Rhona W

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

Gigantic new post is up, with plenty to do for everyone. Stick it to 'em, boys and girls!

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

"Fireteam has the captain! headed for the warehouse, Sir!"

"Good work, step on it," replied the fox brusquely, "We'll try and keep the imps occupied for ya, over".
As soon as he said that, more rounds hammered into the pavement and the surrounding buildings. IR had determined they were empty, along with confirmation from the civil defence forces. Missile teams on a rooftop took daring potshots at one of the Imperial GEARs, and Blade applauded their bravery mentally.

At the location of the other half of the team, the Mid-range artillery GEARs continued to send rounds downrange, while their companions moved to pin Irry and Kuraiko in place and hunt them down.
As Ken's helicopter moved in to make its' run, they attempted to scatter, popping chaff, flares, and smoke - but it was all too little, too late; the missiles homed in. Two went off course and self-detonated after missing their targets. One more didn't arm, and one was shot down by fluke by head-guns from one of the Imperials. But the remaining four found targets. Two plowed into one of the artillery GEARs and turned it to a rapidly expanding cloud of debris; their warheads were designed to destroy MBT's. The light armour of a GEAR was no match for them as a result.
The remaining pair of missiles each found one of the other GEARs. The second artillery GEAR took a round to the upper torso, blasting it into scrap. The final missile didn't hit directly, but severed the right arm from one of the defending machines, leaving an opening for Kuraiko and Irry to advance.
As the helicopter slashed overhead, the Imperial GEARs didn't stay still; one swivelled on the spot, and bracketed the sights of anti-air missiles over the speeding helicopter and launched a brace after it, empty tubes ejecting from its' shoulders.

Irry moved rapidly as Kuraiko took a firing stance. While her GEAR was the same model as Blades', it was a line variant instead of command, lacking the dual head-antennae for the C3i system. Instead, it's backpack hardpoints and head were clustered with the antennae, show its' specialization in electronic warfare and surveillance. Nonetheless, while its' main strength was in subtle and invisible forms of war, it still maintained regular weapons as well. The red panda slewed her GEAR into a skidding slalom across the street, rifle held outstretched in a high grip. Shells clattered to the ground as she hammered a burst into the GEAR aiming at Ken and Dane's ride, cratering impacts dotting the asphalt around it, before climbing up it's leg and arm. Return fire lashed back as she weaved into shelter behind a building, dropping an empty mag to the floor.
Antennae and aerials extended as she sheltered, rapidly tapping holographic keys and icons. Invisibly, electronic signals and pulses emanated from her mecha, and fuzzed the Imperial sensor channels and communications grid.
"Ought to slow the buggers down a bit," she remarked with a grin. "Jacquo here - jamming the Imperials sensors and commo channels. They should be reliant on optical and IR only at close range. No overwatch from above, and no radio for them, over".

The change was obvious immediately; the Imperial team moved slower and with less surety as they continued. The two remaining GEARs in the vicinity of Kuraiko and Irry bunched up; both damaged. Aihara's bursts of fire only made things worse, as the one-armed GEAR fell back, firing from the hip with its' rifle as it wheeled backward down the street; into an ambush of anti-armour rockets from a rooftop, which bought it to its' knees. Moments later, the pilot ejected as the GEAR collapsed in on itself. The remaining machine took flight with jumpjets, crossing two streets in an attempt to join up with the rest of its' team.

At their position, Blade held position behind a parked-up semi-trailer, the Harlock crouched and offering suppressive fire with its' rifle. So far only Mike had managed to counter-attack, his nimble movements and bursts of fire giving the enemy wary pause.

“Four hostiles confirmed, headin’ our way—and they just broke half ‘n’ half. Cap, you got a plan, now’s the time,”

"Yeah, fuggen' shoot 'em!" he growled to himself. Before he could say much more, there was a break in the barrage and Aidan rushed forward, brandishing an uprooted lamp-post as a club. He watched with glee as the canines' GEAR swung the improvised weapon and smashed one of the Imperial GEARs with enough strength to stagger it, and mangle the front of its' head. The interruption in fire was what the fox was waiting for, and he popped up from cover, leaping the truck-trailer and firing the underbarrel grenade launcher at the second support gunner. The grenade exploded at surface contact, smashing the GEAR backward, in tandem with Irry's message about commo support.
Immediately, he launched a salvo of smoke-and-chaff grenades from his mortar, centering them on the enemy, and established datalinks with Keel and Nawlin.
"Keel, Nawlin - use the targeting data and hit the enemy while their comms are down. I'll give suppressive fire with the mortar-"
He was about to continue further when the first barrage of rounds from the enemy artillery arrived, cratering the surroundings. Plumes of debris shot up all around them, blinding his sensors with sheer visual noise from all of the flying material. Minor damage reports echoed in his ears, followed by more severe one was teh enemy used the confusion to open fire, the Harlock ringing from impact damage to the right leg, right arm, and torso. Something was shattered and damaged, but he could still move-

"They're firing the artillery, th-"

"Blade Aidan's down, building's on his GEAR!"

