Nimbus

Noble Arms - The ASEAN War [Moved to New Thread]

“Well, I suppose confidence is an attractive trait... just as long as you know where your limits lay. As long as you avoid overreaching your expectations, I shall gladly look forward to seeing you live up to that advertisement of yours~.” The words echoed in Callie’s mind even as Qingshe continued to speak.

Callie knew a lot about Lei Qingshe intellectually, of course – she’d been briefed on her fairly extensively. Her defection and presence in the theatre wasn’t a secret to those who knew how to look. She held in her head what information had been made public about her past, her powers and her modus operandi and what little could be dredged up by US intelligence from that which hadn’t. She knew, rationally – and had seen firsthand – that this was a canny Arms Master who, like most AMs on their level, had enough power behind her to wipe out everyone in this room with a thought.

Rationally. Now, for the first time in the meeting, a part of her came to the fore to viscerally identify that the woman before her was intelligent, wilful, terrifyingly strong and, yes, extremely beautiful. Unnervingly so, in fact.

She half-remembered a story told by one of the AMCs – an upper-class boy who’d been obsessed with Greek mythology. It was about a master sculptor who’d carved a statue of a woman so flawless that he’d fallen in love with it, and so prayed to the goddess of love to make it come to life. She’d laughed at the time. Now, though, her sight drawn to that hair of immaculate jade and those cold, fire opal eyes…

Oh, God, I was flirting with her before, wasn’t I? Barely even realised it – and now she’s… Nope. Bad! Bad Callie! She blinked again, firmly, to tear her gaze away, hoping beyond hope that she was imagining the warmth in her cheeks as she gave a nod to the two Arms Masters he had mentioned. “We’ll be up to the task, I’m sure, Lieutenant.” Forcing herself to retain her newfound focus, she inclined an eye back towards Qingshe. “We should talk afterwards, in any case.” No, NO, that’s not what I meant to – ! “The three of us with you – important to familiarise ourselves with what information you have, as well as each of us with the others’ capabilities.”

Saved it.

Yep. Definitely.

She shook her head, the tiniest of motions, desperately searching for something productive to do to realign her thoughts… She scanned the upper windows again. Still nothing. Then her potential teammates… Nico was familiar to her, of course; she still didn’t entirely know what to do about Turing but he certainly seemed to have made his mind up on the subject. She could respect that decisiveness, as well as the clarity and focus she’d observed out of the corner of her eye in the past few days. Perhaps this mission would allow her to familiarise herself a little better.

As for one Sergeant Dorn… God, she’s a tall one now that I look at her, isn’t she? And with the build to match… Quickly pushing back down the part of her she was deliberately distracting herself from, the one wanting to appreciate those aspects, she instead turned to the part that had filed her under ‘powerhouse close combatant’. Hope she’s got some sort of area control to augment it. If she has – between that and Nico’s capabilities… She took a moment to re-evaluate her view of Noel. Sure, the poor boy was obviously out of his depth but he possibly did have some budding skill for the tactical side of command, if only it could be nurtured.

Though I question his judgement in bringing on… Huh.

Myron hadn’t been of significant interest to her up to now – reformed AM terrorists weren’t so uncommon these days and the stereotype he’d seemingly built his personality around didn’t exactly make him any more endearing. She’d dismissed him as one to watch carefully, for obvious reasons, and interact with as little as possible otherwise.

If the horror that had appeared on his face for a split second as she’d begun to turn towards him was any indication, he felt much the same way.

Callie’s mind went into overdrive. He knows me or something about me – not necessarily – possibly associated with the mission – can’t take the risk. Don’t have time to deal with it today. Keep him quiet until I can confront him. Use his fear – make him think I know more than I do. Can tease out what it is after.

And so, with another check to make sure that nobody was paying particular attention to her, she looked away again, pretending to be looking at nothing. She summoned Charter, rolling it in her fingers to feign idleness. In her peripheral vision, she watched as Myron hesitated, then let his gaze creep back towards her.

Whereupon she immediately swivelled her eyes to fix him with a stare and a cold smile. She formed a tiny portal inside her mouth and inside his ear. “Shhh…”

(As she dismissed it, she ignored the impulse that it would have been kinder just to ask.)

Noble Arms - The ASEAN War [Moved to New Thread]

Well, if you’ve finished trying to push every single one of my buttons… Callie grit her teeth, keeping her expression schooled in the manner of a soldier – not so hard with what military discipline she actually had had drilled into her. Certainly, the rational part of her mind said that the Chinese Arms Master had at least a part of a point – her own capabilities were hardly a plan unto themselves – but the implication behind it was hardly flattering. God. Why the hell would she want to undermine me like that? For a moment, panic at the worst case scenario filled a different corner – that she’d been compromised, exposed, she’d failed somehow without realising it – before she blinked and, in that moment of cool, encompassing darkness, pushed it away.

In any case, there was an easy way to demonstrate her utility, as she needed to if she was to retain influence here. Maybe some are asleep at home but others are certainly awake… Callie checked through one of the small upper windows (the ones that she had scanned a few times now – still no undesired eyes on the meeting), thankful that the weather had held off today and that the sky was relatively clear. She let out a breath, and a little frustration with it, then called her spyglass to her hand. Her other, she raised.

“Private Caroline Lidmann. If I may?” Allowing herself to indulge in a slight flourishing spin of her Arm to soothe herself as she stood, she brought one end up to her eye even as she formed a tiny portal over the other, connecting it to a vantage point several kilometres away through the window, high into the atmosphere.

Her grip, well-practised, adjusted the magnification to plunge her vision into the treeline below.

“About twenty klicks south, there’s a mongoose in a tree branch eight feet off the ground,” Callie announced. “It appears to be munching on an egg.” And power to you, little guy. Poor bird, though. “If I needed to, I could transfer myself or any of us to where I’m looking from, then down to the ground in thirteen seconds or so.” She dismissed the spyglass, folding her arms. “As for intelligence, I can’t say I’m an expert –” she had to fight the part of her mind laughing uproariously at that one – “but I’m capable enough to know how to spot marksmen and other threats when I’m in the field. Wouldn’t be any good at acquiring them myself if I wasn’t.”

With her point made, Callie frowned, the tactical considerations coming back to the fore. “As for planning, I’m told that the best way to beat an enemy’s to make them your friend. The second best is to turn their friends into enemies.”

“I can transport a number of us to seize the bridge of one of their major ships from our own fleet while outside their range. That should allow us to cripple their local command structure, hijack their weapon systems, sow chaos and move on to another ship where we do the same again – give them no time to react or form a coherent defence. This will open a window for the rest of us, and the assault as a whole, to act decisively, though not incautiously.” Callie raised an eyebrow at Qingshe. “No need to put all our faith in a single strike, like you say.”

She looked about her, then turned to Noel. “With your permission, First Lieutenant, and forgive me for not knowing all of our capabilities yet, I’d look to bring with me people who, in sum, can overwhelm a group of mundanes and possibly low-power NAs rapidly, quietly and without collateral damage, have an escape option in case I am compromised somehow and can interface with Chinese naval technology by NA or by mundane means if we have the intelligence to do so. Ideally the team would be small, so filling multiple roles at once would be best.” She placed a hand on her hip, looking to Qingshe once more. “If you ever got to study those systems on a naval exercise or something, now would be the time to say. Or if that green-black manifestation of yours can take control of the weapons directly – run it through the pipework or the like and we may not even have to show our hand.” Despite herself, Callie smirked a touch. “Would hardly mind having you along.”

Noble Arms - The ASEAN War [Moved to New Thread]

Callie / Henri / Nil / Nemo

@Nimbus / @Chiro / @Gerlando / @The World

“There.”

Most of Callie’s portals were small but with significant impacts. Each was positioned efficiently, as compact as it could be and as simply shaped as possible to minimise energy expenditure and thought. It had a task and it fulfilled it well.

This time, Callie reached for something different, gathering power and focus that she had only sought a very few times even in training. Her efforts now would be complete, overwhelming and devastating. Her opponent demanded it.

