Forums » Sci-Fi Roleplay » Lost Time (SET Initiative RP)

Hello! Happy New Year, and welcome to Safe Haven; Our floating metropolis. It is a protection from the Infection epidemic happening down below, and is protected by the best defense on the planet: The Cyborg Recovery Team, commonly known as SET! We assure you that you will be happy, healthy, and safe he- The annoying female voice was shut off abruptly in Danielle's helmet. Apparently whenever someone entered the city their HUD (Heads-Up-Display, commonly used in military helmets, like the kind used by SET, and also civilians' mobile smart devices, or their smart glasses if they wore any. Think: Google Glass.)they were greeted with this message. Danielle was a tad bit relieved that the voice was shut off, and then remembered that that wasn't normal. She held up a fist and took a knee: Her squad stopped. Someone was manipulating the radio signals. A few seconds later the woman resumed speaking. -ere, provided with the best care from our completely automated androids. No chance of Infection for these happy robots! The city is the most fortified place currently on the planet that hasn't been overrun, so you don't need to worry about anyth- It cut out again, this time replaced with static.

Danielle took off her helmet and spun around. Her dirty blonde hair whipped in her ponytail. "Okay, what the hell? Jones!" Her crimson eyes glared at the team member. "You messing with the comms again? You know we're here to see if there were any survivors, and messing with the comms could-"

Jones stood up and took off his helmet meanwhile, shaking his head. She obviously intimidated him. Danielle was cut off, though, because at that very moment a crimson spike went through his forehead. Danielle scrambled to get her helmet back on. "Crap! Man down! We've got hostiles inbound!" Her HUD's motion sensors picked up major enemy presence. She ripped the spike from her comrade's face and almost immediately he jumped up at her, his body already mutating. "The virus is spreading within seconds! How is that possible??" She screamed as she pulled her pistol out and shot him in the forehead. He'd be back later but at least it shut him up for now.

"Move, move!" She cried, before dashing. Jones was the best they had. Now it was down to her, Kenzie, Amy, Kenneth, and Derek. Derek had a special talent for using explosives, and even though he was a tad reckless he was always useful; So they kept him around.

"Wildner! Maddison! You two go east! Find out where the distress signal came from! Jackson! Go with them! Malone, on me! We're going to see where that spike came from."

With that she ran towards one of the buildings in the city. Speaking of the city: it was absolutely barren. Blood covered the ground, but there were eerily no bodies. Danielle had figured there was a sniper somewhere in that building, and she was fixing to beat their face in with their arms and then chuck them out the window before stomping them into the pavement.

Safe Haven was definitely the safest place on earth- Or so everyone thought. That was before its hover tech and emergency backup suddenly both simultaneously went offline for no reason. Of course it crash landed somewhere in the Sahara. Guess who had to go check out the distress signal?

(Okay guys, I figured our old RP was slowing down so I started a new topic to give us a change of pace. Arrow is presumably dead, witnesses say they saw his throat get slit by Hologram but no body was ever found. Austin's still out there somewhere, probably fully insane by now. Rex lost the fight against Insanity, and nearly died: Although he barely escaped. He's been off the grid for a while. This takes place a few months after the events of the previous SET RP. Sorry if things have gotten boring; Hopefully this will shake it up a little bit.)

One Teammate down already and it had felt like they hadn't been there very long at all.

She was making an effort now, not to get attached to the people she'd worked with now. Red and Jack's deaths had been hard enough and she'd barely had time to warm up to them. Arrow's death and Austin's disappearance had hit her very hard, taking with it an emotional toll, that she really couldn't afford.

She was friendly with Wildner of course, they'd been fighting together now for a long while, but she tried to stay distant with the others now, it was too hard to watch them die otherwise.

It was disturbing of course to see anyone die, to watch them become overrun with the infection, but at least this way she could compartmentalize, keep her head in the game. This time was odd though, it was happening too fast.

She had her orders, and would follow them, she would follow Danielle in hopes of finding the source of the spike.

