2017-08-25: Fly Or Die
- Log: <Your log's title.>
- Cast: Kent Hauch, Morgan Newkirk, Jude Moshe, Cassidy Cain
- Where: Outside of the Guardian Temple, near the Great Aveh Desert
- Date: August 25, 2017
- Summary: Takes place immediately after All They've Got. While they managed to escape the Guardian Temple, the foursome of Kent Hauch, Morgan Newkirk, Jude Moshe and Cassidy Cain find that their troubles are far from over when they find a three-way brawl between the Metal Demons, Kislev and Aveh waiting for them outside.
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
By the time our " heroes " (quotes bolded to indicate just how many grains of salt you should be taking alongside that claim) manage to filter their way out of the Guardian Temple in varying states of irritation, apathy, or ominous motivation, things outside have...
...escalated.
It is an outright nightmare hellscape. Heavy weapons are being set off, gunfire and arcane artillery hisses through the air, there are Gears and at least one Golem around, and somewhere an edgy protagonist is shrieking into the sky as they come into their world destroying power.
More pressingly, there is a Kislevi unit pointing weapons and hollering directly to the east. Filled with a grim kind of energy after claiming his Medium, Kent Hauch had alternately stomped and melted his way out of the temple ahead of the other three. They exit to find Kent standing behind a chest-high wall of tephra, pointing Red River over it at the soldiers, hollering right back at them, because he is famously incapable of ever not escalating a situation. He's being extremely loud, slamming the grip of his gun into the cooled rock, making sure everyone's attention is on him.
...and not on the wagons directly behind them.
Several wagons are bearing down behind the soldiers, the teams of horses laboring with the assistance of some Badlands-style gearworks to haul the scrap-metal armored carriages, the signature rides of the Black Ties. A wiry man swings out of the back of the largest lead carriage, surprisingly spry for his apparent age, with two bottles in one hand and a Crest pinched between his fingers.
Samuelh the Molotov lands on a flat panel, squints with one eye, and snaps his arm out. The bottles fly straight out at the soldiers and ricochet off of their heads a few times, striking several of them and causing general chaos as the most rumpled of the Black Tie Suits grins with gravestone teeth and holds up his Crest.
The Ignition Tipple explodes with two violent blue-green flashes, the same chemical fire Kent used a few times in the temple, the flames not lasting long enough to impede the horses as they race by.
"THASSA GOOD MAN!" Kent shouts, reaching past, hooking one hand onto the slowing - but definitely not stopping - carriage, swinging up onto some precarious footholds. "GRAB ON OR NOT," he yells at the others. "NO SWEAT OFF MY HEAD, INNIT?"
DG: A party led by Kent Hauch is now entering The Battle Front.
DG: Party formation is now over. An Entry Challenge will now be drawn and displayed to the party.
<CARD>
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++<* The Battle Front *>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++++++++<* CHALLENGE - Artillery Bombardment *>+++++++++++++++++++++
|Type: Entry |Dungeon Ability: Agility |Challenge Rating: 3 |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++--< Challenge Information: >+++++++++++++++++++++++++--
The vicinity of the Guardian Temple has turned into a full-blown war zone. A
rush of Kislevi forces and a counter-action by Aveh forces have resulted in
an enormous fight between infantry, Gears, and support vehicles. In the
distance, you can make out where the enormous Kislevi-controlled Golem is
sending huge gouts of energy into the ranks of Aveh's forces. This is truly
worrisome, but a more immediate concern presents itself.
One side has chosen this moment to begin an artillery bombardment. Shells
rain down near your position, huge fireballs and blasts of shrapnel hurtling
at you, posing a severe threat as you try to make your way westward.
+Dungeon Conditions: Slow, Suffer+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"If I have anythin' ta say about Kent there," Morgan drawls as he notes the path of destruction laid out before the rest of the...totally kinda not heroes at all. "He's at least enthuastic."
Which is good, becuase it means Morgan doesn't have to do a lot more work. He can just coast along. Feeling confused about the fact that the Guardians just yelled at them and gave them a bunch of damn rocks.
As they get closer to the entrence though a com-system at this throat buzzes to life.
'Boss!' The words transmited from somewhere outside. 'Hell you still alive? Answer me ya stupid fox!'
There is a smirk from Morgan as he kicks on his end of the microphone. "Yeah, I'm still alive you idgits. Where the hell are ya in this..." And at that moment he crests the raise to the hole Kent blew in the side of the temple to behold the pure mayhem that has become the norm around the Temple. "...hellfire..."
'That about sums it up, Boss. We're outside of the fightin, but Sharpes can still give ya some fire if'n ya need it. Just give the word.' The voice sounds relieved.
"Alright Brig. You just keep your head down fer now. I think..." He eyes the suddenly exploding mess of Kislievites and winces slightly. "...I got a ride." A shake of his head as he summons the power of his ARC and starts chasing the rushing wagon. The energy rope becoming an anchor for anyone else who might need it as the agile fox leaps for the second wagon. "Don't mind if I do!" He calls out as he hauls himself on top with a wicked grin.
Then comes the artillery.
"I think something got their attention!" He calls out as he grips one of the sides of the wagon to maintain his balance as Kent fights fire with...more fire.
"You know I was gonna ask just how much of these wagons are explosive, but I don't want to know." He says conversationally. "So insted I'll just go with thanks for the lift and drive faster!"
DG: Morgan Newkirk has used his Tool Force Lash toward his party's challenge, Artillery Bombardment.
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.
"Huh."
Jude Moshe stares up at artillery shells exploding in mid-air and a Golem rampaging amongst encroaching Kislevi forces currently shooting at Aveh's soldiers, currently being sandwiched by a horde of angry Metal Demons. He scratches his cheek.
"Guess our luck's taken a turn for the better."
And this is how the unfolding chaos opens up, with a cacophony of violence to cheerfully announce and celebrate the wayward explorers/criminals/thieves/trustworthy reporters' return from an impossible task by gifting them with hell on earth. Or, well, close to it.
Elru would probably have some objections to a claim like that.
All things considered, Jude takes it in remarkable stride as he pushes a hand through that unkempt, sweat and dirt-caked mop of hair. That calm, detached stare takes in the situation -- the location of the forces, just how far away the bulk of the fighting is, what direction it seems to be pushing towards, wheels turning quietly in his stare--
--just in time to see Kent brandishing his weapon, screaming, and helpfully distracting the nearby troops to let his wagon-driving friends make short work of them with an explosion of bubbling flame and accelerants. Jude's dark brows lift in tandem. He looks behind him, towards Cassidy and Morgan.
GRAB ON OR NOT, NO SWEAT OFF MY HEAD, INNIT?
"... Well, might as well go in style, right?"
And with that, he makes a break for it, leaping when he's near enough to close the rest of that distance and land upon the back of the wagon with a scramble to get himself more properly situated. His frock coat whipping in the wild lash of momentum-laced winds, the reporter squints against the broil of bluish-green flame, its roar practically deafened by the thunderclap of the bombardment beyond.
"IF ALL WE DO IS BLOW UP, I'LL CONSIDER THAT A WIN," he asides to Morgan. Conversationally loud. Of course.
DG: Jude Moshe has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Artillery Bombardment.
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"You're right," Morgan agrees at similar volume. "We could get set on fire and then blow up!"
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
From above, Samuelh croaks, "S'optimistic about the order, boy! Kyah hah hah!"
<Pose Tracker> Cassidy Cain has posed.
The first thing Cassidy tries to do upon reaching the light of day is escape east, except there's a giant gear in the distance doing quick work on the ground troops.
"What?"
She then tries to move north, only to stare when a cluster of sandships suddenly roar out from the other side of the dunes, artillery fire spraying out of every orifice available.
"What?!"
She tries to backtrack, but a large rock just slams down, blocking any ideas the party may have about going back in and just weathering the storm, the echoing sound of it ringing loudly in her ears.
"WHAT?!"
She is quickly running out of steam.
Her vision is faded in the edges and shapes that should have defined lines and concrete corners suddenly look like they're made out of cotton. Which is why she's tossing a jar of Heal Berry preserves that they have managed to find a cache of somewhere behind them on one hand, already having pried the cover open to take a look inside, absolute consternation on her features. And with good reason; the Temple was old, she doesn't know how long they've been in there, and there's absolutely no guarantee that ingesting some is actually going to make things better. For all she knows, it'll cause even more problems of the gastrointestinal kind and the last thing a getaway needs is a bathroom break.
She looks between the jar and the burgeoning warzone helplessly.
"Fook me, what else could go wrong today?!"
She just had to ask.
Digging her fingers into the jar, she shoves a glop of it in her mouth, reaching into Morgan's pockets to retrieve his flask and chasing it down with a swallow of fine whiskey. A little more than what she really needs to drown the pain, in fact she takes so many swallows that one couldn't be blamed if he thought she intends to kill herself with alcohol poisoning, but she finally puts the cap back on the flask and tosses it lightly the Beastman's way. Emerald eyes shot with gold whip sideways immediately at the incoming rush of a hellfire racket as other Black Ties come pouring into the battlefront, bottles of fire rocketing towards those who might try to get too close.
One of Samuelh's projectiles ignites, tossing a hapless soldier in the air, ARMs and weapons spilling forth. A hand turns upwards to catch a thrown bandolier of grenades, blinking down at it. She looks up at the heavens.
"Apology accepted," she tells whatever cosmic fortune deities are listening, slinging it along her shoulder and taking on a dead run once the lead carriage starts swinging past. In time with the rest, she takes a flying leap, one set of fingers clutching at one of the handholds of the vehicle as wheels make tracks on the sand in breakneck pace.
"Dinnae mind if I do, luv!" she throws back at Kent, peering around the side of the carriage. Morgan's transmissions earn him a furrow of her brow. "The bloody hell?! Did you say Brig?!"
KABOOOM! An explosion rocks uncomfortably close to where they are.
"Dinnae tell me you brought Brig! He's half blind! At least tell me you dinnae give him a HUGE GUN! So we're going tae get blown up, set on fire, and then shot, probably by our own guys!"
DG: Cassidy Cain has contributed a Agility Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Artillery Bombardment.
G: The party led by Kent Hauch has failed this challenge! The party gained 10 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw.
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"Look Brig was the best sniper I knew before you pulled the 'you'll put your eye out' gag on him! I don't even know how you put his eye out! He still won't tell me!" Morgan shouts over the roar of explosions. "But I didn't give him a huge fookin' gun! Sharpe has the huge gun!" A beatpause. "Brig's the spotter!" A longer pause. "HE STILL HAS ONE GOOD EYE DON'T LOOK AT ME LIKE THAT!"