“Weapons ready; target soon exposed!” She broadcast her message to as many as could hear it - meaningful enough to provoke alertness but not enough to alert anyone listening in to her plan. A small part of her mind prayed it would be enough. Now - other two. “Nil, strike the north face.” That would be enough of a distraction for the target and aid the general aim of releasing pressure from the volcano (no matter her companion’s state of mind, as another part of her worried after, screaming at her to help, to care; there was a greater priority now). “Sergeant, ready. In case what she was about to do needed to be shut off rapidly, for her own safety.

”Roger that,” Henri confirmed. He kept a close eye on the happenings around him. Leonidas was kept under wraps for now. It needed all the energy Henri could muster.

Hearing she had been called Nil raised her head from her hands, there was something to shoot at, some north face of, what exactly? As Nil wondered what the target was she looked outside to see the massive volcano covering the whole view, yeah that.

Preparing her NA she hoped not to see that chaos again, hoping the earth would not move, but it was fine, even if it did there was no need to look close enough to notice, it was a big target, no need to focus.

And then the first shot was fired, then another in the same spot, and they kept going until lava was pouring out, then she moved to open another hole and another again, soon the volcano side would be riddled with holes like a colander.

All the rest of Callie’s focus narrowed in on her target. She saw her there, an arrogance in her stance, laughter issuing forth. She knew the type, had seen it in a few of the other AMCs - ones who believed that their gifts made them invincible and deserved them power above common humanity. Now, seeing that attitude writ large and exaggerated, bringing about so much death that she failed to stop...

Conscious thought, intuition and emotion married, something darker than mere anger propelling calculation and flow. Just under four seconds to release. Her intent was simple and brutal: a single, ovoid-shaped portal surrounding Tian Fei, encompassing her and placing her hundreds of metres above Lingayen, away from her substance of power and entirely exposed. Such a conjuration would drain her in moments - working in three dimensions always demanded more area, and thus more stamina than untrained people and those with minds unlike hers would expect. If it worked, however, moments would be all she needed; Tian Fei would fall into the sky and the portal could close. Watch the staff - needs to be upright to fit when -

Who?

A child, her mind supplied - a boy, projected towards her target.

Nemo felt a twinge of despair when he realised that he had been thrown so hard that he lost his grip on Noel’s wrist. But then he remembered his order to “do not despair” and the reality of the situation hit him. He had been launched at the enemy. Still though, his Vitae wouldn’t be useful for killing them like he was ordered to. Reverse wasn’t very effective at cutting things. All of this flashed through his mind as he travelled mid-air towards Tian Fei. Ultimately, he didn’t know what to do; he was being useless again. Two seconds had passed. He was stuck on a collision course and had no real recourse to stop it.

No. No! Callie’s willpower redoubled, any lapse of focus vanishing. No more harm - mine to prevent it!

Her forehead beaded with sweat, watching the boy as he flew at Tian Fei, blade in hand - black hair, sharp nose, a dozen emotions written on his face and shining from his golden eyes… It was easiest for her when bridging space to determine an intent, let the power build, slightly correct for any minor change and then release it - it allowed her to consider other things simultaneously. Now, though, there was someone vulnerable at risk - the situation was volatile, and she would not hurt because of it. Even as the moments passed, time like treacle from the vantage of her thought, Callie fought the impulse to codify the power she reached for, instead forcing it to remain undefined, malleable. Nothing was spared in the effort, drawing both from that deep burning darkness and the bright, flaring desire to protect, to help. Her victory would be total and it would be right.

Nemo couldn’t help but feel a little scared, if he were honest with himself. Though this mostly manifested subconsciously, as he put Vitae in front of him as if to block an attack and closed his eyes. The seconds seemed to slow as adrenaline kicked in, but they passed regardless.

A little longer - focus on Charter, read motion, ready to shape power - where is he - closing, closing - she does no further, not to him, not to anyone! Her lips parted, drawing breath to call to any who might answer…

The boy felt his arms shake as his sword slammed into the target he had been thrown at, still sideways in his hands, possibly breaking Tian Fei’s nose. It was unfortunate for his commander that he weren’t holding it forward, he’d realise in retrospect, but for now he was too focused on maintaining his… he supposed it would be called “balance,” despite being mid-air.

Several things, at this point, were true. Firstly: where before the gap between her target and the boy was narrowing, the impact had imparted momentum to the former while the latter steadied himself, and thus it was now growing again. Secondly: the boy had issued her a sharp strike to the head, potentially concussing, likely disorienting and certainly distracting her. Thirdly: as the human body is wont to do on impact, her target had slightly curled in on herself, reducing the area her portal needed to cover. Finally: her Charter’s might was gathered.

Callie took this all in in a moment, and knew the opportunity.

“FOCUS FIRE, HALF-CLICK ABOVE BEACH WEST!”

Space realigned and snapped into position; she demanded it so. Tian Fei vanished from Nemo’s sight; now about her was now open sky, her position tilted halfway between sideways and down to disorient her further. Momentum carried her past the encompassing portal’s bounds, loosing her in the air above Lingayen’s coastal shallows - far from aid and far from her element.

Callie’s vision swam, even as she closed the portal - the drain not so much as expected, and later she would recognise this as that strange boy’s intervention pushing Tian Fei far more quickly than gravity ever would have, but still taking its toll after so many other demands on her had worn her down. Job to do… Don’t ask others… What would not do yourself…

Blearily, she grasped at her rifle, slotted in Charter as a scope and tried to gather power to manifest a tiny portal to fire through…

And, instead, exhausted, slumped on the helicopter wall.

Next to her Nil had finished with her previous task, the volcano now being riddled with holes. No, Nil was looking for the target Callie had called a few seconds ago. The ex-Buddhist now falling through the sky, there was no doubt, must be her. Nil launched staffs at the small aerial target, if nothing else just to get a taste of vengeance.

Her aim wasn’t the greatest - maybe it was the helicopter moving, maybe it was her still dizzy head, or maybe that she didn’t try to look too closely at the target, so Nil threw many more projectiles at her target, enough to also hide Tian Fei from her sight, deliberately choosing not to look too much at her. Even if she would not hit the Buddhist, surely there were others aiming at her, but getting back at the geomancer did feel good. Forty-four. She was definitely counting this one.

Noble Arms - The ASEAN War [Moved to New Thread]

Callie / Henri / Nil

@Nimbus / @Chiro / @Gerlando

Callie forced her mind into gear through the ever-growing weariness; her eyes scanned the battlefield below, searching for anything at all - ripples in the earth, the shape of the terrain, anomalies within either - all while watching for missiles, stray fire, that odd boiling in the ground and any and all other potential threats to the helicopter. As for her voice… “Sir, ma’am, ready to reposition assets on your command. And…” She bowed her head. “If you’ve any healer AMs below, we could use one right now.”

“We do,” CMS Cabral called out over the comms, “an Army Chaplain back in Lingayen, where you’re returning to - his name’s Carroman.”

“Good…” Not yet, while there’s so much earth… Her mind stalled for a moment, not entirely able to comprehend what her sight showed it: a titan, rising from the rubble and glass to stand atop a dais of melting rock.

She’s not in there, her intuition screamed - too obvious, she’s too smart - she’ll expect us thinking that - how can I - how do -

Sound from the radio - first melodic, teasing, then all at once directional and firm. Those tones recentred her, so like her days in the Cadets on a field exercise, listening to one of her teammates adapting a plan on the fly…

She breathed.

Okay.

Callie rapidly flicked at her comms, locating the channel for Qingshe. Would - it’d help see patterns in the earth - any advantage, take. “Alright, someone, I need infra - goggles, headset, anything portable. She needs an eye in the sky, I’m it.” For the briefest of moments, part of her brain cursed not having the custom attachment she’d had for her spyglass back in the US. “For the other, Nil -” Callie flinched, looking over to the girl before glancing with concern at Henri. No time, I hate it but no time…

Nil got to one of the seats of the heli and pretty much just sat there, hands holding her head but looking a lot more calm right now. She was looking around… but not in a very attentive way… and towards the helicopter’s floor; clearly she had no intention of taking a look outside for now.