"Fuck!" blurted the fox with a snarl, spinning on the spot as the fire subsided all of a sudden, and two of enemy blinked as 'NULL' on the C3i map. A third followed shortly after, with the fourth headed their way.
"Fucking fuck it!" he seethed at the changing display. Aidan's GEAR was half buried; he could see parts of Stumpy protruding from the debris pile. Being buried in a collapsing building was one of the worst problems a GEAR could face. While the machines were sturdy, they relied on a lot of complex moving parts, and were carefully balanced. Too much weight, and they got stuck easily. However, another GEAR could dig them out - if they weren't under fire.
"Keel, Nawlin - keep up the suppressive fire-" he cut himself short as the missile team he'd seen earlier finished off the GEAR Aidan had already damaged by planting two anti-armour rockets into its' chest. At the same time, a wheeled AFV zipped out of a side street, and loosed off a three-round burst of fire from its' turret-mounted 90mm gun at another of the GEARs, smashing its' knee joint on one leg, and blasting an arm free.
"All right," he murmured. "Go home team. As I was saying," he continued, "Keep up the suppressive fire. Jacquo, Aihara, pincer them - close in from behind and box them in. Maxwell, pick 'em off from above once we box 'em in! Work with the locals while we have the comms advantage, we need to finish this quick before whatever's in that warehouse joins in. I'll work on getting Aidan out of the rubble!"
Turning to the pile, he quickly moved the Harlock to the task, metal-shod fingers prising at the pile of timbers, brick, glass and plaster to excavate the trapped GEAR as fast as possible.

The warehouse, in the meantime remained eerily silent. Kellia heard all the chaos from her position a short distance away, and caught snippets of the comm-chatter through her hi-jacked link into the network, before her specialized PADD blinked to life once more with the voice of her 'friend' in her ear once more.
"Kellia, I have more news. Worrying news; there is an intermittent signal closing in rapidly from the due south. I am not registering any hits on ground radar or seismic sensors, which means it is an air target. However, I can detect no visual confirmation and only transient radar or Infra Red signatures... and the signal is large, and moving fast. I estimate an ETA of six minutes. I believe if we are to recover the princess and her information, we should do it before that time. It is not transmitting, and is showing no IFF of any kind... I imagine it is hostile, as it seems to be almost directly on course for the warehouse"
"R-right," she stammered in reply, before stabbing at the PADD and finding the channel for the Roughriders' comms net. "Um, Roughriders? This is Kellia. I have confirmation that there's some kind of air target closing in. Large, and moving fast - it should be here in six minutes, and it's not showing any IFF. I think it's a hostile, heading for the warehouse! If we're going to get the princess out, we need to do it before it gets here!"

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

Dat enthusiasm tho

@MachineSoul

Eh, gotta keep the game going on somehow. You're all enjoying it, so I have to keep it going.

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

blah blah, new post this evening, etc.

Task Force Lima (COMPLETED)

Got a post up, it's not a great one, but it's there. Hopefully it'll serve to link and set up for whatever comes next though. I didn't want to assume too much or take too much action with the situation.

Task Force Lima (COMPLETED)

"Scott, I want you to keep point- we're headed down this alley, it should take us out to the Strøget. No doubt there will be civies, and possibly cops too...watch fire when you can, and watch any runners"

"Sir," Scott replied with a nod, swinging up and around the cover as he moved off, keeping the P90 at port arms. He moved hastily, jogging down the asphalt of the street, breath misting in the cold morning air. The thunder of Wendys' cover fire bounced off of the surrounding buildings, and men ahead of him crumpled and collapsed spectacularly as the heavy, powerful .50cal bullets impacted. "Great shots, over," he murmured on the tactical channel as he paused to take stock of the scene, before moving on again. Ahead, he could see the moving figures, motioning and yelling to each other as they moved in a group, weapons brandished. At least the streets were relatively clear; that was a small mercy. Nonetheless, the SAS trooper wasn't in the habit of taking wild pot-shots. He dug his toes in as he ran, trying to eat up a much ground between them as he could. The sooner he caught up to them and stopped them, the better. And that would need a close, personal touch. His breath huffed and heaved as he ran, and he pulled the P-90 up to his shoulder once more, thumbing the fire-selector dial to semi, and taking a shot. It ripped through the knee of one of the group, and he collapsed to the ground, thinning the carriers' entourage further. Now, he'd bought the distance between them down. Would they stop and turn to engage? He hoped to high heaven the carrier didn't choose to just detonate the bomb if he caught up; but he had to try, whatever else. Setting a determined look on his face, he grunted and hammered himself into running harder to try and catch them.