Kenneth immediately got into a crouch when Jones got stabbed through the head. Much like Danielle, he looked in horror as the mutation spread far faster than it should. He was about to shoot him, but she beat him to it.

He then looked at her and quickly absorbed the orders she shouted at everyone. He nodded confirmingly and gave Derek a quick but firm pat on the back. "Let's go big guy!" They immediately ran east and up a hill, where they paused and surveyed the area. They were on the high ground for now, but Kenneth knew from experience that wouldn't be a lot of good if they didn't spot their targets in time. "Let's have a quick surveillance here." he said and crouched down. He hung the SMG that was in his hand now to his side and took the sniper rifle from his back. By this time, he'd fitted the scope with a device that could detect even the invisible Cyborgs and infected. He only hoped they didn't have a lot of new gadgets of their own.

"Danielle, this is Wildner and Maddison reporting. We're on high ground, nothing to be seen yet, immediate area is cleared for now."

"And Kenzie! Er, Jackson, that is. Don't forget about me!" Said the embarrassed Kenzie, out of breath and behind Kenneth.

"Good." Came Danielle's sharp reply. "Keep an eye out, and keep moving. Check for heat signatures, signs of movement, anything. I don't want to be stuck out in the damned Sahara Desert all day."

The city was absolutely decimated. Giant engines stuck through pavement in some places, buildings toppled into each other. Sparks flew from various cables. It was an utter mess.

Danielle kept moving, to one of the only still-standing buildings in the whole place. "Malone! Watch my six!" She kept running up stairs till she hit the second floor. "Alright, stay frosty. Stick close to me, I don't know what's in here."

Danielle (and hopefully Amy) would begin to sweep the floor (not that kind of sweeping. The kind where you check to make sure no bad guys are there.) until they came to a closed door. It sounded like there was a crying child on the other side. Danielle held up a hand, and slowly closed it into a fist. Danielle's helmet switched to thought-transmission, and a faithful replication of her voice sounded in Amy's helmet.

Don't. Move.

Kenzie almost collapsed when she heard Derek say "Look!" She of course looked up to see him pointing at a collapsed building. "Oh, wait. You guys aren't using thermal. Looks like there's something kinda hot in there, let's go check it out."

The girl switched to thermal vision and there did indeed appear to be some sort of major heat emanating from the building. "Are you sure it's... Safe?"

"No." Came the reply. "But our armor is. Supposedly. What do you say, Wildner? You up for a little fun?" Derek looked up to their guest-star.

(Speaking of which was Kenneth ever granted SET Militia Grade Armor? Or has he been kinda wearing his own thing this whole time?)

(he was wearing his own armor in the first RP, but since this is way after that I think we can assume he started wearing SET armor )

Kenneth nodded. "That's probably for the best." he replied. He got back on comms. "Danielle, we've found a heat signature in a tall building to our north-northwest. It's the only heat signature we can immediately detect, so we're going in to investigate. We'll keep you posted."

Amy followed her orders to a tee, and began the methodical sweep of the room, weapon at the ready and nerves on high alert for even the slightest sign of threat.

They came to the door, and Amy could hear the sobs of a child on the other side, her knee jerk reaction was that she wanted to help what ever was making the noise, but there would be time for that. She didn't get a second to even truly think about reacting, before Danielle's voice sounded in her helmet.

She froze still, eyes wide.

Danielle acknowledged Derek and Kenneth's discovery, telling them to be careful.

She was, honestly, not paying much attention on account of the hopeless sobbing behind the doorway.

The whole city was at a slant, so that Amy and Danielle were almost looking down at the door. It wasn't completely slanted, just enough so.

Danielle materialized a high-powered plasma pistol.

Stay here, in case this all goes to hell.

Then she kicked down the door. The crying morphed into an inhuman screech right as the girl walked into the room. Poor Danielle didn't even have the chance to scream before she was stabbed straight through the chest with a dripping crimson spike. The monster behind said spike seemed to grin. What was once unmistakably an innocent little girl was now a zombified killing machine.

