Crossfire

Revenant: A Sci-Fi Adventure (Always Accepting!)

@Azereiah

"Yeah, I'll get in touch shortly. Have to report in to the boss" Stryker let the disdain drip from his words, not hiding the fact that he still sort of hated everything about this job, especially his position as the captain. He headed off on his way, stopping briefly to chat with SAL over a task he needed done. Up in his quarters, Stryker sat at the terminal and established a Long-Range Transmission Channel. He rattled off the facts of the mission as well as an update on their current location, as per the Alliance's mandate. He also included a pair of footnotes mentioning the extra hands that had been brought aboard. Satisfied with the message, Stryker hit send and waited around to monitor it. Long-Range Transmissions were notorious in their potential delivery fail rate. If that happened, Stryker would have to act quick to salvage his nearly 10 minute long message or risk having to record it again. As he waited, he checked in on the ship's trajectory from his datapad. They were about 4 hours out from Minos Station at current speed. As much as he didn't want to admit it, the pilot had some skills, and he deserved a rest after the hell he'd just led them through. He wouldn't bother with ordering Tibulus to increase their speed to reduce the travel time. They were in no rush for the moment.

@Tickout

"I can assist in this matter" SAL said, taking the small medical droid from Maxi "Scanning. Damage incremental. I estimate that repairs will take about 2.5 hours. Find me then"

The robot stomped off. Before the team meeting, SAL noted that Grayson had left the door to the armory open. Wasn't like him to be so absent minded. He filed that information away as a topic of discussion for later, and proceeded inside to secure a selection of tools for the repair. He paused for a moment, noticing Amy's damaged armor on the workbench. A quick ocular scan revealed a handful of issues that Grayson's (mostly) human eyes might miss. Again, he filed the information away for later and headed out, deciding to use the tech lab downstairs as his office for the repair. Stryker stopped him on the stairs and asked if he would deal with retrieving the memory core from the Federation droid. SAL agreed to it and went on his way. Both the Federation droid and the lone remaining Alliance drone had been brought to the tech lab ahead of time.

@BKburke

In the tech lab, SAL established a list of priority. The memory core had a direct tie to the mission, so that came first. He set Maxi's medi-bot aside and settled in by a workbench along the rear wall, where both mangled military droids sat. Retrieving the core was a simple enough task, locating it was a much more immediate concern. SAL was unfamiliar with the makeup of most Federation tech, and having no prior experience with these Hunter class weapons, had no idea where to start.

He started by plugging the droid into the Mainframe, a computer drive that was unconnected to the rest of the ship's systems, for interacting with AI elements and the like. The Droid has been (forcibly) placed in a low-power state, but within the Mainframe, it's mind was abuzz with activity. An idea hit SAL. He used the systems within the Mainframe to simply copy all the data contained within this droid's head to a blank data-disc. He'd sort through it later and flag anything listed within the directory as belonging to the memory core. Easy as Pi.

Though not directly related to the mission, SAL felt a strange sense of obligation to check in on the Alliance Drone. He felt a sense of kinship to the robot, despite it being technically just a tool of the Alliance. He plugged it into the Mainframe and attempted to communicate. Never one to get emotional, SAL was... surprised to say the least when he interpreted and translated the ultralight communication dialogue AP-772 was transmitting. In English, the drone would have been saying this simple sentence over and over:

"Please help me"

That was quite sad. SAL honestly felt (his closest approximation) to sadness. In that moment, he resolved to do something quite drastic. It was an uncommon practice, but many programmers felt that by combining a pair of corrupt AI programs with a base model, like what the Mainframe provided, the corruptions would cancel each other other out to form a new, cohesive AI unit. It was this very process he was about to attempt by taking what remained of 772 and merging it into the Federation Droid. He patched in some basic AI routines to help bridge the two, and began to repair Maxi's bot as he waited to see if the melding would take. In the back of his head, SAL began to run some calculations on the best possible result of this experiment, and devised a blueprint of a new body for this AI program, one that would use parts of both the Alliance and Federation robots. A fighting machine that would far surpass either entities pitiful military bots... if Stryker approved of it he supposed. The timer he'd been keeping reached zero, and SAL connected himself back to the Mainframe to attempt a contact with the merged AI.

"Hello?" He transmitted "Can you hear me?"

Revenant: A Sci-Fi Adventure (Always Accepting!)