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
So things don't go great.
Kent shouts in wordless warrior exultation as the fireball's heat completely loses out to the Core Bullet, warping in on itself and exploding outward. The shout shrivels in his throat as, behind the fireball, there is a huge, studded anti-personnel shrapnel shell.
He purses his lips as the Core Bullet also punches into that, detonating it in midair. Kent thinks about the price of altruism as he considers how much faster the wagon would be if it hadn't slowed down to pick up the other nerds.
"IN! IN! IN!" he yells, diving behind the seats into the wagon proper, which has very little in the name of amenities - a few benches, a couple Jackets, and the four Suits of the Black Ties: Ribaldy hunched in one corner, stress-eating a thick summer sausage; Samuelh flipping back in and landing in a crouch; Parbody with gas mask, crossed legs, and a ledger in her hands as though this were any other trip...
...and Fargo Foobach, pushing aside the cloth on the back of the carriage to pull the others in. His white bowler hat is obscuring the top half of his face, but he is unmistakeable.
The shrapnel bomb rattles the wagon violently, punching a few holes in the scrap. A shard skins Samuelh in the thigh, but he's too drunk to notice. Parbody calmly shifts her head to the side and allows one to whiz past. Kent eats two to his forearm but they don't get very far through his muscles.
The driver, unfortunately, was too busy wrangling the spooked horses to take cover. The jacket lets out a high-pitched scream as he's punched through the neck and body and topples out of his seat, the wagon bumping with something too grim to consider.
"Ribaldy," Kent growls, pulling a spike out of his arm. "Drive."
<CARD>
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++<* The Battle Front *>++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++++++++++<* CHALLENGE - Pre-Graverobbers *>++++++++++++++++++++++
|Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 1 |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++-< Challenge Information: >+++++++++++++++++++++++++-
Some bandits do not wait for the battle to be over, before they begin the
grisly business of looting the dead. As you move to the edge of the fight,
you find a group of bandits that are not waiting long at all. Clad in heavy
desert garments, toting Gunsmoke ARMs, they see you -- and drop bloodied
bags of loot, before lifting their guns and opening fire.
+Dungeon Conditions: Bad Luck, Tire+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
<Pose Tracker> Cassidy Cain has posed.
I don't even know how you put his eye out! He still won't tell me!
A FEW YEARS AGO...
Two shadows fling into the dirt just as a train car explodes behind them. Landing on the sands, Cassidy and Brig sprawl on their fronts, groaning at the pain as flames engulf the rest of their hard-earned loot behind them. There is a pause. Brig lifts his head and gives the blonde a very long look.
"What?" she wonders, pointing forward. "At least we still have the boat."
The hinges blow off one of the train's doors, spiraling in a dangerous arc. They slam into the sandship, which also promptly explodes, sending chunks of debris flying towards them...
NOW...
"That entire thing was only fifteen percent my fault and you can tell him I said so!"
The carriage doors swing open and Kent promptly dives in, prompting everyone else to do the same. Cassidy lingers in the outer shell of the vehicle, however, turning her eyes towards the front. Emerald eyes squint, that far-seeing stare homing in on a few bodies across the way.
"HEADS UP!" she hollers, bracing a foot on the side of the carriage and vaults herself on the roof of it, whipping off her belt and slinging it on a nearby spoke, tightening it and securing it to a few of her beltloops. Pale-gold tresses whip around her face in uncontrolled torrents as she looks up and ahead. Despite herself, a wild, disbelieving grin curls on her lips, pupils shrinking.
"VERITABLE VULTURE'S GAUNTLET UP AHEAD! HAUCH, I HOPE YOUR DRIVER KENS SOME EVASIVE MANEUVERS BECAUSE WE'RE NAE THE ONLY ONES PACKING HEAT!"
It's probably not a good idea to drive in the middle of the columns the bandits are making after they scatter. She espies bodies moving from the corpses they've been looting - whoever the other gang is, she can't see their colors in all of the smoke. They are, however, seasoned enough to take out an entire group of Aveh soldiers and are now helping themselves to some armed forces-grade weapons.
Taking out a grenade from her replenished bandolier, she twists it and hurls it towards a few of the bandits.
DG: Cassidy Cain has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Pre-Graverobbers.
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.
That could have gone better.
Jude Moshe lands on that wagon, but between maneuvering around the continuous fire from beyond and from Kent and from -everywhere there is so much fire when this area is already basically a desert-, it leads to things being a lot more slow and more awkward than the journalist would have liked as he scrambles. Which leads to...
+ppp-TWING+
--the sharp-edged chunk of red hot shrapnel that punctures straight through Jude's coat just seconds before he enters, cutting through clothes and across his ribs as he stumbles forward with a sudden lurch. To his credit, he only barely winces, as if knuckling down to keep focus on the ride forward. One would barely even notice it, wound hidden within the volume of his coat if it weren't for the way he looks back at that light tan garment and balks.
"Ugh," he heaves in frustration. "Every time."
And that, really, is most upsetting of all.
As it is, the journalist pushes inside the wagon not seconds later, sparing a passing glance Fargo's way with lifted brows and an off-handed, "Didn't die, huh?" before sweeping over the rest of the sparse, spartan confines. The wagon lurches with a meaty thump beneath it. He hears shouting beyond.
"So, this is already going really well," he observes to no one in particular before he looks to make his way. Carriage doors swing open. Amber eyes roll up towards the roof, towards Cassidy playing scout. And further beyond...
"Scavengers are really getting cocky these days," he mutters, half to himself. With a grimace more weary and put upon then anything, he leans back in towards, peering at the newly christened driver.
"BANK A SHARP RIGHT," he shouts over the din of war. And then, once more, he leans out, and narrows his eyes towards the distance. "ON MY MARK! THREE--"
Frock coat opens.
"--TWO--"
That large, revolving shotgun of an ARM is unslung and begins to glow a bright, singing blue.
"ONE!"
And, if all goes as planned, Jude will fire off a single round just as that wagon (hopefully) veers to put him in the perfect position, a sorcery-empowered slug frosting the air as it screams towards the opportunistic bandits to impact the ground beneath them--
--and explode into an icy dome of a prison in the hopes of capturing them all within it. Just them, their newly scavenged prizes...
... and Cassidy's grenades.
DG: Jude Moshe has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Pre-Graverobbers.
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"Hey Brig!"
"Sir?"
"Cassidy is here. She says its only fifteen percent her fault."
Morgan then, as shrapnel is studding into his arm, is forced to hold the com unit away from his ears as Brig just blisters the airway with enough long winded curse words and saying. Most of which are not anotomically possible. Many of which are. He's fairly inventive. Eventually he winds down to end with "AND WE DIDN'T EVEN GET TO KEEP THE BOAT!"
Morgan just raises an eyebrow in Cassidy's direction.
"...you said that they blew up the boat."
But then he's being hauled inside as the shrapnel rais from above. His ARM still glows, and its a good thing it does as up ahead the vultures of the bandit profession seem to be getting to work early.
His eyes narrow. "If there is one things I hate more than graverobbers, its graverobbers who don't have the sense to wait till after a battle is over. I mean really. Have some common sense!"
His shields spring into existance around the rolling caravan of explosives as Cass flings a grenade towards the bandits.
"I'll give y'all the cover ya need! Light them up!" He calls out even as Brig still sulks in his ear.
DG: Morgan Newkirk has used his Tool Shield Gauntlet toward his party's challenge, Pre-Graverobbers.
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
Ribaldy emits a high, piercing whine when told to drive, his ears wilting flat against his skull, but he clamps the rest of his sausage in his mouth and pries himself free of his safe corner, shoulders slumped as he sulks through the carriage's front to grab onto the reins, trying and failing to not sit in the blood. Some Black Ties would risk a lot more to avoid it, but Suits are free of much of the cutthroat clothes-based culture.
The Beastman booms back at Cassidy, "Uh!" Well, 'booms' isn't ever the most accurate word for Ribaldy. "The horses are freaked! I gotta get 'em straight first! Uh! Bag!"
Kent relays, "Bag!" and Samuelh shrugs out of one of his sacks, passing it to the bossman with his free hand. Kent touches the strap to the hose of Red River, and flame starts to spread down the canvas, leaving a worryingly-small strip for the hands. He shoves the flaming bag up to Ribaldy.
This leaves a small amount of fire. Parbody makes a small hmmming noise at it, produces a small spray bottle, and nonchalantly shoots foam at the small flame before it can turn into a terrible flame.
Ribaldy grabs the flaming bag. He is currently barking at the horses, which seems to have a remarkable attempt on their fortitude. He stands up, bracing one foot, muscles swelling as he tenses up, swinging the bag over his head with the reins in his other arm. He looks significantly larger.
Perhaps he is tapping... into the B.A.D.D.O.G. arts.
Ribaldy hauls on the reins and hurls the sack of molotovs at the pile of robbers along with the rest of the horrific munitions. The sack explodes twice - first the molotovs go off in a bloom of normal human fire, and that flame is then sent spiralling away when the Tipple inside manages to touch off in a violent blue-green sphere.
Fargo Foobach has not met Jude Moshe. The Man in White tilts his head slightly, one eye visible from beneath the brim of his hat. Jude does get the opportunity to see him flinch - very slightly - looking up to where Cassidy is yelling before he touches his hat and tilts it back down.
Kent then comments to Morgan, pulling the other shard from his arm. "S'fine. Shitty bandits either learn some bloody sense fast or don't get the chance."
DG: Kent Hauch has used his Tool Molotov Cocktail toward his party's challenge, Pre-Graverobbers.
DG: The party led by Kent Hauch has passed this challenge! The party gained 15 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw.
<Pose Tracker> Cassidy Cain has posed.
"They did!" Cassidy protests at Morgan. "...after a fashion!"
For one small carriage, the team within seems capable enough in doing plenty of carnage in a small amount of time.
Morgan's cover fire and Ribaldy's trick with the bag make quick work of the hostile bodies attempting to ambush the carriage on either side, though those following the lead Black Tie vehicle do not fare so well - holes blow into wood, bullets leaving splinters and blood across the way. Even while Brig screams in the Beastman's ear, the former coliseum champion manages to aerate the contents of a bandit's skull, painting the sands below with blood.
The bag ignites, spreading fire across bodies and charring them immediately, screams lost in the cacophonous sounds of war's raging symphony. The stink of boiling fat and frying skin fold into the unmistakeable strains of gunpowder, cordite and the copper-iron notes of indiscriminately spilled life.
