[center][h3]Vandelay Campus - Research and Development[/h3]
[b]Location:[/b] Midgar Sector 06, the City of Glass
Midna’s [@DracoLunaris], Geralt’s [@Multi_Media_Man], Tora
[b]Word Count:[/b] 3334 (+4)
[/center]

[hider=New Strength for Geralt] Monstrous Physique- The inhuman strength of the Orphan of Kos has suffused into Geralt, improving his already-impressive physical strength to levels far beyond human. This also improves his physical durability, allowing him to withstand more punishment.[/hider]

Those who decided to venture to Vandelay’s Research and Development division were in for a surprise when Sandalphon informed them where they’d be headed. “Your destination is the volcano situated in the rear of Vandelay Campus, the angel explained. “The R&D division exists beneath it, using the heat of its magma for geothermal energy, as well as its proximity to the plate’s underside and Deep-Paris to its advantage. DespoRHado’s troops are accessing it via the Employee Express, and I suggest you do the same. Oh, and for the duration of this op, hail me using callsign Halo. I will hail your team using callsign Phalanx.”

Following her directions and the trail of destruction left by their cyborg precursors, the trio set off. Even without Poppi to help him, Tora could bounce along at a decent clip, and the possibility of augmenting his quest to recover his companion with Vandelay’s finest tech gave him enough hope to stave off despair. Driven by the thought of seeing Poppi’s smile once more, he forged ahead alongside Midna and Geralt through a belt of structures somewhere between Vandelay’s public-facing front and its purely industrial facilities. These turned out to be primarily residential areas, not for the minority of human personnel who commuted to the campus, but for its robotic workers. They encountered VA-SER, TEC, PGR, and OL units, as well as diminutive SCR-UB, CAR-11E, and O5-KARs. Such machines might not need to sleep, but they did need to recharge, and these motel-esque power stations provided just the place to do so. Of course, being robots they received accommodations much, much smaller and meaner than any hotel might possibly consider offering, barely more than cubbies, and being non-combat robots they’d put up no fight at all when DespoRHado tore through the place. The whole area was in crisis mode, with panicked SCR-UBs and CAR-11Es flailing their arms as they rolled around in circles. That made getting through to the nearby on-site subway station easy, at least, and after descending to the platform the trio found that a train had just arrived.

They also found the DespoRHado rear-guard. Hulking and gorilla-like, the [url=https://i.imgur.com/aql5E9D.png]robots[/url] had been too big to board the Express themselves, so they remained behind to destroy any Vandelay robots attempting to use it themselves. When they spotted the newcomers, the three Unmanned Gears turned on them, their eyes glowing as they released mechanical roars.

“Mastiffs,” Sandalphon’s voice announced. The angel routed her communication line through the magically-attuned Midna, and came through with just a slight, almost melodic echo. “I do not have authority over these units. They wield brute strength, agility, and hidden arm-cannons. You are clear to engage.” If the Seekers wanted to reach R&D, they’d need to get through these things first.
[color=Aquamarine]”Good, I need a warm up anyway“[/color] Midna boasted, before declaring [color=Aquamarine]”I’ll take the one on the left“[/color] and then racing to do just that. 

“Then I’ll go right. Tora, can you handle the middle one?” Geralt asked, not unkindly, but also without the tinge of pity the Nopon might be fearing. If he needed a hand, they’d be happy to provide it, but if not, there was no point in putting the extra focus on their friend when they could instead put it on their enemy. Regardless of the answer, he drew steel and cast Quen to protect himself, moving towards his chosen foe.

Tora gawked up at the giant Unmanned Gear, approximately five times his size, with nothing but a medieval hammer to his name. “Mehhhhh…”

As Midna’s wolfos charged forwards, the princess quickly shifted so that both her feet were on its back, and then right before they came close to the brute bot, leapt off of it and into the air. While her steed switched to entirely focusing on evasion, the princess grabbed the massive tree spear she was carrying in both hands, and used it to deliver several swift downwards thrust, glinting from both the charge she had pumped into it crackling as she struck, before slamming a shadowfist downwards to finish her combo. A respectable burst of damage, but these Mastiffs were tough as nails. Planting its back foot, the unit attempted to clamp its arms around Midna’s shadowfist in order to grapple her and pull her in for a pounding.

Knowing about the hidden arm-cannon in advance was very helpful, given that the one he went after raised one of its arms and launched a grenade at Geralt, who was able to quickly pivot around it, avoiding a direct hit and leaving the projectile to detonate behind him as he rushed in. The Mastiff responded with a roar and a downward punch, which Geralt deflected with the flat of his sword before lifting it up and along the machine’s side, scoring the metal but not doing much damage without the time to build up any momentum. The Mastiff replied with a backhanded swipe from its heavy arm, more to ward the Witcher off than anything. It leaped backward out of range, launched a pair of hastily-aimed grenades, then barreled forward to pull off a spectacular dropkick.