When called upon Nil turned her head, as if hearing it but the extent of what she understood was uncertain as she didn’t utter a single word.

Shaking herself, focusing, Callie fit thermal vision goggles to her helmet. Benefit of having equipment from here… “Come in, Snake - I have visual on…” She shuddered a touch, brain still not entirely wanting to accept the scale of that going on beneath her. “Visual on seismic activity. Hoping to release some pressure; going to try marking our target too. Seeking confirmation: if provided, can you direct and expand your terrain effect through -”

A sudden shift - cold, bursting through the heat of the volcano, as masses of ice collided with the lava. Great blasts of sublimated steam issued forth and whatever inferences she’d hoped to draw from the flow of the lava vanished into rapidly-shifting convection currents. Situation changing far too fast - not safe up here - “God, God, right channel - ma’am, sending injured AM down now!” And, with a glance through Charter, a moment’s focus, Sophist was in the hands of a medic below and being rushed into the field hospital.

Now the next, the next! And Callie’s mind raced, as the radio screeched with commands and chaos and destruction unfolded below her. Too much… Simple and effective. Pure utility. That’s what’s needed. It’ll hurt… You’ve practised.

Back to Qingshe. If she’s got everyone’s ear, as it sounds… “Scratch that - if we’re levelling the mountainside, relay that I need someone to provide a sight line on Tian Fei from above, even just a few seconds. Get that and I can isolate and expose her to everyone.”

She looked for a moment to Henri; even as her goggles hid her eyes, her voice told the story of a young woman shaken, overtaxed, but determined. “Sergeant, this could go badly. I go down, you’d better help me like I kept you… Well, safe-ish before, okay?” A thin smile to disguise the pang, the murmur amongst the others in her head that said she shouldn’t, wouldn’t need it.

”You can count on me,” Henri promised, although he admitted to himself that he had doubts. For the last few moments, he had felt himself… lacking. Henri knew that he was only a D-class, but it was just now that he truly thought he knew the full implication. No, he wasn’t useless. With the proper strategy, they had already taken down one strong opponent. It was the same with this.

”I’ll keep an eye on you.”

“Good to know,” came the response, accompanied by a slight and momentary smile. “Not just me, mind - see to your men, Sergeant,” Callie added, a little faux-pomposity in her inflection as a part of her carved out even a little relief from the near-total focus of scanning from the heights, awaiting her chance.

”Naturally,” Henri added before leaving Callie in her thoughts to ponder his own strategies.

Meanwhile Nil was still sitting in the back of the chopper, still not getting up and definitely not looking out the chopper, this time not because she couldn’t but because she didn’t want to look at whatever was making everyone so erratic. It couldn’t be good; from her sitting position she saw an impotent Henri and desperate Callie constantly looking out for an opportunity that might or might not come. Even in this desperate moment it seems they were coordinating with someone through the comms, hoping together they had a chance; Nil was sure to have heard that voice before…

Noble Arms - The ASEAN War [Moved to New Thread]

Callie / Henri / Nil

@Nimbus / @Chiro / @Gerlando

A flare, a thunder and a force shoving them towards the grounds, it all happened at the same time, too quickly to react. The fall didn't hurt much, but it was hard to understand what was happening: flash, noise, ground not good, noise, red ground, noise, the Egyptian charred not good not good.

Then something began to move, shaking and screeching a terrible track forecasting their end being near, a constant, tremendous clamour that left no room for thinking, forcing Nil to stay where she stood, incapable of moving.

Henri was frustrated. Frustrated and fearful. For all his ability to neutralize powers, he couldn’t stop material on the move. Leonidas could work as a regular shield, but it had only one surface, while the sand was everywhere. All he could do was try and defend himself and others, and hope they’d survive long enough for the medic.

The sand prickled and glittered underfoot, silicon all but bristling in anticipation, before rippling in an odd manner of blink, as it seemed to notice something.

The faint sound of rotors could be heard flying towards them, above them, and soon enough, a Philippine Army Helicopter, a MBB Bo 105, flew high above, lowering ropes from a high enough position that the change in air pressure won’t be detected by Tian Fei, at least not immediately.

It was a decent enough stratagem. By all accounts, it was exactly what the doctor ordered to evade the terrifying terrakinetic. But the air pressure wasn’t the problem. It was that the helicopter was making any sound at all.

The earth at the base of the mountains began to writhe more violently, almost seeming to bubble… No, it was bubbling. There was a strange haze rising from the earth… Steam? As ridiculous as that might have seemed, the temperature in the area was suddenly beginning to climb, most intensely from the mountains, billowing down across the sandy beach like a scorching desert wind. The face of the mountains and foothills began to look strangely runny, even as odd tubular protrusions began to sprout across them.

At the same time, the remnants of the Philippine Army and Marines were firing their remaining artillery and rockets at the Chinese fleet, finding new courage even in the face of the renewed offensive. They had witnessed miracles - multiple ones - today, and they knew they can win this; they had won before in the Crisis of 1988, when Angelito Jaime had saved them all and ASEAN had presented a unified front.

The memory of their victory burnt anew, they just needed a new champion.

CMS Cabral’s voice echoed through the comms, “Oi! Sergeant Janssens, use your Anti-Magic to slow the landslide down! Then get up! Get up and make sure the rest of the team goes with you!”

“Yes, sir!” Henri replied, raising his shield. “Fighting in shade!”

The bubble of his shield expanded, and abruptly, the sands within 20 meters of the imperilled Arms Masters went deathly still. The sands further out seemed to flinch at that, thrashing a bit in what might have been a surprise. The writhing sands all around them lurched forward in a collapsing 2 meter wall from every direction at once, before flinching back again, as whatever mass passed the radius of Fighting in Shade slumped limply into the already stilled sands.
The glassy chime of the terrakinetic’s “voice” hummed in an eye-watering tone, like nails on a chalkboard, before a giggle like tinkling glass vibrated through the air. “WeLl NoW~! aReN’t YoU a SpEcIaL oNe?” She “giggled” again, a sudden glee practically palpable in her alien tone. “So… ThAt’S hOw YoU dEsTrOyEd HuO rEn’S sUn So SuDdEnLy, IsN’t It? WhIcH mEaNs, ThE oThErS wItH yOu MuSt Be…” The sands that had prior formed into a malicious mockery of a face twisted again, an excited sadism plain to see on the construct’s features. “ThE nUlLiFiEr, ThE pOrTaL mAkEr, AnD tHe AgItAtOr AlL hErE aT oNcE? I’vE sTrUcK gOlD!”

It was then that Henri noticed Sophist. The Agitator was in bad shape, but Henri would try and save him. Maybe the medics could patch him up together.

“Callie!” He told the other teammate, “Take Nil and climb up. I’ll be right behind you!”

“InTeReStInG pLaN~!” the terrakinetic responded idly, almost as if she could actually hear them. “I sUpPoSe I dOn’T hAvE tHe LuXuRy Of TaKiNg ThIs SlOwLy, NoW dO i?” she almost seemed to pout through that discordant noise. “RiGhT tHeN~! lEt’S sEe HoW yOu TiCk, HmMm?”

“...” Callie stood, looking now towards their companion, scorched and only mostly there - now to the earth, churning with scarlet-stained glass - now to the sky, whence the strike had come. Could have - save - how do I - must -

Tendrils of sand began to rise up like the looming tentacles of a kraken. Two. Then six. Then a dozen. All of them began to almost delicately slide up the outer edges of Henri’s barrier, carefully prodding and mapping the radius. “HrMm… TwEnTy MetErS iN aLl DiReCtIoNs… UnDeRgRoUnD aS wElL… yEs~, ThAt DoEs ApPeAr To TrAcK~! A pErFeCt SpHeRe, It SeEmS! A ReSpEcTaBlE sIzE fOr SuCh A pOtEnT eFfEcT!” The voice was commenting and logging her observations in English to the open air, almost to herself, seemingly completely uncaring of how much the enemy knew that she knew.