Somewhere ahead of them, within Ribaldy's line of sight, Jude's Symbology-augmented slug goes arcing in the air, its launch from the impressively ridiculous (and ridiculously impressive) ARM giving it enough force to rush ahead of Cassidy's own grenades by a few seconds. It impacts the sand, a half-dome of ice suddenly crystallizing into view, in defiance of the sweltering heat and the angry red-gold glow of the dying sun. The bandits within skid to a stop from their attempts at escaping or attacking, and when they turn around...
The grenades fall.
The dome swallows up the explosion, trapping moving sacks of meat between frost, fire and pulverizing shockwaves, screams cut short by death, melting in the fringes as heat batters at its confines. Cassidy's smile blossoms all the more fully, as sharp as a blade.
The ice-shell remains smoking and standing even as the carriage rushes past. Leaning towards where Jude's head is poking out, she flashes him a wink.
"You really do complete me," she tells him gamely, before another explosion forces her to throw herself forward, flattening herself on the roof.
"S'pose as far as death-defying high speed escapes are concerned, this is nae going too badly!"
<CARD>
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++<* The Battle Front *>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+++++++++++++++++++++++<* CHALLENGE - Garlyle Commando *>+++++++++++++++++++++++
|Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Combat |Challenge Rating: 2 |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++--< Challenge Information: >+++++++++++++++++++++++++--
Aveh's ally in the war has not left it out. As you make your way across the
battlefield, a series of fireballs comes raining dwon from above. You find
yourself caught in a pincer attack by a team of Garlyle commandos. Their
black uniforms are crisp -- and their aim is sharp, as gunfire peppers down
around you. Several leap in after, short swords drawn, and ready to strike
you down!
+Dungeon Conditions: Wound, Injure++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
Ribaldy frowns. He didn't want to kill them so descriptively! He was hoping for less-than-lethal fire!
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"Cassidy!" Morgan is holding on for dear life at this point as the explosions rip into the lead car. Its holding together and not exploding, which really is all Morgan can hope for at the moment. "How many times have I told ya, don't tept the gods of dramatic narriation like that!"
He drops his shields for a second, a flicker to clean them of gore as he nods to the carnage that the bandits recieved. "Well," He drawls towards Kent. "They seem to have taken option two."
Not getting the chance.
Clinging on with one hand the other is pointed right at Cass. "AND YOU OWE ME A BOAT THEN!" A pause. "AT LEAST FIFTEEN PERCENT OF A BOAT! I BET YOU TWO WEREN'T EVEN IN PANAMA!"
As he's shouting and attempting to regain his balance is when he sees it. A flicker of movement up ahead. On top of the dunes. "Contact front!" He shouts in a deep throated roar. Military training never quite lets go in stressful situations.
"THIS IS WHAT YOU GET FOR SAYING IT WAS GOING WELL!" The black uniforms flood over the hill and Morgan frowns slightly.
"They shouldn't wear black in the damn sand. It makes em damn easy to see." He's mildly insulted by that. But then they are trying to kill him and he has more important things. "Kent! Jude! Cass! Take the close fighters!" He calls out as he raises his arm towards the sniper teams.
A blue flash summons the man's rotary cannon to keep the group on the ridge pinned down.
Mixed in with the bullets though is a dull red beam of light. It hardly looks like its doing any damage as it fixed on the top of the ridge.
MEANWHILE!!
Over two miles away a pair of figures wait for a signal. Brig, a tall and lanky weasel beastman with an eyepatch grumbles as he holds a spotting glass up to his one good eye. "I can't belive she said it was only fifteen percent her fault. It was her plan!! Like hell I'd get dressed up like a harem girl in any of my plans!"
He doesn't realise he's transmitting where both Morgan and Cass can hear. What he does realise is that there is a red laser painting the top of a ridge.
"Hey Sharpe! You see that!"
Sharpe, a jackrabbit beastman rests comfortably in a chair. A cockpit really. Of a Gear hidden by tarps and baffles next to Brig's position. At the call the rabbit smirks, spitting a wad of chew into a cup set in the corner of his cockpit. "I see it. Settin' mark." The reticle swims across his screen to the painted ridgetop. "And...fire! Fire! Fire!"
The massive sniper canon that is the Gear's only weapon roars three times as a trio of artillery shells shreik towards the commandos on the ridge.
BACK TO THE CONVOY!
Morgan just smiles viciously. "Friendly fire incoming on the ridge on the left! Just so you know!"
The whistling and impact of multiple shells almost drowns out his words.
DG: Morgan Newkirk has used his Tool Shield Gauntlet toward his party's challenge, Garlyle Commando.
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.
You really do complete me.
"Would you believe me if I said it just comes naturally?"
The two-fingered tip of a salute, the brief flash of a smile, and Jude turns his attentions westward...
... just in time to hear the pressing sounds of artillery, and see the swift approach of hostiles in the distance.
"Y'know what," he muses, opening the revolving chamber of his weapon, "you can answer that for me later."
Amber eyes squeeze into a squint towards the horizon. Black uniforms. He looks east, to see more coming in from the rear. Efficient, overkill tactics. Excessive firepower. His teeth grit together in exasperation. "Garlyle," the journalist mutters pulling free several rune-laden shells to chamber into his weapon. "Fantastic."
Fireballs rain, and Jude Moshe ratchets that weapon back into place, pointing it eastwards toward the encroaching, sword-wielding troopers. "Elite forces," he explains casually to Morgan's complaint about the uniforms, "means 'overkill with firepower' with Garlyle, most of the time." He aims. Smiles that half-cocked, hapless smile of his.
"Probably why they get along so well with Aveh, honestly."
Krak-THOOM
Largely lost under the boom of the Gear's weaponfire going off, a squeeze of a trigger sends of rampaging current of lightning crackling through ionizing air. Short-ranged, it lights up the air surrounding the rear of the wagon -- aiming to simply flash-fry any Garlyle soldiers unfortunate enough to get too close to their means of escape. The rest? He'll leave to the others.
"You've got some big friends, Morg!" calls out the journalist, over the cacophony.
"Starting to feel a little inadequate!"
DG: Jude Moshe has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Garlyle Commando.
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
Parbody sharply underlines something in her notebook after Ribaldy hurls the flaming bag, and looks up, the emotionless lenses of her gas mask locking onto Morgan through a rent in the carriage wall. She recrosses her legs, heel clicking sharply against the wood. "Please try to keep things to a dull roar, luv?" she says, voice muffled by the mask. "Some of us can't let something as dull as a war keep us from our work."
Ribaldy has properly gained control of the horses and thuds back down, muscles relaxing and deflating. He adjusts the wagon's direction again, pulling something from under the wagon seat, pointing, and firing. A flare flashes briefly, soaring in the direction they've decided to take. The scattered wagons square up, puffs of flame and exploding molotovs erupting from them as they have their own fights. The Ties have lost a couple more wagons - the sharp will notice that the closer you get to the center of the convoy, the more Vests and Jackets on the wagons. The hierarchy has its perks.
Gunfire is pinging off the scrap armoring of their carriage as a pack of Garlics manage to swing their way into the back of the wagon. In an instant, Fargo Foobach goes from inert to active - the temperature in the wagon spikes up as heat wraps around him, smearing across the distance between himself and a pair, his hat flipping off his head as his hair whirls upward. "Shoh-- toh!" His palm slams out at one man's sword and melts straight through it, steam erupting from his pant leg as his right foot arcs up, hooks onto another man's neck, and tries to drag him to the wagon floor.
Samuelh had sprung away, the old man beaming drunkenly down at another soldier as he clung improbably to the underside of the carriage's roof by one arm and one leg, hand snapping out to throw a molotov at his face, bouncing it back unbroken into his own hand.
Kent Hauch charges for the biggest one, not drawing his gun, just ignoring the swords as he tries to haul the soldier up and smash his head into - and through - the carriage roof. "Now THIS is bloody ungrateful!" he roars. "I take over that shitshow of an operation you lot handed Descartes an' you attack MY BLOODY FOOKIN' WAGON?" The unit commander's head boggles at Cassidy for a moment, having punched right through a square of fabric, before Kent rips him back down and shoves him through the carriage wall, cramming a molotov into his mouth, close enough to nearly slam right into Morgan.
"An' you," he says, pointing a finger at the Beastman, murder in his eyes. "You give me one more bloody order on my wagon an' I'll revoke your ridin' privileges, roight? Count yerself lucky I'm figgerin' I owe you for the temple."
That vein spreads along one side of his temple. "I don't owe you much."
Meanwhile, Ribaldy crouches down, whimpering again as he sees the shells from Morgan's Gear coming on.
DG: Kent Hauch has used his Tool Molotov Cocktail toward his party's challenge, Garlyle Commando.
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"So noted! I'll remember ta say please next time!" Morgan calls over the roar of weapon fire as he puts a boot to the molotov-man's midsection to help him on his way.
<Pose Tracker> Cassidy Cain has posed.
Would you believe if I said it just comes naturally?
Lips part to reply, only for Morgan to interject from somewhere in the side of the carriage.
Don't tempt the Gods of Dramatic Narration like that!
"Ay, well! You know me, luv! I like tae live dangerously!"
AND YOU OWE ME A BOAT THEN!
"LOOK, Morgan. I told you several times already, just because we're nae on anything named Panama dinnae mean we cannae blow shite up! Sometimes it is a verra necessary course of action! You dinnae have tae hold a grudge just because she was pretty! I already have Brig for that and half of it's just because I told him nae anyone's going tae believe he's got tits the size of watermelons, not with those skinny-arsed hips-- !"
A fireball explodes somewhere directly behind them, cutting off the rest of the remark. Emerald eyes grow wide as she stares at the smoking crater. Slowly, her gaze tracks upwards, catching sight of glinting, deadly red-gold balls smaller than the sun arc up from the ridges and descend upon them.
THIS IS WHAT YOU GET FOR SAYING IT WAS GOING WELL!
"Ah, shite."
Suddenly the roof isn't such a good idea. Cassidy's hand falls on the knife with the unremarkable cross-guard on her belt, and with a flash of silver, she cuts herself free from the length of leather keeping her pinned to the roof....just as a head plows through it thanks to Kent's perfectly timed smash. Knee bending, she slams her bootheel right into the man's nose just before the Black Ties' leader pulls him back under again. She rolls to the side of the carriage, grasping the edges of one of the open doors and swings into, it, bracing her foot against it while one arm curls through the shattered window. Glass cuts deeply into skin, crimson welling through the fabric of her red shirt and marking pale skin.