@Dark Light Just cleared out the inactives (Belov the Russian Medic and Saul, the Arson/Cook). We've got one more inactive that I'm gonna be taking care of when

Spoiler

We hit port at the Deadzone station. He'll be reassigned to another ship and never be heard from again, unless by some miracle Sombrero comes back

Revenant: A Sci-Fi Adventure (Always Accepting!)

@Emnosym Yeah of course!

Revenant: A Sci-Fi Adventure (Always Accepting!)

Thanks everyone!

Post took a little longer than anticipated, but I feel all in all that our first mission was a fine success, so let's raise a glass to us, and prepare for even more crazy shit from here on out!

Revenant: A Sci-Fi Adventure (Always Accepting!)

@PlatinumSkink@Dark Light

Grayson struggled to keep up with Lataniva, she was much quicker than him and made it to their destination a minute or so before him. At the mention of Hunters, Grayson had lagged behind a little to recalibrate the MARS rifle into a mode he rarely used- the Heavy Rifle. In this function, the barrel lengthened and the bore size increased, to allow for the firing of .50 caliber F.M.A.P. rounds. They were extremely powerful, but the sheer recoil of firing a single shot of it was like being kicked by a mule. Despite hardly ever using it, Grayson always came prepared, and loaded in a box magazine of 5 rounds, that was all he had, and hoped it was all he'd need.

He came up on Arex and Lataniva's location and pushed his way to the front, taking a stand against the approaching Hunter Droid.
"Got ya covered gang, fall back to the hangar!" He sighted up on the droid, braced the rifle against his already injured shoulder, and grit his teeth, preparing for the kickback.

BANG*chik*BANG

The first round had blown a hole clear through the blue orb that made up it's head. When that hadn't slowed its approach, Grayson aimed lower, and blew out the ball joint connecting the upper and lower part of its left leg. The droid toppled over, but still it tried to attack them, crawling it's way across the floor to them.

"Let's go guys!" Grayson shouted as the team retreated. His comms chirped twice, incoming message on the general channel.
"-yson? Do you read?" SAL stated
"I hear ya rustbucket, what is it?"
"We are awaiting you in the hangar. We just deployed Shuttle 1 back to the ship, you must hurry. The fuse we set is much shorter than anticipated, we only have 5 minutes to get to a minimum safe distance before the station erupts"
"We'll be there, don't ya fuckin' dare take off on us!"

@Azereiah@Banana

"Not a bad idea android" Stryker said, he wheeled into the comms channel and issued an alert for the team still on the station.
"If it's within your power, incapacitate and capture one of the Federation droids. We can scuttle its memory core for any passwords or back channels into the Federation Central Database. Don't risk your lives for it though"
He closed the comms and turned back to his console, ready to assist Tibulus with any last minute adjustments.
"Shuttle 1 coming in now" he stated for no other reason than to settle his own nerves "Cargo bay clear, lowering the ramp"

@Xandrya@Tickout@Turbowraith@Rultaos@mackielars@BKburke

More Hunter Droids had arrived in the hangar, bringing their total number to 9. This was problematic, SAL thought as he returned fire. Most of the team had gone on ahead on the first shuttle. Like a simple organic, SAL had elected to remain behind and wait for his "friend". Sure he had an ulterior motive for survival at the forefront of his mind, but leaving Grayson behind would create a paradox that reduced his long-term percentage of survival to near zero.

The 2 surviving drones had fallen, 116 had shattered to bits by the superior firepower and melee capabilities of the Hunter Droids. 772 was similarly damaged, though it still had some power flowing, twitching at SAL's feet with half a head and very few limbs. The Hunter Droids were closing in, relentless in their quest to extinguish the remaining lives. SAL wheeled out of cover and returned fire, the explosive rounds of his shotgun were quite devastating at close range, but even with the damage he could inflict on any that closed the distance, they were still outnumbered and outgunned.

More gunshots joined the cacophony of the hangar bay. Grayson and the others had arrived. Between the combined firepower of the two groups, they were able to cut a path through the line of Hunter Droids. One droid had it's arm severed by one of Grayson's heavy rounds, and it was close enough for SAL to grab. With a few quick slashes from his wrist-mounted laser blade, the Droid fell in a manner that SAl felt to be sufficiently incapacitated. Grayson's team had made it over to them and the others were loading into the shuttle. SAL grabbed the Hunter, and, for no particular reason other than perhaps pity, also snatched up the remains of 772 and bolted for the shuttle. He saw Grayson looking at him strangely, his eyes going back and forth between SAL and 772.

"I believe we can salvage this drone" he stated simply as the shuttle took off.