Henri grabbed Sophist with his free hand and ran towards the helicopter.

“Be careful with him, he’s badly hurt!” he warned the crew up above. “Callie, are you in?”

“Oh? sO tHe RaDiUs MoVeS wItH yOu?” the terrakinetic remarked. “ExCeLlEnT! wE’rE lEaRnInG tOgEtHeR!” The sandy tendrils wriggled happily, as they began to brush more boldly across the barrier. “Oh!” the horrible crackling exclaimed in realisation. “ThE sAnD IsN’T bEiNg DeStRoYeD! yEs, I cAn FeEl iT, wHaT wAs TaKeN bEiNg UnCoVeReD wItH eAcH dEsPeRaTe StEp! No, ThE sAnD hAsN’t GoNe AnYwHeRe… It’S jUsT bEeN… hIdDeN… I wOnDeR hOw MuCh YoU cAn ‘HiDe’ BeFoRe ThAt BuBbLe Of YoUrS pOpS~!”

Callie’s mind whirled, directionless. The vision of it all - the blood, the fire, the horror of it… But Henri’s words, finally, cut through.

“O-okay! Yes, sir!” She forced her eyes shut momentarily, decoupling Charter from her rifle, securing the latter and reaching out for Nil’s hand. The girl was pulled after her with little effort, following Callie in a seemingly mindless state.

How are you going to protect them?

“Going to be fine,” she told - Nil? Herself? Callie wasn’t sure. But as she began to run, to let her mind work again, to let her eyes take in the world about her, she did know how. “Sergeant!” she called ahead, slowly catching him given the weight he bore. “Just tell the heli, get as high as they can, then cancel the null when it’s safest! I’ll take us!”

”Affirmative!” Henri answered and contacted the helicopter crew ”Delay my last order. Get as high as you can and wait. We’ll teleport in.”

The crew seemed to understand the order; the helicopter up above began to gain altitude. Now for the hard part.

“Ah~! So, YoU dO hAvE tHe LiTtLe PoRtAl PeSt WiTh YoU~!” There was no doubt now. Somehow, Tian Fei could hear them, every word they were saying, despite that they were no longer in contact with the earth under her direct control, she must have had a secondary method of perception. “WeLl ThEn~! I sUpPoSe DrAsTiC tImEs CaLl FoR dRaStIC mEaSuReS~!”

At that tone of consideration, it seemed to be the sands’ que to begin bodily shoving into the barrier’s radius. Though the silicon waves immediately stilled and slumped limply upon crossing the line of Fighting in Shade, they continued to flow relentlessly, the “water level” of sand at the fleeing Arms Masters’ feet beginning to rise inexorably. And as the sand did so, the sun gleamed ominously off several surfaces intermixed within it. Despite being disconnected from her control, it seemed Tian Fei was testing the waters, funnelling 3-foot tall, hollow “sea urchins” along in her sand’s grasp, all of them formed of razor-sharp glass, as they rolled forward from all directions, shoved by the tide of sand.

Simultaneously, blades and other constructs of glass, solid visually, began to prod the barrier as well, daring past the line in various sizes. Initially, they were small and thin, and upon passing the barrier, they slumped, cracked and collapsed into the flow below, but even this was a threat -if perhaps inadvertently- in the case of those blades angled from higher up the sphere’s outside, the risk of falling razor glass prevalent. If that were all, it would have been one thing, but it wasn’t all. One blade, thicker than the rest, was extended through the barrier… and successfully pulled back. The rest of the tendrils stilled for a moment, before writhing in excitement.

“So, It’S nOt TeLePoRtAtIOn, NoR teMpoRaRy Or EvEn PeRmEnAnT oBlItErAtIoN, nOt LiKe ThE dEsTruCtIoN oF HuO rEn’S sUn MiGhT hAvE iMpLiEd… ThE gLaSs IsN’t BrEaKiNg FrOm LeAvInG mY cOnTrOl… No, It Is, BuT nOt FoR tHe ObViOuS rEaSoNs… YeS… yEs, I sEe! InTeGrItY! tHaT’s ThE sOlUtIoN! i JuSt HaVe To GeT a LiTtLe… ThIcKeR~!”

For a moment, a thought - She can hear us, God, she can - but, if she can, she needs some way to… Is she right… Her eyes cast about then, searching desperately… Then stopped. Or she senses from earth right beyond the barrier and is just that good at it. Unsure - no time!

Thus, Callie focused, willing energy forth, already visualising the portal ahead of Henri to the aircraft up above. Nothing happened yet, of course, and there laid the risk - but so long as he let go of Leonidas’ power once the three were all together, it would be momentary, and he could bring his bubble back online.

Thicker glass constructs now began to push past Henri’s barrier, blades, clubs and sturdy, well-made formations. As they moved, they were still, inert and lifeless, aside from where they rooted outside Fighting in Shade’s radius. And this time, they weren’t succumbing to the Anti-Noble Arm power. It seemed that, without being actively animated under Tian Fei’s will, and -more pertinently- held together solely by her terrakinetic power over them, they were able to pass and be wielded by her. Clumsily, granted. Blindly, seemingly also. But this time, her formations carried actual structural integrity, were designed with physics in mind and were held together purely by mundane merits.

”Okay, then.” Henri messaged, ”I will drop the nullifying field in three… two…”

Oh, God, don’t count, she’ll - no time, just ACT! “Nil, listen, please - when I jump, jump!”

“One… now!”

The field dropped; in the same instant Callie’s will, released, surged forth like the thousand times it had in the years before - practised, instinctual. A portal bridging so little distance, even person-sized, took only hundredths of a second to conjure. Henri was there already, getting through the portal at his own end; Callie and Nil right behind, Callie leaping for where she knew the portal would be just before Henri loosed the nullification to get herself off the ground in that moment of vulnerability - she looked without slowing down, brain throwing out half-a-dozen sparks of ideas against things that Tian Fei might throw at them…

And then she and Nil were sprawling on a metal floor dozens of metres off the ground, the glare of sunlight gleaming off the blades of glass that had almost sluggishly passed through where they once stood not a moment prior. And with a ripple, the sands seemed to chitter in consternation, before flashing towards the open portal like bloodhounds. “Through!” Callie called to the sergeant, already cutting the connection as fast as she could, clutching Nil’s hand in her own. The gap in space snapped shut with the ringing chime of severed glass shards and a violent spray of sand upon the helicopter’s innards. Shards of glass, now inert, crashed against the inner copter walls and shattered messily, scattering across the floor… and mercifully nothing more, aside from being a bit of a hazard in the case of a bad fall.

Nil’s head had jumped from an explosion, to the rattling of dozens of glass shards, some even sounding like… a voice, to actually jumping… or being pulled? At least the now more constant chop chop of the helicopter was a bit more bearable, or at least less unbearable.

There was some glass scattered all over the metal floor, this time small, inert and definitely didn’t rattle around like before, she raised a hand to the ear protection that had stopped working after the blast, maybe one day they’ll make them missile-proof.

Henri left Sophist at the care of the medical personnel on board the copter and took a position from where he could observe the situation below. It was all so frustrating. This was supposed to be his baptism by fire, yet he couldn’t even save all those people. He hit the floor in frustration, Leonidas in his arm feeling like a pot lid. Henri didn’t dare to activate the nullifying field. He could only use it for a few minutes at a time, and the field had already been used. Henri could feel his heart beating like crazy and sweat blocking his sight.

”Does this thing never tire?” thought Henri to himself, trying to conserve energy for an emergency nullification.

Callie, meanwhile, checked over Nil, pointedly avoided checking over Sophist… Then, in a moment of possible prescience, possible mania, possible fear, she summoned a portal, a tiny one, linking once again to high above the battlefield, gazing over it like Henri.

She sucked in breath.

The hills looked much the same - glittering with glass, evershifting, almost as a second sea roiling above the first… But now joined by a third black and green, amongst the city of Lingayen itself. It raced westward, towards the river, rushing to confront Tian Fei’s broken earth.

Qingshe was at work.