As the door continues its swing outward, carrying its foolhardy blonde passenger, her engraved revolver spins out from one hand and fires several rounds on a few of the Garlyle agents clinging to the side of their vehicle.
One of the projectiles slams into the space Cassidy just vacated. Smoke and angry, red-gold tongues of heat leap upwards.
"...the roof is on fire," she utters helpfully, finally turning her gaze sideways at a flash of light and fire from within the carriage. Through another window, she watches as Fargo Foobach bears an unwanted guest to the floor.
"What the f-- "
There's a glance between Kent and Fargo as they keep fighting inside the carriage.
"Tch." She turns her attention back to the other bodies clustering after them, firing her weapon over and over, smirk on her lips. "Well played, lads," she murmurs.
Well played.
DG: Cassidy Cain has contributed a Combat Basic Action toward her party's challenge, Garlyle Commando.
DG: The party led by Kent Hauch has passed this challenge! The party gained 15 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw.
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
The trio of Gear sized shells tear into the ridge sending black-clad bodies flying. There is no explosion though, and several of the figures start to raise.
"Wait for it..." Morgan singsongs for a second...
Then the entire ridgeline is ripped apart as the delayed impact rounds explode. The entire top of the ridge is eclipsed in fire and flame as the ordenance erases the entire top section in a mass of devistation.
Debris rain down as the wagon train hurls past and Morgan laughs as he clings to one side. "How's that for overkill!" He calls back towards Jude. "Elite forces my tail." He adds with a smirk as he pulls back from the hole Kent just made in the side of the vehicle.
"And I'll let ya give the orders now on, old habit dies hard." He adds towards the firey leader of the Black Ties.
The rest of the commandos suddenly realise its a very bad idea to leap in close with a bunch of angry Black Ties that can do intresting things like set themselves on fire and have an healthy affilitation with molotovs.
"I'll let ya have the next one, Jude." He adds as he smirks slightly. "Sharpe was getting bored up there. You should hear him laughin' now though. I think that just made his day."
The request from Parbody though causes the fox to blink and flash a grin. He touches two fingers to his temple and nods. "I'll do mah best, darlin'. Don't have much control of everything else. Espicially that Golem."
A glance back at Cassidy and Jude. "Thats a new one ain't it?" He asks right before he parses what Cassidy said.
"Wait watermelons? Seriously?" He clicks on the com. "Seriously? You are nowhere near a watermelon size frame, Brig! I mean come on! Have some sense!"
"WATERMELONS WERE ALL I HAD GODDAMMIT! DON'T TELL ME HOW TO DRESS UP LIKE A GIRL!" Shouts the weasel into the com as he stomps his foot, even as Sharpe just laughs and cycles the canon. The jackrabbit is having the time of his life.
<CARD>
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++<* The Battle Front *>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++++++++++<* CHALLENGE - Battalion Crossing *>++++++++++++++++++++++
|Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Wits |Challenge Rating: 2 |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++--< Challenge Information: >+++++++++++++++++++++++++--
Some of the forces arrayed on this battlefield are far beyond what an
individual Drifter can handle -- or even a dedicated team of them. As you
approach, you hear some shouting ahead of you, and the steady clomp of boots
on the ground. You may want to find a way to be very inconspicuous --
because rounding the bend of the large hill ahead is a cluster of some
hundred soldiers, armed to the teeth and looking for a fight.
+Dungeon Conditions: Bad Luck, Wound++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.
So, for the most part, those Garlyle forces encroaching on Jude just get fried before they can even reach the wagon. Probability says, though, the more there are, the more possibility there is for one of them to slip through the cracks...
... and so one does slip, in the form of a blade introduced to Jude's torso with an upward's stroke.
"Shit--"
It's a close thing. The sharp tip of the sword introduces itself to Jude's vest with a snag, slicing through fabric and gauging a shallow wound up through tanned skin, across the ugly furrow of scar tissue decorating his chest. It stings -- but it could have been so much worse if not for the way that the redheaded man seems to move -with- the momentum of the stroke, as fluid as water, to grab the man and send him -spiraling- upwards onto the roof.
Onto the burning roof.
+whud+
"Damn, I really liked this shirt," Jude mutters half to himself over the unpleasant, panicked hollar of the Garlyle soldier as he rolls off the roof unpleasantly aflame, doing his best rendition of stop-drop-and-roll as he becomes a more and more distant blip on the horizon.
No, Jude's not all that concerned about his fate. He's more concerned about the shirt.
And so, with a weary curdle of his lips and wrinkle of his nose, Jude looks over his own injury before ultimately dismissing it to make his way back into the wagon. He smells the smoke, sees all the signs of violence -- hears Morgan's question.
"Not really new," he says simply, "looks like another one of the excavated ones." His brows furrow inward, contemplation mildly creasing his brow. "... When did Kislev find it, though..."
Ultimately, this all receives the shake of his head and the roll of his shoulders. "Ah well. Looks like Garlyle's troops stopped following us." He pauses, here, poignantly, with the dawn of realization. "... They stopped following us..." Marches his way to the front of the wagon--
--right in time to see so many troops on the horizon. Kislevi. All of them armed and waiting.
"... yep. Yep, that seems about right."
They don't really have a lot of time, here, all things considered. And there's -too many- of those troops. Jude's mind races, amber eyes snapping this way and that, looking towards that canyon's rockface just above the troops, to the paths around them, to the--
-- faint sound of chirping in the air just beyond the wagon.
And he smiles, that faint, lazy smile of his.
"Cassie, what's your thoughts on destroying natural wonders?" he asks, but it might just be rhetorical, considering how he cocks his head in the direction of the canyon walls beyond. "Think you can give Morg's friends a good firing angle?"
The implication is clear:
He wants to start a landslide.
Controlled. Controlled landslide.
"And you're free to listen to me or not," he asides to the Black Ties and their leader as he looks for a place to lean himself, bringing a hand up to compress his wound as he sucks in a deep breath.
"... but I'd recommend following the bird."
And here he looks forward -- to the sight of the avian automaton Jacob fluttering just beyond, circling once, twice, three times to catch the wagon's attention... before it just sets to soar off, away from those Kislevi troops.
DG: Jude Moshe has used his Tool Jacob toward his party's challenge, Battalion Crossing.
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
Kent Hauch backs away from the big hole in the carriage's covering and puts one hand on his shoulder, stretching out his neck with a grating series of pops. Samuelh drops back down and lurches toward Morgan drunkenly, grabbing onto his shoulder apparently to steady himself.
He leans in, smelling like alcohol and fuel, one eye open wider than the other. Breath like a chemical factory wafts out from between his enormous teeth as he grins at him. "Don't be mindin' the boss, boyo. He won't be tossin' ya out fer at least another two fuck-ups! Kyee hee hee!" He throws his empty out of the wagon and scratches at his wiry grey hair, dislodging something best left unexamined.
Speaking of fuck-ups: "Whaddaya mean the ROOF'S on fire?" Kent howls at Cassidy. His coat flaps as he whirls toward the front of the wagon. One of the Jackets hurls a wadded blanket toward him, which he gathers under his arm and shoves at Ribaldy. "Roof's on fire," he growls at him, gathering up the reins for himself.
Ribaldy lets out another whine, quivering as he eases his bulk onto the roof, throwing the blanket over the flame and patting at it. It's a pretty big blanket, and he's pretty good at patting. He's not so much worried about the size of the fire as he is the size of the wagon, namely how little size there is when you really get right down to it.
Kent glowers toward the soldiers as he stands, throwing a few handsigns into the air that filter through the Black Tie wagons. This is going to be a tight move. His hand then reaches into his coat, drawing out the tablet. It happens again, that odd solidity, as he guides the horses after the bird, frowning at the canyon. "How's this work," he mutters. "Do I just sorta..." He thinks about the blood of the mountain rising, disturbing the ground, kind of waving his tablet toward the canyon.
Within the wagon, Fargo Foobach still has his foot on the remaining Garlyle soldier's neck. Starting with upraised hands, he twists his entire body, torqueing the man's spine past survivability, and unceremoniously kicks his limp form from the back of the wagon. He turns, sees Cassidy, and damnably without comment, reclaims his hat, sweeping his hair under it. He seems to no longer be suffering from his injury.
Parbody glances at Jude as she notes something down, and sighs. Without rising, she withdraws a small leather bag from beneath her bench, kicking it toward the journalist with one heel. "I trust you don't need any nursemaiding," she comments. "Not that I believe you could afford my fees."
DG: Kent Hauch has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Battalion Crossing.
<Pose Tracker> Cassidy Cain has posed.
Still clinging to the door, Cassidy's emerald eyes flick over Jude's way when he attempts to flambe another Garlyle agent on the flaming roof, and past his red-haired head towards the canyon walls.
"Would have suggested doing the old uniform steal, but it looks like the ones waiting for us in the far end are Kislevi," she observes, her brogue torn from her throat by the rush of wind. Jude's idea, however, is a sound one - in fact, she's done such a thing very recently, in her attempts to escape a gang of bounty hunters from June City. Unfortunately, unlike then, she does not have the climbing prowess of Noah Hawthorne and things are going too fast for that kind of effort.
"If I had tae pick between us and natural wonders, luv, I'll pick us any day of the week and twice on Sunday," she tells him. "But I cannae guarantee my aim in a carriage, there's too much shite in the w-- "
Somewhere behind them, the Black Ties lose another wagon; the scream of wood exploding and horses coming free from their harnesses pierce the air. An opportunity presents itself immediately.
"Hold that thought." She holsters her revolver. "And wish me luck. MORGAN!" The next to the Beastman. "Tell Sharpe tae follow the lights!"
As a racing chestnut-brown stallion starts to come abreast of the carriage, Cassidy lets go of the door and leaps. She throws herself across the horse's back, spinning around and hitching her thighs against its flanks. The reins remain, but there is no saddle to speak of, but muscle memory floods her veins the moment she hits the animal and its smell wafts in her nose.
It has been years since she's done any trick riding, but she still remembers; the beat of horsehooves through the ring and the rush that comes with controlling a powerful beast. The style she adopts, to those observant and knowledgeable, is prevalent in Southern Ignas, with the way she effortlessly gets back on position despite her earlier awkward one. "HI-YAAH!" Boots find the horse's flanks and a steer sideways and she's off like a rocket, kicking up sand and dust in her wake as she leads the way, rushing past Ribaldy's seat and towards the canyons beckoning at her from afar.
