Summary:The RESCUE team and their allies fly to the Ukraine to take possession of the airframe they hope to be their future team transport. But their visit ends up coinciding - thanks, Domino - with a rebel assault led by Russian powered armor. Log Info:Storyteller: None |
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It's been a fairly long trip from New York, though at least RESCUE can pay to charter a jet, meaning everyone had some room and could be comfortable and even sleep on the way. Arriving in Germany, the group switched to a waiting Ukranian MIl Mi-26 transport helicopter, which was a bit less comfortable but had room for everyone, including a small Overwatch security detachment under Posse who met the group there. Another few hours of flight, and the helicopter is passing over western Ukraine as it approachs its destination, a military base near the large city of Khmelnytskyi. A light snow is falling, but not enough to bother the pilots, who are used to it. However, the chopper doesn't land inside the bunker itself, despite there being an obvious and open hatch sized for aircraft to vertically land and take off, but outside at the military base that's built up around the bunker itself, which looks to be fairly active.
Of not is that it appears to be processing refugees into a tent city set up near the base, with busses and trucks arriving that are disgorging their passengers, who appear to be mostly civilian, though there are troops acting as security, perhaps a company currently.
The chopper touches down with a hum of rotors winding down, the side door sliding open as one of the crew hops out and pushes over a stairway over to the crew outside…apparently no one got the message Veronica might need something else. Standing nearby is a man in a Ukrianian major's uniform with a pair of soldiers behind him, their weapons at rest, though they're watching the group alertly.
Veronica never leaves home without gear to accomodate the world that often fails to accomodate her, so she has ratchet straps and wheel locks to keep herself in place on the chopper when it is not prepared for her. And once she is detached properly and her gear is stowed, she rolls to the stairway and sighs, not offering one single word to anyone.
"Clear!" Rani calls down sharply, making sure no one is in the way before she then rocks back on her large rear wheels and rolls herself off the deck of the chopper, bouncing sharply - and rapidly - down the incline of the stairs to the ground, not braking until she is down completely and lets the front of her chair drop to the tarmac.
One might get the impression that Veronica has done this before. And is used to confounding the 'helpless' expectations of others. Even without exoframes and powered armor.
Once down and stable, Roni moves out of the way and waits for the rest of the team to disgorge, including the casket-like containers from the cargo hold where Iron Patriot and Augmenta are waiting. Just in case, mind you. But they are here.
Once everyone is done, Roni forms up beside Toni and rolls towards the military contingent's commander, noting the rank insignia - thanks to Posse's briefing packets - and addressing him accordingly. "Good afternoon, Sir. We are RESCUE. I believe you were expecting us?"
One of the individuals along for the long haul is a woman whom few here have personally met. What skin can be seen in her face is as white as the fresh snow outside, overlaid with black cosmetics and a black circle around her left eye which may very well be some sort of tattoo. Everything else with her is decked out in black with a winter camo overlay.
Hank knows her well enough.
The rest of RESCUE may have some basic info on file from when she had been brought through the security checkpoint at their headquarters, accompanied by Posse, under the name 'Tamara Winter.'
What travel time hadn't been spent trying to catch up on rest had often involved a fair bit of sarcasm from her end and questionable civility with her use of language, she's definitely rough around the edges but considering how many weapons she's in possession of it's no stretch to say that she's of soldier stock. This is probably why she gets along so well with Posse, the two seem perfectly comfortable BSing one another once the chief of security joins the team.
Whatever had been seen in Domino/Tamara on the way out here quickly changes once the chopper sets down and they're surrounded by military forces. Suddenly she's keeping a much lower profile..and paying attention to -everything- that she can. She's signed on through official RESCUE channels for extra security and for being fluent in Russian. Not that she's here to play a speaking role during the negotiations.
Doc McCoy is in an armored costume, but he's changed the design, it is featuring a lot more blacks and blues, and he has a ton of belted pouches. His visor currently looks more like some pretty nifty shades, still yellow however. During the air flight he'd spent most of his time talking tech and bio-science with Roni and Toni, though he doesn't ignore anyone and will include them in other ways. The man's voice is back to it's old lovingly enunciated self, though there's a bit of a growl sometimes, a subsonic undertone that's mildly shiversome.
Hank does indeed know Domino, and he takes her aside a moment where they talk in low tones. An accord is reached, some sort, and then he returns to what he'd been doing.
Once they land, he waits until Roni is down, then simply hops to the ground over the side of the stairs, knees barely flexing on impact as he strides barefoot over chilled tarmac.
And nope - the cold doesn't bother him anyway.
This is not his show, he'll simply loom, massive hands clasped behind him, adding some extra impact to Roni's words. He's VERY good at loomage!
Last off the chopper is Toni Ho, dressed in jeans and a warm jacket as her purple hair is swirled around by the wintery breeze outside, a scarf wrapped around her neck loosely as she watches the pair of caskets get set up in front of the door if needed, then pauses to talk to Posse briefly, quietly, before the cyborged woman nods and moves to join the Overwatch guards staying with the chopper. That's valuable armor after all! The rest of the RESCUE party gets to stay inside the chopper where it's warm for the moment, as Toni steps down the stairs and joins the group.
The major nods curtly to Veronica as she addresses him, a brow rising at her unconventional departure from the aircraft, his alert gaze running over Domino and Hank in turn. Not quite contempt in his eyes, but definitely 'civilians' as censure in his gaze.
He remains polite if curt, speaking English with a slight accent. "I am Major Borysko Kolisnychenko, commander of this facility. Come. We can discuss as we walk." He turns on his heel, starting to head back to the large doors leading into the facility. "Your purchase is being made airworthy by one of my best mechanics and refueled for a short trip, as specified in our agreement. I would not recommend taking it for a long flight, but it will get you back to Germany for further maintenance."
The odd group definitely draws looks from both soldiers and some of the refugees disembarking nearby, particularly a pair of little girls who look all wideyed at Beast and Domino in particular, dressed in mismatched clothing that speaks of being hastily dressed, but warmly.
Io would fit right in with the mistmatched clothing as she looks like, presently, a sort of five year old picked out her clothes and she just threw them on. There is a punk edge to her, and a certain style too - one that most people would scoff at or give strange glances to.
She is last off, and had spent most of the trip hunkered into a corner and seeming at odd peace with everything and happily quiet.
Now, however, whatever reverie she had been in is gone and she moves to follow the group after sticking a few sticks of chewing gum into her mouth and squinting briefly at those in the camp before moving to join the others. One might note the notepad computer slung over her shoulder, the small backpack around her full of tech gadgets, snacks, and the cellphone on her belt as well.
She just a mute nod of acknowlegement to the white-skinned girl, and waits to be told what her role in this whole thing is.
Veronica can take being dismissed as a civilian one heck of a lot more than being dismissed as a woman, or as handicapped. During the flight, she made a point of at least greeting everyone, but there have been definite differences noticeable to the team and her friends. She interacts with Hank, and clearly lights up during their intellectual discussions. But when she doesn't think he is looking she can often be spotted gazing at him sadly, and is - quite silently and privately - still bearing up under an enormous load of guilt for what she views as the unfair cost to him of their friendship.
By comparison, she seems completely accepting of Domino's presence, even if she cannot seem to come up with much in the way of conversational gambits with the woman; she trusts Ava implicitly, and if Ava trusts this woman to help, she has Roni's absolute and unwavering support.
Sight of the refugee situation tightens Veronica's gaze. She can and will deal with it, but she longs to help these people rather than leave them to all of this. "Thank you, Major, for your consideration." Veronica offers as she rolls along with him at his direction, Toni sure to be right by her side. Meanwhile, her right hand is busy tapping out instructions on the keyboard mounted on her left forearm, sending messages to the rest of the team.
« Io, can you please stand by to monitor the feeds? Posse, as subtly as you can, please, open up the case and free up two of the Humblebees. I'll get them launched. I want a better look around the area. Once they're up, Posse, can two of your team check the stores we brought along, see what we might be able to shake loose to contribute to the refugee camp? »
If Domino has questions she's currently keeping them to herself. Roni's situation in all of this is ..peculiar, and perhaps worth discussion at a later date, but ultimately it's none of her business. Besides, Roni seems to get around pretty darn well on those wheels. This does help to ease the albino's mind somewhat.
She doesn't need to know Io personally to have a good idea of what her trade is. She's also not tricked out in armor and is thus prioritized on the Squishy List in Dom's mind. Someone to keep a close eye on should things go sideways.
Physically she's paying close attention to where Hank is at any given moment. If things do go south, he's mighty bullet resistant. It's not being rude if it's a sound tactical decision!
Unlike most of the others the cold clearly does get to her once out of the chopper. The 'coffins' are noticed, as is the local activity. There's an awful lot of civilian involvement around here… Maybe this transaction will go smoothly and they'll all be on their way soon enough.
Heh. Yeah, -right.- She's giving it twenty minutes tops before someone tries to pull an on the fly renegotiation.
Hank doesn't need to see the guilt, he can smell it, the ONE thing he actually missed in smoothskin form was the super-senses his bestial one had. He can differentiate people by scent, even smell their moods most of the time, but yeah - all his senses are much keener and he has the mental chops to pay attention to the flood of sensory data he is getting constantly.
This is not the place to discuss it, however. Instead he'll treat her as he always has. Truth is - he's grateful. Her surgical acumen was key in keeping him from becoming a monster. He'll never forget that. He'll never blame her for /his/ decision to put himself between the RESCUE team and danger, that's what Hank does. Truly…if there's a version of Hank that doesn't do such things, well, it is a bad LMD, a clone, an alternate universe him, or some other trick. That's too central to the guy's persona.
Io is about the only one he's not met, but as she seems to be blissing out on the trip, he will just leave her be for now. He does incline his head briefly, however. "Great hair."
The plight of the refugees is not lost on Hank, and when he sees the pair of little girls, he murmurs. "Excuse me." Before he moves towards them, and then hunkers down, a genuinely kind smile offered, teeth /not/ bared. In flawless Russian, he speaks. "Hello little ones, I am the Beast."
No doubt jacked into the comms, he's listening but says nothing. If they can spare supplies, Hank will hand deliver them. As for the little girls, he is patient, and very still - willing to let them examine him closer if they wish.
Yes. Hank's a sucker for kids.
Io looks back to the chopper, even as the message is sent back through to Veronica: «Sure.» Yet, her hands don't touch any keypad or device. "You coming?" She asks.
And, there's a bit of sound of clanking, heavy object of metal-on-metal, before a sleek and dangerous looking robotic dogs, red eyes blazing, scurries out of the chopper and moves to settle by Io as a faithful dog would.
Robotic dogs, afterall, are a technopaths best friend. She then asks Roni, mildly: « Want me to monitor their feeds too? Or just ours? » She takes the wad of gum, flavor now spent, wads it into the wrapper and stuffs it into her pocket, and looks over the other woman again, measuring her up for any electronic devices the other might be carrying on her without the consideration to introduce herself - but then, DOmino has enough experience with people to perhaps glean that Io is firing on completely different cylinders than most people.
The two girls squeak a bit as Hank approaches and kneels down to speak to them, backing up slightly, before the younger one (perhaps eight) promptly asks in the same language. "From the fairy tale? Are one of them your princess?" she asks, pointing at the quartet of women standing nearby, as the Major has come to a halt at Hank stepping away, a frown on his lips as he mutters something under his breath.
Posse responds in the affirmative to the text, briefly, and a pair of humblebees will stealthily detach from their bay, using the refugees to mask their ascent into the air. Though the drones do give a birdseye view, it is a military base, and there is always a chance that they might be detected, of course. But for now Io can certainly monitor their feeds without it being obvious. Posse then hops out of the chopper and walks over to talk to one of the nearby troopers, who summons over a sergeant from the refugee force as they begin working out logistics as some boxes are unloaded from teh chopper. This wasn't really a deployment, so there isn't a lot that the Overwatch squad brought with, but they do have some emergency supplies they can provide, mostly blankets, food and water.