Tora, meanwhile, was suffering. Once it registered the tiny, ovoid creature in front of it as a threat, the Mastiff went to town, repeatedly punching and slamming to ground to try and squash him. Having been a steadfast defender for so long, Tora tried to block the attacks on instinct, but even if his hammer were suited to the task he had no extra ether shielding to protect him. After eating a few hits, he focused on evasion instead, trying to dodge the Mastiff’s wallops in order to bludgeon it legs, but he was too slow and the robot just stepped away from him each time. Finally, Tora bounced into the air, leaping as high as he could to bring his hammer down on the Mastiff’s head. The hammer promptly flew from his grasp, leaving only a dent behind, and the Unmanned Gear grabbed Tora in its giant arms to squish him like a squeaky toy. “MEH-MEH-MEH!” he yelped as he struggled helplessly, his eyes bugging out on each squeeze.

[color=Aquamarine]”Vibrava! Initiates! Support Tora!“[/color] Minda shouted as she wrestled with the mech that had her by the shadow hand. To do so, she stabbed the spear forwards, and then held it there to use it as additional leverage to keep herself from being reeled in. Then she aimed to punish it for keeping her close by discharging the remaining voltage stored in her spear via a trio of rotating pillars of lighting, while also opening the shadow hand, and rapidly expanding a vollybomb into it. The magical explosive rapidly grew in size, seemingly harmless until its radius touched the floor below and everything inside was wracked with the resulting detonation. It did a number on the Mastiff, cracking its armor in enough places to send pieces flying, and its head in particular took enough damage to render its optics useless. When it staggered drunkenly to its feet it wildly swung what remained of its arms around, trying to swat Midna down before she could sting him again.

While she did that, her minions moved to aid Tora. The hooded initiates of the penumbra cult stepped away from all the fights, and then bowed down, planting their hands to the ground and sprouting psychic roots around the foe that was squeezing the life from Tora (a safer bet than the spears which would risk friendly fire) and repaying the immobilizing favor. Her Vibrava, meanwhile, buzzed around behind the robot, before threatening to swoop in to deliver an armor sundering crunch to the back of its head.

Unfortunately, the Mastiff’s design prevented that–stooped like a hulking gorilla, its head seemed to be completely obfuscated by its hunchback from behind. Sensing stronger opponents, however, it promptly hurled Tora at one of the initiates like a football, then unleashed hell with its arm cannons.

Geralt sidestepped away from the backhand, performed a pirouette to avoid the poorly-aimed grenades (the explosion from one sent some shrapnel into his back, but the Quen shield meant that Geralt barely felt anything), then lifted his sword into both hands to deflect the flying simian robot, knocking it ever so slightly off course and off-balance. He followed up with a heavy downward swing as the machine UG was getting up, gouging deeply into its arm and leaving the mechanical limb sparking. Lifting his blade, he thrusted forward as the Mastiff punched at him, moving closer to let the limb sail harmlessly past his side, a solid foot of his sword penetrating into the machine. Eyes narrowing, Geralt took advantage of this unexpectedly effective attack and withdrew his blade to quickly slam the pommel of his sword into the machine’s face before it could react. Rather than react with any sort of discombobulation, the Mastiff simply grabbed Geralt with both of his massive arms, though the grip on the damaged one was noticeably weaker. 

Having rolled to a stop nearby after his head-on collision with one of Midna’s Strikers, Tora picked himself up dazedly, then shook the stars from his eyes. If nothing else, the Nopon certainly possessed a hardy constitution, and being a chew toy for a Mastiff was nothing he couldn’t handle. When he got up, though he saw Geralt subjected to the same treatment  “Oh, no!” If Geralt got his back broken by a bear hug here, Tora’s mission would be that much closer to dead in the water. He mustered up all the heroic courage he could find, scooped up his hammer from where it had fallen, and charged toward Geralt. “Hold on friend, Tora is coming!” He lifted his weapon overhead, ready to bring its business down on the Mastiff’s foot with everything he had.

While the boys duked it out with their own gorilla bot, Midna and her minions found themselves occupied with the other two. For the one flailing around blindly, the princess drifted up into the air out of range of the targetless attacks, and then proceeded to summon and drop the massive steel ball on a stick that was her clubba-club right on top of it. 

Her Vibrava meanwhile had a bit more of an issue with its brute. Having failed to find a rear weak point it was at least at range when the grenade spam started, and the psychic roots restricted the ability to aim the shots at it. Still, one of the explosive shots managed to clip the dragon, causing a retaliatory darrage thorns shooting out of the pokemon and at the bot, dealing light damage.

What didn’t cause light damage was the mon retaliating by unleashing the power of the earth beneath the Mastiff, shattering concrete and sending geothermal energy raging up in a miniature [url=https://archives.bulbagarden.net/media/upload/e/ee/Earth_Power_VIII.png]volcanic eruption[/url] that unsteadied the machine as much as it buffeted it with geomental might. As it stumbled, the pokemon hammered it with blasts of dragon breath, tight beams of purple energy hammering the machine while making sure to keep out of range of those powerful arms.