Aboard the Revenant, Stryker got word that the other shuttle had arrived and gave the order to fall back to the edge of the system. The ship hung around until the timer hit zero, and the station went up in a brilliant blaze of red, blue, yellow and white. The explosion was instantaneous. One flash of light before it was swallowed up by the emptiness of space. As if on cue, a pair of ships came onto the radar, blinking into existence via hyperjump tech that the Revenant wasn't equipped with. Making sure they were spotted and (unsuccessfully) hailed. Stryker told Tibulus to flip the engines to full burn and set a course for Minos Station, way out in the Deadzone. The captain walked back through the upper deck to his quarters, stone faced and ignoring any cheers or hellos offered to him. They had done it, against all odds and at great cost of life, they had completed their first mission as a team. Back in the safety his room, Stryker breathed a sigh of relief and allowed himself a quick chuckle before letting the emotion of the moment overcome him. Apparently, Dawson had stashed a bottle of Stryker's favorite rum in the desk drawer, he had discovered it during their trip, now felt like a good time to break it out.

He gathered the crew down in the Common Area, and distributed glasses.
"Here I am again, giving a speech like some kind of goddamn leader, but I just felt I needed to say this. You all did a fine job out there. Never had much experience with teams, but you all just set a good standard going forward. It wasn't perfect, we lost a couple of our own but all in all I'd say this was a good start to our little squad" He raised his glass "A toast for the fallen, for the innocent lives wiped out by our actions, and to our future endeavors, cheers" He threw the drink back and slammed the glass down on the table.

Revenant: A Sci-Fi Adventure (Always Accepting!)

@Azereiah@PlatinumSkink@Xandrya@Tickout@Dark Light@Turbowraith@BKburke@Banana
It's my birthday today, so what say we celebrate with a big kaboom? I'll get a post up in a little bit to end off the mission properly.

@Rultaos@mackielars sorry you guys didn't get to chime in, I know how busy you guys are and everything, but we had to get things moving. I'm sure we'll come up with a way to recap or repurpose anything major you had left to say.

@Zardoric@Silver Carrot Sorry about the delay, you guys can prep some introductory posts if you want. If I forget to mention it in my IC post, we'll be picking you both up on Minos Station in the Deadzone

Revenant: A Sci-Fi Adventure (Always Accepting!)

@Banana@Azereiah@Dark Light

"Hold back for a bit longer, they're not finished in there yet. I'm getting readings of another energy surge, could fire off any second, so be ready for more of your fancy flyin'. When the team's ready for pickup, the shuttles have a recall function that'll help us scoop them up"

Stryker became aware of one of the androids hanging out behind him.

"Well kiddo let me tell ya, it isn't going that smoothly, but fine enough I suppose, given the lack of intel going in. Why don't you hop back over to your station? I'm sure you just heard, but we'll have more incoming fire in a second, probably best not to be standing around if any of those beams sneak through the shields"

Stryker's attention was drawn back to the datapad. Drone 116 was surrounded by friendly signatures, as expected, but Drones 772 and 900 had just pinged a fresh friendly IFF signal, on their way back to the hanger, and it wasn't moving. He logged in to 900's visual interface to get a view inside the station.

"Oh fuck" Stryker said under his breath. Lying at 900's feet was the barely recognizable corpse of Hadrian Saul. The arsonist's face mask had been shattered, a wide bullet hole in his left cheek was the only feature Stryker could distinguish between the mess of blood and gore that sat where the rest of his face should've been. His chest had a wide hole blown right through the armor, and slash marks that didn't look like they were from any weapon Stryker had ever encountered. Looking around, he spied Saul's flamethrower and revolver lying a short distance away, along with the bodies of at least a dozen troopers. The lights in this hallway had been shot out, and even with the drone's headlamp active, it was tough to see everything. He pushed the drone forward, while ordering 772 to proceed on to the others to help 116 carry Amy's armor back. Inch by inch, 900 stomped down the dark hall, gun at the ready. It reached a bend and Stryker angled for it to peek around the corner tactically before walking into a potentially hostile environment. It was dark back here too, but there were some lights at the far end about 200 meters away. Lying in a pool of this light was Arex, who looked in bad shape, but according to the drone's sensors, was still showing faint signs of life.

