2017-05-24: Peer Review
- Cast: Ida Everstead-Rey, Morgan Newkirk, Claude C. Kenny, Rose, Gwen Whitlock, Layna Manydays, Emma Hetfield, Kalve
- Where: Adlehyde - Fairgrounds
- Date: 5/24/2017
- Summary: The Exhibition's ARMs testing range, normally used for demonstration purposes, comes under attack. To most people, this might seem like a phenomenally bad idea. After all, what kind of invader would actually /want/ to be in a place full of people with dangerous relics and freshly-machined firearms? Well... about that...
==========================<* Adlehyde - Fairgrounds *>========================== Located in the northeast quadrant of Adlehyde, the Fairgrounds are situated on a large open space traditionally used to train soldiers in march and maneuver. As a result of the Ancient Culture Exhibition, however, a large number of tents and other temporary buildings have been set up to showcase the latest in ARM discovery and advancement. Paths between the tents and buildings have been set up more or less at random in the area, making it a bit difficult to navigate, particularly with hawkers and visitors clogging the arteries. The central focus of the Fairgrounds is a large plaza set up for demonstrations, as far away from anything flammable as practicable. A raised platform occupies the centre of the demonstration area, with a (probably not scale) model of Adlehyde's Golems - Diablo, Lolithia, and Barbados - occupying three corners. The fourth corner is taken up by a similarly-scaled model of a gender-neutral individual with an expression of dull surprise, holding a model torch in an upraised hand. A plaque at the bottom of the statue helpfully explains that this is meant to symbolize the concept of INNOVATION; it is accompanied by a smaller plaque that explains innovation means coming up with new things or ideas. Onlookers generally remark that it's nice that the sculptor tries hard, anyway. BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6MQRL7xws7w
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
The stalls around the ARM demonstration range are still smoldering. From her vantage-point behind the broken wreck of one of Dr. Bridges's dioramas, she can make out the general shape of the place, and the hellscape it's become. The testing range itself--a cobblestone plaza surrounded by low stone walls, with high, reinforced observation areas--is mostly intact, though even at the crest of the hill, it's difficult to see what's still there. If anything's still there. The walls, which were meant to shield observers from potential misfires, are pockmarked with holes, and the ground around the range is peppered with craters, and dusted with debris. The smell of cordite lingers in the air, along with the increasingly-present smell of burning wood and blood.
She is here--they are here--because of an ammunition shortage, and because of the slight chance someone's left a functional ARM behind. Ida recovered from her all-too-brief convalescence period to hear that something attacked the place. She set out as soon as possible, though not after thanking the dog-eared Beastwoman who might have saved her life. Now, upon seeing the aftermath, it's obvious that there was a struggle, and there is no sign (so far) of the entity responsible.
Ida looks back to her comrades, and gestures for them to follow with a crooked finger. She creeps forwards, using some blackened, burned-out stalls as cover--she glances around, her gaze darting here and there. She hasn't said anything, though whether that's due to fear, discretion, or shock is still up for debate. After a few minutes' walk, she reaches the gate at the eastern end of the testing range. It's now embedded in the ground, a hundred separate blobs of iron, still warm to the touch. Ida's revolver is in her hand before she knows it, though some part of her really feels Devil's Due is more appropriate. She steps to the side--
And nearly trips over a body.
Ida has seen far too many of those in the past half-day, but she still startles. She lets out a hiss of breath, steps back, and all but forces herself to look at it, to examine the wounds. The man looks like the prototypical Badlands Drifter, clad in tanned leather, a pair of six-shooters nearby. One is clutched in his hand, and the other lies where he probably dropped it. His torso is marked by both visible burns and deep stab wounds, one of which probably punctured a lung. Ida's throat constricts, and she breathes deeply She makes a sign over the corpse, and ever-so-gently closes his staring eyes.
"The body's still warm," Ida observes, a heartbeat later. She sounds like she's trying not to be sick. "Move in. Stay alert."
The testing range is a wreck. The demonstration podium has been shattered, and it looks like several crates' worth of weapons and ammunition exploded not that far away--there's scattered debris, bits of ARMs and bullets. Several crates--still bearing the logo of the Everstead-Rey ARMs and Munitions Company--are still intact, more or less, sitting in a pile some distance away. Aside from that, there's so much soot and debris around that it's hard to pick out anything important at a glance. There are more bodies, probably also Drifters--the one closest to the entrance has a shotgun next to it, and its limbs have been wrenched around. The woman's face is frozen in a scream of agony. Ida's breathing gets a little raspy, a little irregular.
"Spread out," she says. Her voice is a whisper, low and desperate. "Eyes open. It could still be here." She starts to move towards the intact crates, scanning around as though her life depended on it. It probably does.
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
A tall Drifter with a very evident ears follows along with Ida. Morgan has caught up with the little group. More going in the same direction than with the same objective in mind. However in a situation like this? There are strength in numbers, and the fox isn't going to look a gift horse in the mouth.
"Hellfire, looking like a whole army hit this place." He hisses quietly, his pistol out as he creeps along behind Ida. The usual glow of his ARM is dampened to try to keep the visual to a minimum as he moves. Quietly from shadow to shadow, ears perked up for signs of movement in the vicinity.
There is plenty of movement from the rest of the city. None of it good.
"I'll split off, need ta get that that werehouse over yonder." He murmurs towards Ida as he nods in the direction of the building. Holes in the wall and the roof show that it hasn't escaped damage. But...well at least the place isn't on fire. "Left something there that might help out a bit." A beatpause. "Or it might just get me killed faster. But I'm gonna risk it."
<Pose Tracker> Claude C. Kenny has posed.
Claude C. Kenny has spent the past several hours alternating between looking for Rena Lanford and running back to the castle to see if anyone has found Rena Lanford. He has failed at both of these things, repeatedly. During the last visit, he came across Ida preparing a sojourn into the city, and while he was still a bit cheesed at her for pointing a gun at his chest, he could use half an hour spent on a mission that doesn't involve running around the city on his own looking for blue-haired elf girls. And also some bigger guns, or at least guns that are bigger than a revolver and smaller than a Federation-issue phase gun.
So there's a lot of space in there to work with.
Claude moves behind Ida, choosing to keep his mouth shut for the most part because she's doing a pretty decent job at the small unit stuff despite (presumably) not having had any proper training in it. His gaze is on the rooftops, keeping a weather eye out for snipers or Metal Dragons or Metal Dragons with sniper rifles. When Ida says the body is still warm, though, he takes a look around.
"Uh, you probably don't want to spread out too far," Claude suggests, reaching down to pick up the shotgun. He snaps it open to check the load, then snaps it closed. "Not until we clear these buildings. No closer than ten feet, but not out of sight."
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
Even an assassin needs to catch her breath.
Between treks into the city, Rose had reverted to her merchant self, distributing healing wares and potions on the front lines and giving everyone the clear view that she is out there helping, and so clearly couldn't be anywhere else. Still, Ida had asked so nicely, and Rose couldn't let a friend down. She disliked being idle, and this was a chance to do something a bit different.
And so she snuck out of the Sparrowfeathers' little camp, past even the watchful eyes(?) of her Seraph guardian.
Dead bodies. Rose has a seen a lot too.
Keeping behind Ida, the merchant reaches the testing range with her, seeing it in even more chaos than when it was active, which is a feat. People were testing highly explosive things here, she had found, and so to think the Metal Demons could make a bigger mess of it than the Drifters and scientists had is a bit of lighthearted giggling everyone could use.
No spreading out of sight. Rose nodded to Claude. Good advice.
She began looking around, without helping herself to any of the firearms and ARMs laying about. They weren't really her thing, she'd admit. Trusty knives all the way. Guns are a cool novelty, but a bit noisy for her, and difficult to control too.
"So what's our goal here, carry as much as we can stuff in our pockets without it becoming dead weight that prevents us from running?"
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
While the chorus of 'you're not supposed to be here' still rings in her head, the resolve she's gained from seeing fellow Drifters, as well as thankful civilians, helps her along. Even if some gawked at her exposed ARM, the whispers of 'metal demon' seem to be kept at the level of quiet glances and children being shielded from sight, if only to avoid them being reminded of the very thing they ran from. But this was understandable. And Gwen was understandable, a balance between the scary unknown and the girl next door. Some even ask questions, trying to gain an understanding.
A metal demon would hide. A metal demon wouldn't put their life on the line. A metal demon wouldn't act like Gwen does, collapsing on benches. They wouldn't eat. They wouldn't have calluses and blisters on their feet. They wouldn't bleed red. Gwen displays all behaviors as any human would.
This will change in time, but for now, Gwen walks among fellow humans without fear or secrecy.
But soon, it's time to go back, and Gwen does, joining with Ida, Morgan, and others at some point just before. Flinching back at the body, the redhead presses a knuckle of her left gloved hand in her mouth, taking a few breaths. It still shakes her. "It wasn't in vain," she murmurs under her breath. "Now we know someone's here. Thank you." It's probably a silly gesture, but it makes her feel better.
"I think so." Gwen turns to Rose. "Anythin's gonna be helpful. We can always come back later for more." To Morgan, Gwen nods. "Be careful. Don't be a martyr. Someone already filled in for that."
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
Layna's crew was depressingly used to her showing up like she'd been run over by something. At this point, the typical reaction was sigh, then have someone grab her so she could get some proper healing before she ran off to do whatever fool thing she had in mind next. This time, however, Layna surprised everyone by showing up with someone else - a certain scientist, Emma Hetfield.
While the two of them were being tended to - either through the use of healing medicines or through the magic of Lysander, the Ruby Empress's chaplain and resident healer depending on Emma's preference, one of Layna's scouts arrived with news.
"Captain Manydays! We've received reports that a group of Drifters lead by Ida Everstead-Rey has been gathered to retrieve supplies from the fairgrounds! What're your orders? Should we send a unit out there to assist?" The man says.
Layna considers this for a moment, grins, and stands up. She picks her hat up from where it had been sitting and affixes it to her head.
"Aye, that we shall. I think I'll be going personally." She says, then glances over towards Emma. "Whaddaya say, Doc? Ready to get into some more trouble?" She asks.
At this time, the pair would've just recently joined Ida's detachment. While Layna was ordinarily the boisterous sort, even she knew the effectiveness of stealth.
To her, though, the bodies were just...there. She'd grown desensitized to it at some point, so she doesn't spare them more than a second glance.