Danielle's last words were simple: "... Dammit." The creature pulled the spike out just as the girl collapsed, her body convulsing as the unnatural changes began to take place unnaturally fast.

So much for a quick search-and-rescue. SET was suddenly in a combat situation.

Kenneth's group was happily oblivious, however, to what was going on. Somebody had conveniently shut down all comm systems between the group.

Derek was first to arrive at the scene of the thermal imagery, and nodded at Kenneth and Kenzie before kicking the door in. Almost immediately he regretted that decision.

Infection had evolved.

This particular carnation of the abomination had harnessed the power of incineration on the poor boy. Of course, his armor could withstand extreme temperatures, which meant that he was merely blasted back with force. Then his armor began malfunctioning. His helmet dematerialized seconds later, when his head was melted. There wasn't even a skull left.

Kenzie had to choke back vomit.

The familiar crimson hue of this particular Infection form was now imbued with a little glowing orange. It stepped out of the building, and turned to face Kenneth and Kenzie.

Their armor seemed to be malfunctioning too. The HUD shut down. Materialization links offline. Whatever weapons and ammo they had on them were it. No spawning weapons.

It seemed that all communications with HQ had been shut down as well. Lovely.

Kenzie's armor was the first to shut down completely. Without proper energy shielding, her armor wouldn't be able to withstand the extreme heat for long. She seemed to be in lockdown mode, which meant she couldn't move. Trapped, and now a prime target, the girl started to realize her situation.

The freak monster bubbled and boiled like lava. It advanced with a sick look of pleasure on its face, or perhaps that was their imagination. Kenzie's eyes began to tear up. This would not be a quick death.

Her screams were heard even through the thick armor of the helmet. She was being cooked alive in there.

Whatever you're about to do, Kenneth, do it fast.

Amy waited by the door as Danielle went in. The second the door had been opened though... things had gotten hairy. Clearly the child inside, was no longer a child at all.

Worse still Danielle had been infected. With how fast the changes were taking place, Amy was in a really bad spot. That is to say, alone.

Danielle's been infected. was broadcasted to the others. She raised her gun, and fired, hoping to end the woman's life before the infection did.

Kenneth cursed when Derek was cooked alive. Unlike Kenzie, he'd managed to avoid the immediate blast and his armor was still allowing him to at least move around. he tried materializing a shotgun, but it didn't work. He cursed again, seeing Kenzie's situation. "Oh HELL no you're not!" he groaned and aimed his SMG at the monstrosity, hopefully at least distracting it. If it would advance on him, he'd slowly step back and kept avoiding it's attacks.

Amy's attempts to subdue the woman would be futile at best: The plasma shots from the pistol only delayed Danielle's inevitable turning to one of them.

The young girl (or what was left of her) stepped into view, and grinned inhumanly before screeching in an attempt to stun Amy with temporary deafness.

Her spike was now poised for a second killing.

Kenneth didn't have it much better off, either. The lead bullets from his SMG were merely absorbed into the creature's fleshy body of lava. It would glance, throw fire at him, and then turn back to its task of welding Kenzie's body to her armor.

The poor girl's emotions, pain, sadness, agony, fear, hopelessness, and claustrophobia were inexplicably conveyed to anyone nearby. Kenneth's helmet was smart enough to divert away most of the harmful thoughts, but it caused the monster to stop in confusion just long enough for Kenneth to make a move.

His overshields had enough power to at least protect him from contact with the creature for a little while, and a brute strength attack may be enough to stun the creature further and rescue Kenzie. If not, well, they tried.

There were more: The remaining team's radars (if in fact they worked) would reveal many more enemy locations.

This was a trap.

SHe sighed when it became clear her actions were only delaying the inevitable. SHe had begun to retreat when the screeching began. She fought the urge to clap her hands over her ears, staggered back, but it was beginning to have it's desired effect. She'd try and send a similar effect into the young girl's own head, in an attempt to prolong her life, give herself time to get away. She was absolutely resolute that she was not going to die of this horrible infection.