She waits until she's under the canyon's shadow before she moves again. Boots planting on the horse's back, she keeps her knees soft as slowly rises upon it.
Slinging her bandolier forward, with a deft hand, she rips off the adhesive back of one grenade and launches it. It sticks to an outcropping, red light winking.
She attempts to do the same again, and again, in equidistant points, and when the fourth grenade is launched, she drops back on the horse in a proper position. Fishing out her lighter, she lifts the precious silver object and flicks on the flame as a signal.
It's ready.
DG: Cassidy Cain has used her Tool Pocket Lighter toward her party's challenge, Battalion Crossing.
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
Kent Hauch thinks that owns, bellowing laughter at Cassidy's bullshit. "Oi! If you like to live that bloody dangerous, why don't you join up-like? I'll even give you a wardrobe advance!"
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"You know," Morgan says conversationally as Samuelh grabs onto his shoulder. "I'm guessing you've drunk enough that you are flamable. Which is pretty damn impressive. Just sayin'." He add with a smirk. "And thanks for the info." He adds as he leans a hand against the side of the wagon.
He can't hate these Black Ties. Even if any of them would likely shank him for a gella.
But he can respect that.
"Well to be fair none of the Golems are new, thats fer damn sure. Kislev..." There is a frown. "...they have been finding all sorts of stuff they shouldn't find lately. I should pay the town a visit."
But then there is more important things to do.
Like bring down the house.
"Cassidy are you gonna do some damn fool stunt again?" He asks as he turns towards where she was just in time to see her leap off onto a passing horse.
"Gonna take that as a yes," He drawls as he watches the horse barrel off ahead. His ARM glows as he unspools his energy rope again and clicks on the mic at his throat.
"BRIG!"
"WHAT?!" Shouts the other smuggler.
"You're gonna like this order, find Cassidy! Get Sharpe to aim towards her!"
"Oh yeah. I'm lovin' this plan."
Morgan rolls his eyes as he starts to spin his rope around his head. "Shut it and listen! Find the lit explosives on the cliff and have Sharpe fire for effect."
"...you sure I can't shoot Cassidy, boss?"
"Yes."
"Fine! SHARPE! You get all that!"
The Jackrabbit smirks as he works the controls of the Gear. "I heard. Follow the lights. Penetrator rounds loaded."
"Fire!" Morgan calls as he swings his rope back.
Two miles away flames erupt from a hilltop as the sniper Gear fires. Four times. Shell casings flailing across the sands that are as big as a horse bouncing away from the Gear.
As the shells scream towards their targets the Fox releases his lasso, giving Cassidy at least something to grab onto as they tear past. Almost like they have done things like this before.
DG: Morgan Newkirk has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Battalion Crossing.
DG: The party led by Kent Hauch has passed this challenge! The party gained 15 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw.
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.
That leather bag slides his way. Jude Moshe rubs the back of his head before he crouches down with the slightest wince of strained, injured muscles, opening it with the helpless rise of his shoulders.
"No promises," is all he says at first in response to Parbody.
"But I think I'm already in enough debt without taking on anymore."
Still, for now, Jude contents himself with tending to that injury with whatever might be inside that bag, letting the others -- and his bird -- do the heavy lifting for him. It's fine. It's his idea, after all. He's supervising. But as Cassidy moves to vacate the wagon, in preparation for her leap, amber eyes find her for a moment, and the journalist pauses in the midst of his work.
... And wish me luck.
"I think I've already given you all the scraps I've got left," are his choice of well wishes, seconds before she takes the plunge.
From where he sits, Jude watches -- at least, what he can see from within that wagon. As Cassidy rides with that distinctive style, sprints off towards that canyon, chucks that grenade--
The sound of a Gear's artillery firing off a heavy shell goes largely lost within the tide of battle.
Less so, the heavy, tremulous shaking that starts to quake above all those soldiers, so violent and precarious that its tremors race across the earth beneath the Black Ties' wagons. Those soldiers look up, confused. And then they see it.
"LOOK OUT! LAND S--"
The sound of earth crumbling in a waterfall of momentum drowns out their chaotic cries as they all scatter and run, their attentions all wholly on survival now, instead of mass killing any poor, innocent criminals and their mechanical bird guides. And journalists.
Distraction: COMPLETE
... but it might be a good idea to get out of the way of that not-so-natural disaster too.
<CARD>
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++<* The Battle Front *>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++++++++++<* CHALLENGE - Barricade Breaking *>++++++++++++++++++++++
|Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Brute |Challenge Rating: 2 |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++--< Challenge Information: >+++++++++++++++++++++++++--
A barricade erected by infantry blocks your path ahead. Built between two
outcroppings of rock, it would be hard to go around -- and even though it
was placed in quickly, it is quite sturdy. Huge beams of steel and spikes
make it hard to move. It could be dangerous, too; the chance of cutting
yourself on those spikes is a real threat.
+Dungeon Conditions: Tire, Bad Luck+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
Kent waves his Medium of the Mountain at a canyon, and the canyon falls over.
He smirks, taking full credit, stuffing the tablet back into his coat. It reminds him that he hasn't lit a new cigar yet and he draws a hand-rolled from his vest pocket, lighting it against Red River's hose and enjoying a brief puff, head tilted back.
He recovers in time to see the barricade nestled in the valley the wagons have nestled themselves into. Smoke jets out of his nose in dull surprise.
"Fuck ass."
"FARGO! FOOKIN' DO SOMETHING!" Kent's a little shook by this one. This is an exact situation where Red River can't do much other than drip lava all over their horses. If they stop due to the barricade, the wagon will crash. If the wagon crashes, it'll cause a nightmarish pileup. If that happens...
That's the kind of thing that can end a gang.
In the wagon, Fargo rises, taking a deep breath, skin glowing white-hot. He moves his hands in a slow circle, a gathering kata over the center of his chest, and brings his fists together. While he does that, Samuelh and a couple other Black Ties spring into action - one starts gathering scraps of wood and rags sitting around the wagon, while Samuelh and a brawny woman drag a rope from under a bench, dumping canteens over one and and looping it over Fargo's midsection.
The Man in White jumps from the wagon, the Heat Haze flaring out around him, and sprints past, trailing the rope as Samuelh carefully feeds it out. He doesn't look particularly drunk all of a sudden.
From this distance, it's hard to even see Fargo at all, much less exactly what he does - but it can be surmised. As he hits the barricade, there is a blinding white flash, a wave of heat erupting out of him over it. The Heat Haze vanishes and he unceremoniously falls over. Samuelh and the woman start hauling the rope while Kent keeps the horses from running the Suit over.
DG: Kent Hauch has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Barricade Breaking.
<Pose Tracker> Cassidy Cain has posed.
I think I've already given you all the scraps I've got left.
The blonde laughs at that as she charges past. "Methinks in our case, luv," she calls over her shoulder. "You take from me as much as you give."
It isn't long until Sharpe does his work from afar, and the chestnut stallion angles its path towards the carriage. With it catching up to her, the thief turns her head towards the bald, burly man holed up within, brows perking upwards as she hears his laughter.
If you like living dangerously...
Cassidy slows down the horse, the carriage pulling up just in time to hear Kent's bellowed invitation. "Wardrobe advance, ay?" she calls back, expression brimming with good, if not sardonic humor. "Dinnae think I'd pull off the Black Ties look as well as you or Fargo, luv-- "
She's cut off when a shot whistles through the air and pierces the skull of her horse, and right into her center mass.
As the large animal starts to take upon a devastating tumble into the sands, and threaten to crush her under the weight, the blonde has enough presence of mind to leap, blood drops scattering through the air like rubies as both arms come around the door swinging wildly from the carriage, one arm looping around it as legs drag into the sand. She bites back a cry, clutching onto the hanging appendage for dear life.
"...god....damn....I hate....the bloody...des..."
A bolt pops off the hinge. The door lists in a jarring angle and dips her already battered body further into the sand.
"What else could go wrong tod-- "
Instincts. The clarion call of alarm bells ring loudly in her skull as she turns her head and gawks openly at the barricade looming ahead of them. Gripping the failing door tight, she clings to it as tenaciously as she can...
...as a hand reaches for her bandolier of grenades and tosses it inside the carriage. Obviously, she can't arm and throw, injuries lancing white hot shards of pain up her side.
"Make it count!" she cries towards Jude and Morgan.
DG: Cassidy Cain has used her Tool Heavy Grenade toward her party's challenge, Barricade Breaking.
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"I love it when a plan comes together," The fox is grinning as he sees the cliff crumble. That same grin fades as he he notes Cassidy's horse sprawl like that. "Cassidy jump!" He knew that was gonna happen. Thats why he threw her that rope...
...that she ignores...
...in favor of the broken door of the wagon.
"Goddamit over dramatic woman!" He calls out as he imeadeatly shortens the leangth of the energy lasso to fling down over the edge and secure Cassidy's door to pull her up from becoming sand-kill.
Then he hears something thump on the floor. A familiar bandoleer of something. "She just threw live grenades in here din't she?" He asks in a much too calm voice. "Jude. If'n ya would? I'm a bit busy tryin ta make sure Cass ain't splattered across the sand. She wouldn't make a very pretty pancake." A pause. "YOU HEAR THAT CASSIDY! YOU WOULD MAKE A TERRIBLE PANCAKE!"
He sees the reasoning of course. A barricade. Something that can end their flight quickly, cleanly, and very painfully. A speeding wagon hitting that is going to end poorly...
"Brig!"
"Sharpe can't get an angle on that thing! You have to slow down!"
"Well that ain't happinin...I'll think of something!"
...but then Fargo. The Burning Man. Goes running past, attached by rope even as he sets himself on fire. The explosion in the distance is damn impressive, though the man does fall right over in the aftermath. He may of just saved them all. "Lemme help," Morgan offers as he motions for one end of the rope to be tossed towards him. Should he get his wish, standing there with lasso pulling Cassidy up with one arm and hauling hard on Fargo's rope with the other, there is a slight suprise to some. Which is the sudden reveal that the lanky fox is actually...strong.
Disturbingly strong.
Its not something he actually advertises, but growing up on a planet with slightly different gravity does have some advantages.
DG: Morgan Newkirk has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Barricade Breaking.
<Pose Tracker> Cassidy Cain has posed.
"WHAT'S THE ROPE GONNA DO MORGAN?" Cassidy shrieks, a vein of frustration protruding from her forehead as she clings to the door like a desperate koala. "DRAG ME ALONG THE CARRIAGE?"
YOU WOULD MAKE A TERRIBLE PANCAKE.