%Toni hmms, smiling faintly as Hank makes friends, then murmurs. "Thank you for consenting to the brief pause, Major." The older man grunts. "With respect, we are not here for one of your mercy missions. My goverment is, under some protest, making a sale of an irreplaceable piece of technology, only becuase we lack the resources or need for it at the moment. The funds are necessary for assisting the war and its fallout." His eyes harden. "I would be lying if I said I am pleased to be selling away what could be future necessities for current requirements. But it is what is, as you Americans say."
Speaking of which, seeing the dogs emerging, the Major apparently has had enough. "NYET! Your dogs stay on the chopper. I am not conducting a tourist tour of a military facility with your weapons." Kolisnychenko says sharply.
« Just ours for now. I don't want to get caught and make more of an issue here. I just want more intel than we have. » Veronica types out, explaining to Io and expecting the woman to both respect her decision, and probably grouse about it. Io's like that, and that's fine. She has her attitude, and Roni has hers. They'll find a way to work together.
Veronica glances back noticeably at Goliath and then up to at the Major, questioningly. "Weapons? I will grant you, the Overwatch team has several weapons on-hand for safety and security. But Goliath is not a weapon. He is a robotic companion animal. I can introduce you, if you would like?" She knows how Io views Goliath, and does her best to treat him as such. Besides, further introductions are likely in order.
"This is my partner, Dr. Ho." Veronica starts with, since Toni is closest. "You saw Dr. McCoy." she gestures towards Hank, who is trying to woo the little girls. "Ms. Winter, our translator and security consultant." she gestures towards Domino. "Posse, our Overwatch commander and head of security." And then Roni gestures towards Io and Goliath. "And this is Eye Oh, our electronic systems expert, and her companion, Goliath."
No. Roni doesn't assume that being friendly and diplomatic about it will make everything OK. But it can't hurt, and it is the way a professional would deal with the situation. So that's how she starts.
Oh jeezus but there is a lot of cyber tech on this flight… All of the power armor and synthetic implants are one thing but the cyberdog takes it to a whole new level. One which the Major doesn't seem any more comfortable with. Domino's shoulders subtly tense, they haven't even made it through the outermost doors yet and their tedious bout of diplomacy seems to be on shaky ground.
Oh yeah, and Hank is over there playing with the kids. C'mon..c'mon c'mon just get inside… Fewer people, fewer chances of ruffling feathers by proxy. Stay focused, team! There's always time to go off the books once their mark is secured.
Introductions soon follow. Dom makes a point of smiling without showing off her pointy canines, she has enough going for her with the coloration and the mercurial glint in her eyes. "Hey" is all she has to offer, her first verbal contribution since their helo touched down.
Nope, there's nothing special about her! Just don't run her through a metal detector or ask to see what's under her coat! She's already run mental calculations on the number of potential hostiles versus how many rounds she's already got loaded into her mags.
She's liking her odds.
"No, little ones, my Princess is still in America, these are my friends, however." And then the Major is sure to get a little MORE annoyed with Hank when he sings a bit of 'Evermore' from the live action Beauty & the Beast movie - and he sings it /well/. The man's voice is DEEP, and damned if he doesn't have a near opera quality voice as he sings.
When done with that, he rummages in his multitude of pouches, he winks and gives each girl a Snickers bar, and then lopes back to the group. "Yes, forgive me, Major. I know your need is urgent, of course." And nope, he has not even a fraction of a dram of actual contrition over having delayed to be kind to children.
Major Sourpuss can bite his furry bottom, honestly.
He watches the dog get specifically banned, and says…nothing. Once he's caught up with the group, he falls in slightly ahead of Roni, and yes, he's more than happy to let Domino use him as cover if needed. That's what meatshields do!
He offers a toothy and perhaps a bit intimidating smile to the Major. "Doctor Henry Phillip McCoy, Major. A pleasure."
The concept of 'robot dog as service animal' /tickles/ the hulking genius, yellow eyes alight a moment with that mirth as he looks to Roni and then to the dog, and then by the time he looks back forwards the gleam is masked again.
Service Robodog, THAT is a new one.
It is probably good that he has NO idea of Domino's thought process - and her ammo to hostiles calculations!
"Companion animal, bozhe moi…" the major mutters, reaching up to adjust his cap absently, then then takes a breath. "…fine, fine, metal dog for comfort can come too." Kolisnychenko says with a grumble as he nods curtly in turn to each of those introduced. "Stay with tour group please." he mutters with just a hiiiint of sarcasm in his voice, turning to resume heading towards the facility again as he mutters under his breath. When did his top secret facility suddenly become this?!? And people wonder why vodka is considered a requirement on a military base.
The little girls giggle and wave a bit at the snack before their mother arrives to usher them back into the queue, shooting a slightly suspicious look at Hank but giving him a tenative smile before they vanish back into the teeming mess outside the fence, while several Ukrainian solders come over to help move the supplies from the chopper over to the refugee area.
Inside, past the massive doors and another pair of guards who salute the major as he crosses is a thick concrete tunnel that leads into the bunker itself, with armored windows on one side where another pair of guards watch alertly as everyone goes through. There's a metal detector…which promptly is shut down as the major snaps something to the guards, who then motion the group through after him, turning it back on once they're gone. They both…well, watch. Particularly Domino. And the dog. For very different reasons.
This leads to a second door that is unlocked via keycard and code by two MORE guards, before rumbling open with the squeal of rollers in need of a bit of maintenance. Io will easily sense that the gear in this place is old, sturdy, and not in the best of repair, mostly from disuse. Very solid doors, twenty or thirty year old electronics save for more recent additions here and there for security. The interior beyond the door is cavernous, with a long path about thirty feet across that heads straight back, with armored doors, four on a side, that lead into variou swarehouses, with Cyrllic lettering and numbers marking each, as well as some cracking and peeling signs of old Soviet posters and insignias.
A cargo cart is waiting for the group, backed up to a ramp with its back lowered, and a soldier waiting patiently inside, along with an older man with two or three days worth of stubble, a balding spot, and a mechanic's jumpsuit. "Ah. This is Anton Blasevik, the chief base mechanic. He can tell you more about your craft." the major says, stepping onto the cargo cart.
Io frowns at the military fellow, pointing out, "He's a dog. Not a weapon. But if you don't allow animals, that's fine. Whatever." Though, she does wait for his response to Veronica, first, looking at least mildly appeased at Roni's interferance and interention. And, perhaps that's another reason (apart from her salary) she doesn't go nosing in on the other feeds to sate her own curiousity.
But - if she's to be monitoring the feeds? She doesn't seem to be doing a very good job of it. Instead, she's leans up against the nearest leaning post, building, or vehicle, crosses her arms and takes on a bored expression.
"Thank you kindly, Major." Veronica offers, because that's the polite thing to do. He did just agree to let Goliath come along despite his misgivings. And Roni will stop trying to torture the man any moreso, rolling along at a good clip as Henry rejoins them and they continue into the base. She works hard to roll herself up the ramp into the back of the cart when it appears, and does her best not to appear too distracted as she takes in the sensor feeds from the humblebees flitting about the base and refugee camp, taking it all in.
While she sits on the cart, Roni joins Toni and Io in questioning the mechanic about their purchase. She's not nearly the aircraft mechanic Toni is, nor the electronicist Io is, but she can pay attention … and record everything for later. Just in case.
To Hank, at some point in the ride, Roni leans over to murmur, "You still have an incredibly handsome voice, Henry. And I think you did very well out there with the girls. Thank you."
Other than that? Veronica is probably spending more time closer to Domino than either enjoy, pleading for intermittent translations. Spoken Russian is not on her talent list. Not one little bit.
Domino seriously has to restrain herself from openly facepalming when -Hank starts singing- and passing out candy. C'mon man, this ain't Halloween! Get your fuzzy rear in gear and rejoin formation!
This is one of many reasons why she prefers to work solo.
Io's metallic companion is approved then they're on their way and fiiinally through the first set of doors. All is not better for the albino, however. The further into the reinforced bunker full of blast doors and soldiers they go the more withdrawn and on edge she might seem. Hank with all of his senses might start to pick up the scent of fear coming from her direction. The signs are quite subtle though, for as much as she doesn't like the setting she seems to be very well practiced at hiding the resulting symptoms.
With the cargo cart brought around the pale lady waits for the others to climb aboard before doing likewise. She'd rather make sure that she's somewhere that's easy to jump and run from. Y'know. Just in case. And so she has as uninterrupted of a view of the facility's interior as possible. As outside she's mostly silent and always observant, now with twenty percent more trepidation.
Veronica's desire for translations actually serves as a much needed distraction to help keep the mercenary's thoughts on point. When offered her words are spoken softly for the benefit of those who happen to need them. No need to interrupt anything else that's being said..or make herself a bigger target.
A little surprised that the Major allows the dog, Hank revises his estimate of the man up a few notches. He ignores the sarcasm as a result, and truly, yes, he knows that they have tasks to do. Still not repentant at all about the kids, not now, not ever. Yellow eyes behind his yellow tinted visor study the old base, considering how strong the doors are, how much force it would take to rip them out of the wall in an emergency, figuring out their mass and about how far he could fling one - you know - the usual.
He smiles brilliantly in response to Veronica's murmured comment. "Well, thank you, Roni…and…they're -kids-." Really, that seems to be enough right there for the man!
He studies the cavernous room, still no sign of the aircraft, though the mechanic is looked over and not found wanting. Not yet.
The plane will be the real test!
Hank can't help but smirk a little at Domino's reaction, hell, Posse will likely want to punch him too, maybe. Still worth it.
Sub-vocalized into the comms. «How sure are we that this is not a trick of some sort?» Much like Prince Humperdink Hank thinks EVERYTHING might be a trap!
Io is content to sit in silence with Goliath who, ultimately, doesn't weight as much as he looks he might, not more than an obese person might. Her eyes are alert enough, but she's not on edge - not in the least. Perhaps it's because she has Goliath with er - or, several persons who have battle armors at the ready - who knows?
She squints at Domino again though, shrugs, and then pulls some LIttle Debbie's swiss rolls from her backpack, and starts to eat one as she swings the notepad around and begins to look at it. Those watching said notebook will see that it's typing out something, even though no hands are on it.
Blasevik is happy to answer questions…he speaks pretty good English but there are still technical terms he occasionally needs the English word for for Domino to translate. In his words "Aircraft is A-OK, yeah?" Thumbs up, big smile missing a tooth or two!"
The rugged cart rumbles along to the last warehouse on the right, with a big '8' stenciled on the wall next to it with Cyrillic writing underneath (which reads 'Warehouse - Authorized Personnel Only' for those who know Russian). The door here is open, with a guard leaning againt the wall who springs to attention as he belatedly spots the major coming towards it, saluting as the cart trundles inside. This…appears to be the aircraft storage hangar. There are two large doors in the ceiling made to split and slide to the side to allow access to a pair of landing spots. One is covered in random boxes and stuff that appears to have been stack haphazardly out of the way, probably to clear the second. There's a variety of craft with dust clothes hanging over the, from what appear to be VTOLs to choppers to a huge aircraft that takes up half the hangar that appears to be…a seaplane? With LOTS of really large missile launchers on top. ICBM-sized. The craft that does look relatively ready is the stocky craft currently parked on the opened door. From the technicians hammering away on said door's mechanism by the roof catwalk, that door ain't gonna close anytime soon now that they got it open, which is why there's a light dusty of snow in the area, mostly on the Bearcat itself. It's in fairly good looking shape…some paint cracking and peelign after its large storage and a bit dusty here and there, but the small fuel truck parked nearby that's finishing refueling it suggests they've cycled its fuel, while there are a few mechanics working on the exterior.
Anton hops off the cart as it comes to a stop, waving the group after him. "This way, this way! Very good, yes!" The major steps off as the ramp lowers at the back, looking around with a slightly proprietary air. 'HIS' aircraft, as he thinks of them.
Toni steps off, glancing to Io. "Io, would you please see how our new purchase is feeling and if there's any other maintenance that might have been overlooked to get it in the air?" She steps to the side, following the Major and Blasevik over towards the Bearcat itself.
Without a ramp this time, Veronica sighs when the cart rolls to a stop and everyone else starts dismounting. She then finally works her way around to looking up at Hank, a bit of a grimace on her lips. "Henry, would you be so kind?" She will not complain to the Russians that are letting them buy their aircraft.
