"I'm on it squidhead, send me all the data you can get"

"Good luck Kalla, I hope we see you soon"
@My Squad: "We're going to follow dino towards the crashed CASKET's guys, be prepared to fight if it should be necessary"


Use my enhanced cam to assess my surroundings
While I follow dino with my GREASE, make jimmy use my MUSE to analyse a sample of the dust in the atmosphere
if there is still time:
- Run a diagnostics scan.

When enemies should attack me/ I spot enemies:
- Take cover
- if there are at least two enemies:
-- Smash two enemies into each other with my GravFM
-- Disable a still combat active enemy with my MicFM
- if there is only one enemy:
-- Smash him into the ground with my GravFM
-- if he's still alive:
--- Try to kill him with my MicFM

When enemies should come into melee range:
- Slash them with my scythe
- Puncture them with my spike attachment

When I have received all the data that was send to me:
- Use my computer to run a backtrace to figure out where the projectiles that shot the dropships came from. Use all the received data + my own data for this. ((this rolls computer right?))
- If my computer should show signs of overheating:
-- Cancel the calculation

(no more than 1 use per weapon, something that's already dead is not an enemy)

"This is Andrew, I'm still alive at least. Running a diagnostic on my CASKET."
"Man, this plan sure died and went to hell in a hurry."
Run system diagnostics on my CASKET.
Report CASKET status to DIno.
If CASKET is fully operational:
-Flying as close as I can to the ground without crashing, catch up to Dino.
-Match Dino's speed and await orders.
-if enemies are encountered:
--Fire on them with my electrolaser and try to take cover.
If CASKET is damaged:
-Flying as close as I can to the ground without crashing, catch up to Dino.
-Get out of the CASKET and try to get it fixed.

((Hopefully I got the formatting right!))

Triggerhappy wrote:S2 Channel: "Dak, you and I are the ones with ship weapons here. We should move slightly ahead on each side of Hema. Maybe have Unit cover the rear flank while we move up?"[/u]

S2 Channel: "Triggerhappy, from what I heard, Unit seems to have his orders. I'd prefer to get out of this dome as quickly as possible though. Wait a minute..."

"Dr. Cha0zz, are we still going ahead with the plan to study the domes? Since one appeared around squad 2, it might be dangerous to stay or leave but I don't think we have the knowledge to make that decision."

Take up position just ahead and to the right of Hema's casket and slowly(and low to the ground) move north towards the alien structure near the cave.


((INFINI-EDITS!))

I don't know Perkins, it seems a bit late for it now that we're already in them.
I might think about it again later on.

Black--Snow wrote: "Alright William, straight out of the book of badassery I see! Enjoy the ride, I'll try not to get blown up!" (Again light heartedly)

"I wouldn't say that while I've got my 'bad ass' on your CASKET."
Move to sit on top of the canopy instead of the hull, if the canopy can take it. Wriggle a little. (( ))
"And I'm not taking chances. I'll hop off as soon as someone shoots at you."

cuisinart8 wrote:"This is Andrew, I'm still alive at least. Running a diagnostic on my CASKET."
"Man, this plan sure died and went to hell in a hurry."

((Hopefully I got the formatting right!))

"Yeah, that seems to happen a lot. We just have to make the best of it. At least it's not as bad as Chilendorn - there 18 people of our platoon got killed by those AA turrets before we were even dropped."

(( And yes, you did ))

"On it Doctor"
"Dino, Payback, Andrew, anyone else who can hear me: send your sensor records of the flak fire to Doctor Cha0zz, we are trying to extrapolate the cannons' locations. All data available, casket, PDA and, if you are augmented, body sensor records."

((I'll edit actions into my action post))

"Okay, I'll try to do that without crashing my computer."
((will probably fail, but edited in ))

Cornflakes_91 wrote:"Dino, Payback, Andrew, anyone else who can hear me: send your sensor records of the flak fire to Doctor Cha0zz, we are trying to extrapolate the cannons' locations. All data available, casket, PDA and, if you are augmented, body sensor records."

"Right, I'll see if it works."

"Records incoming, Cha0zz."

Send CASKET and TARGET helm records to Cha0zz.

"I'll send you whatever records I can find, Doctor."