"Aye, let's make this quick. Sooner we get outta here the better, I'd say. Rather not have another run-in with something like that 'Berserk' fellow', aye?" Layna mutters. It had been fun, but once in a day was enough.
<Pose Tracker> Emma Hetfield has posed.
"Hello, everyone," Emma had said to the crew. And then, "Hello," in a significantly lower register, to Lysander.
"Don't worry, I got that one fighting gangsters," she explains.
Soon, Emma is sipping a refreshing juice when they're updated. Straightening up with a sigh, Emma says as she shucks off her suit coat, "Can we do less?"
SOON
"I can feel them around us, circling like some great predatory bird," Emma observes quietly, having stuck near to Layna from a lack of clear alternative options and a certain residual fondness. She has an ARM out - sadly, it's a gun with a cute little boxing glove in it.
She taps her nose in Rose's general direction. "I'll help you pick out what's most important, since we have to prioritize. We can't just throw an empty ARM at a Metal Demon and expect it to work. That almost never works."
So she's saying... there's a chance?
<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.
There is a sense of unease in the air. The scents of blood and fire sharpen it; the bodies scattered around draw attention to it. It's a feeling that comes from the primitive part of the human mind, the primal lizard-brain that tells you something is wrong. Something is here. Something is watching.
Something moves amidst toppled supplies, a shape behind an overturned cart. It looks like someone tried to load it up with exactly what Ida was looking for when they ran afoul of whatever is here. A shadow passes behind the wreckage, moving into sight...
The stray dog looks right at the assembled group. It freezes in its tracks. There's a moment's pause, and it suddenly straightens as if hearing something. It looks up and to the left, and then disappears behind the wreck again, taking off at a mad dash.
The destruction looks fresh because it is. The monster never left.
Pieces of something fall from above, landing in the midst of the group. A revolving rifle cut into three neat pieces -- the cylinder slashed out and the length of the weapon cut into a cross-section -- hits the ground. The creature that dropped it descends, a blur of grey metal swathed in cloth of a color that seems to blend weirdly with the backdrop. It hits the ground on the far side of the yard, straightening in a smooth motion.
It must be more than seven feet tall, with long, narrow legs covered in angular, articulated carapace like some kind of insectile armor in steely grey. They bend strangely, designed to absorb the shock of landing, with wide, apparently taloned feet. Its midsection is covered in a similar carapace -- what's visible of it, anyway, everything above the waist wrapped in loose grey cloth that hangs like a robe or cloak. It drapes over wide shoulders and down to its elbows, long in the back, with black gauntleted hands pressed together in front of it in something like prayer. They seem humanoid.
Its head looks more like someone started to sculpt a human with nothing but sharp angles and never filled in the details. Three eyes arranged in a triangle open, shining red. Lines of bright silver cross between them, dividing the face. There's no mouth to speak of, or from. The lines twist, wriggling across the surface of the creature's head like metal worms, flicking between geometric patterns in fast-forward.
The lines shiver. A deep, metallic voice rumbles out of it, strange to the ear when produced in such a fashion. "More," it -- he? -- says. "Good."
Its robe suddenly billows outward and upward in an unseen breeze. Four arms, looking more like extensions of some metallic mimicry of a spinal column than an actual arm, unfurl outward. They curl forward, three-pronged claws wielding human weapons -- two revolvers, a rifle like the one cut into pieces and a double-barreled shotgun, respectively -- presented forward.
The gunfire starts immediately, a thunderous welcome and a driving storm of lead rippling across the field. The Demon starts to stalk across the cratered ground, talons tearing up soil with each plodding step, its other two hands still folded in utter tranquility.
Take cover!
GS: Kalve has attacked Emma Hetfield with For Demonstration Purposes Only! GS: Kalve has attacked Layna Manydays with For Demonstration Purposes Only! GS: Kalve has attacked Gwen Whitlock with For Demonstration Purposes Only! GS: Kalve has attacked Rose with For Demonstration Purposes Only! GS: Kalve has attacked Claude C. Kenny with For Demonstration Purposes Only! GS: Kalve has attacked Morgan Newkirk with For Demonstration Purposes Only! GS: Kalve has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with For Demonstration Purposes Only! GS: Kalve has completed his action. GS: Claude C. Kenny takes a glancing hit from Kalve's For Demonstration Purposes Only for 44 hit points! GS: Gwen Whitlock guards a hit from Kalve's For Demonstration Purposes Only for 68 hit points! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes a solid hit from Kalve's For Demonstration Purposes Only for 90 hit points! GS: Layna Manydays takes a solid hit from Kalve's For Demonstration Purposes Only for 98 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Flora Everstead-Rey was an Etone, back when she was just plain Flora. Small-unit tactics are incredibly handy when you are dealing with monsters that come in slavering hordes, and can easily overrun the unprepared.
Ida reaches the pile of crates, and sees one with its lid ajar. There's a rifle sitting on top--to Claude and Morgan, it is a quaint weapon, with a largely-wooden body and a box magazine. To Rose, it is yet another mysterious noisy thing. To Ida, it is one of the new box-magazine rifle models her family's people were debuting at the fair. Ida has no idea if any of them made it out.
"Mr. Newkirk," Ida says, her voice still very unsteady, "an entire army hit this place." She thinks he means Adlehyde. She's still obviously disguieted. Claude turning out to be a completely normal(?) human was probably the one bit of good news she's had, short of the existence of the mysterious Beastwoman healer with a whole stockpile of healing fruits. She snaps one of the box mags into place, and holsters her revolver. "Yes," Ida adds, to Rose. It's a hushed whisper. "Start looking through these crates, I'll keep you covered." There's packing in there, a mixture of straw and crumpled paper, and it's kind of a wonder the crate didn't go up like kindling. Rose is going to have to clean some of it out before she can find anything else. She's not going to have time.
The pieces of the ARM fall; one hits the ground in front of Ida, and she jerks back, looking up out of reflex. What she sees sends fear down her spine like an electrical shock. "ENEMY SIGHTED!" Ida yells, trying to keep the terror from seeping into her voice. Time slows down. She sees the creature pointing guns, plants a hand on the edge of the crate, and vaults it in a single, smooth motion. A bullet tears through the air, clipping the side of her arm; a spray of red coats the Everstead-Rey logo on the side of the crate. More blood drips onto the ground as she sinks into a crouch.
Ida swallows hard. She doesn't have much rifle training, but that's what she has in her hands. She'd yell at Rose and Layna to take cover, but there's no time. She has to take point on this one--and this means potentially putting herself at risk.
Ida doesn't so much stand behind the crate as leap out from behind it, a low spring that's not quite one of the rolls she uses for in-combat movement. She breathes, channeling chi into her arms and core, and fires twice at the monster. The rifle cracks, its muzzle flash casting her shadow on the wall, spent casings falling to the ground.
<Pose Tracker> Claude C. Kenny has posed.
Claude C. Kenny is kind of a derp. The suggestions that he has skated through the actual university parts of his education on name alone are, if not based in fact, then certainly strongly supported by circumstantial evidence. But over the past several hours, the parts of his education and training he actually paid attention to - i.e., the military parts at the premier space military academy in the galaxy - have become increasingly relevant. And so when the monster comes up, his training kicks in and it's like a switch turns on in his brain, transforming him from a sort of derpy Drifter into a weapons delivery system, causing him to:
a) Shout "COVER!" at the top of his lungs.
b) Pull the trigger on his shotgun.
c) Start diving for cover.
d) Curse mentally as the stupid gunsmoke shotgun fails to fire (cause unknown)
e) Curse loudly as a round from one of the pis tols slams into his upper right pectoral muscle, where it...sort of flattens, caught against the jacket. That's weird.
f) Land on the ground behind the remaining 2/3 of a shattered crate.
Wincing at the bullet impact, Claude breaks open the shotgun and checks the load again... then realizes some panicked idiot loaded spent shells into this shotgun before dying. The young man sighs wearily, places the gun at his feet, then draws his sinclair-hilted broadsword. "I'm going looking for a non-terrible gun!" he shouts in Ida's general direction, then breaks from cover toward one of the nearby buildings and fires the one weapon that has never let him down.
"AIR SLASH!"
GS: Claude C. Kenny has attacked Kalve with Air Slash! GS: Claude C. Kenny has completed his action. GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Kalve with Everstead-Rey Model 15 Mk. II! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action. GS: Morgan Newkirk critically Guards a hit from Kalve's For Demonstration Purposes Only for 26 hit points! GS: CRITICAL! Emma Hetfield takes a solid hit from Kalve's For Demonstration Purposes Only for 148 hit points! GS: CRITICAL! Kalve takes a solid hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's Everstead-Rey Model 15 Mk. II for 106 hit points! GS: Kalve enters CONDITION GREEN!! GS: Kalve takes a solid hit from Claude C. Kenny's Air Slash for 97 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"Truth ta that, Ida. Truth ta that." Morgan drawls as he creeps forwards. "And come on Gwen, I'm always careful ain't I?" The fox flashes the messanger a quick grin before he suddenly freezes. Like the dog there he can hear something. Something coming that isn't right...isn't natural.
...and then it lands.
Shattered remains of weapons hit the ground. A creature made of nightmares appears to have way too many arms filled with way too many guns starts to aim them downrange.
Then the shooting starts.
Now Claude's reaction to shout and dive for cover is a smart one. In fact thats his first reaction too. However the fox has an objective in mind. So instead of cover he just winks once towards Gwen. "Be right back." The words tossed towards her and Ida."
A lazy salute is tossed towards the rest of the ladies in attendance. Then he's sprinting. Bullets nipping at his heels and he runds hell-for-leather right in the open towards the dubious cover provided by the tumbledown building he was aiming for in the first place.
GS: Morgan Newkirk has attacked Kalve with Deadeye! GS: Morgan Newkirk has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Kalve guards a hit from Morgan Newkirk's Deadeye for 76 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
"How can you say somethin' like that with a straight face?" Gwen shakes her head at Morgan. "Really..."
She quiets a few seconds after Morgan, her human senses finally perceiving what the trashed surroundings and still cooling body had hinted at. Something is here. Lurking. Slowly, the fingers of her left hand touch the ground as she kneels, feeling for the cold metal of some stray bits of metal. Carefully, she loads her ARM, trying to get her eyes used to the darkness.