Noble Arms - The ASEAN War [Moved to New Thread]

Callie / Henri / Nil

@Nimbus / @Chiro / @Gerlando

“Sir!” ‘Course I’ll protect her, what kind of a fireteam leader do you think I am?

Such thoughts ran through the back of Callie’s mind. Its front was nearly full to the brim; Charter was a blur of motion to track multiple points on the battlefield at once, her eyes and mind only functioning by innate overclocking and years of practice. One particular sight, of course, was more worrying than the rest… “Enemy fleet under Arm effect, sir - looks like phasing or regen, possibly carrier-centred. Redirected attacks aren’t landing.”

With the realisation that sinking their warships was fruitless, new orders had come up; the group had to find and team up with a Belgian Arms Master with a negation ability. While his name was not given, command had already put them through the comms. Can’t just stop attacking, though - they’ll know something’s up. “Alright,” Callie said, glancing back at Nil, “plan’s changed, going now - target the bridge from above. Ready bombardment!”

“Right away,” Nil responded while creating more copies for the attack, trying to cover as many as possible under the foliage. The enemy carriers were hard to even see at this distance but wouldn’t be a problem if Caroline was going to create a portal.

Meanwhile, Henri was still checking the city for people trapped under the rubble.

“Sgt. Janssens to Search and Rescue base. Sector F3 Clear. Moving on foot to Sector F4”, he messaged and was about to continue his journey, when he got contacted through his comm. “Sgt. Janssens here.”

“Private Lidmann - hope you heard from command, Sergeant.” Still don’t like that I can’t use my actual rank… “If you can get a clear fall from high ground where I can see you, I’ll launch you at the target and catch you when you reach the apex.”

“Roger that, Private,” Henri replied. “Can you see sector F4 from where you are, or should I search for another spot?”

A twitch of Charter. “Sector F4, confirmed…” Callie’s eye caught something - a red-orange glint from… Oh, yeah, ha. That’s an Arm. “Have ‘ya! Get on top of something, Sergeant - ready when you are!”

She allowed herself a smirk. Through a tree’s branches. Damn, I’m good.

Now… Charter back to the ships. Aircraft carrier isolated; bridge identified. A glance to Nil and a hand raised. “Hold!” And focus.

Space bridged. At once, Nil’s staves were only a few dozen metres from the carrier’s command centre - and directly above them.

Fist clenched.

In an instant they flew into the portal and on top of the command tower, pushing air as they bolted to their target, leaving behind a mess of leaves and dirt that had been blown by the air.

Twenty or maybe a bit more were the first to hit, practically demolishing the upper superstructure that once was the carrier’s conning tower, soon after about a dozen followed, this time aimed at the deck and airplanes preparing to take-off.

From a top view the ship was now barely recognisable.

Henri didn’t witness much of it, focused as he was on reaching the roof of the tallest building he found. He caught some breath after reaching the top and then signalled again. “All right, I am in position,” He said, waving his arm “You should be able to see me waving. What’s the next step?”

Callie’s eye was on Charter even as she loosed the connection with Charter, relief suffusing her as the tug of draining energy dissipated. “Sighted. Get edgewise and ready to jump, Sergeant!” ‘Course, some things are more fun as a grunt… “I’ll portal underneath you - only unsheath when you’re through, then stop once that blasted sky orb’s gone!”

“Roger that.” Henri said in confirmation. Then he took a running position, ready to take the leap. Just in case, he pulled his pistol. “Ready to go!”

Another moment gone; Callie removed her eye from her Arm, seeking Nil. “Once more before we reposition - another barrage, pick your targets.” She let out a huff of breath, then shook herself. Focus, Caroline. Just one after another after another now. All of them need to be right. No time for tiredness.

Charter back to Henri - then to the artificial sun, still blazing in the sky, beam scorching the beach and turning sand to glass up to the barrier. Callie forced herself not to squint against the brightness, her mind already working to evaluate the geometry. Beam keeps strafing like that and… Opening in the pattern - there. “Now!”

Now the trickier part - she’d only know where to put the portal on Henri’s end after he jumped. Still, Callie drew the energy, readying herself to direct it. She could hardly stop now.

As he heard the signal, Henri ran toward the edge and jumped. He seriously hoped the teleporter knew what she was doing and he didn’t just end up a pancake.

Next thing Henri knew, he was falling up, or that’s the feeling he could express. He could feel the heat of the light blinding his eyes. Quickly, as planned, he activated Leonidas.

“Fighting in Shade!” he shouted, activating Leonidas’s negation bubble. The light and heat around him dissipated. It seemed the plan had worked.

Not that Callie was anything more than subliminally aware. Just got to give her a whole bunch of shots… You aren’t answering us that easily! “Ready!” She raised her fist again, looked through Charter, chose a new site - Behind them, hit them in the rear.

Portal opened. Fist closed.

Once again blue projectiles fell upon the Chinese fleet, destroying decks and conning towers of destroyers, cruisers and even hitting the central carrier again, just to ensure it properly looked like a rough patch of gravel, plus a spectacular flame on top.

This time, Callie allowed a smile - and not just for herself. “Nicely done!” Now, we move!

But Henri couldn’t celebrate just yet, because the gravity began to pull him again. Quickly he unsheathed Leonidas, hoping it wasn’t too late to be pulled back.

“Comeoncomeoncomeoncomeon!”

“Alright, getting clear. Dismiss Arm!” Long jump takes too much time - damn it, won’t be able to shake a lock if they have it. Well! Cursing under her breath, Callie instead focused her power towards her back-up: a secondary hill she’d identified when she first claimed this cover, a click away beneath the same minor ridge. The other end? Just behind Nil, where the underbrush wasn’t. Callie hoped that barrelling directly towards her would be a good enough indication.

It wasn’t.

The unsuspecting Nil stood confused for a second, slowly looking at Callie dashing out of the blue. Too slow, Callie decided it was faster to tackle Nil, pushing her off her feet and into the portal they were soon on the other side, one of them visibly dazed by the whole manoeuvre.

“Sorry!” Am I really - yes, I - no time for that! Sever flow, now where’s… Oh, God. Henri, as viewed through Charter, was falling. Not entirely slowly either. She could try directing the portal back to them up again, launch him to dissipate the momentum, but that act could easily give away their position…

The smart move would be to do so in midair.

Callie was not thinking about the smart move.

Another sudden change in vision, and Henri found himself back on the ground. The fall on it was painful, but at least Henri would be alive to feel it. He pulled deep breaths, as he looked around, trying to determine where he had been brought into. Some sort of bush, seemingly to break his fall… And beside it, two women - one in combat fatigues, the other fully covered with a dress popping from under the military uniform.

“Welcome to our little fireteam, Sergeant - sorry about the bumpy ride.”

“No problem,” Henri assured, as he rose up and dusted himself off. “Not the toughest I’ve faced so far, and probably in the future.”

Although Henri wasn’t really fond of Arms Masters, something even he admitted was hypocritical, at least this one had proven herself trustworthy.

“Onto the next step, I guess.”

Noble Arms - The ASEAN War [Moved to New Thread]

It has been a long-held principle of warfare that only a desperate or supremely confident army keeps no force in reserve. A reserve sacrifices immediate utility for flexibility that the rest of the army, pinned down in engagements, entirely lacks. Fresh and energetic from anticipation, it can engage to support a battle at its critical point in the moment that that point proves critical, striking an exposed flank or a buckling formation or reinforcing such a weakness in one’s own formation to turn the tide.

Thus, possibly the most crucial aspect of a reserve’s capability is their power to strike at a time and place of their choosing. For such a reason, cavalry and elite medium infantry have often performed this role throughout history. Of course, these are limited in scope; a truly ideal reserve would be unseen by the enemy and so unable to have their responses predicted, while retaining all of the striking power and flexibility of target that more conventional forces are capable of.

