Cath

Ban the Person above you

Banned because I read it as 'a period of absence'. Oops

Ban the Person above you

<Snipped quote by Catharyn>
Banned for the absence of a period.

@Raptra

Banned for reading my bio

The Cradle

“Not as readily as you. But i can follow your IFF just fine.” 595 lied, unholstering her pistol and holding it in her right hand, finger off the trigger. She set off at a sprint after Rareth, taking a dose of stimulant immediately via her suit. It infused her with so much energy that it’d be harder to stop running than carrying on.

Her vision adjusted to the complete blackness almost immediately, before partially refocusing when Rareth activated her suit lights. 595 peeled back her visor and sniffed the air; the cavern smelled damp, with hints of vegetation and other organic matter.

The river flowed through the middle of the cavern, while rocks protruded into the narrow path on either side. 595 vaulted over a few formations in quick succession, using her free hand as the lynchpin to acrobatically clear obstacles without losing speed. She kept a close eye on Rareth's back and tail, wiggling in front of her, while also surveying the area with her equipment and senses.

“So... that was a pretty impressive maneuver you pulled in the lake with that creature. Are all Datius units equipped like that?” 595 sent in a private comms channel with Rareth.

The Cradle

595 grimaced behind her visor; she’d need to be very careful about giving away too much on this expedition. The Rothians were doubtless building a profile on her, as she was with them - the less detail they had the better. 595 had already used up a lot of political capital at the Institute after that stunt in Boycott Park. If they learned she’d given up state secrets to the Rothians as well, she was as good as finished. A large part of her wanted to take this opportunity to concede and let one of the Sacred Band go instead. But her pride and urge to feed just about stopped her.

“We may have different toys, but i can hold my own.” 595 replied to Rareth. She then looked at the Human scientists and Nirann. “See if you can get the mast working at the very least. We could really use intel from our teams in the real world. Keep an eye out and stay on comms, we’ll be back within an hour.” She turned back to Rareth. “Lead the way, I'll bring up the rear.”

Ban the Person above you

Banned for having a weirdly attractive avatar

The Cradle

“Good plan! I’ll go with you.” 595 asserted firmly, looking between Nirann and Rareth. “You might need some backup, if you’re right and some hideous creature lives in there.” She quickly turned to point at Thebes, who was still attending her. “Have one of the Sacred Band scout the mountain path down into the valley; no longer than an hour though. We may need to move fast if we find something inside this cave.” Thebes nodded, before turning himself to elect someone to go.

The Cradle

“There may be something even worse down in that valley! And besides, even without Carthage’s armaments, we have enough munitions between us to blast through any tight spaces.” 595 countered, exasperated. She glared out across the valley; patches of water glimmered in the very faint light. “Look at it, the whole valley is sodden. If we go down there, it’ll take hours to go the long way around this mountain. At that rate, we’ll need to make a camp out in the middle of nowhere. Is that really what we want?”

595 surveyed the waiting group. She knew that if ordered to, the Sacred Band would follow her into the jaws of hell. Most were surveying the area through their weapon scopes to avoid looking at her. Athena was even laying on the floor with her sniper rifle fully deployed to scout the valley. It was the Rothians and Human scientists she needed to convince. “If we set up camp, Nirann and I could try to fully reconcile the code base and bring in reinforcements, so to speak?” Dr Wetherall offered nervously.” 595 snapped right back. “True. But who knows what kind of attention that’ll attract? We could be spawning them right into a trap.”

“Our mission is to bring everyone back alive, ma’am. Our close quarters element is without a suit. The Sacred Band are conditioned for long nights; we can keep watch. If we can get this transit station online, there is always the option of pulling out too.” Thebes advised, assuming a non-threatening stance. 595 breathed in deeply, trying to control the onslaught of borrowed feelings. It wasn’t hard to feel like the group was ganging up on her.

The Cradle

“Hmmm...interesting.” Dr Wetherall grumbled, tapping the part of his faceplate in front of his beard as he scanned the ocean of symbols. “No wonder our gear isn’t working properly. We’re only using about seventy percent of the code base correctly. Well done on this conversion architecture, old boy! I’m going to save a copy and try a few things I thought of while dangling from that tree back there.”

They continued following the rapids for another hour in relative silence, except for a few exchanges and observations between the scientists. After a little while, the Sacred Band lowered their weapons and assumed a quicker march than before, meaning they made up some of the lost time. Carthage easily kept up without losing breath, often jogging backwards and encouraging the civilians to hurry.

Eventually, the river slowed to a languid crawl. The incline levelled out steadily until they rounded a corner onto a flat ledge. Off to their left, the river disappeared inside a cavern attached to the side of a towering mountain. The bright light they were headed to was distantly visible above the entrance. In front and below them, the canyonsides fell away to reveal a huge valley nestled between four mountains, shrouded in gloom. “There’s a path here.” Athena peered over the edge of the ridge. “We could scale down it, find another route through this mountain range on the other side of the valley.”

“That’ll take all day." 595 replied, then pointed to the cavern. “That’ll take all day. This river must lead somewhere; we could shave hours off our journey.” Thebes shook his head. “I don’t like it. Lots of tight corners and not a lot of exits.”

Song Reference time

She bases what she's drinking on the place and time of day
Says that she loves California but she hates LA, okay

Song Reference time

You're making me a wreck, you're kissin' on my neck, but that's not better than sex. You're getting me obsessed, sending me dirty texts-