... And nearly falls backwards at the appearance of a stray dog. "Aww, poor guy," she cooes sympathetically. "Probably wonderin' what the heck's goin' on right now-"
This is what happens when a person hasn't seen nor read a piece of schlocky horror media- not that this would be a thing just yet. Never trust the dog. Gwen jumps back, swallowing nervously at the horrific sight of the metal demon. Too many angles. That mix of insectoid and humanoid parts. The many, many limbs. "Oh god!" She steadies herself after her outburst, seeing the paths her companions take.
She charges forward, using Ida's actions as her cue. Bullets hit into her right shoulder and arm, the metal serving as an impromptu shield. "If it's metal, I can use it!" Gwen says to Claude, pointing her ARM at Kalve. "If it can fit, anyway!"
Almost as a demonstration, some pellets fly out of her arm, trying to get an angle on the many-legged entity as others release their own fire.
GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Kalve with Coil Shot! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
They'd walked right into its trap. Claude's warning gets Layna moving to dodge as the creature's ARMs begin to fire, but she can't move fast enough to get out of its range. A hail of bullets meets her, and she's forced to stop her movement.
"Blasted thing..." She mutters, hunkering down behind a crate. It had managed to land some good shots in. She'd have to be more careful. She'd heard of ARMs before, and had seen them used, but this was her first time seeing them in a combat situation - at least, when they were on the enemy's side.
Unfortunately, she was somewhat at an impasse here - doing any appreciable damage would require her to get up close...but that thing would probably shoot her down before she could.
She had Sorcery, but...she doubted wind would really affect something like this all that much. She really needed a more effective form of long-range attack.
So, instead, she rummages around her coat for a bottle of liquid, and...takes a drink. She'd have to get out and do something - probably something stupid - soon, but for now...well, now she had to wait.
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Layna Manydays with Batten Down the Hatches! GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action. GS: Layna Manydays heals Layna Manydays! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Emma Hetfield has posed.
Bullets! Her one weakness! How did it know, Emma thinks even as she gets a glancing tear past her arm and
oh
god
She lets out a weird, atonal screech even as she ducks beneath some wreckage, face going pale, panting for breath as she calms herself down by force. Not as bad as before, and a glance on her bare arm tells her that it's a surface gash but
"NGHHHHHHHHHHH" there it goes again.
She seems fine other than these noises at least. There isn't much additional blood. Emma turns her head and her eyes widen at the sight of a box. This box seems to her as if it contains her destiny. She plunges her hands into it without heed, rises upwards -- and points two boxlike black objects forwards.
Light gleams off half-scrubbed metal script on the side. TNPR? But the R is backwards.
Emma starts firing them blindly at the spindled machine, shouting with belting force over the chaos of gunfire. "Don't assume thin materials will protect you! It's making effective use of the ARM! Try to disable its mobility equip-" chuk chuk
Emma discards the two shotguns with contempt and dives back down.
GS: Rose takes a glancing hit from Kalve's For Demonstration Purposes Only for 46 hit points! GS: Emma Hetfield has attacked Kalve with Just grabbing some crap off the floor! GS: Emma Hetfield has completed her action. GS: Kalve guards a hit from Gwen Whitlock's Coil Shot for 43 hit points! GS: Kalve critically Guards a hit from Emma Hetfield's Just grabbing some crap off the floor for 19 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
"Righto!" Rose replies to Gwen, though her eyes, not long after, settle on Layna suspiciously. Where's she seen that face before? Definitely in Glenwood. Think, Rose, I know there's a lot to think about lately but spare some processing power for recognizing people, sheesh.
A lightbulb finally lights up.
Rose does not say anything.
With Emma's guidance it'll be a lot easier for Rose to identify what's really valuable and what isn't, given she lacks in-depth knowledge of ARMs. Or it would be, if something hadn't dropped in to say hello.
Caped, four arms, insect-like armor. Can talk. Hauling more guns than the average gun-totting Drifter. Oh that's not good.
Rose dives behind cover, luckily, not crates of ammunition. A bullet grazed a shoulder, nothing threatening, kind of cliche, but better than the head.
"OKAY, SO, WHAT'S THE PLAN NOW, BESIDES TAKING COVER AND FIGHTING BACK? ISN'T MOST OF THIS STUFF DANGEROUS TO SHOOT AROUND?" Hey, Rose knows enough about ARMs to know you don't want to set supplies on fire.
She pulls a throwing knife out from under her arm, hidden under that vest, coming out of cover long enough to hurl it towards the four-armed gunslinger. "Glimmer Dragon!"
The knife shines yellow-ish, multiplying itself in the air to form a few more energy knives equally capable of stabbing things.
Maybe raiding the crates would work better than her knives against that.
GS: Rose has attacked Kalve with Glimmer Dragon! GS: Rose has completed her action. GS: Kalve takes a solid hit from Rose's Glimmer Dragon for 72 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.
The creature's advance is steady but unhurried. It empties the shotgun and tosses it aside. The pistols follow, dropped carelessly. One ends up in its path, a talon on its foot slicing into the cylinder and pressing the weapon into the dirt. The rifle is lowered in front of it, one of the three eyes focusing downwards on the gun. It unfolds its hands, holding them palm up, and the weapon dissolves into a swirling mass of grey sand, held spinning above its hands.
Gunfire erupts from the Drifters downrange. The creature's extra arms snake in front of it, the metal bonelike prortusions flipping forward and flattening into long, narrow shields. Morgan's shot hits one and sparks off of it, twitching the arm in question and pounding a dent into the flat surface. One of the arms lashes out, driving forward like a spear to try and catch him with a suddenly-pointed appendage. It doesn't stop moving forward to chase him, though. Maybe the monster isn't worried about some warehouse's peashooters?
Rifles aren't quite peashooters. One shot hits a shield-arm from Ida's rifle; the other hits the thing in the midsection, staggering it for half a step. "Incorrect ammunition for such an engagement," it observes matter-of-factly, facial lines vibrating. "Primitive projectile weapons require more specialized munitions to be a threat." Two of its arms straighten, the claws at the end folding and twisting, rearranging into something barbed and jagged --
The AIR SLASH hits it, blowing the robe backwards and stopping it again. An eye focuses on the origin. The body beneath is bent forward, narrow up to the bottom of where the rib cage would be on a person and made with a skeletal motif mixed with the insectile armor. It looks to be one piece. There are no distinct components, no gaps in plating, no seperate pieces. It flows fluidly together. For a moment, the spot Ida hit it is visible, a shallow cut across the armor plating glinting with wet quicksilver. "Fascinating."
Claude has its attention. It suddenly leans forward, powering across the field towards the oncoming Drifters. The ball of swirling particulate in its hands seperates, half jumping into the upper-leftmost arm and solidifying into a boxy-looking pistol with a vertically- divided barrel. A flare of red light travels down the barrel, and a lance of red jabs out towards the Space Swordsman...'s coat. This one is absolutely not a gunsmoke weapon.
More fire meets it. The monster keeps advancing. Shotguns blaze, and it sweeps the cloud of dust in front of it with its two humanoid hands. The pellets rush into it and get slowed beyond, striking the carapace armor beneath it and sticking like glue. The metallic dust melds over it, forming a sheet of roiling, rippling liquid metal. The monster hunches over and scoops up one of the crates it passes with one hand, flinging it at Emma. Another cloud of metallic dust rises from its hand and, with a pushing motion from two of its upper arms, forms into long, narrow spikes of metal that shoot through the crate and drop it downward on top of her, points down and weighted by whatever it is in the box.
<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.
It ends up right up front, practically within arm's reach of Gwen and Ida. It chooses the former to focus on. Its humanoid hands come forward in a swipe at her extended arm and a jab towards her stomach, her gunshots ripping through its cloak and leaving points of welling-up silver on its midsection behind. The left two of the four other arms swing down after, trying to get a grip on her ARM-arm and hold her fast. The other two sweep upwards, intercepting a storm of knives, pierced by duplicate blades while the real travels towards its heart.
The creature snatches it out of the air with one of its black-gauntleted hands. There's a brief flare of yellowish light from the palm of the gauntlet. It releases the knife, and curls the punctured arms inward towards its humanoid hands. One is left free to reach up with another ball of metallic dust, while the other stays close to its body. It swirls until it resolves into an object, taking the shape of something with a nozzle and a glinting metallic tank of some kind affixed to the top at the rapid urging of the pair of manipulators.
It snatches it up with the hand that once held the dust, squeezing the trigger. Liquid flame sprays across the makeshift cover in an arc. Fire lashes out, and Rose and Layna are both in its path.
GS: Kalve has attacked Kalve with Fifth State! GS: Kalve takes a solid hit from Kalve's Fifth State for 0 hit points! GS: Lock and State! Statuses applied to Kalve! GS: Kalve has attacked Claude C. Kenny with Scientific Method! GS: Kalve has attacked Morgan Newkirk with I Have A Tip For You - Get The Point?! GS: Kalve has attacked Emma Hetfield with Liquid Metal! GS: Kalve has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Combat Maneuver Check! GS: Kalve has attacked Rose with Demon Fire! GS: Kalve has attacked Layna Manydays with Demon Fire! GS: Kalve has completed his action. GS: Claude C. Kenny takes a glancing hit from Kalve's Scientific Method for 17 hit points! GS: Break! Statuses applied to Claude C. Kenny! GS: Emma Hetfield guards a hit from Kalve's Liquid Metal for 43 hit points! GS: Kalve takes Cover! He gains 50 temporary hit points! GS: Rose guards a hit from Kalve's Demon Fire for 58 hit points! GS: Layna Manydays takes a solid hit from Kalve's Demon Fire for 101 hit points! GS: Gwen Whitlock guards a hit from Kalve's Combat Maneuver Check for 96 hit points! GS: Morgan Newkirk takes a solid hit from Kalve's I Have A Tip For You - Get The Point? for 142 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
It caught her knife. Sure, the duplicates hit, but it -caught her knife-. Rose is really starting to reconsider bringing knives to every fight now. The ranged weapons are going to make it really hard to get into melee, and it's fast enough for piddly little throwing knives not to really be a threat to it. What do?
Well for starters, let's try not to get set on fire.
SECRET RANGETSU TECHNIQUE, WATER BARRIER NO JUTSU.
Actually it's neither secret nor a jutsu.
"Shining Mirror!" Rose yells, as her two primary knives come out of their sheaths and cross in front of her. A half-dome of water and ice forms in front of her, tanking the blast of demonic fire... at least for a moment. The shield quickly falters, showing Rose's inexperience at using her more esoteric and out there artes. She's blasted back as it breaks, but thanks to it avoid major burns or being set on fire outright. Narrowly.