Once she has been hefted down, chair and all, Roni thanks Hank and then rolls towards the aircraft, listening to everyone's reports while she checks the feeds from the humblebees. Everything looks OK, and thus far she hasn't spotted any signs of an impending double- or triple-cross. But she is typing up a list of materials and sketching out a plan for deliveries after they depart of goods and materiel to the refugee camp.
Including Snickers bars. And plush stuffed animals.
Domino grins right back to Blasevik and thumbs up right back at him. "A-OK!" We're all just makin' friends down here!
Opportunity comes in the form of faded sign right before their cart ducks into Warehouse 8. "Hey. Give me a few, I'll catch up," Domino chimes in out of the blue with a sidelong dip of her head toward a door. "Long flight." And who could fault her? Long hours of flying and an ever-present necessity to keep hydrated, the concern is real!
They can go without a translator for a little while, right? This 'Anton' fellow speaks English well enough (A-OK!) and they're all going to be focused on the techie stuff for a while. -Plenty- of time for her to freeze her white butt to a grimy Soviet toilet seat.
Io comes to life, then. She looks up at Toni, her head tilts and she moves over to consider said purchase, and - well, talks to it. She talks to it like someone might a close friend, a lover, or - a crazy cat lady might talk to her cats or one of those silly rich types who carry around dogs in their purses and spend more money on their dogs then they do their children's education.
"Hey, baby," she croons to it, soothingly, setting a tender hand upon it's bulk. "What's your name?" She seems to listen. "Mmm. You think so?" She turns an eye on the Major. Frowns. Looks back to the machine who has her attention. "Yeah, I'm Io. Don't worry." Io pats it, as if to comfort. "Yes," she says, as if answering some unspoken question. "I promise." She pats it once more, then slowly withdraws her hand, pivots, and folds her arms.
Her eyes narrow. "Considering the lack of effort given to maintain her, she's in pretty good shape. I'll need to put new slam-jammer widgets in her, and she'll need some of her whirlygigs changed out," for this Io makes a spinny motion with one finger, "Some oil, and other stuff. Mouse nest in the radar, but that's not anything I can't fix in a few minutes. If you don't purchase her, though, she'll die in a year or two, most likely. Io seems completely sincere on her name for parts by the rather grim expression on her features.
Hank is only too happy to give Roni a hand, in fact he sets her and her chair both down with scarcely a bump, very mindful of the chair and occupant both. The Russkies might not be too happy to see just how effortlessly Big Blue lifts that mass, sure - he LOOKS strong, but to get a glimpse of just -how- strong might not be a welcome thing for them.
When Domino excuses herself to use the water-closet, which term might /actually/ apply here, Hank will step up to take over translation, not like he doesn't speak Russian himself.
Watching the technopath at work does give the man pause. A moment later he's tapping away at an invisible keyboard, lights flickering on the insides of his visor lenses. "Should be able to fabricate carbon fiber and alloy replacements for the parts, but it will need a full workshop." A moment later he moves over to the plane, a clawed hand gently pressed to her. "She's a beautiful lady, no doubt." A glance to Io. "Did she tell you her name?"
The Major raises a brow as Io seems to talk to the aircraft, pulling out a cigarette as he idly lights up, watching, a thin string of smoke leaking from it as he puffs it out his nose. Toni nods to Io, frowning. "Well, we ARE buying it…" she says, tugging out a tablet. "If you're ready to complete the sale, major?" He huffs, then walks over to her as they work out the nitty gritty of buying a one of a kind tens of million dollar airframe. Blasevik looks a bit hurt by Io's blunt description, then notes. 'Is Bearcat! Bearcat, yes. You know this animal? Is very fierce! Strong.' He mimes flexing his biceps, then waves towards the open ramp at the back of ship. "Come, we chase mice out of radar, give them new nest away from cat…show you blueprints, da?"
Meanwhile…Domino is able to charm her way past the guard at the door, who points her towards the nearby restroom, watching her go with mor ethan a little interest. Apparently not a lot of women assigned to this station. Entering the restroom, Domino suprises atech who is apparenly attempting to deal with the aftermath of a burst pipe which has frozen into an icy layer on the floor. "<What? Who are, this is not working..>" he starts to say, getting to his feet…
Then promply slips on the ice, falling backwards, his head ringing off one of the pipes as he crumples unconscious to the floor. The keycard on his belt and little scratchpad of numbers next to it easy to see. What luck!
With those in hand, it's easy for Domino to slip out again while the guard on Warehouse 8 isn't looking her way and input the number and card into the personnel door by Warehouse 6 and slip inside.
This warehouse looks more like it belongs in an Indiana Jones movie; there's a wide variety of boxes stacked on shelves or individually, ranging from larger ones around the perimeter of the room to smaller on the shelving, with pathways weaving between them that seem more made from whatever path the workers left open than anythign planned. By the door, however, there is a newer looking metal box, about four by three feet, with a blinking indicator on top next to a keypad.
Veronica cannot help a bit of a sigh at the litany from Io, though whether that is from the evidence revealed, or the other woman's far less than technically accurate names for parts is left up to the imagination, seeing as no telepaths are in residence. "And I chose to leave the humblespider prototypes at home." she grumbles softly to herself.
No. Veronica is not kidding. Yes, she has been building some additional drones that do not rely on flight, with smaller cross-sections.
"If the rotors will survive the flight to Germany, we have secured enough space at the hangar there to do the fabrication and replacements." Roni explains, glancing at Toni and then Io. "Does the Bearcat believe it can make that flight? Or should we work on replacements here?" The Major is not going to like it, but Roni is more than capable of deciding that they'll fabricate on the spot if necessary. The plan was to fly this thing out of here, after all.
« Everything clear, still, Posse? » Veronica texts, checking in on her security chief and friend as she, the mechanic, Io, Toni and Hank evaluate next steps here. She's a bit too involved to quite realize how long Domino has been away.
Could anyone fault the albino for the tech's mishap? After all, she never laid a finger on the poor guy! Dom's hands are well clear as he falls and knocks himself out with an adorably sadistic note ringing through the headbutted pipe. "Such a shame when that happens" she mutters to herself while neatly unclipping his keycard and helping herself to the scratchpad. A quick glance at her watch then she's on the move.
Enter Warehouse 6. Alone from the group and without a 'tour guide' she takes a quick look around to get her bearings then quickly turns her attention to the metal box with the blinky light on it. A second is given to double-check the number on the side of the case to make sure it's the right item in their inventory before she goes to the keypad.
If the tech's scratchpad has the code then this'll be super easy! If she has to guess then it should only take her a moment.
Io squints at Hank, then, as if he'd grown a second head - she'd not looked at him like that the entire trip, until now. Until he asked that question. Then, he demeanor shifts to something a bit more, well, warm towards him and she says, "Her name is Nina." She looks at Veronica, states, "She'll fly. Sure. But, it'd be like asking a guy in an iron lung if he can sing a sonnet for you." At least, that's her opinion.
There's a glance to the Major, "You really should take better care of your machines, you know." But, that's all she says on the subject and at least he's willing to get rid of the mouse nest. She adds, "I've already got the blueprints, but, you should probably hand them over regardless. Not sure my boss will get my blueprints." Whatever that's supposed to mean.
She looks at Goliath, "Go with the Major, Goliath, fetch the blueprints, okay?"
The robotic dog barks agreeably, turning bright red eyes expectant on the Major, and waits patiently like a trained dog would. Service dog indeed.
Unaware of Domino's hijinks, Hank steps back from the aircraft, once more placing himself near Roni, you know, just in case she needs someone to take a bullet for her or something. Yes, that would do wonders for her feelings of guilt, but you know what? He'd rather she had to live with that than have her get shot and not live at all. Simple equation. Also, with his body armor and natural toughness a gunshot is not all that likely to do that much to Hank unless the shot is a really really good one, or using special ammo.
He will also very much approve of the plushies and Snickers bars that Roni is planning to add to the shipments she'll be sending to the refugees. If he didn't have most of his much less robust funds tied up in Escrow for the purchase of a lab, he'd HELP with the expenses!
Ah well, maybe someday he'll actually GET the lab! You know, without there being a techno-organic bio-weapon in the sub-sub basement!
A smile to Io, yes, he really does take her power seriously. "Nina? That's a great name. Also a great singer, Nina Simone." He hums a bit, and then watches as hound and major are sent for the blueprints.
A soft mutter. "Probably going to be paper."
Given her somewhat unfortunate personal situation with unsavory parties in Russia Nadia van Dyne has taken certain unusual precautions with her travel arrangements. With her Pym particle shrinking tech it was no trouble to add a sleeper cabin inside some of the RESCUE equipment. Especially when that cabin is the size of a grain of sand and shielded against anything but the most advanced sensor equipment.
Deep in a little personal research project she hadn't even noticed the expedition had arrived at it's destination until a notification was received that some Humblebee drones had been deployed to scout. And after the realization she was long overdue a little exercise the Wasp figures she may as well go out and have a snoop around too.
Not spying strictly speaking, although she was trained as a spy and is flittering around in her costume at insect size. But what their hosts don't know won't hurt them right?
Major Kolisnychenko eyes Io. "If I had the resources to get these machines operational, my country wouldn't be having to sell them to Americans millionaires." he notes, in a slightly growly tone, as he finishes the transfer with Toni. "Unfortunately, we need the funds more than we need those resources or this machine." He waves the dog after Blasevik. "That way, shoo…he has the plans." Which are, indeed, paper, as Anton re-emerges from the craft to set them on a nearby table, spreading out the paper..which is not in the best shape, but is not in dangers of crumblign apart, at least. Between it and Io they can probably make an electronic copy given some time.
«Everything clear. Shall I start moving in the equipment?» Posse responds. Toni gets on chan. "«Go ahead, move the armor first. It's the largest gear. Thank the pilot for me and get everyone inside, we'll just be in the hangar until we're ready to depart.»"She looks to the major for perimission, who nods and gets on his own com, ordering the troopers outside to let the RESCUE team by with their gear. Nadia will be able to clearly see the little caravan moving from the outside helipad to the inside hangar.
Meanwhile, in Warehouse 6…
The code was one that Domino was given in advance to memorize…but it works first time, the box chirping and the indicator turning green, before the box unseals with a hiss, slightly foul-smelling gass leaking out as the side of the box unfolds to a mis filled interior from which a figure emerges…a small one, but obviously powered, considering his head is almost the size of his body, which is dressed in an non-descript military jumpsuit. From the connection inside the box, he appears to have been there for a while. He strips off a breathing mask, taking a deep breath of relatively fresh air, then grins toothly at Domino then greets her in Russian. "Zdravstvujtye. Domino, da?" The little man switches to accented English. "You may refer to me as Gremlin. I am your contact. Come." A little flight pack on his back fires up as he zips up off the ground, then starts hovering down the path towards the wall that separates Warehouse 6 from 4. "Ah yes…here we are…" He pulls out a little sprayer of some sort, then draws a four foot circle on the wall,l before putting a small cap into it and backing up, pulling out a pair of shades that he puts over his eyes. "YOu may wish to look away for this part…"
There's a flash as the spray ignites, starting to cut right through the concrete as it sinks out of view, a greasy gray smoking coming from it, before with a faint THUMP the two foot plug cants to the side, then falls through the other side of the hole, leaving a passage.
Io grunts back at the Major, but doesn't bely the point. She looks back at Nina', patting her frame and then moving in to go get rid of that nasty mouse nest, pulling a small belt of tools out of her backpack.
It doesn't take her too long to get access to the panel and the circuits where the radar is nestled in, and she pulls out the mouse nest, tossing it away from herself and then goes to work on rewiring and soddering the circuit board to get it working again without complaint, all the while speaking in low tones to 'Nina' and letting her know she's in better hands now.
Goliath, for his part, is curiously careful with the paperwork and blueprints, nabbing them up in his mouth, and trotting them faithfully over to Veronica, for folding and safekeeping after 'woofing' a thanks to Blasevik.
Since Toni summons their gear, Veronica nods and rolls over to Io. "Tell Nina that we'll get to work, then. I don't think what we make here will be the final replacement, but we'll get her better before we ask her to fly us out of here." OK. It's weird talking about the vehicle as if it is a person, but Veronica will try to adapt. Somehow.