((I'll edit it into my first post))

TURN 1

Time passed: 1 minute, 45 seconds

Map: SQUAD 1: Dr. Cha0zz, BFett, Ysavva, Taepilus, Kalah Grimm
Dr. Cha0zz You flip on your enhanced spectrum cam, trying to assess your surroundings. It seems you've landed at an intersection between two large canyons. The walls about you are steep - at least half a kilometer high - and the canyon itself is almost a kilometer wide. All about you, a fine dust whirls, with winds towards the southwest. Your visibility is somewhat limited - but not by much. You can see the massive, hulking shape of Aerevoh, the ice giant - it hangs menacingly above, blotting out most of the starless twilight sky. A part of you feels uneasy looking at it, as though you're worried it might somehow fall on you and crush you. This is, of course, utter foolishness, and you brush these thoughts out of your mind as quickly as they arrive. Regardless, the only things you see that feel out of place are the rocks on the ground outside... but you can't quite put your finger on why.

You fly over in Dino's direction, moving close to the ground, and wait for him to move.

And you wait.

Then you wait some more. Dino is taking his sweet time about getting a move-on, swiveling about on his tank-like treads and getting used to their steering. You note he's laying tread marks in the dust behind him as he moves - a trail that would surely lead any aliens nearby after you if they saw it.

You fly down closer to the dust and try to analyze it with your MUSE - the new attachment you've mounted on your robotic arm. Its complex mechanisms whir as it extrudes several instruments to obtain a sample - which it soon does. It then withdraws the materials back inside its protective sleeve and begins the process. Soon after, your screens blink with information: the dust is just dust. Nothing out of the ordinary - it's just rock dust primarily composed of silicates. It's definitely not nanobots.

Finally, after Dinosawer finishes his annoying spree of driving around in circles, he starts to head northwards towards the crash site, and you follow along behind at one-third of your maximum speed. His rover-like treads slowly edge him forwards at a decent (but irritatingly slow) pace, but there are no signs of enemies anywhere. You do notice the dust in the area beginning to get a little thicker, though.

As you travel, reports start to come in from your request - flight data from some of the AA projectiles. You set a program running in your computer to analyze the data, one piece at a time, trying to match the same projectiles from different angles. It's a very complicated process, especially as nobody was really trying to look at where the rounds were coming from, and you were dozens of kilometers up. Gradually, though, as you sift through it all, a pattern begins to form: a pattern that places their location origin as somewhere in the northeast quadrant of your AO. You lean back in your GREASE's comfortable seat and smile. That wasn't so hard after all. You still need to pinpoint it somehow, but it's only 25 square kilometers to search as opposed to hundreds, and that's a definitive victory.


((It was a hard roll (major penalty applied) and you mostly succeeded. Congratulations. The extra points in computer paid off.))

BFett "Already on it, Doctor," you say, as you're punching in directions for your computer. You're hoping to do a scan of the immediate area, looking for computer signatures... If possible, you'd like to also triangulate Kalla's position. It's some detailed work involving you slowly moving your CASKET back and forth over half a kilometer's distance and triangulating what you can, but before long, you've got a solid trace - not on Kalla, but on something - something down in the dark, rocky gorge over on your left. It's difficult to say what's there - it could really be anything... but your computers clearly detect some kind of computer signatures in that general direction.

Kalla's position, however, is impossible to determine. She's still lost. She might not even be in the dome. The only reason you know she's not many kilometers away is that you can hear her in the first place, but you know literally nothing beyond that.

Sighing somewhat at your half-failure, you clear out the processes in your CASKET's computer and start up a diagnostics scan - which doesn't really take long at all. The scan comes up completely clean - your CASKET is fine, though you're missing your parachute. You assume it was jettisoned at some point, but there's no telling when - or where it is now.

"Hey, SCAMPS?" you ask, hoping he'll respond. "Is my head camera still transmitting data to you?"

But there's no answer. You don't even know if he's ignoring you. Except for the occasional chatter of your platoonmates, all the channels are eerily silent.


Ysavva You look around. The place you've landed is particularly pretty - just sitting there in the middle of a kilometer-wide, half-kilometer-deep canyon. Most planets don't even have views like this - especially with ice giants like Aerevoh looming overhead. You look upwards at it and get lost in its icy blue-white swirls of colors - storms spamming the size of entire planets. You feel like you can almost see them move... It's a few minutes before you can tear your gaze away from its mesmerizing beauty.

"Right," you whisper. Then, louder: "Kalla, this is response from squads one and four. We appear to be intact. Report on your squad?"