Kenneth cursed. His radar was indeed still working and even though it had some interference, he could definitely see the growing amount of dots appearing on it.
"Everyone who's still alive, we've been caught in an ambush. I suggest retreating to the entrance from where we came. Anyone who is still among us, please respond."

When Kenneth returned his attention to the lava creature, he smiled. he'd been working out his own little trap, and the creature had fallen for it. As he shot at it, he had aimed several bullets at a weak point between them and it, and it was now about to crack. He quickly switched to his heavy rifle and shot without aiming, at the weak point in the ceiling now located just above the creature's head. He watched with a smile as the ceiling cracked open widely and it all came down on top of it's head, including a heavy cabinet that happened to be on the next floor. A pillar came down as well and smashed into the creature's side.

that should slow it down at least... he immediately got a cooler from his belt and sprayed it all over Kenzie in an attempt to cool off her armor to get her out as quickly as possible. "Come on Kenzie, we need to get the hell out of here.

"Anyone got a mag?" She shouted toward the group. She was with her own, but only two survived, the other one went missing. She ran for a piece of cover and shot at the lava beast. "I need a medic!" She looked around frantically for a piece of ammo. "Dammit!" She pulled out her pistol and started shooting.

The little monster was caught off guard- It didn't expect someone else to have the ability to produce sonic noises. It stumbled backwards, clutching its head and screaming, giving Amy some time to escape.

Kenneth's trap worked, the ceiling fell on the monster trapping it. Kenzie was crying now, her armor came off relatively easily. She was covered in second and third degree burns, and she was sobbing uncontrollably, but she was okay. Her bodysuit protected her somewhat from the flames, but not much.

"Okay..."

Kenneth tried to take a supportive hold of her without touching too many wounds so as to not make things worse. She helped her out of the building, knowing that since they had been on a higher-up floor, the lava monster was probably already giving chase. He opened his comms tab again.
"Anyone who is still moving, please respond! he almost yelled. They needed to link up again if they wished to get out of there...

Comms were still jammed, unfortunately.

Kenzie's bodysuit looked like it had been in a toaster for way too long. Her hair was burned and missing in some places, and tears streamed down her face. This was not a good day.

More movement on the motion sensors- These things, whatever they were, were closing in fast. No visual yet.

(By the way, they were on the ground floor of the building, in case it wasn't clear. I actually had it set up where as soon as Derek opened the door he got blasted back, so they shouldn't actually be in the building but in the street, but oh well.)

Her own high frequency noise had done the trick thankfully, and she wasn't going to wait around to find out for how long. She would shoot the child, disturbed at how easily such things had become to her. Then she fled, in hopes that she'd bough herself enough time to make her escape.

A creature the size of a small building burst forth from the ground just as Amy and Kenneth each reached the street. More movement at the edge of the radars. A visual sweep of their surroundings would reveal quite a few more monsters moving in on the city.

Kenzie's armor was fried, and she could barely move. Any one of those things attacks and she was good as dead.

The giant monster, of course, set its sights on Kenneth. Amy would see this, and may be able to stop it.

Amy nearly toppled over at the force of the creature bursting from the ground, but regained her equilibrium after only a second. WHat she found herself in was a terrible situation, there were several others, sweeping the city around them.

She saw that the monster was baring down on her teammate and sent a frequency into its mind, it had worked in the past on the infected.. She hoped it would work for this large creature. She would follow it up with gun fire for the time being. Trying to create a window of opportunity for Kenneth to escape.

Kenneth saw the beast coming, and immediately took action. He gritted his teeth as he did the only thing he could think of to slow it down: shoot offhand with his rifle. The recoil was heavy though, and after the second shot he couldn't bring his gun up to aim with only one hand anymore. One of the bullets managed to go towards its head, and Kenneth just hoped to deal enough damage so he could take Kenzie to safety.
"Come on stick with me." he basically dragged her along into an alley, hoping to lose the creature there.