Argh! And now she has robo-slobber on blueprints! OK, not really, but she schools her expression as best she can.
« Posse, on your way by can you please check the restroom near Warehouse 8 to make sure Domino is OK? » Veronica sends. Everything the drones have spotted seems fine, so she has largely stopped worrying about something going sideways here outside of the technical challenges of fabricating replacement parts here instead of in Germany.
"Maybe we can reinforce the exist —-"
And then a giant thud-slam sounds, and Roni's head jerks in that direction just a hint before guard rifles start rising. Oh, frakk. « Posse! » those fingers fly sharply across her forearm, and then hover over the now-armed button connected to the controls for Augmenta.
The location is correct, the box is right, the code checks out, and her contact for the next part of the job is -inside the box?!- "Alright, didn't expect that" she again mutters before responding with "Da" and a thin smirk. Oh hey, he speaks English too! And has a jetpack thing. Well this just got WAY more interesting! The albino motions forward, lead on!
Not having to find her own way through the maze cuts down on time, passing another quick glance to her watch as they go. Everything's still on the down low so she keeps her hands free of weapons.
The sprayer is a curious device but she doesn't need to be told twice to shield her eyes before the fireworks come to pass. Once the giant chunk of wall drops out of place and their new doorway is formed Dom is grinning like an absolute -fiend.- "I've gotta get me one of those."
Smooth, swift, and..maybe not QUITE so subtle anymore, but hey. Let's see what Warehouse 4 has to offer!
Holding back for just a moment she decides to check her phone and is perhaps fortunate enough to see her name being mentioned. « Plumbing issues, place is a mess. » It's not even a lie!
With his augmented hearing, Hank also very easily hears the *thump*, and then the comms chatter. «Actually, Domino, are you sure you didn't want to say something more like 'Uh, everything is under control. Situation normal.'?» Yes, he just quoted Han Solo in the Death Star prison scene.
Hank is, indisputably, rather a nerd…maybe even a 'Nerd's Nerd'.
Not sure what's going on, he never the less turns up the magnification on his visor, studying everywhere he can see seeking signs of weapons emplacements, or snipers. He also stands close enough to Roni that he can easily either knock her over, cover her with his own body, or step into the path of an incoming attack.
He is particularly watching the Major, and scanning for active comms /not/ on RESCUE-Net.
Angela, for her part, wasn't the most obtrusive of individuals… well, when she's not wearing her wings and fiery halo out in public for all to see. The rather unassuming (compared to everyone else) woman was just helping with the rest of the group with the gear, making sure everything was okay there…
And that's when the alert from Roni came in, causing her to move ahead rather quickly… far too quickly for a typical human, but she still doesn't take the time to reveal herself just yet. No need to go that loud. Though she does speak quickly into the comlink, "Roni, this is Angela, where do you need me?"
The downside of having been helping with the gear, she's still not fully aware of the tactical situation. Though her eyes flicker back and forth, making sure she's not missing anything as she's ready to run interference.
From her airborne position Nadia frowns when the suspicious comms chatter begins, moving just inside the hanger so she's better able to respond to a trap inside without losing the option to head back outside to protect the helipad. She sets her suits electronics searching for satellite images of the local area, as current as possible and going back as far as a week and running it through some image identification software that'll bring up anything suspicious. Alas it's likely all from commercial weather satellites but it's better than nothing.
While that's going in the background she begins doing some more active scans for encrypted communications, odd heat signatures and anything more exotic. At least within the realms of technology and science, she sadly has yet to figure out a way to scan for magic.
'Check the restroom?' Fully armed and armored with a military escort twice the size of her own fireteam, Posse's voice cuts over their radio band with another approach. "<Tamara return to the main hall immediately to regroup. You have fifteen seconds before fine Ukrainian men help—>"
The last of Posse's communication is lost by the crashing sound of concrete that echoes from one of the warehouses. The sergeant's eyes narrow as her small team looks around on edge. "<Zero seconds. ASAP, Tamara,>" she amends, not stopping her units movement towards warehouse 8 but looking silently to the Ukrainian sergeant for direction.
There are no weapons or weapon emplacements that pop out of the walls….possibly not for lack of trying considering the state of maintenance, but the soldiers do seem on alert as the major whirls around, then gets on his coms in Russian, demanding to know what the noise was. None of the soldiers seem inclined to point their weapons at the group in the hangar, instead loosely pointing their weapons towards the direction of the noise outside.
In the hall, the two armor caskets are being pushed via motorized cart towards the hangar, accompanied by the Overwatch squad, Angela, and Posse. The thump is a bit louder there, though it's difficult to say exactly where it came from other than 'left side of the tunnel midway down?' or something similar. The Ukrainian troopers who were traveling with the group to escort it down, whirl around, rifles coming up as they scan the area, the sergeant in charge pointing at the RESCUE personnel and motioning them to take cover behind the caskets, before whistling and choosing a pair of random troopers as they start heading towards the warehouse doors towards where the noise was. As Posse motions the troopers to go check the restroom, the sergeant points vehemently back. "Nyet, NYET, stay there!"
Inside the warehouse, Gremlin rubs his hands together, looking around as he pulls out two things from his pockets…some sort of scanning device…and a small bag, which hs tosses to Domino. "A slight upgrade to your payment…you have one more box to open, but this should cover an additional smaller box and a brief detour." He also tosses an odd key to her. "Hold this." The bag, it turns out, is full of kugerands. Probably another 50k of gold currency, easy. Enough to go slightly off mission, perhaps?
Gremlin quickly follows his scanner off to the side, muttering to himself. This warehouse is smaller, with less stuff piled inside it, though there are more hazard stickers and radiation symbols on some of the boxes. Nothing leaking ominous liquids at least. Or glowing.
After a moment, the little man lets out a gasp and zooms over to a box, then rests a hand on it, next to the stenciled words:
TITANOVYYY CHELOVEK
"Ya nashel eto, otets…" he murmurs in Russian. 'I found it, father.' He seems to focus on it, before the box shudders a bit, lights along its side blinking on in sequence. "Yes, yes….too long asleep by weak-willed /fools/…come on….come on?" he coaxes as the box shudders.
Then a large metal fist sudden bursts through the front of the box as he backs up, before an eight foot tall armored figure tears its way free, the whine of overpowered servos filling the air as it straightens up, a green optics glowing to life.
Gremlin lets out a high pitched giggle, clapping his hands. "Good, good!"
He turns to Domino. "Now, other box, yes? Rush rush. Little time. Also, take battery out of phone." he recommends, zooming off towards a large flat box set back against the wall, perhaps ten feet high and about eight across, but only a couple feet thick. He produces a key, then motions Dominio over to the other side of the box, as the colossus tromps into position to guard the path leading to the warehouse door. "Now…put in key…turn on three? Da? One…two…"
In the hallway, as the soldiers are covering one another and shooing Overwatch to cover behind the gear and caskets, lights start lighting up on the caskets. Meanwhile, a location transponder flares to life as virtual map and location awareness AR comes to life on the RESCUE comms. No one needs to ask where Roni is; their gear tells them exactly where she is, and where that is in relation to their current location. Then Toni's beacon and others' start coming online.
This is officially 'a situation;' Veronica's next words are given aloud, if softly, across their tactical net: "Posse, command is yours. We are currently secure in the hangar with the vehicle, small guardian squadron, mechanic and major.
None of the beacons are showing distress markers, but all are lit within fifteen seconds.
Did they remember to put a beacon on Domino?
« Situation Normal. All Fucked Up.» This blazes across everyone's gear, and message board as Io finishes resetting the panel after fixing the radar - and, actually increasing it's parameters by a little bit at the same time.
« Another technopath just came online. We aren't alone, kids. »
Io gets up, dusts herself off and extracts herself from where she was working, whistling sharply and Goliath comes over to her side. She pats his head, "Good boy," then she looks to those of her co-workers at RESCUE, quizically.
Sigh. « Seriously Doc Darkfuzz, I don't need to tell you the situation of my stall time. »
Domino subtly rolls her eyes then catches up to Gremlin. "I give us thirty seconds tops before someone comes calling. How soon can we have this wrapped?" Another message. Two messages from Posse. "Make that no seconds."
Then more money (GOLD!) is all but thrown right at her and something -properly- interesting bashes its way through Box #2. Aw hell, that doesn't look good…
What'd she think before? Twenty minutes -tops- before someone tried to renegotiate..and it had to be with HER.
Time spent thinking is time wasted. The albino stares at Gremlin and holds up her card as if to punctuate 'this is the LAST time we're breaking contract' before marching to the door and slotting it into place. Fifty grand for unlocking half of a door and damn the consequences. She's played worse odds before. She can do this shit.
With the last deed done she runs like hell back the way she came and quickly comes across another dilemma: How to get out in the hall without stepping out of warehouse 6. She needs to stall (hah) and hope like hell that opportunity comes around.
Posse will probably give her shit for this later but she's sending a message rather than running out into the open. « Working on it, layers! »
Hank allows Roni access to his locator and bio-monitors in the visor, so Beast will also be on everyone's tracking maps.
Fortunately with his visor tied into their network, once Roni brings it live and cedes tactical command to Posse, he has a few moments to act. He hops to two guards, picks them up by a shoulder each, and sets the Overwatch troops flanking Roni. A low growl. "Guard her." He is VERY serious about this, and then he lopes off on all fours at highway speeds to intercept the armour caskets. He studies the motors, the gearing, the just plucks the caskets from their conveyance systems.
Yup, Hank just plucks them up, balances one on each shoulder, then bounds back to where Roni and Toni wait, making himself the delivery system to get them their battlesuits! Okay, so, the ground cracks a bit after that first jump, but still.
Each casket is set down by their respective user, and he waits, crouching low and baring teeth and extending all four sets of his claws with overt menace and hackles raised.
Um…scary Beast is scary!
Angela frowns a little at the situation, and says something unintellligible… well, to anyone who wouldn't understand ancient languages anyway.
For the record, Phoenicians had some of the most colorful swears.
In any event, Angela concentrates a moment, and suddenly seems to grow in stature slightly, silver armor materializing over her body as brilliant red feathered wings erupt from her back. A pair of swords are sheathed at her hips, and a fiery halo roars over her head as she definitely makes herself…
Well, noticed might be an understatement at this point.
It's entirely possible that not even all the RECUE team knew Nadia was tagging along, it's easier to avoid the Red Room finding out information if no-one knows it in the first place after all, but her voice chimes in on the comms channel "We've got suspicious Russian chatter in the area," she informs. "Someone called Gremlin is in contact with a Colonel-General and about to proceed with some sort of operation."
For completeness she uploads the relevant comms recordings to the RESCUE local network. Wasp doesn't have a locator beacon either, at least not one which is currently active, although her upload does give a rough approximation of her location. Sneaking around in the rafters of the hanger and running the name Gremlin through her records. She has a lot of old AIM, SHIELD and Red Room data and it never hurts to see if a particular codename has a history.
The Overwatch troops shift formation to pile on the far side of the caskets and Posse ducks right to join them while the carts are turned to form a loose semicircle along the opposite wall, granting the group a measure of cover. Stun rifles come to rest upon the cart tops at the same time a flood of room information passes into the RESCUE net from Posse's scanners, joining the sea of IDs and biometrics. Anyone who blinked would have missed how the carbine entered the cyborg's hand from its holster.
"<Roni group find cover, not concealment, and hold position at major's direction. Pass him this intel. Nadia investigate if able,>" she radios tersely to the group. Beast's arrival, while surprising, isn't evidently unwelcome as the Overwatch guards nearest simply move their rifles off the caskets and reset them upon the cart beds. They're far more accustomed to the looming mutant than the local Ukrainians likely are - and he is so good at looming.
On three, Gremlin and Domino turn the keys. Her job is done! And as she runs off, Gremlin glances her way but shrugs. She's served her purpose, both for him and for his superiors. Money will be waiting in her account when she checks it next.