She crashes into a half-open crate, the contents of which attract her attention. Knives are sheathed, and Rose suddenly whips back up wielding a... grenade launcher? It goes PHTOOM, PHTOOM twice before being out of shots. Did you know that, technically, a grenade launcher is a silent weapon?
Rose would go 'LOOK MA, 'M USING THE ARM RIGHT!' if the blowback from firing it didn't trip her backwards into the crates again. Maybe the explosions will distract people from her critical mistake of forgetting firearms have recoil.
GS: Rose has attacked Kalve with Loot 'n Shoot! GS: Rose has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida hits the ground on her side, pushes off with a hand, and scrambles behind a pile of broken, smoldering timber that used to be part of the bleachers. "Covering!" Ida shouts back, at Claude. As he rushes for more cover, she rises, and empties the rest of the magazine in the Metal Demon's general direction. Suppressive fire--she's not trying to hit it, just force it back, give Claude and Morgan some breathing room as they reposition. "FOCUS!" she yells at Rose. She has to. The last gunfight she got into opened with Janus Cascade almost sniping her from over a hundred yards away, and she still hasn't gotten used to it. She feels each shot in her ribs, which are freshly-healed from what Berserk did to them. When she fires the last round, she drops the weapon, and goes for a revolver.
For a moment, the thing looks at her, speaks to her, and icy talons clutch at Ida's heart. It thinks she's not a threat. It thinks this cutting-edge weapon is pitiful. Ida gets a glimpse of quicksilver as Claude's attack shifts the monster's robe, but not much. She ducks back, taking cover against return fire that... never happens. A glance out tells Ida that the thing, whatever it is, has completely snubbed her, in favor of the others. Ida takes aim, focuses, tries to follow the monster's skittering, scuttling motion. She pulls back her other hand, to fan--
And suddenly the monster is right there next to her, so close it could reach out and grab her if it wanted. "GET BACK," Ida roars. In the next heartbeat, it's grabbed Gwen. Ida completely misses that flash of yellow-gold light, and tunnel-visions right in. She fans all six shots at the creature, trying to put as many of them into it as she can.
Something rattles into her consciousness, as if to spite her. Something live by the ARM, die by it? Why is she thinking of that now, beside the obvious?
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Kalve with Fan the Hammer! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
Layna feels the heat of the flame as it consumes her cover. While she is mostly okay, her cover is not - it was instantly consumed by the flames, leaving her open to attack.
It does, however, give her an idea. After a bit of working, she turns the remains of her drink into a makeshift molotov cocktail with the flames helpfully provided by her opponent, and hurls the mixture at him.
"Try this on for size, ya great ugly blaggard!" She shouts, hurling the bottle at the metallic creature before hurrying off to find some more sturdy cover.
Right now, bravado was really all she had, but if she could serve as a distraction away from some of her more injured allies, that was the best she could hope for.
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Kalve with The Dangers of Drinking! GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Claude C. Kenny has posed.
Claude C. Kenny runs for the building like his life depends upon it, because it sort of does. The building in question is an old-timey (or, since this is Cow Patty Planet, new-timey) bar with a blurry mirror on the back wall behind the bar. Through it, Claude can see the reflection of a monster from the depths of his imagination looming over him, preparing to shoot somethign that glows with a red light, and so he throws himself to the ground, allowing the red beam to pass over his head. "HA!" he barks.
The universe punishes him immediately, as the beam carves through the back wall and also several liquor bottles of varying quality, sending shards of glass and bad whiskey spraying over the young blonde swordsman's face and head, setting several strands of his fine princessy locks alight. His first response is notably not to stop, drop and roll, because stopping and doing anything in a gunfight it a good way to get yourself killed. Instead he rolls out of the line of fire, then begins brushing the worst of the mess out of his face.
This has been a lovely day.
Claude is preparing to fire off another air slash, but his eyes widen instead as he sees a nearby body clutching a massive eight-chamber gun, almost four feet in length and made of some sort of gleaming metal that gives off a bronze sheen. The young man sheathes his sword with a grin, hefts the mighty weapon in both hands, gripping it in an undergrip like a chain gun. He turns back toward the door, kicks the charred remnants away, and brandishes his enormous, enormous gun. "Hey jerkwad!" Claude shouts, because he is not great at taunting. "SUCK ON THIS!"
The first shot explodes a nearby water fountain. The second tears through a building. The third bounces off the stones about three feet from Rose's crate. Claude frowns, and steadies his aim, eyes narrowing. The fourth and fifth more or less go where they're supposed to, but the sixth ricochets off a short stone outcropping and embeds itself in the wall behind Claude, who turns to look at it.
....
"This stupid piece of crap fires square bullets!" he exclaims, throwing the stupid piece of crap in Gwen's general direction. "WHY?" he screams as he dives back for cover. "WHY IS THAT EVEN A THING?"
GS: Claude C. Kenny has attacked Kalve with Puckle Gun! GS: Claude C. Kenny has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Kalve takes a solid hit from Rose's Loot 'n Shoot for 122 hit points! GS: Kalve critically Guards a hit from Layna Manydays's The Dangers of Drinking for 18 hit points! GS: Kalve takes a solid hit from Claude C. Kenny's Puckle Gun for 107 hit points! GS: Kalve guards a hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's Fan the Hammer for 72 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
Morgan did get the point. As they say. The slashing arm stabbing right though the side of the Digger as he dashes. Mostly because he was more intent on charging than on dodging. He was hell bent on getting to that building. It costs him.
Blood trails after him as he stumbles, but the fox never really falls. The pain is a driving force, singing an old battlecry in his veins. Blood pounding, eyes wide he runs to dissipear into the hole in the side of the building.
Stumbling though he's already shoutng. "HOT LAUCH!"
A half dozen cowering mechanics suddenly leap up at that one shout. Moving with purpose around a tarp covered object as Morgan hurls himself under the tarp and dissipears.
He was wounded. Obviously. Dissipearing into the smoke. Did he escape on his own? Did he collapse in a ditch from his wounds? Its amost impossible to tell.
At least until those with sharper ears might hear a deep throated humm of an engine spinning up. Not the roar of a one of those louder gas powered affairs. Something else, a humm just on the edge of hearing. Two more sounds suddenly join the cacophany of battle.
The first is the whine of a large weapon spinning up.
The second the assault on the ears of a minigun opening fire.
The third is the shattering timber as that werehouse blows itself apart.
Out of the dust raises a Gear, dark gray in color with little in the way of distinguishing markings. Apart from a odd handpainted laurel and globe insignia on one shoulder, and the caracture of a cheerfully laughing fox on the other.
The minigun attached to its right arm as the massive war machine raises to its full height continues to roar as bullets stitch across the ground towards Kalve.
The shield in the off hand angles with the recoil of the minigun to protect the machine from fire as the humonid weapon of battle swares off legs bent slightly as if ready to dodge.
At least he's trying to make himself a target now.
GS: Morgan Newkirk has attacked Kalve with Fire Fox! GS: Morgan Newkirk has completed his action. GS: Kalve guards a hit from Morgan Newkirk's Fire Fox for 58 hit points! GS: Morgan Newkirk takes Cover! He gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Emma Hetfield has posed.
Emma can see what the pellets do, the cloud of dust serving, she thinks, as an erosive barrier - something that absorbs incoming force, reducing it, perhaps stopping it entirely. That's so good, she thinks, even as she's coming on down and FWUSHNK.
"Fortunately," Emma says to no one in particular from the floor, "I was able to anticipate that it would aim for my legs and plan accordingly. Even so, I'd hate to chance that reaction again!"
Emma's legs have been splayed out like she was doing splits, with the metal spears right behind her. She attempts to get up and immediately feels something wrench in her back, grimacing with the pain that only your older sister (age 39) can truly understand. This may be to her benefit, as the creature is moving with speed and efficiency to murder everyone else.
A crate breaks on her. As she rummages in its leavings like some kind of animal or Kislevi, Emma answers Claude's question. "Better wound channels! That's important when you're fighting a large organic creature or if you really are focused on hurting or killing enemy soldiers. Though," and now Emma has something that's flipping open on its own as she lays down on her tummy further, "It's probably not very nice, now is it!"
Emma sights down the scope. A readout comes up that she can translate as something in the ARM fitfully comes to life. Many shots, one kill? What a miserable idea, Emma thinks, before
"!!!"
"Yes! Focus fire!" Emma shouts into the cacophony. She takes several shots at the legfeetetc. business of the Demon even as the Gear moves nearer into the field...
GS: Emma Hetfield has attacked Kalve with Just grabbing some crap off the floor! GS: Emma Hetfield has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Kalve critically Guards a hit from Emma Hetfield's Just grabbing some crap off the floor for 27 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
The fire grabs Gwen's attention as she shoots, adrenaline and the shouts of injured comrades blotting out the sudden urge to shrink backwards away from the threat.
What does manage to grab Gwen's attention is Claude's helpful contribution to her arsenal. Square bullets? GWEN WANTS TO SEE THIS. Curiosity drives Gwen to look at the shiny piece of crap being thrown at her, as well charge forward, extending her right hand in order to snag it in midair.
The square bullet flies right past her, unfortunately, and Kalve is right there, snagging her arm. She fights against the hold, another of Kalve's arms managing to jab at her side rather than her stomach. "Ngh!" It's one human against the expanse of a much larger, much stronger machine; while Gwen's ARM strains against Kalve's grip, the rest of Gwen's body can't retain a firm enough grip on the floor to further resist the metal demon's hold.
At least, that's what it looks like the entirety of Gwen's plan is, at first. But, with the distractions of the others, especially with Morgan piloting that... wait, IS THAT WHAT HE WAS GOING TO GET?
Gwen's lips split in a toothy grin. She grips onto the arm, and lets loose with a charge of electricity, attempting to use Kalve's arm as a conduct directly to the rest of his body. "Haaaaaahh!"
GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Kalve with St. Elmo's Fire! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action. GS: Kalve takes a solid hit from Gwen Whitlock's St. Elmo's Fire for 68 hit points! GS: Disrupt and Jam! Statuses applied to Kalve!
<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.
Leaving Ida alone seems to be a terrible idea for six very loud, very specific reasons.
The gun fires at point-blank range. Six shots hammer home into the Demon, each one a little higher than the last. Rounds stitch up its side, going from waist to shoulder. The last hits one of its primary arms, and it drops the flamethrower, the weapon turning to dust and vanishing entirely when it hits the ground.