The Mastiff stumbled when Tora’s hammer came down on its foot, and Geralt took advantage of the opportunity to draw the Sign of Aard between himself and it, the concentrated telekinetic blast launching the machine backwards. Geralt turned his head to his Nopon “rescuer” and nodded with a short, “Thanks, Tora,” much to Tora’s delight, before charging back in, steel sword finishing the job on its damaged arm as the UG regained its bearings. Following up with a spinning cut to the body, Geralt carved a furrow into its armor and blocked the punch it tried to counter with. 

Seeing the situation Midna and her Strikers were in, Geralt scrunched his face up and, after taking another heavy swing at the Mastiff and dealing far more damage than he felt he ought to against the armored machine, summoned the Judicator in the middle of the group, commanding it to launch its spectral fires at both other Mastiffs to distract and deal some minor damage to them.

Returning his focus to his enemy, Geralt stepped in, deflected a wild flailing punch, and strafed around the side of the machine while bathing it in a concentrated stream of fire from Igni, turning its metallic body cherry-red and ripe for a finishing strike.

Tora knew the limits of his strength -as well as his reach- but he also knew very well just how pliable hot metal can be. While Geralt kept himself one step ahead of the furious machine’s swings, Tora waddled in beneath the purview of its red-hot haymakers, took his hammer in both wings, and dealt a single well-placed smash against the outside of its left knee. Already softened up by the intense heat, the thin metal around the critical joint gave way, buckling in a way it shouldn’t beneath the Unmanned Gear’s weight. It reeled, attempting to stabilize itself as much as possible to counteract the instability before it fell, but Tora just kept hammering. “Meh-meh-MEH!” After two more blows his hammer blasted straight through, and the Mastiff began to fall. Unfortunately, it happened to fall directly toward him, and as the robot’s shadow enveloped him Tora gawped up at the smoldering heap metal. “Oh no!” Thinking quickly, he reached out his hammer toward the Witcher, hoping that he’d be able to snatch it and pull the attached Nopon to safety.

Tora’s hopes were met with results as Geralt yanked the Nopon out of the way of the collapsing Mastiff, and to ensure that their efforts were not in vain, his steel sword was brutally stabbed into the machine’s chest, tearing through the softened metal like a hot knife through butter, and he dragged it through the molten slag with ease, destroying vital components and shutting the Unmanned Gear down for good. “Good work. Now let’s see if Midna needs a hand or four.” 

They turned to her just in time to see a giant cyber-bear headbutt the final foe into a wall, before Midna and her vibrava unleashed earth power and vollybomb strikes on it in quick succession, blowing it to smithereens. 

She also had the audacity to be standing there with her arms casually folded while doing this.

The Mastiffs had been rather tough nuts to crack, but with the last one out of commission, the trio could finally board the monorail in peace. Tora waddled on and plopped down to rest for a moment, panting, as the monorail automatically pulled out of the station. This had been his first taste of combat since losing Poppi, and the reality of how much weaker he was -and how little help he could be- stung. He wanted nothing more than to stand between his allies and whatever might bar their way, fearlessly negating whatever they might throw at him, but now the others were the ones rescuing him. Twice. Even if he happened to be of some use during that skirmish, the negatives dwarfed the positives. His eyes fell on the hammer, laid down beside him on the ground. If not for Poppi’s unexpected aptitude at the batting cages, he wouldn’t even have this. It was a sobering reality.

Midna wasn't exactly blind to this reality either. She'd assumed the Nopon would have asked if he needed help, but given what she had just seen, it was time to be proactive. 

[color=Aquamarine]”So, I take it the shield you used to use was a Poppi thing? Do you need a replacement?"[/color] She asked, pulling out her green thorn shield out of a portal and offering it to him, before thinking and adding [color=Aquamarine]”or anything else? I've got all sorts of things sitting in the Twilight realm, and I'm pretty versatile in what I use, so it won't hurt to lend it out."[/color] 

Having said that, she swept a hand around the area, and summoned several crates she had used to store gear, offering up everything but the helmet, pauldrons, mimic tooth necklace and rosary she was wearing.

[color=Aquamarine]”Ah, but maybe not that"[/color] she added after a moment, sending the cursed sword back to where it came.

Without much in the way of pride in anything but his engineering ability, Tora quickly relented and accepted Midna’s help. After sorting through all the interesting gear, he took both shields -the Sabo Shield to wield and Darwin’s Danger Shield to wear- and the Scorcher Flamethrower (which Midna seemed equally sad and excited to see him choose with for some reason). He might not be proficient with ranged weapons, but anyone could use a flamethrower: just walk forward and hold the trigger. With the extra protection and literal firepower, Tora felt a bit better about what lay ahead, not knowing that the resistance encountered so far was just the tip of the iceberg.