, or anything that could trigger some more memories in him. The boy didn't need to look far for a dark haired figure had appeared in his vision, or rather he had spotted them, the figure hardly moved at all
"... H-Hi....?" the boy would speak, just to try and start something. "... Who a-are... you..?"
Toffi soon came to notice that the figure was a person - not sure if male or female - and they appeared to be hurt, the position and mood of it gave them away. The picture of it all was still blurry, he couldn't tell if he knew the person or not. He wouldn't usually hang around with strangers, especially if he was in such a condition himself, too vulnerable... But he was too kind to just leave the other person there, practically 'asking for help'. It would go against his morales.
"A-Are you hurt...?" the German asked with concern in his voice. He wasn't a medic himself By any means, but he wanted to check on the other people, get in contact with them somehow. The least he could do was to be of Company for the stranger and, maybe, if the situation called for it, offer some body heat... Only in extreme cases though. "Do you need help...? Can I assist you in some way..?"
The boy regained his memories quickly, but he couldn't still attach them all to the big picture. He knew he was in a park, that there had been some people with him, both of them had left all of a sudden and then there was a raid. He felt empty... Was there something else he was supposed to remember? And what was he raid..? What.. Why...
As he headache eased up a bit, the German would try looking around himself if he'd see someone, or anything that could trigger some more memories in him. The boy didn't need to look far for a dark haired figure had appeared in his vision, or rather he had spotted them, the figure hardly moved at all
"... H-Hi....?" the boy would speak, just to try and start something. "... Who a-are... you..?"
Toffi soon came to notice that the figure was a person - not sure if male or female - and they appeared to be hurt, the position and mood of it gave them away. The picture of it all was still blurry, he couldn't tell if he knew the person or not. He wouldn't usually hang around with strangers, especially if he was in such a condition himself, too vulnerable... But he was too kind to just leave the other person there, practically 'asking for help'. It would go against his morales.
"A-Are you hurt...?" the German asked with concern in his voice. He wasn't a medic himself By any means, but he wanted to check on the other people, get in contact with them somehow. The least he could do was to be of Company for the stranger and, maybe, if the situation called for it, offer some body heat... Only in extreme cases though. "Do you need help...? Can I assist you in some way..?"
On top of a old office building made out red bricks, a sniper looks over the rather large scrape yard looking a bit irritated. "Jeez man I understand the part of keeping an eye on things, but I how can I see if theirs all this junk in the way" he complained. The Z-bot farther into the room looking at his weapon said in a southern draw "Well, like Commander Louie said, we need defend the border against any suspicious individuals"
"Well yeah, but I can't see jack" the sniper replied as he looked though his scope of his energy beam rifle. He scan the farthest he could see and saw a woman on top of a junk pile. Not knowing if she was armed or not he ducked into cover immediately and said to is guard "Hey, I think I just saw an enemy sniper" the guard looked up and said "Well darn it man, did you fire?" he asked
"Well of course not, if I did the machine gunners would open up with there auto laser machine guns" he said i response. The sniper gripped his rifle tightly and pointed out the window and exclaimed "I have you now yo-" he realized that the woman wasn't there "Uh-u-w-where did you go" he questioned as he scanned the scrap yard once again. He notices the rear end of someone almost outside of the scrapyard, in his scope he could see the lab coat but not a lot, but to him it was enough to confirm that there is at least two people trying to get in. He retreated back from the window and said to the guard "Yeah pop a flare out the other side of the building, the one that say's we encountered hostile's but haven't engaged yet". The guard got up and picked up the flare gun and said "So what color was it again" the sniper faced palm himself and said "You, idiot, you had two jobs, guard me and shoot the flare" he said with agitation "Well yes, but it didn't mean I had to remember the colors" the guard replied smartly. "Ugh, it's the green flare" the sniper said as he returned to the window looking for more hostiles. "After you do that fire an illumination flare so I can see better" the sniper ordered. The guard got up and walked to the other side of the building and shot the green flare into the sky. He walked back and fired the illumination flare brightening up the scrapyard eliminating people trying to hide in the shadows. "Now let's see if we can find more of you, Yankees" the sniper exclaimed as he scanned the scrapyard for more targets
The tsunami soon approached the coast of Earth City, with a fleet of ships ready to deploy an amphibious force to take over the city. Admiral Omega was getting slightly annoyed that he couldn't signal Kampfer of his arrival. The Admiral in his head was intent to start the invasion since the EMP rendered the city defenseless, but couldn't until he was ordered too. In waiting for a reply, the admiral ordered his ships on standby all 8 of them and be ready when he gave the signal. The tsunami's guns pointed at the city ready to fire, and fighter bombers on the decks were ready to sortie. The fall of Earth City is the main objective for Kampfer in with the long term goal of the planet being under his control.
"Well yeah, but I can't see jack" the sniper replied as he looked though his scope of his energy beam rifle. He scan the farthest he could see and saw a woman on top of a junk pile. Not knowing if she was armed or not he ducked into cover immediately and said to is guard "Hey, I think I just saw an enemy sniper" the guard looked up and said "Well darn it man, did you fire?" he asked
"Well of course not, if I did the machine gunners would open up with there auto laser machine guns" he said i response. The sniper gripped his rifle tightly and pointed out the window and exclaimed "I have you now yo-" he realized that the woman wasn't there "Uh-u-w-where did you go" he questioned as he scanned the scrap yard once again. He notices the rear end of someone almost outside of the scrapyard, in his scope he could see the lab coat but not a lot, but to him it was enough to confirm that there is at least two people trying to get in. He retreated back from the window and said to the guard "Yeah pop a flare out the other side of the building, the one that say's we encountered hostile's but haven't engaged yet". The guard got up and picked up the flare gun and said "So what color was it again" the sniper faced palm himself and said "You, idiot, you had two jobs, guard me and shoot the flare" he said with agitation "Well yes, but it didn't mean I had to remember the colors" the guard replied smartly. "Ugh, it's the green flare" the sniper said as he returned to the window looking for more hostiles. "After you do that fire an illumination flare so I can see better" the sniper ordered. The guard got up and walked to the other side of the building and shot the green flare into the sky. He walked back and fired the illumination flare brightening up the scrapyard eliminating people trying to hide in the shadows. "Now let's see if we can find more of you, Yankees" the sniper exclaimed as he scanned the scrapyard for more targets
The tsunami soon approached the coast of Earth City, with a fleet of ships ready to deploy an amphibious force to take over the city. Admiral Omega was getting slightly annoyed that he couldn't signal Kampfer of his arrival. The Admiral in his head was intent to start the invasion since the EMP rendered the city defenseless, but couldn't until he was ordered too. In waiting for a reply, the admiral ordered his ships on standby all 8 of them and be ready when he gave the signal. The tsunami's guns pointed at the city ready to fire, and fighter bombers on the decks were ready to sortie. The fall of Earth City is the main objective for Kampfer in with the long term goal of the planet being under his control.
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