Caroline Lidmann fell into her position in a crouch. The warp from her prior location was smooth and practised, dropping her inside a bush on one of the hills to the West of the town of Labrador. After hearing a similar soft thud behind her, she centred herself and lifted her gaze to watch the attack through Charter. Yeah, ‘less they’ve found some way to replicate or project Arm powers, they’re definitely here… Come on, come on! She scanned across the bow, then the bridge of one of the Chinese transport vessels but there was no sign, not yet; nor had she felt the familiar tug of Charter pointing her towards a vital target. All the while, her other senses reached out to her surroundings, a habit she’d picked up after one too many times being outflanked while in this precise state in training – she not only heard but felt the blasts, echoing off the hillside and transmitted through the ground.

Her spare eye flicked sideways for a moment. Her teammate – one ‘Nil’, who she’d only met shortly after teleporting into Lingayen and apparently spoke too little English or Filipino to communicate with beyond very basic small talk and battlefield orders – seemed remarkably calm, almost absurdly so given the context. Callie had seen pre-battle jitters in almost everyone she’d trained alongside – they were nothing to shrug off – but this girl was just sitting there, still and silent… Worse in this moment, her Arm glowed, something not entirely conducive to stealth. Hopefully nothing to worry about, and what she’d heard about it would work extremely well in combination with Charter, but it did put her on edge ever so slightly.

She shook her head, then returned to surveying the area. Those aircraft are tearing into the city… Response seems capable, though. Back to the ships… Still nothing.

Wait, what’s –

The heavens unfurled, and from them speared a beam of brightest light.

Callie acted before conscious thought, not quite screaming into her radio: “Hostile code Glint confirmed, sir – engage?”

She needed to be fast. She’d trained for that.

“Permission gran-”

Let’s see how much you like those ships.

“Okay, we’re doing this!” Callie pointed Charter down to the bay; in an instant, her focus zoned in on one of the warships, isolating. Deck gun fore; VLS fore; VLS aft. The next: Same again. The next: Deck gun fore; ASM mid; SAM mid. Then the next, then the next – for each, distance and angles gauged, instinct granted by years of wielding her Arm; all the while, her other eye squinted against the light of the beam.

Alright. Now.

Energy projected; space warped. Callie felt the familiar pulse sapping her, only barely – she didn’t need a large portal here. Instead, high above the battlefield, a forty centimetre-diameter circle of space right in the path of the beam was suddenly next to one of the Chinese ships on the edge of their formation, as Callie joined near a league in half a tenth of a second. Light lanced out from it, aimed to burn through multiple ships’ armour, the geometry aligning the strike with as close as possible to where she thought each of their magazines were.

Then, as the beam left her first portal behind, she made another.

Then another.

A word back to Nil: “Once the beam stops, I’m opening a shot for you – as many as you’re able to bombard them with.” Awareness open to await that moment.

And even as her mind and perception worked furiously, a third of her attention still trying to catch sight of the enemy Arms Masters aboard one of the vessels… Hope that learns you your lesson from… What’s that green –

Right. Good thing we have one on our side…

@Gerlando

Noble Arms - The ASEAN War [Moved to New Thread]

Callie Lidmann

Name: Caroline ‘Callie’ Lidmann

Appearance:

Age: 22
Gender: Female
Sexuality: Bisexual, as far as she is able to tell.
Height: 165 cm
Weight: 63 kg

Nationality: Half-English, half-unknown

Noble Arm Name & Appearance:



‘Charter’
(naval officer’s spyglass)

Noble Arm Rank:

Noble Arm Type, Element, and Range: Support-Ranged/Space/Long-range

Noble Arm Abilities:
Leaguespanner: Wielding Charter allows Callie to realign the fabric of the universe to join one space to another, effectively creating a two-way portal in any shape that she desires. She may only create one such connection at a time and may only do so between places that she is able to see. Seemingly as an inherent safeguard, this portal cannot form inside or otherwise ‘cut’ sentient beings or other Noble Arms, though it can do so for non-sentient life and non-living things. Whenever she does so, Callie must fix both ends of the portal in space in relation to another object; she frequently uses the ground, the Earth as a whole or some part or all of her body for this purpose, though she cannot use any part of another sentient being or Noble Arm.
Creating a connection takes a small amount of energy and time that both scale with the portal’s size and the distance that it bridges; the amount of energy continuously consumed from Callie until she releases it also increases with the portal’s area (see hider).

Charter Calculations

Where Callie’s stamina is represented as 500 of an arbitrary unit…

Portal Creation Time (seconds) = Portal Area^2 (square metres) x Distance Bridged (km)
Stamina Cost upon Portal Creation = Portal Area^2 (square metres) x Distance Bridged (km) + Distance Bridged (km) x 0.1 + 10
Stamina Cost while Portal remains (per second) = Portal Area^2 (square metres) + 1

While Callie can push herself beyond this limit, she risks unconsciousness or death by doing so.

Sight Unbounded: Charter is far more capable than a spyglass of its apparent age or, indeed, any spyglass at all has any right to be: it has the ability to project Callie’s vision, allowing her to bypass non-solid objects. Solid objects inhibit the projection of her vision in this way, while liquids slow the projection depending on its density rather than it being instantaneous.
Commander’s Aim: While looking through Charter and wielding a projectile weapon or in contact with a person who is, Callie can will the spyglass to direct her gaze to the point where the projectile, as the weapon is currently aimed, will land. When she does so, she gains an instinctive sense of this point.
Guidance: Whether a precognitive subpower of Charter itself, a quirk of her hyperactive mind or a combination of both, Callie often finds herself drawn to details that are or will be important for herself and/or her allies when looking through Charter, even if she doesn’t know how they are or will be important yet. This helps Callie both when she is scouting or infiltrating a location or when she’s picking out a target in the chaos of a fight.

Misc. Abilities:
Determined Adaptability: Callie’s open-mindedness and sheer drive allow her to take on problems and learn new skills more capably than most, throwing sufficient energy and ingenuity at difficulties and mental blocks that others would give up on solving.
Trained Operative: With some Arms-tailored military training under her belt, Callie has had the chance to experiment with her Arm in battlefield conditions. As such, she is thoroughly familiar with her Arm’s basic capabilities and has even come up with a few unconventional ‘tricks’ with them, as well as appreciating the basics of tactics and operational warfare. She has also been given a more rapid coaching in the art of covert operations, allowing her to hold her own in a number of tight spots even without her Arm.

Personality: Callie is characterised by drive above all else; she launches herself towards her own and others’ success and even when ‘relaxing’ is constantly looking to find growth in everything she does. Unlike many of this archetype, however, she doesn’t naturally chafe against authority to any great extent, only that with which she disagrees for other reasons; she instead demands that she be accomplishing something in every waking moment, set by others or, if they do not, by herself. This makes her an invaluable asset to any team – focused, unfailingly energetic and downright inspiring, a champion for her allies and a constant harrier against their enemies – but can also come across as brashness, insensitivity and arrogance. She is, needless to say, a little polarising.

Likes: Achieving goals (especially by creatively efficient means), feeling capable, learning, helping others, using her Noble Arm, dogs and cats, Ribena

Dislikes: Helplessness (especially not being able to help others), duplicity among friends and teammates, indecisiveness, overbearing nationalism, excessive reliance on others

Fears: Being powerless, causing harm to those she cares about, becoming an emotionless killer

Bio

Callie Lidmann was born in the UK and lived there for four years or so. That she knows. In truth, her mother has always been cagey about the first few years of her life and, indeed, about Callie’s father, who Callie herself only knows by scattered half-memories. She didn’t especially care, to start with; her mum, Mary, has always been as good a parent as possible to her, as has her aunt Sandra, with whom the two live.

Good intentions or no, Mary’s actions rendered Callie somewhat poorly formed at first. The two only settled down with Sandra six or seven years after arriving in the USA; before then the two lived hand-to-mouth and constantly on the move. Mary took jobs and found schooling for Callie wherever she could but always became more and more alert, cautious, nervous over the months they stayed in a single place and then swept the two away again, as if running from something. By the time they came to live with Sandra, the damage had been done; Callie, despite a natural keenness of mind and a relative affability that let her just about coast through schoolwork and friendships, was behind on more or less every academic metric and had a lack of motivation to match. If, after all, her teachers and schoolmates changed so regularly, any effort she put into making a good impression or form connections would just go to waste. Why make the effort?