From the other side, electricity flows. Gwen holds fast and releases a charge, blasting the Demon with a rush of electrical power that it can't possibly escape. It shudders and spasms, convulsing as the electric pulse rolls through it. Its body seems to momentarily lose cohesion, the almost skeletal, buglike midsection evening out to an almost human shape, its head gaining more definition, with metallic fibers like hair rising out of it and rolling upwards into place and then away like a wave. Up close, it looks less like a monster and more like a man in armor for a bare few seconds.
Kalve plants his feet, grounding out the pulse, tightening his grip on Gwen's arm. The extra joints in his legs suddenly reverse and disappear, turning more humanoid. His body rapidly reverts back to the monstrous shape it was in a moment ago, but his voice loses some of its inhuman timbre. It sounds... familiar. "You are wasting a valuable opportunity," he says, "to bond with your ARMs. You use inferior tools and hinder your own development. Do you think this is a game?"
"I speak, but you learn nothing." Irritation comes through in his voice. The snakelike silver lines return to his once more featureless face. The strange, alien sound comes with it. "I will show you."
He moves. Three arms attack Ida, the huge Demon stepping in towards her and snaking in with a drumroll of jabs and a sudden and final thrust-punch to her midsection. A huge ripple rolls down the extended arm in the instant of that last strike, snapping forward with more force than the short space he moved should reasonably allow. It's enough to knock a grown man off his feet. If nothing else, it will put some distance between himself and Ida -- to say nothing of the damage it might do. It looked so simple, but...!
He slides back the other direction with hardly a pause, the fingers on his primary left hand flowing together while his fingertips form knife-like points. The two manipulators clamp down, extending her artificial ARM. His right hand comes around, hammering in towards pressure points with the intent to stun her. His left hand swings in with surgical precision. He knows exactly where the ARM connects. He knows exactly what it does for her.
Kalve's hand cuts. His manipulators pull.
He drops Gwen and releases her arm as an almost afterthought, turning away.
Kalve gets two steps before the grenades hit him, the detonations peppering him with blasts of fire and clouds of shrapnel. There's a noise that's felt in the chest more than actually heard, a noise of pain from the monster. He stumbles and falls backwards, shards of hot metal stitched up the front of his body. His manipulators swing backwards before he can hit the ground, catching him. He doesn't quite fall completely, but he's still for a crucial moment.
A bottle breaks over him. Fire spreads, catching to the odd cloak. The creature makes that noise again. He rolls back up to his feet in a smooth motion, and with a rumble that would be an exhalation on anything with a mouth, begins to shed the shrapnel like darts falling from a board. Bits fall along with droplets of quicksilver blood, his cloak shredded and his armor punctured. He sweeps his extra arms down his injured body, extinguishing flames and bleeding metal into the myriad wounds he's suffered so far. The metal seems to solidify, turning to dozens of tiny metal scars.
The eyes turn. Motes of metal dust appear over his gauntlets. U-shaped weapons that look like they've been assembled of fragments of broken glass materialize, one in each hand. He holds them by the middle, and arcs of lightning cross the gaps like a ladder. "Learn," he says.
Lashes of something like lightning rip out from the weapons. He drags them across the field, the bolts attracted to anything metallic near the point they're aimed. They burn their way through wallboards and ignite crates. Glass shatters and explodes when it crosses the front of the building Claude fires from, the first shells going wide. Layna, Rose and Claude are directly in the path of the strange weaponsfire, but they're not the only ones: something starts to hit him, shots raking his arms and legs from behind and the side. His leg gives out, dropping him to one knee. He turns his head, sighting Emma and her weapon.
He springs up and forward, diving at her with four arms covered in spikes and claws. He hits the ground in front of her and looms over her, driving them downward like a cage of spikes and spines. He stabs at her from nearly every direction he can reach while his leg ejects the worst bullets and forces itself functional again. He draws back, ready to attack again -- and then looks up like he just heard something.
Kalve turns and focuses both lightning guns on the Gear, the heavy automatic fire ripping into his armored body. His four manipulators move in a blurring flurry, more of that dust he used to intercept the shotgun pellets spreading between himself and the Gear's guns. He uses the lightning gun more like a surgical implement this time, directing the energy across actuators and towards the cockpit with the eye of someone who knows exactly what to do against something like that.
Claude's puckle gun finally gets aimed right. The enormous shell takes Kalve clear off his feet, sending him sailing into the ruined cart from earlier. He snaps it in half when he lands. Inside the ruined fragments, he starts to get back up, an enormous wound spilling silvery blood torn in his side. He's slowed... but he's not down yet.
GS: Kalve has attacked Morgan Newkirk with Method I - Unity of Tool and Hand! GS: Kalve has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Method Mercury! GS: Kalve has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Method Mercury! GS: Kalve has attacked Emma Hetfield with Paradigm Shift! GS: Kalve has activated a Force Action! GS: Kalve has attacked Layna Manydays with Method II - Force As Instruction! GS: Kalve has attacked Rose with Method II - Force As Instruction! GS: CRITICAL! Ida Everstead-Rey takes a glancing hit from Kalve's Method Mercury for 112 hit points! GS: Poison and Disease! Statuses applied to Ida Everstead-Rey! GS: Emma Hetfield takes a glancing hit from Kalve's Paradigm Shift for 62 hit points! GS: Layna Manydays takes a glancing hit from Kalve's Method II - Force As Instruction for 140 hit points! GS: CRITICAL! Morgan Newkirk critically Guards a hit from Kalve's Method I - Unity of Tool and Hand for 57 hit points! GS: Rose takes a solid hit from Kalve's Method II - Force As Instruction for 158 hit points! GS: Gwen Whitlock guards a hit from Kalve's Method Mercury for 104 hit points! GS: Poison and Disease! Statuses applied to Gwen Whitlock! GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Rose with Captain's Orders!! GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Ida Everstead-Rey with Captain's Orders!! GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Morgan Newkirk with Captain's Orders!! GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Emma Hetfield with Captain's Orders!! GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Gwen Whitlock with Captain's Orders!! GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action. GS: Morgan Newkirk takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's Captain's Orders! for 0 hit points! GS: Reload! Morgan Newkirk gains 15 extra FP from Layna Manydays! GS: Rose takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's Captain's Orders! for 0 hit points! GS: Reload! Rose gains 15 extra FP from Layna Manydays! GS: Emma Hetfield takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's Captain's Orders! for 0 hit points! GS: Reload! Emma Hetfield gains 15 extra FP from Layna Manydays! GS: Kalve has attacked Kalve with Sufficiently Advanced! GS: Kalve heals Kalve! He gains 100 temporary hit points! GS: Kalve has completed his action. GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's Captain's Orders! for 0 hit points! GS: Reload! Ida Everstead-Rey gains 15 extra FP from Layna Manydays!
<Pose Tracker> Emma Hetfield has posed.
The creature speaks with querulous condemnation to her. Emma sees it through the damaged scope screen as it rolls forwards and raises up and lunges towards her. Him, no, she thinks. She raises up the ARM to try and guard her head and her upper body, which is one thing that a soldier sometime had drilled into her; the casing of the old and half-repaired ARM is refulgent enough that the spikes do not hit her there, but they gash into her body otherwise. She hisses, if with less of the agony that she had before.
Something is flowing in her, after all. And before Kalve can finish things off there, he's gone, and Emma flops to the side, gasping for breath. It is not the first near-brush with death, and she reflects to herself that perhaps it's good it was over so accursedly quickly. And now he's engaging the Gear.
That's good, Emma thinks as she pushes herself upright. I can actually stand up! That is a Gear, he'll be busy for at least a minute or so.
"Take the opportunity to bond with our ARMs? Well," Emma says, reaching into the pocket of her dress - yes, it has pockets; do you not? - "if you insist. I would hate to disappoint a person who invaded Adelhyde."
Out comes a sheet of green glass? "Actually I'm lying," Emma says, in a conversational tone. "I'm not very good at expressing nuance, and I'm a little betwixt and between right now. I'm not actually feeling at all submissive to your commands taken as a general point, and I don't think I'm going to internalize any messages you have to send. Whatever your motivations here," the green glass beeps, "you are" CLANG, FOOM "ing with my bread and butter, mister and/or miss!"
Emma is surrounded by shimmering green iterations of something. It's like computer code, but, of course, the only person present who likely knows that that isn't some kind of street accounting ethical vow is Emma herself.
Either way a horrible force reaches out through the subtle interplay of god's plan. The goal: To download Kalve's data.
"And your bellies ARE chubby!" Emma concludes. She seems satisfied at this outcome, at least.
GS: Emma Hetfield has attacked Kalve with Download! GS: Emma Hetfield has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Claude's back. Ida sees the gun he's holding, and realizes a moment later that he's holding it all wrong. "Claude!" she cries, "Get closer and brace it!" Because he's waltzing out of that bar with something that's meant to be mounted on a ship, and why is he yelling about square bullets, doesn't he know--
--FOCUS--
Claude opens fire. Ida leaps to the side, combat-rolling and rising to a crouch behind a fragment of stone wall. She knows few of the bullets are going to make it this far, but at least a few do. Ida rises, draws a bead on the monster again--
The warehouse explodes. Ida sees Morgan's Gear erupting from the warehouse, and her eyes go wide--she dives back behind the pile of wood as its chaingun tears up the ground. The ground shakes and rumbles with each step it takes. Ida grabs her speedloader from her belt, and fumbles with it. If it wasn't clear before, it's very clear now; this is a gunfight, and...
Suddenly it's not. The Demon looms over Ida. She steps back reflexively, still trying to line the speedloader up with the weapon's chambers--it speaks to her. Its form is shifting like quicksilver, and for a few instants, she can see something more human in it. Can Demons do that? Its voice is familiar. The bullets slide home with a click and rattle, but Ida is no longer paying attention.
The proceedure is different, but it's using those gauntlets to shape ARMs out of nothing. Its flesh is flowing like mercury. And that voice.
"Kalve?" Ida whispers.
She knows it is. The thing she was hoping, praying she wouldn't find is here. Her hands start shaking. Her vision blurs. Kalve's fists rush in, and she offers absolutely no resistance. Berserk cracked most of her chest less than three hours ago, and now Kalve is right there, laying into her like a heavy bag. The final punch knocks her off her feet; she flies a short distance, and lands with another unpleasant thump. The taste of copper rises in the back of her throat.