"I would have ended up as ground beef with your plan! A pancake would have been preferrable!"
And she's still yelling at him when the Beastman yanks her up.
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.
Cassidy is shot. Straight through her horse. It's a sound that goes lost within all the discord surrounding them, what with Medium-assisted cavernous collapses drowning out everything sensible, but he sees it clearly. He sees a glimmer of blood from horse and (impromptu) owner, an owner currently flying through the air like she were desperately trying to discover some hidden set of wings only to end up colliding with the doors of the carriage with a meaty impact that resounds through the vehicle.
Jude watches -- right up to the point where that bandolier of grenades hits the floor before him. This might be the time for him to be conflicted, or try to offer to help in some way, or worry, or--
"Giving me your explosives. Now I know you really trust me."
--or make some glib remark while he crouches down to scoop up that belt of grenades and sling it over his shoulder. He could have done all those things, but, well. Jude Moshe is pragmatic.
And he's seen Cassidy Cain at work long enough to know what to do next:
Let her do what she does best while he tries to help avoid all of them getting killed.
And so, as Fargo starts to glow, Jude looks the man's way only briefly with the lift of brows and a whistled, "Wow, impressive," before he makes his way to the front of the wagon. "'Scuse me," he mentions off-handedly to Ribaldy as he positions himself right at the edge of that wagon, propping himself up. One hand grabs a grenade, the other unpins it...
... and how it glows a bright and searing orange before he throws is something perhaps sight unseen by all but the Good Boy beside him before he lobs that churning, empowered grenade straight towards the barricade, aimed towards the opposite end of where that walking pyroclasm known as Fargo Foobach burns through it all like the blaze of a dying star.
"Here goes nothing--"
And that grenade will blow. -Violently- and -blindingly-.
DG: Jude Moshe has used his Tool Demolition Shell toward his party's challenge, Barricade Breaking.
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"Oh. I hadn't thought of that." Morgan's face screws up in thought as he hauls on two different lines to get people back abord. "Well look in my defense its been a long day!"
DG: The party led by Kent Hauch has passed this challenge! The party gained 15 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw.
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
The Black Ties, as a group, are almost enjoyable to work with when they don't have it out for you. They're a cast of fun and amusing characters, the alcohol flows freely if you're willing to chance it, and by and large if they're going to do a betrayal it's going to be something on a grand scale - just ask Descartes, if you can find him.
But they're still a criminal gang of outcasts, ne'er-do-wells, and broken people. They have priorities.
Cassidy Cain is not their priority.
Kent Hauch's reaction to her getting shot is to simply roll his eyes and lean the horses away from her. No sweat off his head if she doesn't make it. His eyes are on Fargo, his left-hand man, as he's hauled along. Ribaldy gathers the burnt, smoking blanket up, moves to the hole in the top of the carriage formed earlier by Kent and the Garlyle soldier, and jumps down through it, blowing the hole open wider. Samuelh and the woman look up, with Morgan and Ribaldy right next to each other, and pass the rope to the dogman. They close ranks, physically separating Fargo from the group as he's hauled, woozy and shivering, back into the wagon.
"C'mon buddy," says Ribaldy, low and urgent, throwing the smoldering blanket around him. Fargo's color looks a little better as he pulls the heat from the blanket. Concern in his face, he brings Fargo to... well, the fire the Jacket has been building in the wagon, which is sparked right now. Breathing in, Fargo bends the fire toward him as Ribaldy massages warmth back into his limbs.
The two groups are, for the moment, starkly separate as the Ties bunch protectively around Fargo Foobach at his most vulnerable. Outside, the sagging barrier's metal has been softened by the Supernova. Kent whistles as the grenade soars toward the barricade. The horses are starting to worry and chafe at Kent's control as it nears. "Don't'cha," he snarls.
The bomb hits a metal bar and just... sticks there, the iron malleable enough for the moment to just accept it. It blows. Kent covers his eyes, a fearsome grin on his face as debris is scattered back in a great wave, clearing the path for the wagons. A horse attempts to rear, but Kent flicks the reins, expertly snapping it in the ear and convincing it to not get froggy.
<CARD>
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++<* The Battle Front *>++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++++++++++<* CHALLENGE - Artillery Flare *>+++++++++++++++++++++++
|Type: Exploration |Dungeon Ability: Wits |Challenge Rating: 2 |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++-< Challenge Information: >+++++++++++++++++++++++++-
As you make your way westward, you find an Aveh soldier who has been shot
dead. He has a pair of large tubes, which have the word "ARTILLERY" printed
on the side. These tubes hold flares, used to signal artillery emplacements
and indicate where they should open fire. Careful use of these could cause
Aveh's artillery to hit a point you desire -- to clear the way, perhaps. Of
course, doing so improperly could draw fire... or attention from Aveh's
soldiers.
+Dungeon Conditions: Treasure, Injure, Stupify++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
<Pose Tracker> Cassidy Cain has posed.
Giving me your explosives. Now I know you really trust me.
"Dinnae get too ahead of yourself, luv. I want that back."
With Morgan's help, Cassidy is hauled inside the surprisingly roomy carriage. Sliding her back down a decimated wall, she takes a huge breath of relief, and while everyone else gets to work and does the heavy lifting for a change, the blonde woman finds her last cigarette, staring at it morosely.
"I need tae resupply," she tells everyone else in the vehicle, apropos of nothing.
Slipping it between her lips, she fishes out her lighter to strike the flint, drawing a deep inhale from it and letting smoke curl up from the corners of her mouth as she tilts her head back. Her hand falls on her torso, where she had been shot; blood wells between her fingers, seeping through the bandages hidden underneath her tattered shirt. The bullet that took down her horse, however, is strangely visible.
A fingernail dips down to work the slug off her corset-vest. Through ruined leather, bits of steel could be glimpsed, sandwiched between layers. The thing has saved her life more times than she could count, and she chalks this up as one of those moments.
The woman takes for a living. Lies for a living. And she survives because she cheats.
Tossing the bullet out the open doorway, she rolls her head sideways and blinks. Rolling on her hip, a hand reaches out to snatch something from the sands, when unforgiving wheels roll over a corpse and burying it further to be forgotten by the dunes of Aveh. Hitching herself back up, she scrutinizes the tubes she has retrieved in passing as their carriage continues its wild, reckless path through the battlefront. The big letters spelling 'ARTILLERY' are reflected in her green, gold-flecked eyes.
"Huh. Think we could use these?" she wonders, waving the tubes within both sets of fingers.
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
"We can always use an artillery strike..." Morgan's reply is quick as he notes the words scrawled across the casing she's found. There is a wicked grin as he looks towards her, though there is concern in his eyes as he sees all the blood.
He's bleeding himself. Most of them all. Some of the Black Ties are worse than bleeding.
The fact that he wasn't given the rope? Doesn't suprise the fox in the least. The offer was genuine, but the Black Ties are by nature insular. One of their number is hurt. Its time to close ranks and make sure they don't get hurt worse. He understands.
So he concentrates on Cassidy and Jude then. And Cassidy finds a packet of Heal Berries slipped towards her in exchange for one of the flares.
"Nice vest." He adds with a smirk towards her. The bullet-resistant clothes are nice things to have. They save your life.
"Think we can convince them to clear a path for us?" He asks of Jude and Kent as he sets one of the tubes up to aim ahead of them.
To pave the road so to speak. All it'll take it the right timing.
DG: Morgan Newkirk has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Artillery Flare.
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.
Jude makes his way back, calm as can be. Giving an encouraging little pat to Ribaldy's shoulder as he goes, the sound of his well-abused shoes hitting the wagon flooring announces his return almost as well as the sound of a heavy thud and jingle of metal as that bandolier drops beside one Cassidy Cain.
"Couldn't find a way to get off the wagon with it before you got back," is his explanation for its timely return, before he sets the leather bag Parbody had offered him before beside the thief to give herself whatever aid she sees fit. He peers at that leather vest a moment before just flopping into the first available seat, all boneless, dead weight as he fishes for his cigarette case.
"I'd act surprised," he notes of the vest, "but I don't want to sound disingenuous."
Really.
Calm, amber eyes slide their way over to the Black Ties, lingering a moment on Kent as that cigarette settles between his lips. He lights it, wordlessly, his face that blank sort of flatness that one expects to see from someone on the verge of taking a nap. Amber eyes roll towards the scorched and tattered and ruined roof above him, looking somewhere far away.
"--Huh?" is the first thing he utters when he is torn from his reverie by Morgan and Cassidy's words. He looks down towards those tubes, brows lifting a fraction of an inch. "--Huh," he echoes, more realization than question. He considers as heat whittles down his stick of tobacco into so many embers.
"They might as well do -something- for us, right?"
And with that, the redhead removes his cigarette briefly to loose a brief, sharp, whistle. It takes a handful of seconds before Jacob, glinting in the battlefield's hazy light, emerges through one of the (many) holes of their transportation; Jude cocks his head Cassidy's way. "She's got a job for you, Jake," is all he says -- before the automaton just lands on the blonde's shoulder, waiting to accept one -- or any number -- of those tubes as she would like to offer.
Yes. Jacob is going to help coordinate an artillery strike.
It's the 5th century. Birds can do -anything- these days.
DG: Jude Moshe has used his Tool Jacob toward his party's challenge, Artillery Flare.
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
Kent Hauch knows what he's doing with the horses up there. Back when he was a Suit, his jobs were mostly the ones Ribaldy does now: important but boring technical tasks. He's ran horses in front of the lead wagon for years, and his comfort and relaxation speaks to that.
He puffs cigar smoke as Morgan comes up front, squinting down. "Flares, eh," he mutters, familiar with the equipment. He pulls out the flare gun from where Ribaldy left it - which is to say, where it belongs - and squints down the barrel. He digs out a spare flare from below the board as well, snatching the artillery flare from Morgan and squinting at them both. "Arright."
He tosses the reins to Morgan abruptly as he takes the Black Tie flare in both hands, removing the cap off the bottom with a little pop, pouring some powder off the side of the wagon before replacing it. He slots it into the flare gun, fiddles with it, and fires off to the side without looking. The flare that soars out is dim and fitful. "Right," he says, dropping the flare gun at his feet, where it doesn't go. "A disregard signal," he mutters. "Now the rest o' th' gang won't get confused by the other ones." He grabs the reins back, ending Morgan's brief brush with horse divinity.
Parbody's masked face tilts slightly as Jude brings the medical bag to Cassidy. She makes another note.