That changed a few months after Callie’s thirteenth birthday. Taking a stroll past a lake just outside the town that had – surprisingly to her – been her home for a good length of time now, her ear caught an odd series of sounds accompanied by what resembled an alarmed voice in the distance. Turning to look, she saw a woman thrashing at the water, small rowboat upturned and floating away over the rippling surface. In that instant, Callie reached out to help – and found that there was nothing she could do. For the first time, she fully regretted her indifference; she regretted not having had the presence of mind when walking here before to memorise where any of the lifebuoys were, dotted around the lakeside; she regretted having let learning to swim go by the wayside somewhere in her various relocations; she regretted being sufficiently apathetic as to not bring a phone with her or, indeed, to know what this lake in particular was called so she could guide an emergency responder to it; and she regretted not paying attention to the assembly given by a lifeguard on one day in one particular school whose name she couldn’t remember, that she might have properly known what to do in the first place.

For the first time in her life, Callie wished she might have done things differently.

She wished she could do something now.

And, from within her, something answered.

A brilliant flash of light in her palm, materialising into solid form. Moments later, a pulse in the air beside her; shimmering, marine light on the grass, followed by a deluge that knocked her off her feet and dropped one sopping wet ex-drownee onto the ground beside her. She had tried – and the world had made clear to her that that would make an impact.

How far could she go?

From that point on, Callie’s every action was infused with energy. Between the story being picked up by the local newspaper, the touch of renown that she gained in the community as a result and her generally more pleasant demeanour, she started to make some proper friends (and, of course, some enemies among those whose carefully constructed cliques were disrupted); astute enough to realise that a lot of these relationships were superficial but sufficiently determined and free-thinking enough to decide to forge them into actual bonds, Callie began building a network that not only further propelled her emotional rise but also brought those others with her towards fulfilment, her joyful and determined demeanour infectious. Simultaneously, realising that the key to her future and her growth laid in her new Noble Arm, she began practising with it on her own and doing research and joining several Arms fora online to start investigating its powers.

Eventually that research led her to the US’ Arms Master Cadets programme, in which Callie saw an opportunity to finally use her newfound power for good. Mary saw something else; Callie would often catch sight of her mother watching her out of the corner of her eyes, wringing her hands, muttering, every tic and negative signal of body language multiplied a thousand-fold. Sandra’s stabilising influence helped; Callie, on the other hand, could not decide whether her presence was causing her mother more pain than she would by leaving, even as her past, so long unquestioned, began to bubble in the back of her mind. With her new impetus driving her on, however, doing nothing simply wasn’t an option and, though she had picked up in school, it was clear that academics would be a path of far, far greater resistance given her track record. Her aunt in her corner and covering for her mother’s concerns, Callie eventually signed up for the programme, packed her bags and made her way onwards.

From there, everything accelerated. Entirely separate from the regular JROTC programme, auxiliary to a normal education, the AMC’s work is simply to take young Arms Masters and turn them into soldiers – to explore and actualise the martial potential of each cadet and especially their Arm’s powers and then integrate them as seamlessly as possible into their armed forces, all while securing their loyalty. For Callie, it achieved one of those three very effectively! With experienced Arms Masters and experts in their study helping her and dedicated testing facilities and events to experiment within at her full potential and full of sharpness and conviction, she became a skilled, diligent and distinguished warrior. Once again, her energy was infectious and she quickly made close friends amongst the other young Arms Masters on the programme (not so hard – being the person to near-instantly evacuate you to your team’s medic in a training exercise tends to endear you to them).

As for the other two… As she went on through the programme, Callie began to realise that she was being pushed in a certain direction: that of special and covert operations, reconnaissance, assassination. On a purely strategic and tactical level, she could understand that – information gathering, rapid movement and precision striking power were her Arm’s specialities – but she also wasn’t naïve. Even the brief period of research she’d done before she entered the AMC had told her what the country she and her mother had come to was capable of; while she’d put that to the back of her mind at the time it increasingly weighed on her thoughts as she approached the end of her training, something only reinforced by the patriotic tendencies of her fellows and their superiors.

The war in South-East Asia offered a way out. While the US has so far refused to commit to a full military response to Chinese aggression, for fear of escalation to unrestricted conflict between their Arms Masters with a level of accompanying global devastation unseen since WW2, they were willing to send materiel, military advisors and training and, off the table, covert military support. As a capable fighter who had not yet seen action and so was not identifiable by the enemy, Callie was in an ideal position to take advantage – and she knew it, seizing what she felt was an opportunity to use her training and skills to do something fairly unambiguously good. And so, after intensive training in Filipino and in the Philippines’ culture and geography and picking up some new skills over a period of six months, Caroline Lidmann, officially an unaffiliated Arms Master volunteering with the Philippine Army from abroad, headed for her new posting.

Current Goal: Support the Philippine resistance to Chinese invasion without revealing her true role.

Military or Civilian Rank: As a participant in covert operations, Callie has technically been transferred out of the US Armed Forces to become likely the youngest member of the CIA’s Special Operations Group, though the rapid development of the ASEAN War and the lack of need for much of the usual process (parachute training, for instance, was considered basically irrelevant for her) has left some holes in her preparation for the latter.

Character Theme: “No reason to stop now, not when I can finally do some good in the world. Just try to hold me back!”

Noble Arms - The ASEAN War [Moved to New Thread]

Callie Lidmann

Name: Caroline ‘Callie’ Lidmann

Appearance:

Age: 22
Gender: Female
Sexuality: Bisexual, as far as she is able to tell.
Height: 165 cm
Weight: 63 kg

Nationality: Half-English, half-unknown

Noble Arm Name & Appearance:



‘Charter’
(naval officer’s spyglass)

Noble Arm Rank:

Noble Arm Type, Element, and Range: Support-Ranged/Space/Long-range

Noble Arm Abilities:
Leaguespanner: Wielding Charter allows Callie to realign the fabric of the universe to join one space to another, effectively creating a two-way portal in any shape that she desires. She may only create one such connection at a time and may only do so between places that she is able to see. Seemingly as an inherent safeguard, this portal cannot form inside or otherwise ‘cut’ sentient beings or other Noble Arms, though it can do so for non-sentient life and non-living things. Whenever she does so, Callie must fix both ends of the portal in space in relation to another object; she frequently uses the ground, the Earth as a whole or some part or all of her body for this purpose, though she cannot use any part of another sentient being or Noble Arm.
Creating a connection takes a small amount of energy and time that both scale with the portal’s size and the distance that it bridges; the amount of energy continuously consumed from Callie until she releases it also increases with the portal’s area (see hider).

Charter Calculations

Where Callie’s stamina is represented as 500 of an arbitrary unit…

Portal Creation Time (seconds) = Portal Area^2 (square metres) x Distance Bridged (km)
Stamina Cost upon Portal Creation = Portal Area^2 (square metres) x Distance Bridged (km) + Distance Bridged (km) x 0.1 + 10
Stamina Cost while Portal remains (per second) = Portal Area^2 (square metres) + 1

While Callie can push herself beyond this limit, she risks unconsciousness or death by doing so.

Sight Unbounded: Charter is far more capable than a spyglass of its apparent age or, indeed, any spyglass at all has any right to be: it has the ability to project Callie’s vision, allowing her to bypass non-solid objects. Solid objects inhibit the projection of her vision in this way, while liquids slow the projection depending on its density rather than it being instantaneous.
Commander’s Aim: While looking through Charter and wielding a projectile weapon or in contact with a person who is, Callie can will the spyglass to direct her gaze to the point where the projectile, as the weapon is currently aimed, will land. When she does so, she gains an instinctive sense of this point.
Guidance: Whether a precognitive subpower of Charter itself, a quirk of her hyperactive mind or a combination of both, Callie often finds herself drawn to details that are or will be important for herself and/or her allies when looking through Charter, even if she doesn’t know how they are or will be important yet. This helps Callie both when she is scouting or infiltrating a location or when she’s picking out a target in the chaos of a fight.