--It is a potential weak point to be exploited, should the wrong people discover what it means to you.--
Ida watches as Kalve, her friend, does exactly that. She can't even cry out. She braces a hand on the ground, shoves herself upright, even as everything in her chest screams in protest. She spits blood onto the cobblestones.
Truth is, well. I hope I never have to shoot someone!
Ida reaches around to the small of her back. Kalve knows what this means. The hand comes up again, holding a heavy pistol with a barrel made of Demon-bone.
No responsibility that has been taken lightly has ever been spoken of like that. You know what you want to do, and the path you want to walk, I think, and for that, you have my respect.
Ida aims at her friend's center-mass. The Dragon-breath igniter takes an agonizingly long time to prime, even if it's only a heartbeat's worth of time.
I hope it never comes to that.
Ida does not look away. Devil's Due fires, sending an almost white-hot slug downrange at the Metal Demon, trailing smoke the color of quicksilver. More mercury-colored smoke forms a mandala at Ida's feet, drifting upward in plumes.
It takes everything she has not to just collapse after that shot.
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Kalve with Devil's Draw! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes 7 damage from Poison! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Kalve critically Guards a hit from Emma Hetfield's Download for 15 hit points! GS: Emma Hetfield drains Kalve! Emma Hetfield gains 14 temporary hit points! GS: Kalve takes a solid hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's Devil's Draw for 155 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
Why is the giant four-armed caped bug monster Demon talking about... advancement, development, learning, wasting opportunities? Is it really that offended that the prey before it can't fight back as well as they could?
And what's the deal with ARM bonding? I mean sure some weapons can have symbolic value but bonding? They're just weapons!
Rose has many questions.
Kalve answers them not with words, seeing as how she never asks them, but with terrible lightning. The blast arcs through Rose, predictably a painful experience that sends her flying back and smashing into the ground with zero grace or style. She whimpers and mutters, brought back to reality by the shouts of a certain pirate. She feels conflicted, but admittedly, good orders aren't worth disregarding on the basis of who gave them.
"I feel terrible, I want to go home," she manages.
She never got anywhere whining about pain though, so why started now. She grabs her knives, gets back onto her feet. Shakes her head, hypes herself. If that... THING, Demon, bug, whatever, wants to see advancement, she'll give him advancement. Also someone brought a giant robot, that's... probably good news? Rose has never seen a Gear in action before. She's seen them, heard of them, but never caught one in battle. It's impressive for sure. It brings some confidence back.
Flames erupt from the merchant's feet. She runs towards Kalve, the flames spreading up her legs. More burst out around her knives, too. She leaps, to feet the much taller bug face to face as soon as an opening presents itself.
"Bond with THIS! Rising Phoenix!"
Rose fiery dropkicks Kalve. IN THE FACE probably not the face, guy is fast, but she's TRYING, it's the thought that counts. She slices with her knives in passing too, but the real danger's the flames, not the blades.
GS: Rose has attacked Kalve with Rising Phoenix! GS: Rose has completed her action.
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
Some kind of giant...metal monstrosity explodes from the building, and there's a look of something between panic and excitement on Layna's face.
"How...? What...? What in the world is that!? Is that one of them!? Do they get that big!?" She asks, looking towards some of the more intelligent members of the team...namely, Ida and Emma, who she expected to at least know something about this...thing. On one hand - she really wanted to punch it. On the other, it was huge, and so were its weapons.
Layna is new to Filgaia, and while she's learned of ARMs, Gears are still a foreign concept to her.
While she is distracted by the sight of Morgan's Gear, the creature is undergoing another strange transformation.
Layna is learning today that there are still many things she does not know about Filgaia, and this point is driven painfully home by the creature's next attack. She attempts to dive out of the way, but she is wholly unaware of the nature attack and is buffeted before being sent painfully to the ground.
"Well, that's certainly something..." She mutters, hauling herself to her feet.
By the time this was all over, she'd...probably have to consign this coat to the depths. This one's...getting to be all torn and bloody. Well, there was no time to be dwelling on that. Her allies were starting to look a bit battered, it was time to rile them up.
"Keep at it, me hearties! Don't let it distract you! Keep firing! We've got more important things to worry about, aye!? So let's finish this quickly!" She shouts.
GS: Kalve critically Guards a hit from Rose's Rising Phoenix for 26 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
In the cockpit of his Gear, Morgan grits his teath. He didn't have time to get into his pilot suit. He didn't even have time to get into a decent helment. All he had time to do is punch his Gear up to full operation in a fraction of the time that he should have. Warning shrill at him from multiple directions. Temp gages spike as he forces the machine into action. "Yeah yeah," The fox drawls to the warnings as he slams the flips switches to silence the warnings.
The gages throw a sickly green light across him as his eyes fly across the controls. Targets paint themselves on the primitive HUD as he pushes the machine on. Ponderous steps thunder as the Gear advances, the werehouse collapses in its wake as Morgan pushes it forwards. Then the lightning flies from the Demon. The twin tounges of energy rip into the shield that he holds. Systems read damage and there is a dispationate nod to the power of the creature as he grabs hold of the firing controls.
The reticle swims across the screen, matching up with the Demon things center of mass just as it...
It moves. Blades snicker snack and Gwen falls in two pieces. Ida is pummeled nearly into her component parts. Its almost too fast to follow.
Almost.
"GODDAMIT GWEN YOU SAID YOU WOULD BE FINE!" He roars as instinct takes over. The Gear drops to one knee, is Morgan going to change again. Snap out of the cockpit to take his anger out on the thing with his fists. Rush over to his friends to try to scoop them away from the danger.
"Ida. Stay low." This growl comes from the speakers of the war machine as what looked for a moment like a exaust pipe on the back of the machine suddenly rotates down.
Its not a exaust port.
Its a canon.
The report of a trio of anti-vehicle rounds fireing causes windows to shatter. The rounds firing almost in the same breath as the rip downrange, the timing near perfect to weave in-between those in hand-to-hand with the thing. Ment to tear into the center of mass of its target. Knock it back and away from Gwen and the others.
And hurt.
Morgan does want it to hurt.
GS: Morgan Newkirk has attacked Kalve with Deadeye! GS: Morgan Newkirk has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
That voice. It's familiar. Gwen gasps. "H-hey, Kalve? Is that you?" Why is that Kalve's voice? Maybe she was mistaken? It's still distorted.
Her confusion gives way to fear as her right arm is extended. She struggles, her left hand and feet scraping against the ground. "Kalve!" Gwen looks up, her face openly pleading with the man she only knew as Zed's friend. "It's me, Gwen! You helped me, remember? Please, please, PLEASE don't-"
--It is a potential weak point to be exploited--
Her words are cut short as she's stunned. Maybe, it's a blessing in disguise, as she doesn't feel it when he-
---should the wrong people discover what it means to you--
-cuts.
The ARM falls limp as a specific connection is cut with Kalve's expert technique. Blue-grey eyes widen as a numbness travels from the place where her slacken, disconnected arm used to be. The other part of her ARM, held deep within her chest, struggles to connect to its other half.
Gwen falls, curling instinctively into a fetal position. At first, the pained gasping from the balled up courier could be mistaken for the trauma, but her left hand is clutching at her chest, her mouth open and struggling for air. She's breathing, her chest is falling up and down, but something's not happening, whether due to pain or something else.
GS: Gwen Whitlock takes a solid hit from Layna Manydays's Captain's Orders! for 0 hit points! GS: Reload! Gwen Whitlock gains 15 extra FP from Layna Manydays! GS: Gwen Whitlock has attacked Emma Hetfield with Need a Hand! GS: Gwen Whitlock takes 10 damage from Poison! GS: Gwen Whitlock has completed her action. GS: Emma Hetfield takes a solid hit from Gwen Whitlock's Need a Hand for 0 hit points! GS: Reload! Emma Hetfield gains 15 extra FP from Gwen Whitlock! GS: Kalve guards a hit from Morgan Newkirk's Deadeye for 58 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.
The download takes perhaps seconds longer than it ought to. Attempting to take stock of what Kalve is and what he's armed with and condense it to a single usable fragment... it's a difficult task, no matter the system you use to do it. It's trying to make a copy of a thing that makes copies. Narrowing down the result takes nerve-wracking seconds.
One of Kalve's eyes locks on the pane of green glass. There's a noise that comes from him. It sounds an awful lot like an interested, 'hmmm.' His injured form slowly knits itself back into some semblance of solidity, of being whole again. The horrific bleeding stopped almost immediately; the wound itself is covered by a shell of rapidly-solidifying metal, like a self-made bandage.
In those seconds, Rose leaps across the battlefield like a goddamn gorilla. A flaming, knife-wielding gor-okay it doesn't quite track. She connects with something solid, though. There's a flash of fire, a blaze of heat and light. Her knives meet metal and find some give to it.
When the smoke clears, she finds herself practically hanging in mid-air with her foot planted on one of Kalve's outstretched hands. The left of his two primary hands has caught her foot in the black-armored gauntlet; the four manipulators are crossed above and below him. His cloak is blackened at the edges, burned rapidly towards a state of rags. Two of his three eyes are locked on her, red orbs glowing malevolently.
"Your style lacks substance," the Demon says, and promptly moves hit her with a fist that does a passable impression of a freight train.
Kalve breaks off from Rose's assault. One of his hands glows yellow, the swarm of metallic dust swirling upwards again. It turns into a revolver Ida should be familiar with -- she shot Kalve with it moments ago. Kalve fires on Emma as he moves towards the Gear, apparently choosing to engage it properly. The gunsmoke weapon is mercifully familiar and thus potentially predictable, but unfortunately, it's still firing bullets from a gun. His other hand generates metal spikes, and his manipulators whip them like knives towards the shouting captain across the field, eyes tracking both targets simultaneously.
"I wish to understand," he begins, and is promptly cut off by an anti-tank gun going off in his general direction. Kalve throws up his arms, the screen of dust appearing. The rounds pass into it and slow, hitting him with greatly reduced force. His body jerks and twists with each successive hit, holes punched in the screen, the metal shell, and his armor. He bleeds quicksilver, but never much. It always stops far, far too soon. His pace slows, but only slightly. He's stopped shooting at the Gear.
He gets in close. The Demon leaps forward, throwing his weight into the war machine. He tries to duck in behind the shield, attacking it with his manipulator to shove it aside. The dust gathers, and an enormous maul manifests in his hands.
In his six hands.