The small fire goes out, Fargo consuming the last of its heat. His skin remains patchy, but he's slowly mastering himself. He rustles until he gets one arm out of the blankets, tapping on Ribaldy's rubbing arms like a man submitting to a wrestling hold. He quietly rises, hat gone, white suit stained with sand, dirt, and blood, moving to Cassidy's side, crouching next to Jude.
He holds up one hand, heat blooming through his skin, pooling in his fingertips like a branding iron. "Is the bleeding bad?" is all he asks.
They say when Xantia ripped his chest open with... whatever she did, he cauterized the wound with his own hands. It seems it is a service he freely offers. Afterward, there is a cough from Parbody's direction. She gives Fargo a long look before gesturing with her pencil toward the medical bag.
"Ah."
DG: Kent Hauch has contributed a Wits Basic Action toward his party's challenge, Artillery Flare.
DG: The party led by Kent Hauch has passed this challenge! The party gained 20 exploration! If anyone needs to use party management commands, do so now. Otherwise, the next round's GM may begin the next round with +dungeon/draw.
<Pose Tracker> Cassidy Cain has posed.
Nice vest.
After a glance down at the leather affair and a hint of what's underneath, there's a low chuckle from the conwoman, lungs expanding at another inhale from her cigarette. A hand does lift, however, to pull her jacket closed over it. "Like I told a strange lad with blue eyes verra recently," she murmurs, lashes falling low. "It's nae any fun if anyone forces me tae spill all my secrets."
The Heal Berry packets pushed towards her, however, softens her demeanor - it isn't anything overt, touching lightly around the eyes and the way her pliant mouth takes a turn for the wry. There's a long, inscrutable look directed at the Beastman's way - long enough for Morgan to know what she's probably thinking, considering their vicious row just a few nights ago, before unwrapping one and taking a bite.
Heavy footfalls follow at that, her bandolier returned and a honeyed brow perking upwards when Jude returns to the interior. "Got tae be quicker than that," she tells him with a smile, just before Parbody's kit makes its way to her too. There's a glance at it, and then at the redhaired reporter. "Alright, then?" Though he seems to have seen to his injuries already. Picking up the satchel, she rifles through it until she finds what she needs, taking a set of hypodermic needles and their painkillers before slipping them in the inner pocket of her outerwear. Then, she gives the rest to Morgan wordlessly, without looking at him.
I'd act surprised, Jude Moshe remarks. But I don't want to sound disingenuous.
She rolls her head back, letting loose a tired laugh. "Tae think I thought you only kept me around because of my good looks," she retorts, emerald gaze glimmering with mirth before a piercing whistle calls Jacob to her shoulder. "Hey, Jake," she murmurs, pinky finger moving to scritch lightly under the bird's beak, nevermind that it isn't actually alive. "Think I speak for some of us when I say that I'm verra glad you've nae tried tae ditch our slow, sorry arses yet. Could have just flown off tae greener pastures, but nae. Stuck here with the rest of us. Dinnae tell me you're in love." After a moment, she hooks one of the tubes in the automaton's talons. "I mean...Morgan's taken thirteen times over."
She hefts the bird up.
"Have them drop a few of their bombs for us, then. That's a good luv."
With that, she sends the bird off. Fingers lift, to toy absently on the string of bloodstained pearls twined around her neck, underneath her collar; a thumb flicks lightly on a single bead as she watches the afternoon sun glint off of metallic plumage. She observes Jacob's progress just as another person joins the fray, and when the blonde turns, she finds the familiar face of Fargo Foobach.
"Fargo," she greets. "You're looking better than the last time I saw you, dinnae think we had a mutual acquaintance." Meaning Kent. There's a glance towards the glowing hand, inclining her head at it in casual observance. The smile inching higher, she shakes her head. "Think your comrade's got that covered, as she said. Handy trick, that. How long did it take you tae learn it?"
Somewhere in front of Ribaldy, the glinting form of Jacob vanishes into the distance. Soon after, fire falls from the sky, utterly annihilating whatever blocks their egress out of the war front.
<CARD>
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++<* The Battle Front *>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++++++++<* CHALLENGE - The Shattered Landship *>++++++++++++++++++++
|Type: Final |Dungeon Ability: Brute |Challenge Rating: 2 |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++--< Challenge Information: >+++++++++++++++++++++++++--
The Golem Sado has dominated the battlefield in the distance. A fully armed
and operation Golem is a terror to behold, and the violet, snake-like
machine towers over the battlefield. Gears lay scattered and shattered
around it, and periodically, a beam of energy lances across the ground and
burns something from existence. That happens now, as a land battleship from
Aveh hurls through the air.
It has been blasted through and burnt -- and it smashes into the very ground before you. It shatters apart into so much debris, and makes a huge mountain of fiery wreckage. You cannot possibly clear it.
But you must climb, hack, and cut your way through -- because on the other
side is a final escape from the battlefield.
+Dungeon Conditions: Wound++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
Right. So. There are now reins thrust at him, and the fox takes them like he actually knows what he's doing. Which he does not really. At all. I mean he's ridden horses before. But a wagon is a different beast. A wagon hurling pell-mell though a warzone is an even larger and more grusome beast.
HOW DOES ONE HORSE DAMMIT?!
All this goes though his minds in the few moments he holds the reins and watches Kent make his own flare. "...I'm not sure they work like th--"
Then Kent is firing said flare.
Which backfires due to the loose black power. The blowback possibily marking fox and firebrand with even more charcol and bits of flare gun.
"-- right. Nevermind." He says as he just hands the reins back to Kent as he turns to stroll back towards Cassidy. "Who did you marry me off ta this time, woman?" He asks as he takes the kit. Popping a few painkillers and knocking it back with the flask that was returned to him earlier. The fox having plucked it out of the air and made it dissipear so fast that it was almost magic.
Of course knowing what Cassidy knows, it might have been.
A nod towards Fargo and a smirk. "Damn impressive." He adds towards the well dressed man before he frowns at something in the distance.
"Y'all seein this..." He calls as he points in the distance and one of Aveh's battleships turns broadside to the Golem. The massive guns rotate, the ship slowing as its brave captain attempts to dismantle Kislev's secret weapon.
The big guns on the battleship roar. The ship itself skitters to the left from the recoil of those weapons. It doesn't let up either, round after round flying from barrels turning red-hot as the shells fly.
The rippling barrage comes to a standstill. The unbelieveable display of miliary might almost awe-inspiraing to behold. The best that Aveh has to offer. The tip of its military spear.
Smoke wreathes the Golem, dust kicked up by dozens of shells big as Gears. A pair of pinpricks of red light cut though the dust as the shadow of the ancient war machine moves. Turning with an inextorable slowness towards the beings that dare to fire upon it.
The dust parts to reveal the Golem unscathed. The superstructure showing at best cosmetic damage.
The battleship resumes the rolling barrage but the Goelms advance is unstoppable. That terrifing violet visage moving ever closer to the battleship.
Its tail cuts though the smoke to send the entire massive sandship spinning as if it was a child's toy that the Golem has grown bored with.
The ship upends as the energy beam fro the deadly thing lances into its side. Superstructure crumples. Seconddary explosions rip though it.
The Golem isn't done.
Again the tail slams out sending the burning ship flying though the air like so much kindling. Morgan's eyes widen as he notes the trejectry.
With a groan louder than belief it flies over their heads. Slamming down into the sand before spinning like a top. The keel snaps in two, the lion's share of the ship spinning out into the sands but the back third of the ship crashing in a burning pile of scrap right in their path.
No time or way to go around...so...
"SHARPE! USE THE BIG ONE! Aim high! Collapse the damn thing and give us a ramp!"
The Gear-based rifle speaks again, though the fire at first is slow and innacurate. Morgan's support team distracted by the unbridled power just on display.
They do get more and more accurate as time goes on though. Dozens of rounds slamming home. The hull plating giving way under the assault to offer Kent and his wagons two ways across.
Over, via a sloaping ramp of scrap metal that used to be a gun turret. Or though the belly of the beast itself as part of the hull falls away to reveal the cavernous bay that once helped the loading and unloading of gears. The way dark, filled with wreckage and sparking wires.
DG: Morgan Newkirk has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward his party's challenge, The Shattered Landship.
<Pose Tracker> Jude Moshe has posed.
Well.
None of any of that is good.
It's like watching giants of legend fight. In fact, it literally is -- a piece of antiquity ripped from the history books, tearing asunder the war machines of now as if they amounted to little more than paper mache. Paper mache that shrieks like death when it crumbles inward, metal grinding along metal grinding along metal as an entire warship of Aveh goes toppling skyward. It less looks like it's flying than just falling, in reverse, like gravity had suddenly reversed for the entire structure in a fit of pique.
And in the fact of it all, Jude Moshe, quite eloquently, summarizes with his cigarette hanging limp between his lips:
"Fuck me."
The note taking of Parbody is forgotten for now. The words of Fargo fall away. Now, Jude, simple country reporter, just utters another put-upon curse under his breath and shakes his head before unslinging that ARM of his. The chamber spins. He leaps, grapping onto the heated ruins of the roof above him. He ignores how the excessive, venting heat burns his fingers as he drags himself up over the edge, teeth gritting along his cigarette, eyes squinting against the wind and the fury and the NOISE that rattles its way right down to his teeth.
The ARM whines. High pitched and accelerating until it is just a piercing drone just audible enough to the ears to truly irritate with the warning signs of danger. Magical energy sparks and sputters, penting up into the barrel as it glows an increasingly brighter shade of yellow-bled orange to match the ebb of the runes thrumming along the shotgun. He ignores the pain straining at his midsection. He aims.
And fires, one massive burst of demolition power from the churning barrel, to drive straight into the heart of that obsolete thing that was once a gear of war.
DG: Jude Moshe has used his Tool Demolition Shell toward his party's challenge, The Shattered Landship.
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
Fargo's fingers return to normal, and he closes his hand. "You, meanwhile, seem to have run afoul of some difficult road," he says with some irony, pushing back to his feet. Cassidy has likely read enough of Fargo to know not to expect an excuse, or some justification, or an apology for deception by omission. No glances toward Kent or any other Ties. He simply responds: "We are unpopular in Lacour. We have given them ample cause." The King. The Spirit Stone, though the latter isn't something the kingdom has been in a particular hurry to announce.
He remains damnably coy on the topic of his art. There is an extended moment where both Parbody and the brawny Jacket are staring at him until the latter walks over, bumping him aside with her shoulder. "Go have a seat or something," she sighs, crouching down and opening the medical bag to get to work on her stopped bullet wound.