A flash of alert drew Stryker's attention. The drone's motion tracker had detected something moving quickly behind it. He sent an order to turn, but it was too slow. The drone was knocked off it's feet, and Stryker's view flailed about wildly as it tried to re-orient itself. The image cleared up and focused just in time to see a human-shaped drone. Structurally, it was more heavily armored than the Alliance AP drones, yet slimmer, particularly in the arms and legs, which were little more than thin metal beams joined by a ball-joint. Its head was a blue orb with a holographic image of a skull on it, which gleamed menacingly in the dark. The hostile drone brought its right arm up and activated a large laser blade. It emitted a scream, like a banshee's wail before the blade crashed into the drone and Stryker's connection was severed.
"Fuck" Stryker said, as he wheeled the comms back around to the channel for Grayson's squad.

@PlatinumSkink@Xandrya@Tickout

"Ugh" Grayson moaned as he hauled himself to his feet. One errant laser blast had grazed off his right shoulder in the firefight. It hadn't gotten through, but it had singed his suit pretty badly. One trooper still stirred slightly, not quite willing to die yet. Grayson put an end to that notion with a quick bullet to the head from his pistol. The gunshot echoing through the tight corridor to put an exclamation point on the encounter.

"Grayson, report in. This is urgent" Stryker's voice made him jump slightly. He shook off the fog and responded as he retrieved his rifle from beneath Xeltos' body.
"Copy that mate. We hit a bit of a snag there, 9 Feds slowed our progress, getting back to the objective now"
"Fuck the intel. Fuck the Alliance. Get your squad together and get them the fuck back to the hanger, bunker up by the shuttles until the others get back from planting the bombs. We've got a big problem. The Federation has Hunter droids aboard. I don't know how many, but one just took out Saul and the other drone. It might've done in Arex too, I couldn't see before I lost the feed"
"Wait, back up Stryker, Arex might be still alive? Then we've got to get him. I'm not sayin' this from a 'no man left behind' standpoint or any of that shite, but if he's still breathin', then we're gonna need him. At least find out why he attacked Amy out of the blue"
Stryker sighed. The worry in his voice was very noticeable. For good reason too, Hunter droids were notorious in their efficiency. Their toughness and battle-prowess was only dwarfed by their savagery on the battlefield. Whoever wrote the programming for the things was a sadistic son of a bitch, outfitting them with psychological warfare protocols and even a strict order to destroy the remains of enemy combatents if given the chance. They were not to be fucked with, not without an army at your back at least.
"Fine" Stryker finally said "I'll send the coordinates for where I lost the drone. Check it out quickly, then get out"

"Alright folks, you heard the man" Grayson said. A second drone had arrived during the conversation and began to assist the other unit in carrying away Amy's armor "We gotta get the fuck back, but there's just one little pit stop left. Maxi, you go on ahead with Amy, guide her back to the shuttles. Lataniva, you're with me"
He walked past Amy on his way to the front of the group and paused to pat her on the shoulder. He'd tell her what had happened later, unless she demanded to know right this second.
"You alright?"

@Turbowraith@mackielars@Rultaos

"Acknowledged. Calculating. Confirmed" SAL said "You are correct, an extra catalyst embedded within the reactor will increase the chances of our primary desired outcome by 17.9%, upping it to a total of 87.4%. I'll stay behind once the primary explosives are planted and set the catalyst, to prevent you organics from being exposed to the mass amounts of radiation in the lower chamber. Just don't leave me behind, or I may interpret that as a hostile action and be forced to defend myself"

It sounded more threatening than SAL intended, but with no appropriate response in his database, he rolled back to the topic at hand. He looked to Benny again.
"Do we have anything with a manual trigger that we could use for this end? I'd prefer to not be obliterated in an early blast"

Revenant: A Sci-Fi Adventure (Always Accepting!)

@Banana@Azereiah@Turbowraith@mackielars@Rultaos@Tickout@Xandrya@PlatinumSkink@BKburke

Sorry about the delay everyone, post going up later tonight to nudge us forward a bit more

Revenant: A Sci-Fi Adventure (Always Accepting!)

@Turbowraith Don't worry about that too much, I think we're heading into the Deadzone for a bit of down-time, more than enough opportnity to replace his stuff at the black market. Besides that, we've got a great weaponsmith aboard (if I do say so myself) If Joe's gear isn't properly recovered, it'll be easily replaced!

Revenant: A Sci-Fi Adventure (Always Accepting!)

@Silver Carrot Accepted! Welcome aboard. There's gonna be a slight delay before you can join us, because the team is currently on a mission, but we are in the endgame of it so hopefully it won't take too long! Sorry about that. (I haven't forgotten about you either @Zardoric!)

On that note, @Banana@Azereiah@Turbowraith@mackielars@Rultaos@Tickout@Xandrya@PlatinumSkink Everyone ok with concluding the mission after another round or 2 of posts?