Kalve swings the thing with a worrying sort of ponderousness. There's an explosion from an aperture on the back of it that propels it forward, the gigantic hammer suddenly rocketed into the side of the Gear with enough force to crumple armor and crush something terribly vital. No matter what it hits, the noise is going to be awful.
He kicks off the ground and flits backwards, moving with agility that he should be too large to manage. He gets two long strides back from the Gear and half-turns -- and then gets pitched over by the shell from the Demon-bone ARM, his body crumpling as he's hit center mass. Something vital was struck, Kalve thinks with some alarm. He drops onto his side, and rolls to his knees. His head splits with something like a mouth, and he retches quicksilver blood.
"Ah," he says.
Kalve pulls himself back to his feet. He sees his handiwork with Gwen has done its job -- exactly like he said someone could. He sees the state he's left Ida in. He remembers his fight with the spear-wielding human in the field of flowers. You don't leave wounded animals.
<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.
Kalve, in a move very unlike one of the other Demon invaders... hesitates.
"I am Kalve of the Method," he announces in that alien, reverbrating voice, "Demon of Hyades. I fight for my people. Continued resistance is pointless. Flee with your lives, while you can."
This is the point where he stops trying to actively kill everyone. There's a momentary lull. The odds of it getting filled with gunfire and yelling in about three seconds are very high.
GS: Kalve has activated a Force Action! GS: Kalve has attacked Rose with Method Mercury! GS: Kalve has attacked Morgan Newkirk with Fulcrum Crusher! GS: Kalve has attacked Layna Manydays with Liquid Metal! GS: Kalve has attacked Emma Hetfield with Silhouette Tracer! GS: Kalve has completed his action. GS: CRITICAL! Layna Manydays takes a solid hit from Kalve's Liquid Metal for 124 hit points! GS: Kalve takes Cover! He gains 50 temporary hit points! GS: Morgan Newkirk takes a solid hit from Kalve's Fulcrum Crusher for 109 hit points! GS: Shieldbreak! Statuses applied to Morgan Newkirk! GS: Rose takes a solid hit from Kalve's Method Mercury for 149 hit points! GS: Poison and Disease! Statuses applied to Rose! GS: Emma Hetfield takes a glancing hit from Kalve's Silhouette Tracer for 41 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Gwen's pleas echo in Ida's mind long after they fade from her ears. Was this--was this what he was all along? Just a monster wearing a human face, lulling her into a false sense of security by pretending to be a foreigner? She should've known better the instant he mentioned he was from Arctica, no one's gone there and lived to return for years now.
Now, Ida is fairly sure she knows why.
Ida lets out a pained breath, and spits more blood onto the cobblestones, watching as Kalve just...
Merciful Granas, Ida thinks, as he straight-up attacks the Gear in melee, just like Zed did. He lands again. Ida looks at him, blood spotting her lips and chin. If Kalve has picked up one thing from his interactions with Ida, it's that she presents one hell of a public face, always calm, collected, and polite. Even when he saw her running on empty after her confrontations with K.K. and Agatha, she at least had the vague impression of control. That is gone now.
"LIAR!" Ida screams. It is the most eloquent response she can muster to his identification. "This--all of this--!" She trusted him. She let him in. And now this. Now, all of this. Kalve has neatly destroyed the delicate balance of adrenaline and focus that Five Precepts Chained Demon relies upon. Devil's Due might as well be a lead weight in her hand now.
Ida saw Kalve swatting Rose out of the air. She saw him just kind of manifest an oversized hammer, just for Morgan's Gear. None of that registers. Adrenaline takes over.
The naturalist charges, her aching, broken ribs reminding her of their status with each breath. Her shoulder joins in after the fifth step. After the tenth step, Ida drops Devil's Due, lets her mother's weapon clatter to the cobblestones. She keeps her gaze focused on Kalve's, her eyes alight with fury and desperation and grief. After the eleventh step, Ida leaps. She manages to clear a good bit of ground, perhaps owing to work with Claude. She pulls back a fist, and drives it at Kalve's face.
GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has attacked Kalve with This Is Definitely A Bad Idea! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has been weakened by Disease! They take 0 hit points of damage, and burn off their temporary hit points! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey takes 8 damage from Poison! GS: Ida Everstead-Rey has completed her action. GS: CRITICAL! Kalve takes a solid hit from Ida Everstead-Rey's This Is Definitely A Bad Idea for 115 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Rose has posed.
If Kalve's words ring heavy, the punch he delivers does even moreso. The ease with which he deals with her alone staggers Rose, and it's then it becomes oh-so-clear that she's outmatched here. Crates can only do so much to break her fall this time. It's perhaps pure luck that she doesn't break anything, but the same can't be said for her spirit and health. Coughing from the sudden infliction, barely able to stand, the merchant feels sick, in no state to fight.
And that's not even accounting for the pain she feels all across her face due to the fist itself. Is THAT why everyone is so afraid of Metal Demons? This is nothing like the smaller ones roaming the streets. This guy is... even that Gear is struggling?
"I'm-- I'm pulling out, if I take another step I'll just fall over," she says, maybe just to herself, seeing as how Ida is... charging right in. Rose doesn't have that energy anymore.
And there's still so much to do around the city.
Can the human body build an immunity to healing potions and Heal Berries? Let's hope not, she's about to need a lot.
Either way: watch as Rose cleverly flees behind cover. And never comes out. She's not behind that cover anymore next time someone takes a look!
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
Layna was far too used to fighting human opponents. The creature - calling himself Kalve - was able to shift and transform in ways she didn't expect. She thought she had managed to dodge it but it comes around again, slicing her viciously across the back and leaving a red stain going up. The pain is excruciating and forces her to her knees, but right now, that's not the thing that concerns her.
The demon's assault has been halted - for now. He gives them a warning. A warning to run. This infuriates Layna, but right now, there's a bigger issue at hand. One of their number has fallen, curled up on the ground.
She takes advantage of the momentary ceasefire to rush over towards her, kneeling by her side.
"Lass!? Speak to me, lass!" Layna shouts. She has...no idea what's happening to her, and she's concerned.
While she's keeping an eye on the course of the battle - and notes with some satisfaction Ida delivering a punch towards Kalve's face - right now her main concern is Gwen. She wouldn't put it past the demon to attack a downed opponent. Looks like she'd have cover her for now.
GS: Layna Manydays has attacked Layna Manydays with Batten Down the Hatches! GS: Layna Manydays has completed her action. GS: Layna Manydays heals Layna Manydays! She gains 100 temporary hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"Oh great. It has a hammer."
Morgan can see it coming for him, and he knows its going to hurt. The Gear is already moving with the blow as it connects. Warnings suddenly shriek in his ears as half his board turns red. The Gear staggers to the side, armor crumples under the attack and for a moment it seems like it will fall.
Then Morgan shows that he is actually that good a pilot.
"Darlin!" The words booming towards Layna. "Get her arm! She's goin into feedback shock! See if it'll reattach!" He calls as his hands fly over the controls. His ruined shield is discarded as he bypasses a half-dozen systems in the blink of an eye. The pannel of gages in the cockpit turning green once again as the massive defense system crashes to the ground.
Free of that piece, the Gear seems to move more swiftly. One foot digs into the ground, shattering the corner of a building and it propels itself forwards.
"IDA! DOWN!" The words boom out just after he sees the womans fist connect with the things face.
The reason is obvious a split second later.
He closes to short range, one hand reaching to towards Kalve to yank several of his arms at once if he can get them.
The opposte hand forms its fingers into a knifehand that he drives into the Demon's chest with all the power of the machine behind it.
With the arm burried into the target that gattling on its wrist it triggered, armor piercing rounds hammering into the Demon even as Morgan rips his hand free to fling Kalve away from those wounded.
Someone went and made the fox turn vicious.
GS: Morgan Newkirk used Mystic on Morgan Newkirk! 200 Temporary HP gained! All statuses cleared! GS: Morgan Newkirk has activated a Force Action! GS: Morgan Newkirk has attacked Kalve with Laughing Fox! GS: Morgan Newkirk has completed his action. GS: Kalve has activated a Force Action! GS: Kalve critically Guards a hit from Morgan Newkirk's Laughing Fox for 37 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Emma Hetfield has posed.
Emma sees Kalve look at her. See? Wisdom. She throws herself down when he aims a gun and whips things around, though she answers in a sort of conversational shout. "Well," she points out, "you're in the midst of an invasion and I'm not sure this is the best situation for this discussion. Unless you're suggesting that love -"
Other problems burst out. Dear Sophia, Emma thinks with casual heresy, how many of these limbs does he have? Her eyes cut down to the Emulator's screen, but it presents no clear answers. There seem to be possibilities, but - hm.
He's actually suffering for reasons other than sheer explosive force. Interesting, Emma thinks.
Rolling to the side and wincing as her own wounds complain, she concludes her thought in reply to Kalve. "I'd say it's a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Kalve, but given the circumstances I would be lying. Nonetheless I'm going to take you up on your offer."
And that's when Emma vaults over towards the fallen Gwen! "What a disarming young lady," she says, which is incredibly wretched taste. Alertly, she sees the severed ARM nearby, and steps over Gwen's corpse to get near Layna and grasp the limb.
"If this was integrated in her body, she's likely in - oh?!" And the shoulder-wards part of the limb snaps forwards as if attracted by magnets. "It snapped forwards," Emma says, "as if attracted by magnets."
And then perhaps Emma proves herself to be something less than a goofball sniper because she rolls Gwen forwards, stepping over her again and kneeling down. After a little contortion she manages to roll Gwen forwards enough to get a shoulder under her...
"Hngh... don't worry," Emma says, and her affect is curiously flat despite what she says next. "I'll take - care of you -"
And so she ends up standing upright, if in something of a horse-stance, which doesn't work that great with her dress. "Captain," she says to Layna, before she starts to walk off. Other than having apparently shoved the Emulator into a hip pocket, she has foregone loot.
"If you can talk please reply to my entertaining banter," Emma says as she keeps going. Then, interleaved with grunts and an occasional stifled groan, she becomes the perky figure of before. "You'll have to tell me - where you got this. I've seen - prosthetics coming out of Guild Galad, but - this is certainly something else. You're lucky - it fits!"
<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.
The Emulator has trouble distinguishing the presence of another ARM from Kalve's actual, well, arms. Is there a limit to how many he has? Is there a limit to what he can do with them? There must be. The answer, however, is not immediately apparent.