Kent curses. The Black Ties flares can be tempermental, and Samuelh is liable to beat the ass of anyone (other than Kent) who adjusts them past his specifications. Fortunately, the flare still works, so the Ties don't go haring off in random directions. The gun looks bent and charred. Unconcerned about the soot splashed across his face, he tosses it over his shoulder to Ribaldy.
Ribaldy catches it in both hands, looks down at it, and deflates. "Awwww, maaaannnn."
Kent Hauch glances at the incredible battle between landship and Golem, the absolute clash of military might, and grunts at it before putting his eyes forward again. It's not that he's not impressed - looking at it seems to be making him angry, reminding him that in the grand scale of things he's still quite low on the totem pole. He lashes at the reins, the vein standing out in the side of his head.
The incredible impact of tail on ship does get his attention. He cranes his neck to watch it sail, the vain bulging, sweat standing out on his bald head. While Black Ties in wagons behind them cheer and hoot at the incredible destruction, for Kent Hauch and the others with them, it's a much more immediate problem.
"Bloody fuck slag that to shit, hell!" His analytical mind keenly summarizes the issue. When Morgan shouts 'ramp', Kent's instincts fire off, and he starts barking orders. "Ribaldy, reins!" He tosses the reins down, standing up and stepping forward onto the carriage front, taking a moment to balance himself. "Samuelh, rocks!" Kent pulls Red River and elbows his tank, popping it open as he starts to inch along the scrap-reinforced wooden brace between the wagon's columns of horses. Parbody stands, crisply stows her ledger, and pushes the wooden slat she was sitting on aside to reveal her bench was in fact a big wooden bin full of stones of various sizes. She grunts, Samuelh moving to help her push the bin toward the front of the carriage.
"Everyone else FOOKIN' HANG ONTO SOMETHIN' AND PRAY THE BLOODY SCRAP DOES ITS JOB!" Kent stands at the precipice as Morgan and Jude unleash at the wreck, knocking down the turret. His ash grey longcoat flaps behind him as he wipes sweat off the top of his head with a burned hand. Smoke streams from the cigar he still has clamped in his teeth.
Samuelh's throwing arm has amazing accuracy even in outlandish conditions, trained first by years of carnie stunts and then by years of crime. Parbody acts as a go-between, handing him rocks that he then arcs into Kent's open tank with a shockingly high success rate, given.
The gang leader toggles several things on his gun. The barrel extends foward and opens into a wide nozzle. The dull glow from within the tank brightens as Kent overrides the lid safety, a violent heat haze rising as it resumes melting the rocks within. They aim for the ramp as Kent Hauch aims and closes one eye.
ARM Synchronization ticks up.
Lava pours out ahead of them in a worryingly short arc, hardening to tephra as it mortars in gaps in their ramp in a manner that doesn't seem... particularly possible at this speed, but both technology and science are magical mysteries. Kent is roaring obscenities at the lava, at the ramp, at the Golem, a few times at Samuelh when he misses and clocks him in the back of the head.
DG: Kent Hauch has contributed a Brute Basic Action toward his party's challenge, The Shattered Landship.
<Pose Tracker> Cassidy Cain has posed.
There is absolutely no indication that any lie, omitted or otherwise, bothers her. Rather, the utterance and observation that Fargo provides has the blonde inclining her head at him, her smile indicative of that perpetual good humor. "Need nae explanation, luv," she tells him. "S'pose it was time for our fortunes tae reverse."
With Fargo moving away, there's a single blink. At the apocalyptic sounds of something absolutely horrific going on in the horizon, Cassidy drags herself off the floor of the carriage to move towards the window across the way. Pushing her head out into open air, she gawks at the distant sight of the Golem laying to waste...well. Everything. Including those in the air. Her virid stare tracks the large airship as it leaves a devastating, burning streak in the sky, roaring over their heads; a dying dragon made out of steel and steam, threatening to unleash untold destruction wherever it decides to land.
And it does land. Right in their path. The high-pitched whine and scream of metal pierce the air as the entire construct just slams several feet before them, forcing carriage wheels to rattle. As she stares, her cigarette dangles limply from between her lips.
Jude is already moving; she turns her head to watch him half-dangle from the roof as he fires. She whips her head forward at Morgan shouting in his com. Something about a ramp.
"Bloody hell," she breathes. She reaches out to grab her bandolier of grenades, and arms every single one. And because she's already done this to him before, she tosses the thing to Morgan, who is a little ahead of her in the carriage.
"You've got the better arm!" she explains to the Beastman as all the grenades tick their readiness to explode in his hands. It may not look like she is paying attention, but she hears Kent barking his orders from the front - she already knows what he is preparing for, considering what Morgan had just asked Sharpe and Brig to do.
Everyone else FOOKIN' HANG ONTO SOMETHIN' AND PRAY THE BLOODY SCRAP DOES ITS JOB!
"Bloody hell!" Cassidy repeats again. Moving once more, both hands come up; the first thing she does is grab Jude's ankles from the roof and with a heave, drags him back down into the carriage - he was taller, and heavier, but hers is a strength born out of desperation. The second thing she does is look around for seatbelts.
There aren't any.
"BLOODY HELL!"
There's nothing left for it. She finds a corner, a leg bracing on one seat and pushing her up against the wedge as securely as she can. Her heart is in her throat and molten heat returns to her eyes, blazing underneath her lashes. Adrenaline courses through the open channels of her veins as her chest rises and falls rapidly, straining through her bandages. Every breath feels like a javelin of fire lancing through her ribs.
Either they fly, or they die.
She laughs, the sound of it carrying. She can't help it. She keeps coming back here, and she never gets tired of it.
DG: Cassidy Cain has used her Tool Heavy Grenade toward her party's challenge, The Shattered Landship.
DG: You have overcome the dungeon's trials! This run is a success!
DG: The party led by Kent Hauch has successfully explored The Battle Front!
<CARD>
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++<* The Battle Front *>+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
++++++++++++++++++++++++<* CHALLENGE - The Lucky Find *>++++++++++++++++++++++++
|Type: Discovery |Dungeon Ability: Conclusion|Challenge Rating: 1 |
+++++++++++++++++++++++++--< Challenge Information: >+++++++++++++++++++++++++--
As you tear your way through the battleship, you come to a room that has not
been shattered. The hangar is damaged and burnt, but a small number of Gears
sit here. They are largely unharmed -- though unarmed, and they will need
some repairs before they could be used in combat. However, the engines are
active, and you could use these to force your way out.
OOC: Congratulations! You may each do some +request work to repair these
Gears and make them serviceable for a fight, if you wish.
+Dungeon Conditions: Treasure+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
<Pose Tracker> Morgan Newkirk has posed.
They are going to fly a wagon.
They are totally going to fly a wagon.
Shells crash into the side of the ship. Lava. Gear rounds. Jude's massive demo blast. They all combine into a explosive cocktail that melts even the mighty ships armor.
Which is an impressive feat. Even for the gathered group.
Morgan reaches back to fling those grenades...riiiiiiiight when they hit a bumb...
...and they go flying up in the air as the fox looses his grip on the bandoleer. Up and up they go before arcing downward and...into Kent's ammo hopper.
Morgan just blinks for a moment before he shrugs. "I'm sure that helped."
Then he's holding on for dear life. Bracing against the side of the wagon. One hand reaching up to brace against whats left of the roof as they barrel towards the ramp.
...a ramp that is partly made of hardened lava.
The horses squeel in protest of the sudden heat though Ribaldy keeps them moving at break-neck speed towards the objective. The wagon's wheels though? Yeah those burst right into flame. Licking at the occupants. lending a hellish air to the already hellish outside.
"HERE WE GO!" Shouts the fox with unrestrained glee in his tone as he laughs, feeling that unmistakeable pull as they leave the confines of the ground.
The end of the ramp looms up and then they are over. Sailing into the sky.
The foxes laughter is slightly unhinged, but entirely unfeigned.
He is having the time of his life.
The horses. The wagon. Its occupents. All hang there for a moment at the apex of that jump for a split second before gravity once more makes its foul influence known.
The horses start to scream as they nose over. Some of the occupants might too. After all no one knew what was on the other side.
Whats on the other side seems to be some kind of slope though. The underside of the armored hull. Still smooth enough to catch them...
The problem being the precariousness of their perches of course. Morgan near one of the open sides, Jude up top, Kent in the front, even Cassidy braced as she was...well...the wagon itself isn't that stable.
The impact of the landing is tremendous. The weight of the vehicle coming down sending a suprised looking Morgan flying off one side and into a massive hole that the wagon just missed in the superstructure of the ship.
The wagon wheels are still on a little bit of fire.
But its fine. I'm sure its fine.
Morgan's laughter can be heard from that hole he dissipeared into. Echoing up, so either the Fox is fine or seriously concussed.
Possibily both.
"HEY I FOUND A HANGER!"
...oh yeah he's fine.
<Pose Tracker> Kent Hauch has posed.
As the wagon manages to take off, Kent's roaring laughter cuts out over everything: the cheers of the Black Ties, the shrieking of the horses, the sounds of the battlefield. He stands with his arms spread, bellowing with laughter, lava dripping from the nozzle of his gun.
One touches a strap of leather a horse is attached to, snapping it. The horse shifts out of line, putting stress on the wooden brace below Kent. It cracks, snaps, and shatters under the combined weight of the gang leader and his huge weapon. (Fortunately, the escapade causes the lid to slam shut after the grenades fall in. They detonate with a loud thud, but Red River is built VERY sturdy.)
The shattering brace frees the Black Tie horses. By some miracle, they manage to land on the incline and scatter down the ramp. "Kent!" shouts Samuelh, in a position to see Kent drop down into the landship beneath them through the ravaged carriage cover.
The carriage hits the ramp, skidding wildly, splinters throwing off the wheels at it bucks and swerves down the ramp, shaking the occupants around viciously. It makes it all the way to the bottom before the wheels on its left crack and shatter, the vehicle slowly tipping over, Ribaldy diving clear and immediately sprinting back toward the ship.
Kent Hauch vanishes into the ship, down a separate hole from Morgan, grunting as he caroms off a wall and slides down a tilted hallway into a blown open door.
Air rushes out of his lungs as he lands tank-first in the open palm of another fallen Gear. His vision swims, but he takes it in, another mad grin cutting across his face.
"Right of seizure, Yugh," he mutters, shakily pushing up to his feet, checking on the Medium in his coat. He holds it up in front of him, side-by-side with the Gear's face, a single optic glowing a dull red.