Rhona W — Roleplayer Guild

The situation continued to evolve rapidly in Blades' C3I computer-generated overview of the battlefield, the 'Net fusing the data for him into a cohesive pattern.
Ken was standing by to move in to his location for a medevac, with Aidan on the way. Meanwhile, the remainder of the units' GEARs were doing a damn fine job pinning down the unexpected hostiles. However, he still hadn't heard a sitrep from Esailia's team, which worried him.
Sykes' voice came over the tactical commnet, and Blade replied with a sharp. "Roger," before speaking up again. "Ken, move over here and prep for medevac. Sykes, I'll secure the area so you can work unmolested. Out".
He could already see the blip in the C3I display indicating Sykes moving his way. Kicking himself mentally, he gripped both of the control sticks in the GEARs' cockpit. He felt his hackles raised, and his muzzle felt dry and he could feel his heart hammering in his ribs. He gritted his teeth and blinked rapidly as he thought, unbidden, of the feel of whiskey burning down his throat, and the blissful, soothing cocoon that would come with it if he could just have one drink...
Tightening his grip on the sticks until his artificial arm refused to go any tighter and the fur on his right hand stood up, he banished the thought, pushing the voice to an insistent nag in the back of his mind, before toeing the GEAR into motion with a tap of the pedals. LIDAR indicated bodies on the move, but the signal was hazy.
Aidan's reports began to roll in, and the vulpine squashed down his feelings and the bile rising as he listened, running the GEAR in a hunched-over 'roadie run' toward the nearest cover, as the thudding report of a heavy machine-gun sounded, followed by the warbling alert of a laser-paint on the Harlock's armoured hide. Diving and sliding on the GEARs' front, he ground to a stop behind cover, rolling onto one knee and leaning out. A zoom-in view showed a team of heavy infantry, clad in ballistic 'hard-suits' (not full powered armour, as such a thing had yet to be invented, but armour with electronic support; sensors and the like, and a full shell of hard ballistic armour over a softer suit of armour), setting up a position and fanning out. A ping with the LIDAR locked in their general position, and a burst of fire from the head-mounted miniguns sent them scattering back into cover. Rolling back into cover himself, the vulpine fired off a high-explosive round from the shoulder-mounted mortar. Rising up, he charged at the position as the round exploded, strafing the position with minigun fire, scattering and shredding the troops.
Nothing else moved, and he turned back to the center of the area.
"Position secured. Aidan, Ken should be on station momentarily. As soon as he arrives, I'll move to the Landcrawlers and find out what the situation is with Esailia's infantry team, as they haven't reported in."

At the mine, the marksman GEAR had been doing well in it's duel with Mike. The pilot had evidently been formally and expertly trained; moving position after each shot and firing only from cover and when he was afforded a shot. Each had either landed home, or hit nearby to the Prowler. However, when the GEAR returned fire with the shower of tungsten flechettes, the heavily jacked Civilian GEAR had ducked back into cover. Kuraiko's shots had then peppered it's side, and the machine had made to move away, popping smoke and decoys - and then, while moving, had strayed directly into the pattern of fire from Aidan's barrage, and had, essentially, ceased to exist in any meaningful fashion under the bombardment of the demolition munitions.
The Gatling-toting GEAR was less easily stopped. As Kuraiko took pot-shots at the GEAR, it didn't waver, and despite a few clean and powerful hits, returned fire with a withering barrage of 23mm gunfire, ripping the ground up and shredding whatever cover he was sheltering behind. The GEAR followed up by advancing, dragging a ruined leg, and unable to use its' tracks - and then the demolition rocket barrage fell from the sky. The impact missed hitting it directly, but the concussion blasted the machine forward, and sent it crashing to the ground on its' face, where it lay without moving, smoke curling in lazy strings from the shredded armour on its' back.
With the remainder of their unit down, the 'standard' equipped GEARs covered one another as they maintained their back-to-back formation. Popping smoke and flares, they scooted for cover, though one was chopped down by the massed fire from the Rough Riders' GEARs as they moved, leaving only a pair. The remaining duo of machines remained behind their cover, popping out only to exchange momentary fire, and the stalemate persisted for a few moments -

- before thunderous explosions tore up the area, showering the Roughriders with scattered flying shrapnel and gravel. The pair of GEARs high-tailed it, fleeing under the covering fire and escaping down the backside of the slope and running under the cover-fire, darting from cover to cover as they fled, smoke and hot-smoke rounds blinding sensors and tracking, and shielding their retreat.
As the smoke cleared, the thundering rumble of artillery receded, leaving the three remaining GEARs and their pilots alone in the debris.

At the landcrawlers, the hostile heavy weapons team kept their fire on the access doors to the Landcrawler. Like those encountered by Silverwind, they wore heavy armour and toted considerable ordnance. As the ATCV crested the ridge, the team were momentarily distracted and alarmed, firing their rifles at the oncoming vehicle - and thus not noting the grenades pitched their way until too late. A half-heard shout of 'GREN-' was cut off with the thump of the explosion, and the machine-gun fire cut off abruptly. There was a moments' silence, broken only by the whump-whump-whump of artillery in the distance as the mine was shelled.
The gunmen in the position rearranged themselves with dogged persistence, dragging injured limbs and damaged equipment into position - and then froze as the throbbing engine of the ATCV was underpinned by the whine of GEAR mechanisms, as Blade pointed the Harlocks' rifle directly at the pair of soldiers, the muzzle inches from their helmets.
<Give me a reason,> he said over the speakers, in a voice that dripped with the threat. <I've just lost one of my pilots, and I'm looking for someone to take it out on.>
Edward pulled himself up out of the ATCV's seat, pulling on the rollcage, and yelling "SECURED!"' toward the landcrawler, and looking toward the GEAR, and the two men who were laying down their weapons, and removing their helmets. Neither looked at all remarkable, and had any distinguishing features.
Blade kept his eye on them too, while calling over the tac-net to the others.
"Everyone, sound off. What's the situation? Everything seems to be secured at the 'Crawlers, and at the Irrigation Facility. I heard artillery! What's going on? Any news on the hostages location?"
Despite Arcade being rendered out of action, and whatever had happened to Myrina - Blade still wasn't sure - they still had no firm intel on the hostages' location, or even what the bandits had been after. Or where they'd got their firepower from, if that had indeed been artillery. Not to mention the military-grade combat armour the infantry he'd encountered had sported. Something else was going on here, and he felt that if they could find the hostages, they'd find out what. Or at least, be on course to find out what.

Muse, your character looks fine. I'd maybe suggest bumping up the calibre of the GEARs pistol to 20mm rather than 10mm, as 10mm is an infantry pistol-sized cartridge, so not really suitable for GEAR combat. It does seem a little under-armed by comparison to some of the others, but all weapons are modular and interchangable anyway, so that's not a huge issue. I'm happy to approve your character, and I'll add her to the list later when I have more of a chance to do so. I can then introduce her alongside the other two characters, once we get to a suitable place.

Mainly I'm just waiting for a round of reactions from the last post before I bring things on a bit more. But we're lagging a little right now.

Rhona W Member

Burd-Dragon

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