[color=dodgerblue][h3]Storm Front Hazan and Serena Virmire[/h3][/color] Serena slowly made her way over to the fallen turrets, bitching the entire way. [color=hotpink]"Stupid fucking jungle. Stupid fucking storm. Stupid fucking crappy machinery that we should've had insured."[/color] She continued like this till she reached the first turret, complete crushed under the tree. [color=hotpink]"Damn it. Haze, one turret is completely destroyed. I don't know the status of the other one...wait. It's coming back online. Seems to be functional enough. Detecting and assigning targets now. Thank God for small victories ri-OH SHIT!"[/color] Serena dove to the side, smacking into the ground behind the tree as bullets screamed in the air above her, fired from the turret. [color=hotpink]"Haze! Don't approach! It thinks everything is it's enemy! Do not approach it will shoot at you!"[/color] She glanced at her readings. [color=hotpink]"Fucking piece of shit. Knew I should've looked it over first."[/color] [color=dodgerblue]"Oh [i]spirits[/i]."[/color] Hazan trudged up the hill behind Serena. Through the torrent of rain, he saw the sparking, crushed metal of the turret underneath the tree. But just as she rattled off its functional status, it was broken by the second turret. Damaged and malfunctioning, it fired at first her, then him. Bullets screamed through the air as he hit the dirt right next to Serena. Dimly, he was aware of the downpour on top of him as he scooted up against the tree. "Well fuck us sideways, huh? Fucking storm!" [color=hotpink]"Kinky Haze. Very kinky."[/color] Serena couldn't help but chuckle, even as she scowled at her readouts. He reached down and grabbed for his pistol. The Predator unfolded and beeped to life as he slapped a mod cartridge onto its side. Its lights flared a bright blue as a lightning bolt appeared in hold above the grip. "I could disrupt the damn thing so we can take it down without damaging it [b]too[/b] much! Swing right, I'll distract it on your count!" [color=hotpink]"Oh so [i]I'm[/i] the bait. How chivalrous of you."[/color] Serena grumbled, a barrier and her sentinel armor coming to life around her. [color=hotpink]"On one. 3...2......1!"[/color] She leapt out from behind trunk, cursing her luck as the turret whirred to life again and began to open fire. In a few seconds she was behind another tree, getting away with only a few pings off her armor and shield. As soon as Serena left the safety of their log, Hazan rolled out from behind it and aimed right at the sentry. It beeped and swung towards him as he pulled the trigger twice. Two bright blue sparking bolts shot straight towards it and impacted its frontal armour. Bright bolts arced over its armour as the Disruptor rounds shorted its circuits. The turret stiffened, giving a metallic shriek as gears seized up and ground against one another, before it finally collapsed and shut down. [color=hotpink]"There we go!" Serena called out from behind her tree. "I don't know what we can salvage, but it's definitely shut down."[/color] Nonetheless, she cautiously poked her head around first, awaiting the first sign of it starting to come back to life. Not seeing any, she quickly made her way over to the turret, her omi-tool taking on the form of a screw driver. [color=hotpink]"Can't work in this fucking rain."[/color] A barrier swelled around her, stopping the heavy pitter patter of rain from hitting her, and muting the storms fury. [color=hotpink]"Better."[/color] With that, she undid the turrets back plate to begin fixing the insides. [color=dodgerblue]"Hopefully those bolts didn't do too much damage. I'll try to set up a place with my tarp to get us some shelter from the rain. See if that helps."[/color] Hazan stowed his Disruptor mod and returned his handgun to his hip. The turret being tended to by Serena lent him some calm. But he hoped that the gunshots hadn't traveled over the torrential downpour and alerted someone down below. That said, he scrabbled around in the dirt for a second before locating his camoflage tarp. While Serena worked on the turret, he fixed up a makeshift tent out of the nearby trees and fallen branches. By the time the two were finished, the Turian had strung up his tarp over some tall branches and on the few trees nearby. The rain pattered noisily on the canvas and flowed in torrents off the fabric, but underneath it was mostly dry. [i]Back at the Smuggler Camp.[/i] "Hey, didja hear that?" The gunfire was a whole lot louder than the pouring rain that pattered across the base. Of course, muffled shots coming from a cliffside was extremely suspicious, which attracted the attention of a couple of smugglers relaxing in the nearby shed. 'Yeah I did. Sounded like gunfire." "On the cliff?" "Yeah man." "Shit, you think it might be those other guys?" "What, our competition?" "Competition, Alliance, Turians, Asari Commandos, doesn't matter. Whoever it is isn't supposed to be there." "I'll call it in." The smuggler pulled a radio out. "Hey, command? This is Steve. We've got a problem. Yeah, we heard gunfire on the Happy Cliffs. Yeah, those cliffs. A patrol squad is already nearby? Sweet! I mean, sucks for them in this rain, but that's good for us! Thanks command." His companion gave him a confused look. "Happy Cliffs?" "Right, right, you weren't here for that. Some damn junkie Turian would always say he was going to his Happy Place, then run up there and shoot up. Went up there so often we started calling it Happy Cliffs. After he got so high he fell off to his death the name stuck." He took another drag on his cigarette . "People like to die on those cliffs." .......... Serena slammed the back plate shut with satisfaction, activating the turret once more. It beeped and resumed it's scanning, recognizing Serena and Haze as friendlies now. "There! Fixed it!" She shut down her barrier, quickly scrambling over to where the turian was. [color=hotpink]"This works. Not a five star hotel, but this works. Thank you, oh jungle survival expert."[/color] She grinned mischeviously at Haze. [color=hotpink]"You know, to pass the time, I [i]do[/i] have a holographic chess set..."[/color] Her omni-tool suddenly beeped again, before Haze could reply. [color=hotpink]"What [i]now.[/i]"[/color] She complained, bringing up the view. Serena froze, eyes widening in surprise and slight panic at the two readings on it. [color=hotpink] "Uh...Haze? We've got incoming. Too big a group to be Iosif, Tanya, and Vellios coming back. Fuck. I think they heard the gunfire. In addition to that problem, I think Tonka is compromised. His readouts are all sorts of adrenaline fueled and his shields are too low. We need to deal with these people and then see what we can do for him. Luckily I don't think they know where we-"[/color] Her speculation was suddenly cut off as the turret exploded. [color=hotpink]"Are."[/color] She finished miserably, drawing her pistol.