The big box shivers, then the front slowly topples forward to form a makeshift ramp with a crash, revealing…an odd stone gateway. It looks almost as if it's made out of a geode, with shimmering crystals built into it. The ugly part is the squat electronic box that's been fastened onto it, the very best of 1980s Soviet technology, consisting of a screen and a keyboard in Cyrllic. Gremlin flies over to it and begins typing furiously as the stone starts to make a faint grinding noise, shimmering brighter as the gateway itself begins to flicker and darken..then there's a RIIIP sound and a vibration that echoes through the facility, before the alien gateway flicks on.
And troops in rebel Ukrainian gear come charging through, makin way for a pair of larger armored figures. The first is the size of the colossus standing guard, all in red armor, with four clawed hands and massive shoulderpads, with a glowing red star on the front. One hand is up, electricity crackling around the wrist as it scans the area, stepping forward and to the side. Seeing the colossus, it halts, then the helmet turns towards Gremlin. "Gremlin. This was not the mission." hisses a digitalized female voice through the helmet speaker.
The other is smaller, also red, but standing closer to seven feet, with a masked helmet and heavy ablative shoulder pads and arm and leg guards, its hands clasped behind it in a parade rest as it steps through. "Gremlin. Well done." says a man's voice from inside it, before he notices the colossus, then narrows his eyes behind the mask. "…irrelevant for now. Captain Nemirovsky, prepare the charge. All troops, power down.
Gremlin drops to his feet, shutting off his pack as he pulls it off, then the mightly titanium colossus clomps over to the small man, kneeling down and its chest planel opening. "A fortunate coincidence that the Titanium Man armor was here, Colonel-General Shatalov! And certainly a boon to our plans, given how well shielded it is." Gremlin grins toothly, his eyes slit, then disappears into the chest cavity of the Titanium Man as the chestplate closes back up, then it straightens to its feet again.
"We will discuss this later, Major." the general grits, his red armor turning as he gestures to the larger. "Shut them down. We need no warning to the Ukranians that they are about to have a second front opening behind their lines." Titanium Man's helmet turns toward sthe gateway. "A pity it may not recover…but with this base as our beachhead, we will be able to reinforce through more mundane means."
In the Hangar, Angela's suddenly transformation draws a heartfelt "Trakhni menya!" in Russian from the major, who reflexively draws his side arm to point at Angela, the guards nearby doing teh same reflexively."
The larger of the red armors steps forward with a faint tch, glancing at Titanium Man, then nodding. "Da, colonel-general." With a hiss, a pair of large electrical coils extend from the back of the armor as they start to pulse with rapidly building power as the massive armor stomps towards the doors..then simply grabs hold of them and flexes, ripping them off right out of their frames as they tumbles forward with a crash. "Privet. Ya Malinovoye Dynamo." the armor grates out.
Before the EMP goes off with a flare of energies flaring from the two tesla cylinders on its back, channeled down the hall to the electronics at the front of the base and outside it. The armor caskets, fortunately, are behind the concrete bunker wall by that point due to Beast's quick grab.
But all communications are down. All non-hardened recordings
And suddenly Hank is taking charge! Or, sort of. Holy crap! Veronica had not consciously experienced Hank's newfound strength. Now she has.
And Augmenta's casket is now in front of her. "Major, I do not know what is happening, here. But we stand ready to help, and to protect the civilians." she calls out, as she takes in Wasp's reported data. She's not sure what to do with that right now, but she taps the control on her keyboard: Deploy.
The metal casket hisses, and its front face falls down as a bar extends from the top of the casket outwards. Veronica rolls around onto that plate and reaches up, seizing that bar and pulling herself clear up out of her wheelchair by sheer muscle, even as the matte grey metallic suit inside opens up like a flower before sunlight, and she drops herself down in, initiating full power-up and seal immediately thereafter.
"Posse, Augmenta online." Veronica reports over comms, as her locator beacon changes color and identifier accordingly. "What the —"
And then an EMP fires. That's going to be a mess. Such a mess. The comms net is going to be a hashy mess for a while.
And Augmenta's altered, mechanical voice bellows very loudly, "Multiple large metallic figures, forty meters!"
Io watches all of this go down with a frown, and knowing there's not much further she can do yet beyond be support - which isn't necessarily a bad thing. She's willing enough to take a backseat to the others far more fit to be heroes or hired guns, she's just tech support, really - at least, in her mind. Also in her mind is the 'They don't pay me enough for this shit' thought.
But all that goes to the wayside when the EMP goes off, and Io's world is shut off. Even from Goliath, whose eyes go from burning red to dull black orbs as even he powers down along with her notebook, and all other electronics near her. Most of which are things she's kept. Things that are her 'friends'.
There's little else she can do, besides go catatonic, with that horrified eyes-wide-open stare - the look has been captured on film before, in pictures in magazines, newspapers and film, of people who have been exposed to massive trauma beyond the scope of what the human mind should ever endure.
"No," she whispers, hoarsley. "Nonononono."
Her hands move to her head, and she collapses onto her knees, balling up around Goliath, cradling the inert and 'dead' hunk that is little more at present than a metallic sculpture of a canine.
Oh man.
Oh man oh man.
This is another shining example of why specific details are left out of most contracts. Within seconds the whole gig turned into one colossal fustercluck with Domino standing in the middle of it all (and with only a small portion of her promised pay!) while the world around her goes straight to Hell.
Was the job worth it? Probably not, but it's too late to go back! These jobs can't all agree with the ol' morals. Fortunately there's nothing in the contract which stated that she couldn't turn around and be a part of the group effort meant to shut these guys down. She's careful to watch for that particular bit of fine print.
Regardless, with the giant constructs going to town on the bunker Domino has her window to dive out of hiding and make it look like she is indeed coming out of the restroom. Outside she'll probably run right into a bunch of armed and cranky Ukrainians..and Overwatchers… Her hands are empty and ready to go up into the air if necessary. Survival instinct is go!
"Didn't give me any time to wash my hands!"
Of guilt, perhaps?
Angela looks at the Major, "Fortunately for you people, twelve thousand years gives one patience. Keep cover against these attackers!" She speaks in, well… it sounds like English, but the soldiers would hear their native Russian.
With that, she hovers into the air, then launches like a bolt out towards the hallway, where one of the Crimson Dynamos is.
Which is when Angela swings out her flaming sword, looking to slice through that armor like a hot knife through butter. And… well, even someone raised in the former Soviet Union might have a bit of shock for a Certified Angel of Vengeance(tm) taking a swing at them with a burning blade.
Wasp is lucky, her suit is designed to withstand all kinds of exotic energy and interdimensional travel, so when the EMP goes off it doesn't blow her electronics out. But it does kill her connection to the RESCUE network before she can upload all the technical and personal information she'd been able to dig up. With a sigh Nadia loads the information into a discreet repeater beacon that she secures up in one of the upper corners of the building. She can't gaurantee anyone will get up and running, but she can at least ensure they'll have as much info as possible when they do.
Of course no matter how good her shielding might be it won't able to stop a technopath, so as a precaution she shifts all critical system into a manual back-up mode. It wouldn't do for someone to subvert her size changing systems and blink her out of reality after all.
While those precautions enable she manually tunes her energy blasters to optimally cut through titanium..
In any other situation, the fifty year advantage in technology would give Posse's fireteam a tremendous edge over their Ukrainian counterparts, perhaps even enough to take them in an engagement if it came to it. Against an EMP, it's a different story. Weapon charge lights cut off, the squad net disappears in a haze of static, and all the indicators and lights disappear from the assembled Overwatch suits as all five guards go momentarily slack, their suits overloading from the surge and shutting down to become so many pounds of dead armor. And then there's the cyborg in the back rank…
A weighty metal crash is the answer to the unasked question as a hundred kilos of soldier and steel hit the concrete limp and dark, with her rifle still half-resting in her hand. There's no stir like the rest to regain mobility in her disabled suit and the second carbine at her side, matte black and loaded with a conventional magazine, sits completely unused - ready for just such an occasion but without anyone to wield it.
Hank's visor has some minor protection against power surges but nothing to harden it against an EMP, at least the armor is already manifest - were it not he'd have no way to summon it. In the moment of darkness his eyes gleam green, backlit by the light of a flaming sword, his form almost hellish in the way the fire light of vengeance dances over blue black fur and razored claws.
Now, Hank is many things, he's very strong and quite tough, but he has a pretty good idea that directly engaging people in power armour is /not/ the wisest action. At least not engaging them hand to hand.
A glance up, and then Hank springs for the ceiling, moving across it with claws sinking into the concrete until he can get to a point over the Titanium Man and the upraised cart. Looking at the angles, he shifts a bit, and then pushes off, a mighty leap aimed not at the armoured soldier, but the cart. Sorry Roni, sorry Toni, Hank's going to do his level best to stomp the thing down hard enough to drive it down onto Titanium Man, essentially making him a spike. That might offer some other options, after.
Needless to say…the Ukranians are taken off guard by the sudden appearance of the massive power suit. But there's nothing wrong with their reactions as after the flare from the EMP finishs, the seargeant roars. "OPEN FIRE!" in Russian, and the troops do so…to absolutely no effect, other than ricochets off the armored opponent. Which raises a clawed hands as panels on its forearm open, electricity running along its fingers as it builds up…then the armor jerks, swinging its arm down reflexively as its pilot catches Angela's approach out of the corner of her sensors. The swing is enough to keep Angela from cutting teh main body of the armor in half…but she does cleave throught he left forearm as it slams into her with some force and bounced away, clattering down the hall. Even suprised, the pilot's reflexes are top notch as she spins the torso to slam the other claw into Angela, trying to smash her straight into the concrete wall by the door. AK-47s open up from inside the warehouse as the rebels storm out, some going down under the fire, but there are a LOT more of them than the single platoon in the hall.
Following behind them is the towering form of Titanium Man, the greenish metal giant ducking under the ruined door jam as it steps out, then makes for the still filled cart, hefting it up as it takes aim at the soldiers still standing behind the other two carts. At least until Beast suddenly spoils the throw, smashing it down on the armored giant's head as it staggers slightly, the cart breaking over its head and tumblign away…leaving nary a mark on the suit sadly as the helmet tilts up to peer at Beast in a very 'did you actually DO that?' sort of look.
Domino luckily has time to run for cover as a gunfight breaks out in the middle of the hall around the angel and the two giant armors. The RESCUE troopers, finding their wepaons useless, run for Posse, then start low dragging her behind the carts, trying to make for the open Warehouse 8 door. One grabs the other carbine on Posse and starts using it for covering fire, though most of the rebels are focusing on the rapidly diminishing platoon. The major and his men arrive at the door to Warehouse 8, adding to the cover fire as they sends a barrage of fire down from the doorway. It's a good thing Angela is pretty much immune to small arms fire considering how much of it is flying around the hall.
'We need to get our people to cover!" Iron Patriot says. "Posse…POSSE? Shit!" The engineer is well aware of what probably just happened if Posse was next to that EMP, and runs to the door, skidding out as she lowers her concussion gun over her shoulder, then sends a bolt slamming into the Crimson Dynamo, sending it skidding back as Angela gets tossed away.
"Damnit!" Augmenta complains. No use telling everyone she's frozen in place, it's obvious when she does not move to help. And as she realizes what is happening, what is wrong with her, she realizes Ava is out there in the middle of that gunfire, locked up helpless inside a frozen suit, half-blind and returned to her crippled state. To WORSE than her crippled state! The guild that lacerates the doctor's psyche is potent indeed.
"Wasp!" Augmenta shouts aloud. "Help Patriot any way you can! Take my darts, and the screamer pods. Go! Posse is down, and our people are trapped in that Hell without backup!" That said, she lifts the arm of the suit by biological strength alone, and cycles the launchers for her neuro-disruptor darts. With the suit's systems hardened, she can still target and fire, but her brain's connection to her suit is hash while the EMP's effects remain in the air.
Io isn't going to be much of a help to anyone, she remains mostly catatonic, cradling Goliath, oblivious to any outside stimulus. Not the shouting, the combat, the people - the EMP worked just as well on her as it did Augmenta's suit, or any of the other technology in the room, it'd seem.