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

Eh, I'm in no hurry - the break has been nice

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

Since it seems like everyone and their grandmother has been cursed with exams or other stuff that seems to have delayed posting, I'll give everyone an extra 7 days to get their posts in. Then the murder will begin.

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

NEW IC IS UP

A breakdown of the tactical situation:

-The town is roughly an oval blob around five miles in area.
-The Landcruiser docks are in the south, where we started from.
-Currently, the Imperial forces, Kuraiko, Irry, Es and the Fireteam are all on the Eastern Side of town.
-The Imperials are heading to the West Side of town, where Blade, Mike, Aidan and Adrian are all positioned to intercept them.
-The Warehouse where the Princess and the second group of unknown enemies (assumed to be Southern forces) are located is a few blocks behind them to the West
-Kellia is waiting for the Fireteam and their ATV to pick her up at the touch-down point for the teams' GEARs after the BGD. She has some info on the Warehouse and is ready to assist them.
-There are ten Imperials total. They are skilled opponents, with high-end military GEARs, and equipped with powerful weapons. I.e., they are not idiots, and not a pushover.
-Four of the Imperial GEARs have broken off to engage Blade, Mike, Aiden and Adrian currently. Six remain in the mid-part of town, still moving west.
-local forces consist of wheeled light armour (stryker equivalents) and light vehicles (hummvee equivalents), with scattered man-portable heavy weapons in infantry units. No GEARs, tanks or aircraft.

Hopefully this will make things clear for upcoming posts, so that nothing gets missed out when people are posting, and I have to do in-character leaps, or run-arounds to make things make sense.

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

Blade looked over as the jeep squealed to a halt nearby, and the remainder of his pilots jumped out, accompanied by an attractive young female mink. As he looked at her curiously, Mike answered the question he hadn't yet asked. With a nod, he turned to the young woman.
"Well, miss. You've helped us out so far, and right now I don't have time to run you through the mill of trust/don't trust or anything else; there's too many people in danger. So, if you're working to the same end as us, then good. I'll get you in touch with our ground assault team; in they'll be on site shortly while we try and deal with the big guys. Speaking of which..."

"BGDs. Never thought I would live the day to see that."

"...what are we waiting for? ....ah, that....I like that"

"Ain't it a thing of beauty," the fox said in reply, before dashing forward to his GEAR. Keel boarded his quickly, using his natural agility. Blade was left with the more traditional route of the built-in hand-and-foot holds to mount his machine.
He swung into the cockpit and the hatch powered closed. Holographic instruments flickered to life and the internal monitors showed the outside, pixels chasing across the screens as the machine moved from standby to full power. AlThe GEARs UHD batteries whined to life, motors across the machine coming to life with a building hum. In the distance, the chatter of weapons fire and thunder of explosions could be heard. Baring his teeth, Blade urged the Harlock to come to life
"C'mon, faster, faster, faster!" he urged quietly.
One by one; in fractions of a second though it seemed like hours, the machine came to life. Blade slid on his helmet, and almost immediately his ears were filled with chatter from the other pilots, the fireteam, Ken and the Claw.

"Silver! This is Kensington and I'm in the bird. Look boss we gotta hit these guys so to at least slow them down for you! Hollar when you receive."

"Maxwell, I'm online now. We're just powering up our GEARs. Harass the hostiles, get them with hit-and-run attacks; keep mobile and try to keep them moving this way. We'll stage an intercept and try and pin them in this location, away from the residential areas. Maybe the forces in this warehouse will engage them too, and we can let 'em knock each other out - if we can keep the collateral down".

His paws slid onto the HOTAS and his boots onto the pedals as the machine gave him the all-clear. Targeting reticles and readouts were displayed, floating holographically in his field of vision, and synced to the tags and markers on the panoramic interior monitor as he responded in turn to the calls from his squadron.

"Blade, can you get the locals to focus on civvies, get them to stop fighting and get any stragglers out of the fray, Also, the Imps are carving towards what's near the direct opposite of my prior location, you should have local authorities clean that are out ASAP. Hopefully Ken will spot their leader and I can focus him down right off the bat. Throw a wrench up their asses. Aihara out."

"Check my last message ta Maxwell; work in tandem with his movements. Harass 'em and hit-and-run. Stay in place too long, and they'll chew us up, and th' settlement too. Keep movin' to draw their fire t'ward the West side of town, away from the population center and toward us. We'll set up a cross-fire an' an ambush. I'll get ta work on liasin' with th' locals on evacing the civvies. They're already doin' their best as it is, but there wasn't much warnin'. Be careful. Don't get dead. Blade out".