True to his rather pointed suggestion, Kalve lets the retreating Drifters flee. He doesn't hunt them through the streets. There are other Demons who would rather have that duty. Kalve has other tasks in mind, and they do not involve wasting his time chasing the wounded.
Or, more relevantly, the people he had started to take a liking to.
Kalve's body looks like it's healing, but that's merely a surface-level phenomenon. He doesn't seem to be actively regenerating so much as shifting things around to cover his weaknesses. The damage is starting to take its toll, though. He won't be able to keep up this pace forever. With their diminished numbers, however...
Ida loses her cool entirely. Kalve doesn't attack her on her way up to him. One of his eyes is focused on Gwen; another is on the Gear, never leaving it. Ida drops Devil's Due. His third eye finds it, and then her -- and then she connects, twisting his head to the side and forcing him back a step from the force of the impact. With her bad arm, no less.
Kalve takes a step backwards. He has things to say to Ida -- an explanation of what he's done, and why he's done it, reasons for this whole debacle, an argument to make towards the fight being necessary -- but he doesn't end up managing to say any of it. The briefly-formed mouth vanishes. His weapons are gone, too. The Gear --
The Gear grabs him. Kalve gets hauled upwards by the huge machine, another giant hand rammed into his midsection. Two of his manipulators are in the machine's grip. He swings himself to the side as it starts to fire, shifting his body, the screen of metallic particles appearing again. Heavy caliber rounds start to come apart in mid-air... but not all of them. Half a dozen punch holes clear through his midsection, through his side, leaving holes in solid metal.
Solid metal. No internals to be seen. No blood, either.
Kalve's body shifts like water. His other, free manipulators lash out and take hold of the Gear's wrist when it starts to get flung away. The enormous holes seal near the center of his body, leaving holes like swiss cheese that don't seem to bother him at all. His whole body whips around until he's clinging to the arm, scuttling across it like a giant mechanical arachnid.
"The design is interesting," Kalve says, "but inefficient. Your drive system was flawed by adopting a purely humanoid design. Were you aware of the gap in your arc of fire?" He practically flings himself over the shoulder, ending up on top of it, behind it. "I recommend a change in chassis. Allow me to assist you in making the necessary alterations."
Kalve's primary hands grip armor plating. His lets twist around, knees bending the wrong way, talons biting into metal. His manipulators draw back, the three-pronged claws reconfiguring into... tools. Cutting tools, with bright motes of light at their tips. A heat-edged saw. Sharp-toothed graspers for tearing into delicate internals.
Kalve promptly goes to work turning the Gear's insides into outsides.
GS: Kalve has attacked Kalve with Fifth State! GS: Kalve takes a solid hit from Kalve's Fifth State for 0 hit points! GS: Lock and State! Statuses applied to Kalve! GS: Kalve has activated a Force Action! GS: Kalve has attacked Morgan Newkirk with Method II - Force As Instruction! GS: Kalve has completed his action.
<Pose Tracker> Gwen Whitlock has posed.
When Gwen is looked more closely by Layna, the developing blue tint in her lips and accelerated breathing become more obvious. Shock, most definitely. The woman is greeted by Gwen's left hand, which clings to the closest of Layna's own arms with the grip of someone struggling to keep from drowning. Gwen's eyes settle on hers before she relaxes, her gaze distant.
Indeed, Emma will notice, before the ARM reconnects, that there was a reason why there wasn't a massive amount of blood from the cut. There's metal leading into Gwen's body, surrounded by the foundation of the ARM, as well as bleeding tissue. It's that which readily responds to Emma placing the physical arm next to it, with a weak but noticeable pull. As soon as it reconnects, Gwen's expression relaxes further, and her breath stabilizes.
Her heart begins to pump normally, speeding up to match the demands of her body.
Even still, the ARM will need further repair. Kalve's cuts were specific in their damage, and while the ARM was quick to repair the most vital connections, the arm still hangs limp from Gwen's side, though Gwen seems responsive enough already to not hamper Emma's efforts to lift her up. "Em...m. Mm." She's conscious enough to respond, at least. "Mme."
GS: Morgan Newkirk guards a hit from Kalve's Method II - Force As Instruction for 79 hit points!
<Pose Tracker> Emma Hetfield has posed.
"Oh, good," Emma says.
Then she keeps talking. The conversation is entirely on irrelevancies; cloud formation and the natural history of some river fish that apparently care for their young a little. Emma does not flag. It is not difficult content. It only stops when they get somewhere with a table and lights suitable for further repair.
Maybe there's something to this, but Gwen probably has other things on her mind right now.
<Pose Tracker> Layna Manydays has posed.
"Her arm?" Layna repeats, glancing towards Morgan and his gear. She looks back towards Gwen and her arm. She sees it, but...what was she supposed to do with it? This technology was far beyond her. Asking her to reattach it would be like asking her to prepare a cure for an incurable disease.
"Lass...you'll be alright, lass...just...just hold on, aye? That's an order." She urges, reaching for the hand that is grabbing onto her. She holds it tightly, meeting Gwen's eyes.
There is, for a moment, hopelessness on Layna's face. She sees an ally on the ground, but she can do nothing to help her. For someone whose crew was always her foremost concern, this was one of her greatest fears.
Fortunately, someone more knowledgeable appears, and Layna moves aside so that Emma can take her into her care.
"Ida! We're pulling the lass out! You'd best be considering the same!" She shouts with an unfamiliar wavering in her voice, looking in Ida's direction.
Emma might need someone to cover for her. A lone human carrying another wounded one would be a prime target for the enemy. Besides, she was too wounded to be of too much help here - and this Kalve seemed almost engineered to negate anything she could throw at him.
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
Well. That wasn't as effective as he hoped.
Morgan's eyes widen as he notes the distinct lack of damage done to the Demon. "What the hell are you," He breathes in the interior of his cockpit before the thing is climbing all over him again. "Well," He shouts back. "Design wasn't my first choice. And I know thar are blind spots!" He replies even as he sees the damage tearing though the bypasses he made in the system a moment ago. Things are holding, but they won't hold for that long in the grand scheme of a fight.
"Thats why I can do this," He adds as he slams a series of commands into the console.
Commands that vent molten hot cooling waste onto the Demon clinging to his back.
"Ida! Get out of here! Gwen will need you!" He shouts over the speakers as he spins to face the Demon again, the Gear moving with suprising agility as the pilot manipulates the controls like the master he is. He might be outclassed, but he doesn't seem to intend to give up yet.
"Come on Bug. Lets see what ya got." He growls before he flips on the speakers again. "And someone owes me a goddamn drink after this!"
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
There's a bit more give, this time. She managed to turn Berserk's head maybe a few inches in one direction, knock him around just a tiny bit. Perhaps it's the damage, perhaps it's the fact that Kalve is no Quarter Knight, perhaps it's just rage--but Ida feels Kalve budge a bit more. It's still hitting something much denser than a human face, even if there's a sort of vague fleshiness to it. Little spikes of pain shoot through her striking hand like a chain of fireworks. Broken bones.
Morgan yells at Ida to get down. She does so, sort of, in that she essentially falls out of the air, landing on the broken stone with an impact that jars her hips and knees. Dirt flies up behind her feet. Blood trickles down her lips.
I hope it never comes to that.
Ida's battered, bleeding, broken body finally gives out. Without another word, she collapses to the flagstones, as if whatever was animating her suddenly up and left.
<Pose Tracker> Kalve has posed.
Kalve sees Ida finally drop out of one eye. He tenses somewhat. He's not quite certain why.
Waste heat and molten scrap vents out the back of the Gear. Kalve gets forced off of it by the sheer force of the expulsion, knocked back to the ground by it. He ends up covered in red-hot waste metal, plastered to the ground by the mass. Searing pain shoots through his body. His eyes flare frightfully bright, and his manipulators shift tools again, dousing the material to cool it to a less agonizing extent.
The extra arms peel it off of him. He pulls himself up. Kalve gathers it up, rapidly working the hot waste with scrap from the ground around him. It turns into something like a spear in the shape of a crucifix. A big one. "Clever. Interesting tactical choice. However --"
The Demon advances. He moves two steps forward and then leaps straight in, darting around the crushed side of the Gear. He expects it to twist around to follow him. His whole body shifts, and he swings his upper body like a partly liquid slingshot bullet in the other direction, catapulting himself the other way before the actuators in the Gear can actually respond fast enough to track him.
Kalve slams the spike through the Gear's knee. It passes through armor like a hot knife through butter, and continues on into the ground. It punches into the foundation of a building and gets jammed there. It's sunken in to the cross of the crucifix. Kalve presses forward on either side with his extra arms, bending it into a hook to catch the leg.
"-- I can no longer allow your machine to threaten our mission."
The Demon manifests a two-handed cannon with a box-like bin attached. The barrel is red hot. He circles the machine, identifying weapons and firing hot spikes into the ammunition magazines in a serious effort to cook off the contents. He gets around behind it and spikes the opposite leg's knee from the back, and then discards the weapon, casting aside a handful of metallic sand that vanishes before it can scatter across the earth. He jumps upwards, towards the vents where the hot waste came from.
Kalve latches on again. His primary hands are encased in armor and transformed into terrible claws, a high-pitched keening sound emitting from his fingers. They become things that take chunks of armor off like he was scooping up soil with a backhoe. He hips his way into the core of the Gear in three wide swipes, finding the source of the machine's power.
For a second, it sounds like he's just... stopped. There's a little scratching sound...
Then, every alarm in the Gear goes off all at once. 'DAMAGE CRITICAL.' 'CATASTROPHIC EQUIPMENT FAILURE IMMINENT.' 'EVACUATE IMMEDIATELY.'
Kalve isn't sure if the explosion will disable it or entirely core it. He expects he'll find out momentarily... from the far side of the demonstration area, where he's taken Ida, held carefully by the mass of metallic arms.
<Pose Tracker> Ida Everstead-Rey has posed.
Ida tries to get up.
She can hear the sounds of metal being stressed beyond its breaking point--horrific groans and screams that always herald the imminent failure of something structural, something important. She coughs again, violently, and manages to push up onto one arm and hold herself there. She hears some sort of distant noise, a howling, oddly mechanical.
Something seizes her, something cold and metal. Part of her desperately hopes it's Morgan's Gear, but something tells her that's no longer in play. She looks up. Her mouth moves. She looks like hell, to put it mildly.
She opens her eyes, and looks into that alien face, and can say nothing. She looks like she's waiting for the other shoe to drop.