Too late. Not that it would have mattered. Dom's back out in the hall and Posse is freaking -down.- Hank has gone full on feral and -who the hell ordered the Angel?!-
Cripes their entire operation has already been hamstrung by that blast. Conventional bullets clearly aren't doing anything. These guys survived their own blackout attack so zapping them with electricity probably won't do much good. At least she won't have to waste any more time in the bathroom playing with the broken plumbing…
Oddly enough, that Dom is splintered from the rest of the group could become an advantage. She still has access to all of Warehouses 4 and 6 and there's a LOT OF STUFF in there! Maybe she can find something useful in another crate? Seems like a fine moment to roll the dice a few more times.
First off, maybe she can buy the others some time to extract Posse. The albino quickly unzips her winter coat and snaps up a stubby AKS, flicking it to full auto then dumping all twenty rounds into one of the robot guys. They don't have to see who's attacking them (and better if they don't!) but if they're being hit from another angle maybe it'll disrupt their formation.
Then it's -run like hell- back into Warehouse 6 to see if Lady Luck might be able to scare something up for the crazy Hellbino.
The Angel gets caught by the other claw, and is slammed through the wall… but while that's happening, her blades come down on the arm in question, severing it even as she crashes into the wall. Unfortunately, no one told her that the capacitors were kept in the arms… so when she cuts through…
*KABOOOM*
The explosion and being shoved through the wall means that it doesn't look like Angela is moving at first. Then there's a dim glow that grows in intensity from the cracks of the rubble. After a few moments, the slightly scorched and fiery-eyed angel shakes off the rubble, her halo glowing as bright as her fiery blades as she speaks, "Being Russian, I suspect you don't really have a belief in God, given the history of the Soviet Union."
She pauses, and then grins slightly, "You will." Her eyes glow with brilliant fire as she looks at the "disarmed" suit.
"On my way," Nadia shouts from somewhere up above. She doesn't detour to collect any of the weapons Roni mentioned though, at her current size they'd only slow her down or force her to grow in size and become an easier target. "Watch out for re-enforcements. They'll have a plan to get these things out of here somehow."
At full speed she flitters through the complex. Thankfully it doesn't take high tech equipment to track down the fighting, anyone with ears could manage to follow the sounds of battle, once she gets eyes on the robot rumble her energy blasters will unleash a hail of pinpoint laser blasts. Trying to pinpoint the sensors and lenses which allow the bigger of the pair to see.
Hank is strong, and his claws can rend steel, that said…yeah…not having a magic sword of magic, he will do what he can. A smirk at the Titanium Man, and a shrug - 'had to try' pretty clear in the body language, and then rather than fight to do damage, he shifts tactics. Despite all appearances he is NOT feral at the moment.
Nope. Angry? Yes. Worried? Very much so. All that and more - but not feral.
Hank leaps /over/ Titanium Man, hands briefly resting on the armoured head, and uses to vault over him, and then into the ceiling. From there he bounces off the wall and kicks the armored suite behind one knee, and drives four hundred plus pounds into the small of the back, heaving not to harm but to hurl about. He can't hurt them, but he might just be able to keep this one at least off balance. Hank never stops moving, striking, kicking, heaving, dodging. Walls and floor and ceiling used to bound about and about to confound the power armoured villain with sheer mobility and grace.
He /is/ the BOUNCING Beast, after all.
Back in the hangar, the Ukranian mechanics led by Blasivek move to Io and start moving her and Goliath into the cover of the Bearcat, as they're pretty unarmed at moment and also not bulletproof, and the girl seems unable to respond to her surroundings. The RESCUE troopers keep trying to drag Posse towards the door, which is slow going considering she's not exactly the lightest dead weight…one rolls her into the farthest cart, as the solders behind it are dead or have abandoned it, then start doubletiming it towarsd the door as best they can!
The now armless Crimson Dynamo straightens as its optics gleam at Angela as she digs her way out of the rubble. "I"m not Soviet." snaps the female pilot. At which point its shoulderpads split open, revealing a line of missile banks. "SO GO TO HELL!" There's a roar as a barrage of small missiles streak out, angling to hit Angela…and pretty much everyone in the area, as the armor fires thrusters to get distance from her, skidding backwards.
Meanwhile, in Warehouse 6, Domino frantically looks through the nearby boxes, finding one roughly rifle-sized that she can smash open. Oh look! Rifle! It's all sci-fi looking and has a radar dish instead of a barrel tip, but it seems to be at least partly charged. Might work!
Titanium Man takes a step forward towards Beast. "The Americans use Muppets now to fight?" says a voice through the speaker, Gremlin letting out a high pitched cackle. "I like this show! How does it go? Bork bork bork?" The fist in question slams down, trying to catch beast as it smashes into the floor as the giant advances, then twitches as its suddenly barraged by Wasp's lasers, waving a hand to try and swat her away. "Auugh! Bug!" It doesn't seem to be penetrating the armor…of the pair, this armor has the heavier of that. But the constant flashes are definitely disrupting its pilot's ability to see. And Beast slamming into the back of its knee definitely does help as it goes to one knee with a crash, holding out its hands to catch itself as its pummelled by the attack, swinging wildly now to try and catch either Wasp or Beast!
Patriot sees the missiles coming and raises her hands, starting to summon a force field, before she suddenly lets out a paint grunt fo suprise as a pair of energy bolts streak out of the hands of a third armored villain as he steps throught the wall, the other Crimson Dynamo armor sending her spinning to smash into the end of the hall. "Annoying."
On the bright side, the effects of the EMP are gone…which does nothing for everything shorted out by the pulse, but at least it's not interferring with anything in a new way.
Veronica remembers all too well what it is to feel helpless. She hasn't felt this helpless in a long, long time. She has no desire to ever feel quite this helpless ever again.
And then Roni sees with painful clarity Iron Patriot get swatted away by energy beams of an unknown nature.
"Patriot!" Augmenta shouts, and then she lurches forward.
Waitaminute. What?!
The interference from the EMP is gone, and finally the signal from Veronica's brain is reaching her suit. And that means her suit is back online. Augmenta ducks and steps out of the casket, and then does quick calculations, firing a series of sensor pods at the doorway, bouncing them of walls and rims to scatter into the hallway. No harm. No foul. But now she has clear feeds on the entire hallway … and she programs her intent. Then she launches herself, boot jets alive, and streaks out over the heads of the Major and his remaining guards. She has already programmed in her target selections, and her arm-mounted dart launchers fire in rapid succession, aiming for all of the rebel soldiers, anyone not in powered armor not wearing an Overwatch or Ukranian uniform, even as her pod launcher goes on rapid-fire. "Ten seconds, Beast. Screamers incoming. Get Patriot back inside!"
Every dart, as it strikes, releases a neuro-disruptor charge, paralyzing the target. She does distinctly non-lethal effects. The screamer pods, on delay, will only go off on her command. And when they do, their intense flashes and screaming, ulullating sounds will lash at the senses of suits and people alike.
Augmenta cannot beat these armored behemoths. And she knows it. But she can try to keep the soldiers and civilians here from being overrun and killed. And save her people. Somehow. And that means getting to Posse and her team, and getting them the Hell into Warehouse 8!
At her current size Wasp can't cause any lasting external damage, just bother the sensor systems, but with a little more shrinking there's almost certain to be ways inside the attacking armours. The volley of non-lethal weapons from Augmenta provide a perfect chance for her to disappear from view and take the fight microscopic.
Of course that doesn't mean she can't unleash a barrage of Pym particles into Titanium Man as she vanishes from view! The formerly giant size suit of power armour will, for the next five minutes, be dramatically reduced in size and strength. Hopefully that'll give her the time she needs to carry out some size changer sabotage.
"Do the best you can with what ya got" Domino mutters while pulling the Buck Rogers looking rifle out of the case. Who knows how old it is, if it still works, what it does and if it's going to blow up in her hands or irradiate the hell out of her! It looks strange and it's a gun, that's about all she can ask for short of a crate full of RPGs!
Back out in the hall there's already a freaking lot of explosions going off. At this rate the whole facility might come crashing down on top of them all! Although that could potentially work to their advantage if it does… Dom's power can be weird like that.
Any other merc would have taken the chance to run the instant that the explosions sounded. There's distractions aplenty! However, -this- merc is lining up a shot and crossing her fingers. There's plenty of targets (one of them shrunk?!) and they're all plenty easy to see.
"Come on you old Soviet piece of shit, give me a crit."
The first couple swings by Titanium man are only glancing hits or complete misses - no doubt the damage to the walls and floor will buff right out! Or not. However, the third connects solidly, titanium encased fist slamming into Hank's chest and sending him flying. OF COURSE the armoured villain gets shrunk /after/ sending Hank flying.
Fuzzy body encased in armoured weave is sent hurtling through at least a half dozen crates, only stopping when he slams literally INTO the wall in a spray of cement fragments, and dust.
Even Hank needs a moment to recover from that, and that's when Augmenta gives her warning about the Screamers. Sadly, he's no Domino - he won't happen to trip over a pair of sound suppression ear guards, nope, not even a smidge of that. "Understood." He growls back to her, and then wrenches himself out of the Hank-shaped crater in the concrete wall. Improvising, he wads up some cloth and covers his ears with the mass in the hopes he won't end up crippled.
Angela doesn't even wait for the missiles to be launched before ducking back behind the wall, letting the warehouse structure take the impact of the warheads instead. After all, when one makes a bold statement, typically the reply is either wilt or fight.
And whoever is in that Crimson Dynamo armor didn't seem to be the wilting type, even if they were "disarmed."
Once the missiles are expended, well, then Angela takes off, launching out with blinding speed as she angles in for another sword-strike on the Dynamo armor. Her goal is to carve off weapon systems as best as she can, just to neuter the big hunk of metal so it's mostly harmless.
Explosions rip through the hallway by Angela…the only place she can avoid them is to dive into the open Warehouse 6 door, really as they leave the area around them covered with craters and smoke and fire. And then the angel re-emerges from the fire and smoke, shooting forwards as her wings spread as she leaps at the damaged Dynamo armor, sword raised…and the the OTHER Dynamo armor explodes from the smoke, grabbing the angel by the back ankle and spinning to redirect her straight into the door fo Warehouse 5 as Shatalov flies forward to hover, immediately following the throw up with a blast of electricity that would make Palapatine go 'whoa'. A few unfortunate soldiers on both sides get caught int he blast and go down…what the Colonel-General would call 'unfortunate collateral damage'. "This one is mine. Clear the other Americans." Angela apparently has his full attention now.
Titanium Man shrinks, which seems to disorient the armor's pilot for a moment, before it straightens, starting to march down the hallway towards Augmenta at her shouted warning, building up speed to a full charge. One arm swats an unwary Ukranian out of the way, complete with Wilhelm scream. This is made easier by how many rebel troopers just drop from the darts being fired by the smaller armor.
Meanwhile, Wasp slips into the severed arms for Crimson Dynamo, as swearing in Russian starts to leak out as the armor flails as little flashes of light are visible from inside the suit. There's a surge of Ukranian reinforcements from outside as they charge in, firing at the rebel soldiers, though one or two have shoulder mounted rockets they start to lock into the fray.
Iron Patriot regains her feet, shaking off the impact, then takes off, accelerating down the hallway fists first as she slams into the oncoming Titanium Man in a defeafening and sends him flying towards the front of the bunker where he smashes through the security door as the troops there dive out of the way, Patriot following him out of sight.
Domino's shot, on the other hand…well. She pulls the trigger, the gun hums to life, and a brilliant bolt of shimmering golden energy goes shooting through the middle of the battle. The odd bolt ricochets off the staggering Dynamo, igniting a short that causes half its missiles to misfire as they go streaking out to slam into the battle…mostly landing at the ruined door to Warehouse 4, which sends the rebels there flying and…well, lots of them aren't getting up. Definitely not the ones who were already neural stunned out. A stray missile, by itself, somehow goes streaking through the center of the battle almost in slow motion….avoiding the tumbling Titanium Man as Iron Patriot slams into him…past a rebel trooper trying to fire his AK at Augmenta…over the RESCUE troops who have gotten the cart with Posse's unconscious form to the Warehouse 8 hanger door, then ricocheting off the wall and ceiling as its fuse fails to arm…and spinning right back to slam into Shatalov as the electrical storm barraging Angela cuts off as he's knocked to the side, spinning around before he plants himself again.