The bulky parachute-and-retro pack disengaged with a brief flash of explosive bolts, tumbling to the ground of the abandoned lot as Blade listened to the next speaker, the GEARs hands moving to pull its' autocannon rifle from its' carry-mount at the rear of its' waist.

"Captain Sprinsteam reporting in! Heading back to the Crawler now!"

Blade looked puzzled as he heard Esailia's words and quickly replied. "Negative! The ATV and fireteam are in the field; they were supposed to pick you up at Maxwell and Aihara's location-"
"Sir, she wasn't at the location," Irry cut in. "I'm at Aihara's location now. The Fireteam are on site in the ATV, over".
"'Fuck is goin' on wi' that feline," he muttered to himself, before replying on the open channel. "All right, whatever. Jacquo, stay with Aihara and give 'im support. Fireteam, break off an' get to yer CO's location. Sprinstream, once y'all are with yer team, head t' my location; you an' the team are th' best bet fer infiltratin' the warehouse and recoverin' the princess. Me, Nawlin, Keel an' Sykes will head off the Imperials wi' Aihara, Irry an' Ken. Move out, over".

He set the GEAR into motion, pounding the pavement out of the lot, before the foot-wheels engaged and he skated across the asphalt, leaning the two-storey robot vehicle into each corner, smoothly sliding through the streets.

The Imperial GEAR team were making their way steadily through the streets toward their objective. They were moving constantly, and were heavily armed. However, they were not causing wanton or pointless destruction; and had refrained from plowing through buildings to get to their objective, or machine-gunning everything they came across. Only when resistance reared its' head did they engage - although, then, collateral damage was no concern. Splash damage from explosions, shrapnel and the mass of GEARs or vehicles manoeuvering, being destroyed or turned over and otherwise engaged in battle shattered businesses, vehicles, homes and more.
As soon as Irry and Kuraiko's GEARs appeared on their instruments and Ken's helicopter appeared overhead, the Imperial team began fanning out, adopting careful positioning and overlapping fields of fire to defend their flanks.
An infantry heavy weapons team moved in as the Imperials slowed down, moving in to plant charges with careful motions and through cover; but as soon as they closed within range, panels around the knees, shins and calves of their target exploded directionally toward the team in a devastating and brutally lethal shower of razor-sharp flechettes, turning them into raw, bloody masses. Empty shell-casings rained down on the street as the GEARs opened fire with a variety of autocannon, gatlings and other such weapons.
As more targets appeared on the screen indicating the rest of the team moving in, one pair of the Imperial GEARs angled their direction. Long-barelled cannon unfolded from their shoulders and began to launch projectiled toward the trio.

Silver reviewed the C3i information fused from the sensors arrayed on the battlefield; a drone orbiting over the battlefield launched from the Claw, the milita's vehicles, satellites overhead and the rest of his teams' own outputs. The comphrehensive results were presented by his GEARs battle computer allowed him a clear overview of the battlefield and tactical situation, and he used that information to direct the others.
"Sprinstream; we have a friendly asset on the ground at the Warehouse in the western side where the Princess is located. She has access to intel about the hostiles in the warehouse. We know they have GEARs and battle armour, so be prepared."
The mid-range rounds began to rain around Blade, Mike, Adrian and Aidan, and Silverwind weaved around them, before sliding into cover.
"Aihara, Jacquo, Maxwell; suppress those mid-range artillery units. We'll close in and attack from the front!"

With their artillery suppressing Blade and the others, the four leading Imperial GEARs began to move out, heading to attack Silverwind and the others, all armed and ready for trouble.
As soon as they caught sight of the quartet, they spread out. The rearmost pair opened up with suppressive fire from hand-carried rotary cannons, while the two leading GEARs moved in, using precise bursts from their autocannon or under-barrel grenades to target the four.

At the warehouse, Kellia had taken cover behind the vehicles Blade and the others had used to get to the abandoned lot. Her 'friend' had patched her into their tactical network, and she had listened to the gruff foxes' instructions to the fireteam to pick her up. The mink looked in the direction of the explosions and fire as they grew closer, spotting the smoke trails of rockets and missiles on occasion, and seeing Ken's helo overhead. The buildings were tall and numerous enough that she caught no sight of the GEARs as yet.
Glancing back to the warehouse, she scrutinised it further. Her 'friend' had still not been able to get any interior views, beyond the original picture. She had no clue as to how many of the enemy were inside, or what their exact disposition was. However, she had detailed plans of the interior, and all of the architectural details.
Biting her lip, she glanced up and down the street and over to the warehouse, its' roof visible above the intervening buildings in the streets between. She took a step forward... and then back.
"I should wait," she muttered to herself. "They might need my help..."