Misc. Abilities:
Determined Adaptability: Callie’s open-mindedness and sheer drive allow her to take on problems and learn new skills more capably than most, throwing sufficient energy and ingenuity at difficulties and mental blocks that others would give up on solving.
Trained Operative: With some Arms-tailored military training under her belt, Callie has had the chance to experiment with her Arm in battlefield conditions. As such, she is thoroughly familiar with her Arm’s basic capabilities and has even come up with a few unconventional ‘tricks’ with them, as well as appreciating the basics of tactics and operational warfare. She has also been given a more rapid coaching in the art of covert operations, allowing her to hold her own in a number of tight spots even without her Arm.

Personality: Callie is characterised by drive above all else; she launches herself towards her own and others’ success and even when ‘relaxing’ is constantly looking to find growth in everything she does. Unlike many of this archetype, however, she doesn’t naturally chafe against authority to any great extent, only that with which she disagrees for other reasons; she instead demands that she be accomplishing something in every waking moment, set by others or, if they do not, by herself. This makes her an invaluable asset to any team – focused, unfailingly energetic and downright inspiring, a champion for her allies and a constant harrier against their enemies – but can also come across as brashness, insensitivity and arrogance. She is, needless to say, a little polarising.

Likes: Achieving goals (especially by creatively efficient means), feeling capable, learning, helping others, using her Noble Arm, dogs and cats, Ribena

Dislikes: Helplessness (especially not being able to help others), duplicity among friends and teammates, indecisiveness, overbearing nationalism

Fears: Being powerless, causing harm to those she cares about, becoming an emotionless killer

Bio

Callie Lidmann was born in the UK and lived there for four years or so. That she knows. In truth, her mother has always been cagey about the first few years of her life and, indeed, about Callie’s father, who Callie herself only knows by scattered half-memories. She didn’t especially care, to start with; her mum, Mary, has always been as good a parent as possible to her, as has her aunt Sandra, with whom the two live.

Good intentions or no, Mary’s actions rendered Callie somewhat poorly formed at first. The two only settled down with Sandra six or seven years after arriving in the USA; before then the two lived hand-to-mouth and constantly on the move. Mary took jobs and found schooling for Callie wherever she could but always became more and more alert, cautious, nervous over the months they stayed in a single place and then swept the two away again, as if running from something. By the time they came to live with Sandra, the damage had been done; Callie, despite a natural keenness of mind and a relative affability that let her just about coast through schoolwork and friendships, was behind on more or less every academic metric and had a lack of motivation to match. If, after all, her teachers and schoolmates changed so regularly, any effort she put into making a good impression or form connections would just go to waste. Why make the effort?

That changed a few months after Callie’s thirteenth birthday. Taking a stroll past a lake just outside the town that had – surprisingly to her – been her home for a good length of time now, her ear caught an odd series of sounds accompanied by what resembled an alarmed voice in the distance. Turning to look, she saw a woman thrashing at the water, small rowboat upturned and floating away over the rippling surface. In that instant, Callie reached out to help – and found that there was nothing she could do. For the first time, she fully regretted her indifference; she regretted not having had the presence of mind when walking here before to memorise where any of the lifebuoys were, dotted around the lakeside; she regretted having let learning to swim go by the wayside somewhere in her various relocations; she regretted being sufficiently apathetic as to not bring a phone with her or, indeed, to know what this lake in particular was called so she could guide an emergency responder to it; and she regretted not paying attention to the assembly given by a lifeguard on one day in one particular school whose name she couldn’t remember, that she might have properly known what to do in the first place.

For the first time in her life, Callie wished she might have done things differently.

She wished she could do something now.

And, from within her, something answered.

A brilliant flash of light in her palm, materialising into solid form. Moments later, a pulse in the air beside her; shimmering, marine light on the grass, followed by a deluge that knocked her off her feet and dropped one sopping wet ex-drownee onto the ground beside her. She had tried – and the world had made clear to her that that would make an impact.

How far could she go?

From that point on, Callie’s every action was infused with energy. Between the story being picked up by the local newspaper, the touch of renown that she gained in the community as a result and her generally more pleasant demeanour, she started to make some proper friends (and, of course, some enemies among those whose carefully constructed cliques were disrupted); astute enough to realise that a lot of these relationships were superficial but sufficiently determined and free-thinking enough to decide to forge them into actual bonds, Callie began building a network that not only further propelled her emotional rise but also brought those others with her towards fulfilment, her joyful and determined demeanour infectious. Simultaneously, realising that the key to her future and her growth laid in her new Noble Arm, she began practising with it on her own and doing research and joining several Arms fora online to start investigating its powers.

Eventually that research led her to the US’ Arms Master Cadets programme, in which Callie saw an opportunity to finally use her newfound power for good. Mary saw something else; Callie would often catch sight of her mother watching her out of the corner of her eyes, wringing her hands, muttering, every tic and negative signal of body language multiplied a thousand-fold. Sandra’s stabilising influence helped; Callie, on the other hand, could not decide whether her presence was causing her mother more pain than she would by leaving, even as her past, so long unquestioned, began to bubble in the back of her mind. With her new impetus driving her on, however, doing nothing simply wasn’t an option and, though she had picked up in school, it was clear that academics would be a path of far, far greater resistance given her track record. Her aunt in her corner and covering for her mother’s concerns, Callie eventually signed up for the programme, packed her bags and made her way onwards.

From there, everything accelerated. Entirely separate from the regular JROTC programme, auxiliary to a normal education, the AMC’s work is simply to take young Arms Masters and turn them into soldiers – to explore and actualise the martial potential of each cadet and especially their Arm’s powers and then integrate them as seamlessly as possible into their armed forces, all while securing their loyalty. For Callie, it achieved one of those three very effectively! With experienced Arms Masters and experts in their study helping her and dedicated testing facilities and events to experiment within at her full potential and full of sharpness and conviction, she became a skilled, diligent and distinguished warrior. Once again, her energy was infectious and she quickly made close friends amongst the other young Arms Masters on the programme (not so hard – being the person to near-instantly evacuate you to your team’s medic in a training exercise tends to endear you to them).

As for the other two… As she went on through the programme, Callie began to realise that she was being pushed in a certain direction: that of special and covert operations, reconnaissance, assassination. On a purely strategic and tactical level, she could understand that – information gathering, rapid movement and precision striking power were her Arm’s specialities – but she also wasn’t naïve. Even the brief period of research she’d done she entered the AMC had told her what the country she and her mother had come to was capable of; while she’d put that to the back of her mind at the time it increasingly weighed on her thoughts as she approached the end of her training, something only reinforced by the patriotic tendencies of her fellows and their superiors.

The war in South-East Asia offered a way out. While the US has so far refused to commit to a full military response to Chinese aggression, for fear of escalation to unrestricted conflict between their Arms Masters with a level of accompanying global devastation unseen since WW2, they were willing to send materiel, military advisors and training and, off the table, covert military support. As capable fighter who had not yet seen action and so was not identifiable by the enemy, Callie was in an ideal position to take advantage – and she knew it, seizing what she felt was an opportunity to use her training and skills to do something fairly unambiguously good. And so, after intensive training in Filipino and in the Philippines’ culture and geography and picking up some new skills over a period of six months (including the memorisation of aerial photographs of key strategic locations for rapid travel), Caroline Lidmann, officially an unaffiliated Arms Master volunteering with the Philippine Army from abroad, headed for her new posting.

The journey took but a moment.

Current Goal: Support the Philippine resistance to Chinese invasion without revealing her true role.

Military or Civilian Rank: As a participant in covert operations, Callie has technically been transferred out of the US Armed Forces to become likely the youngest member of the CIA’s Special Operations Group, though the rapid development of the ASEAN War and the lack of need for much of the usual process (parachute training, for instance, was considered basically irrelevant for her) has left some holes in her preparation for the latter.

Noble Arms - The ASEAN War [Moved to New Thread]

Just putting a marker down here - Caroline Lidmann will soon be joining the fight!