Augmenta flew in to make a difference, and she has done that; but she very nearly then ended up in a powered armor v power armor conflict with a shrunken Titanium Man, and that would have been bad; Augmenta is awful at those kinds of conflicts, because her pilot has no serious combat training, and all of her weapons systems are non-lethal and intended for use against people and animals, not machines!
Thankfully Iron Patriot recovered herself - obviating Roni's need for Beast to fetch Toni and get her to safety - and took on Titanium Man, so he didn't get to Augmenta. Yay for that. But the pilot inside that armor is agonizing at the sight of all of those dead and dying. She is trying to use - as always - her non-lethal weapons, yet all she is doing is rendering people helpless so that they can be shredded as so much passive meat under the withering attacks of the other killers.
Choking off a sob at the horrors she is witnessing, Veronica throws her mind into 'surgery mode'; it's horrible, it's disgusting, and she can throw up and cry later. For now, she must ACT! Act to save as many lives as possible. And so Augmenta bounds improbably and grabs the cart upon which Posse lies, and wraps her arms around the men who were alternately pushing and pulling it, and shoving everyone through the doorway into Warehouse 8. "Screamers, two seconds!" she shouts, warning the men who know what her gear can do, as she starts pushing as hard and fast as she can towards the Bearcat's loading ramp.
Angela flies back against the closed door, flipping around and using her wings as drag so she can 'land' against the door in a crouch, ready to spring back at Shatalov… which is when the burst of electricity hits her, knocking her to the ground. Fortunately, the burst is cut short by Domino's lucky shot, so the angel is able to pick herself up.
Angela takes a breath, looking pretty beat up, but still full of fight as she says, simply, "My turn." With that, she flies right at Shatalov, looking to just slice him in two…
But it's a feint, as when the expected blast comes up, she breaks wide, hopefully goading him into blasting his own men. Her goal is to loop around and plant her sword firmly through Shatalov's back. Not a lethal hit… maybe not even hitting the pilot, but definitely looking to take the leader of these troops out of the fight.
Io doesn't even seem to recognize that she's been moved along with Goliath. Not for a good minute or two, her brain still agonizing over the loss of all those 'lives'. But then, she blinks, turns her head away from where it's nestled against Goliath's metallic skin. She blinks again, and again, and begins to crawl towards one of the boxes on her hands and knees. At first, slowly, as if she were only remembering how to use her limbs or were uncertain if the world wouldn't explode - but then, fast, and urgently like someone crawling out of burning building to save their own skin or into one to save someone else's.
Wildly looking around, she finds something that wiill work, a rusty screwdriver. She grabs it, pries at the crate until it wedges and slams her foot into it to crack it open once it's wedged as a lever.
"I hear you," she says, desperately. "I'm coming. Just hold on." She pulls the item from the crate, it's a monstrous looking gunlike mechanism, and fingers shaking, Io manages to pry off the old metal to reveal the circuits inside. "Just a minute," she promises it. "I'll get you good as new. Promise."
What..the..HELL just happened?! Domino's staring in a mix of confusion and awe at the results of the bizarre weapon. "You're coming home with me."
Does it have enough juice for another go? Is it SAFE to use again?? 'Wings' is getting pounded something awful out there and Posse's still in the line of fire and for better or worse these guys -still- haven't targeted the albino.
It's back to the stubby AKS she goes, sprinting back to the hall yet again while loading in thirty rounds of armor piercing ammo. Of -course- she had a mag full of AP, doesn't everyone?
The wiry albino kicks off of a crate and leaps backward over a piece of shrapnel, catching a fallen trooper's AK out of the air in her other hand, then lands and neatly slides beneath the Dynamo that Wasp is wreaking havok inside of.
Mentally she's ticking off the locations of all of the friendlies along the way. One streaking down the hall. One rebounding off of a vault door. One right in front of her with Posse and Co, Dom's going to kick off of that cart with a "Hiya!" before Roni starts hauling people to safety. Hank's..not present but he's easy enough to spot.
While twisting through the air like some demented cat the first handful of AP rounds are sent toward Shatalov's armored head -right- at the same moment Angela is going for her feint flamey backstab. The stolen AK's getting mag-dumped toward Gremlin and his fancy and slightly shrunk Titanium Suit. Bullets for all of the baddies!
Ow. Screamers…yeah, even with improvised head covering, super-hearing is /not/. Having been knocked back into the main hangar area, Hank looks to the agonizing Augmenta when she gives the two second warning, and yes, the fact he can hear that tells him just how bad being present for the screamers will be if he stays.
Decision made, Hank takes two bounding steps, and then /leaps/ for the exit to the outside in the roof.
The screamers fire as he drives claws into the metal hatch, scrambling up and out with agony twisting through is skull like a drill bit made of molten razor-wire.
Sudden relief outside, and then he scrambles to his feet, and then for a sandbag surrounded emplacement with a crew. Snarling, barely in control, he roars at the confused gun crew and sends them scrambling, one even shoots with a hand gun, but the bullet just deflects off Hank's armoured costume leaving a grey smudge of lead.
Grabbing the heavy weapons system, Beast shoulders it, and then grabs the ammo container before heading /back/ towards the fray.
What follows is probably fairly memorable. The cannon? A Finnish made 20MM Lahti rifle firing anti-tank armour piercing tungsten rounds. Dropping down from above, the Beast is literally bellowing with the pain of each shot, firing this weapon full auto, pumping every round it can into the Crimson Dynamo that still has arms. This gun is /far/ too big to fire like this - usually used prone with a bipod, and he holds it rock steady as the gas fed rounds eject spent brass to the sides.
He lands on the ground with enough force to spider-web the concrete and send a ring of dust expanding in front of the compression wave. Standing, he ejects the empty ammo magazine, and pops in a fresh one.
The RESCUE troopers go from a low crawl to a full on sprint as Augmenta moves the cart with Posse to safety by the Bearcat. Of course, any sound cancellation they might have had in their helmets are fried, but they can certainly doubletime Posse aboard to set her to the side. One sees Io working at one of the crates. "Kid! Get onto the damn jet, you don't have ear protection!" Mind, they'll be going off in the hall outside, so there's some shielding happening, more so if the doors are slammed shut first.
Crimson Dynamo has been having a bad day, and having a Wasp inside her armor certainly isn't improving it. She staggers back, planting her foot as the unexpected cook-off of her missiles throws her off balance, then snaps "GET OUT!" The tesla coils on her back that created the EMP earlier pop out again, crackling as the pilot adjusts her equipment, before discharging at a lower power setting. This time, they're not giving off an EMP, fortunately. What they do instead is create a lighting storm that hits the area about twenty feet in any direction, mostly striking the Dynamo suit itself, causing a shower of sparks and its optics to flicker wildly for a moment. But the pilot is in an insulated suit. Wasp…is not, and barely gets out in time before one of the arcs smacks into her and sends her flying to land with a little bounce behind some rubble as the Dynamo suit shut down its coils. "Vreditel'…" the woman growls.
Titanium Man takes a a spray of AP slugs acdross his back…which seem to do very little at all. That think is heavily armored! Also airborne as it slams into the ground otuside the base, bursting through the doors with Patriot and Beast in hot pursuit. The armor lands heavily but rolls, getting back to its feet, before its visor takes in its surroundings…including the refugee camp. It turns out the suit CAN fly. A bit ponderousely, but thrusters fire off in its boots as it lifts off, starting to make for the camp. Which is about where Beast opens up with the gun he's found, slamming round after round into the armor to send it tumbling wildly as Iron Patriot raises a force field between the gunfire and the refugee camp, trying to cut it off. "SHTO?! AUGH!!!" Gremlin's voice comes over the armor's speaker as it crashes back into the ground, leaving a long furrow in the earth, then disappearing as a missile streaks in from a shoulder launcher and explodes, cloaking the armor in smoke and fire.
Shatalov is suddenly pelted with AK rounds from Domino, an arm coming up so he can catch the rounds on his more heavily armored vambrace, though it still leaves pockmarks across the armor as he staggers. Unlike Dynamo, however, he seems to have a very healthy respect for Angela's sword now. When she lunges, he doesn't try to blast her…he throws himself forward in a roll, the blade skidding off his back armor as it shears a neat line across it but doesn't penetrate deeply. Tactically, now Angela is in the middle of the fire from Domino…which she's mostly immune to. Though those armor piercing rounds probably hurt more than the regular ones.
The gatling that pops out of Shatalov's upper arm that he brings to bear towards both women really doesn't look like fun either, as it spins up then sends a storm of bullets addressed 'to whom it may concerned' in a cone that tears into pretty much everything in the area as he fires his jets, flying backwards. "Dovol'no!" his voice booms, his gaze sweeping over his pretty much annhilated rebel force intended to take the facility, the severely damaged Dynamo, and the remaining opponents left. The shrunken Titanium Man.
Then with a sudden blaze of thrusters he ends over and accelerates through the smashed front door after Titanium Man, slamming into the Ukranians there, and snatching up one of the shoulder launchers. "I will remember you." he promises thos
When the screamers finally go off, it is indeed a whole new pit of Hell inside that reinforced concrete hallway. The screamer pods - and there are four of them scattered to various spots around the hallway - are not terribly large, but they have been purpose-built explicitly to do this job: they dump an incredible amount of power into two systems for a very brief period of time: for sixty seconds, they produce ulullating screams at incredulous decibel levels, and brilliantly eye-searing flashes and arcing strobes of blue-white light. Posse once described them as flashbangs from a whole new pit of Hell, not the least of which because standard sound-baffle and light-baffle gear worn by tactical units for combating flashbangs are virtually useless against these.
This is why all RESCUE personnel have gear specifically designed to combat the disorientation of the Screamers. They are vicious and terrible. But they are in fact non-lethal. They also do not produce the smoke or the igniting heat of a standard flashbang, making them much safer in more environments. But, fair warning: hearing damage is quite possible Corneal damage is less common, but not impossible.
Spoken communication in that hallway? Impossible. Hand signals? Almost equally impossible. And radio transmissions do no good if you cannot hear the speakers. Posse may have huge and nasty things to say about Veronica's failures today, but deploying the screamers will not be one of the things she views as a mistake.
Augmenta turns as soon as Posse's form and her team are at the Bearcat, and seizes the caskets in which her armor and Patriot's armor arrived, turning them on their sides to act as shields, like enormous refrigerators. She holds position for sixty seconds, while the screamers do their job. Then she leaps past that barrier and sprints out into the hallway, looking for wounded and pulling them back to safety so that she can begin medical efforts.
IT's another few moments of tinkering, before Io pats the monstrous looking gun. "Good boy, Alexi." She picks it up with a bit of effort, puts the shouldstrap around herself, "Let's go fuck these fuckholes up. They'll wish they got off just eating a bag of dicks after they get a taste of you."
Io walk-staggers over to the door, and kicks it open. The first 'baddie' she sees she turns the ghastly barrel of the gun towards them and fires.
There's no 'gunfire', though. But there is a hot-white and blue pulse that eminates from the barrel along with a soft 'whoomp' that is probably drowned out by all the other sounds. A flash of light from the barrel slams into the targeted baddie who is introduced in the most vile manner possible to an experimental 'Vertigo' as the light explodes in front of his face and does strange and nasty things to his visual receptors and stimulates the brain into creating the horrific disorder. This gun that had been put on the shelf and forgotten about because the scientists couldn't get the targeting right on it is Io's salvation, a focal point. Luckily for Io - and RESCUE, it was also built out of shielded metal and managed to somehow escape the EMP unscathed.
Io doesn't wait to see how the target reacts, she's already firting the huge barrel at a new target. Fires away. "Eat a dick, motherfuckers!"
Io. Probably not a 'hero' RESCUE wants in the papers.
Being the new girl on the team may have some advantages but it also comes with some notable disadvantages. Domino doesn't have the same fancy communication gear that the rest of RESCUE and some allies have. She also only knows so much about their tech and capabilities.
After today's mission she -absolutely- knows what the hell a 'Screamer' is.
Mid-leap while ammo dumping from two Kalashnikovs her world suddenly goes absolutely haywire. The guns fall right out of her hands, the staccato of dual automatic fire replaced with a scream which she can no longer hear. Instead of a graceful tumble across the floor she lands hard onto the concrete and slides, hands clamped over both ears and eyes pinched shut as she -howls- in pure agony!
This is why it's a bad idea to play the hero. She should have stayed in Warehouse 6. Instead she wound up in the single worst place on the battlefield at the worst possible time. Luck's a real fickle thing like that.
The upshot is that she doesn't get -completely- ripped to meaty shreds by Shatalov's minigun, though the sheer volume of fire and bullet fragmentation within the concrete bunker means she won't be walking away unscathed. The heavier winter layers slow some of the smaller pieces but other fragments and a couple of whole bullets punch right through, going for the 'death by a thousand cuts' approach. Where she comes to lie tightly curled up behind a large piece of debris she's blind, deaf, and bleeding all over.
Posse sure wasn't kidding about those Screamers.
Having slapped in a new mag, Hank studies the bolt, then winds it with a single finger rapidly to ready the Lahti rifle, the thing is longer than a lot of men are tall! With the rifle readied, he sees the armoured villains falling back, perhaps to regroup, with their commander serving as rearguard.
A low growl as yellow eyes narrow.
He scans the surrounding area, and finds a half-track APC with a much BIGGER gun system! This one sports a battery of Small Anti-tank Missiles. "That's the thing." He rumbles.
He looks to Toni. "Fire in the hole, or maybe I should say…Beast: Fox 1, Beast: Fox 2!" And then he aims and fires the SAM system at the rearguard, firing both of its missiles once the system acquires a lock.
No, not a non-lethal attack - quite the opposite in fact, but as tough as this super armour has proven, he's pretty sure this won't kill anyone, hurt yes, he hopes…but not kill.
While Nadia's suit isn't specifically set up to resist electricity right now it does at least have some basic hazardous environment protections that'll function even when she's running the suit in it's most basic mode for technopathic security reasons. Plus it helps that being shrunk that small makes her functionally denser than steel and rather hard to injure.
Still it takes a few moments to reorientate herself after the rapid escape and to evaluate the situation, ideally without having to dodge several tons of angry power armour stomping on her head. So for now at least she stays low, stays tiny and flits from one chunk of rubble to the next.
While moving to gain sight of the retreating Russians she loads a radioactive tracking marker into her wrist mounted blasters. Just in case an oppertunity presents itself to tag one of the suits of power armour.
If the missile explosions, the neuro darts, the friendly fire, the Ukranian resistance, or the sight of their heavy hitters withdrawing from the field didn't break the rebel's will to fight, the screamers combined with a blue haired girl showing up and starting to methodically blast them with a huge energy rifle while swearing like a sailor certainly does. The remaining rebels (and Ukranians) drop from the noise and are thorougly disabled. Once the screamers cut out, Augmenta can start doing triage, but the major, when he recovers, promptly has his men train weapons on the broken rebels as the latter drop their guns and put their hands behind their heads, surrendering. Hopefully Domino gets some aspirin first! It would have been a lot worse, of course, save Angela moved to shield her from the worst of the fire, being an angel and all that. She's probably not feeling too good either after weathering that though. Mostly immune to small arms does not mean completely immune, after all.
Outside, Titanium Man recovers from his tumble, the inexperience of the pilot showing somewhat as it straightens up, getting to his feet, just in time for Dynamo to rocket outside and arc up into the air immediately as an evasive manuver as her sensors scream at the SAM system locking on to her. Chaff shoots out of small hatches on her back as she expertly dives under one of the incoming missiles as it explodes behind her, rocking her in midair but not a direct hit. Iron Patriot throws herself at Titanium Man, slamming into him…only for the shrinking effect to start wearing off as the two wrestle. "Got you!" Gremlin crows, then bodyslams Pariot into the ground before starting to wail on her with metal fists, smashing her into the ground repeatedly as she struggles. Shatalov emerges behind Dynamo, just in time for the second SAM to lock onto him. Reflexively he spins around from where he was aiming the TOW he picked up at the entrance to the bunker and instead reflexively fires it at the APC Beast it firing from, right before the SAM hits, exploding as the entrance to the bunker partially crumbles from the detonation, pieces of concrete spinning through the air. There's a shout from Crimson Dynamo at that. "Colonel-General!"
A moment later with a roar of bootjets Shatalov remerges, looking a bit worse for wear. Behind him, the entrance has partially collapsed…not enough to stop a determined wasp, of course. But it will probably require a bit of digging for those inside to get out easily, save for one or two at a time. "ENOUGH!" he booms. "Gremlin, Dynamo, we withdraw!"
Of course, luck comes in many forms, as Angela lands over Domino's huddled form, wings spread wide as she catches the bullets and shrapnel that might otherwise have hurt the other woman too badly. While Angela is mostly impervious to bullets… well, higher caliber ones like this still sting quite a bit, leaving the angel pretty badly battered but still full of fight…
Though the fight seems to be withdrawing for the moment, so instead she takes a look down at Domino, placing a warm hand on the other woman's shoulder. Hopefully she doesn't take that as an attack, but Angela did remember to have her protection from Screamers active, along with the other RESCUE folks.
With the screamers done, Augmenta acts to save lives. To be a doctor. And as much as they have done to invent non-lethal weapons, powered-armor and assistive technologies, advanced drones and sensor systems and more … Dr. Veronica Kelsey has done at least that much, with the help of her friends, her team, to develop advanced first aid and lifesaving tech.
And now RESCUE employs it all, to save as many lives as possible.
It is a mess. No arguments can be made. And there will be terrible consequences from this battle. Consequences they will all shoulder the burden of, not just a few. But it is here, not in battle but in saving lives, that RESCUE shows their true might and wonder.
This is what Roni and Toni have built. Marvel at it.
Io fires a final bolt as the leaders of this invasion break out of the building and try to make an escape - she'd like to hit him, but at least she's getting some of her anger out!
Once the 'coast is clear', she sets the vertigo gun on the ground, then flops on the ground and exhales, her eyes - instead of going to the wounded, or casualties of flesh, move to the inert machines and electronics.
She sits a few moments, before rubbing at her eyes and then moving around some to check on things, not bothering those like Augmenta who are clearly busy with their own needs and duties.
She surveys the destruction again, mutters, "Thank you," and pats the Vertigo gun. "I appreciate it. Now, we gotta save Goliath. And, fix up everyone else, yeah?"
Saved by an angel, go figure. One which Domino had been trying to save! It isn't the first time something linked to the heavens saved her nonbeliever butt. Not that she currently has any idea that Angela kept her largely in one piece, she's busy dealing with the aftermath of a level of agony she hadn't experienced since escaping the Project. What a coincidence that it also took place in a cold underground bunker!
With the passing of those absolutely horrific sixty seconds she's left in a super bad way..but the hand on her shoulder she can feel. It doesn't feel like a threat though Angela might be a little startled at just how quickly and firmly the albino reaches out to grab her by the wrist as if silently saying 'get me the hell out of here!'
Helloooo, PTSD. You've been expected.
"Patriot…incoming! The refugees!" Hank barely has time to warn his cohort about the incoming tankbuster missile as the APC is blown apart right under him. Engulfed by the fireball, he is hurled a good thirty feet through the air, rolling to a smouldering stop some twenty or so feet further on. His feet and hands are badly burned, as is the uncovered portions of his face, most of his fur charred, thankfully the body armour is somewhat flame resistant, and he's all kinds of impact resistant.
Battered, burnt, he groans and manages to get one hand planted and partially raises himself off the ground before he sees the meter long section of one of the axles of the APC that got driven through the meaty part of one thigh.
A blink, he didn't even feel it, thank you shock!
Seeing it, he digs out a field medical kit, sitting up to brace his back to a boulder and downs a half-dozen pills, and then injects himself with an auto-injector full of all kinds of pain killing goodness and artificial adrenaline.
THAT wakes him the hell up!
Rather than risk removing the axle section, he simply breaks off the ends, then wraps the whole mass with a strip cut from his armor, leaving his chest bare.
And then he levers himself to his feet, and starts back towards not the soldiers, but the refugee camp to see what he can do. He knows he has time - they might not. The thing about great strength is that as far as he's concerned it is NOT there for /his/ use, it is there to use on behalf of those who can't.
Although a hole small enough to require crawling would slow most people down it's wide enough for a swarm of Nadia's to travel through all at once. So she prioritizes getting to the other side and seeing what the situation is there. She can always come back to clear the entrance later. But for now at least she does everything within her power to try get that radioactive marker launched. If not at the power armour then at whatever is turning up to extract them. After all people don't usually steal that sort of tech without a good reason and those reasons are rarely something pleasant.
Shatalov lifts off into the air, soaring up to join the Crimson Dymamo, as Titanium Man looks up from his…well, beating of Iron Patriot, before straightening up. "Stay in the mud. Where you belong!" the armor rumbles, before it lifts off, soaring up after the pair, chased by weapons fire from the surviving Ukranians outside.. But not before Nadia can get a clear shot with her tracker to stick him with it, before the three armored figures accelerate away from the battlefield. With the rebels plan thwarted, the battle, it seems, is over. Leaving a wounded Beast and a badly smashed Patrot outside, and the others inside recovering and reorganizing.
Major Kolisnychenko quickly takes charge of the surviving defenders. None of the vehicles are operational, of course, including the refugee caravan trucks. But he will make available his base medic and medical supplies to Augmenta, before leaning back against a wall, rubbing his face as he surveys the damage. "…thank you." he says to the gathered RESCUE troops…which is probably everyone but Augmenta who's doing triage and Toni, who's unconscious and being carefully pried out of her armor. "If you had not been here…my men would have fought bravely, but we were not equipped to deal with that kind of firepower. They would have taken the base, and made it a beachhead to open a new front in the west, with all of the weapons stored here at their disposal."
Angela pauses, then seeing the fighting is mostly over at this point, concentrates again, her halo and wings fading from view, along with her armor, leaving her, to all appearances, as a normal human. Really. Absolutely normal. No flaming swords here.
However, she still has her angelic strength, as she picks up Domino effortlessly and carries her over towards where the triaging is taking place.
"This is what RESCUE does, Major." Augmenta offers distractedly, while moving from one case of a wounded individual to another. "We are happy we could help, and sad we could not do more. It is for this specific purpose that we want to buy the Bearcat and fix her up, to help us get these kinds of resources and more to those in need quickly, around the world."
No. Roni never turns off 'professional mode'. It's just always there, lurking beneath the surface.
"Oh my God!" Yeah, Roni's cool, calm facade cracks a bit when she sees what has been wrought of Domino. "Angie, get her over here quick, please. Darren, I need the last medipac, please. And can one of you work with Io to get a radio working? I need word sent to our operations base in Germany immediately, so that they can be ready to receive us and treat the injuries we can only stabilize here."
Domino's done her damage today! Now she gets to kick back and think about what she's done.
Just as soon as she can hear herself think.
Once it is plain the refugees are not in fact in distress, Hank limps over to the fallen form of the Iron Patriot. A grunt of pain as he lifts the rather heavy armour, heroine inside, and then carries her in a 'bridal carry' back to the base, limping all the way.
It is a fairly sad sight when he arrives, though his burns have already started to heal, the man is no Wolverine, but he does heal a lot faster than most people, healing in hours what takes most people days.
"Augmenta, the Patriot is in need of assistance." He gruffs out, and truly, from the battering her armour has taken one might have to worry about what will be found inside. "Don't worry, she's alive." He assures. Not that /his/ appearance isn't a damn fright.
His visor destroyed, the man's yellow eyes are quite visible, and he's clearly whacked up on pain meds and more to keep going.
As emergency crews start to put out the fires still smoldering in the bunker, the remaining wounded are moved out of it to bunks in the living areas, some of hte refugee cots pressed into surface for wounded soldiers. It'll be hours before Ukrainian command notices the bunker isn't responding and sends scouts to re-establish communications. As for the RESCUE members and allies, the price for their new aircraft came at an unexpectedly high cost….but no one of their number…died? Except a little metal dog.