It doesn't take her long to reply, though it's somewhat hard to hear her; there's a fair amount of static. "We're all right," she radios back. "The only one that got damaged on the way down was Trig. Fallen's squad is fine; they landed in a canyon below us. We're up on a ridge - or some kind of plateau. There's two peaks some distance above us - something like mountains. If you could see those, we could probably work out where we are."

As she stops talking, you look around again, trying to use your Quantum Vision to see if there's anything... anomalous... about the area around you. There's not... although... you think you can see something... something... in Dinosawer's direction. You can't quite make out what it is, but this "sixth sense" of yours is picking up some kind of glow - a particularly large glow, dim though it may be. Unfortunately you're unable to tell the distance; it's little more than a feeling. It makes your head prickle with warmth, like sunlight on your scalp. You blink your eyes to clear them, and the vision fades away; all you see are the dark, twilight-lit rocky canyons and drifting clouds of dust.

Turning your attention back to your ship, you try to start up a diagnostics scan, but quickly grow annoyed with your CASKET's obfuscated computer UI. At first you can't find the diagnostics program - and then you realize there are dozens of them, and most of them have strange, useless names like "DIAG02834.303". There's a whole fukcing list of them. You roll your eyes and wish one of the software engineers was sitting in front of him. You'd punch him in the face.


Taepilus You start up your computer and quickly run a diagnostics check on everything to make sure nothing's broken - and it quickly returns a positive answer: everything is fine. Your CASKET sustained no notable damage on the trip down. The heatshield/parachute system seems to work rather well. Pleased, you begin to analyze your surroundings through the canopy of your cockpit.

The world outside is a dark, ugly, and gray. You turn your CASKET's headlights on and start looking around, lighting up the bluish rocks. That's interesting, for a start - rocks you've seen rarely tend to be that color. Even more interesting, the layer formations on the tall cliffs around you seem to indicate that they're likely sedimentary - which implies that this planet once had liquids flowing on its surface. Liquid methane seems the most likely candidate to you, but then, you're no astrogeologist - just the former head of a weapons manufacturing corporation. This wasn't typically the type of thing that interested you.

Without any noteworthy objects in sight, you begin to set up a test with your field manipulator - you're going to try to magnetically manipulate dust that is somewhat distant from your position - a kilometer or so away. You set up the conditions and requirements, input them into the computer, and wait for it to calculate the appropriate parameters for the field - which it soon manages. Upon hitting the Big Red Button, however... nothing really happens. This dust doesn't seem to be ferromagnetic - which certainly rules out nanobots, as far as you know.

Kalah Grimm You stay put and look around. It's a pretty place here - not quite the beauty that you're used to at home (especially not with the dreadful globe of Aerevoh hanging there in the sky. Someone more superstitious might think it could fall and crush you - though that would be silly. You look away from it and try not to feel uncomfortable.

Most of your squad is staying in the same place - apart from Dr. Cha0zz, who seems to be following Dinosawer and leaving the rest of you behind. He hasn't told you to follow him either. You're not sure what to do, so you just sit there for a while. At least you're safe.


SQUAD 2: Hema, Unit 4965, Dak Perkins, Triggerhappy, Servius
Hema After giving out a few orders, you flip your Enhanced Spectrum Cam on and get a good look at the surrounding area.

Everything seems cold and dark. There's some flicker of power coming over from the caves, and the building you see in front of you certainly has power going to it - but whatever is generating its power seems to be buried. In fact... the more you look at it, the more you wonder if it is perhaps some kind of combination of a power generator and a shield generator. It would certainly explain a few things, but wouldn't explain why it was locking you into the pit.

The edges of the walls in the area are rough and layered - they look like they might be possible to climb, if you had enough time and the appropriate skills and/or equipment, but you don't really see the point. You have CASKETs, after all.

The buildings in the darkness near the cave entrance are the most interesting, though. They're lined up against the sides of the pit walls, stacked upwards in some kind of strange, jumbled formation. The longer you look at them, the more it feels like there's some kind of methodology behind their placement... alien though it may be. They also seem completely dark and cold - with no visible open doorways or windows. You rather wonder what they're meant for, and how people (aliens?) are supposed to get inside.

You fly over to the alien structure, staying close to the ground, and start a diagnostics scan. The scan turns up clean - except for some overheated thruster components, but your computer gets those fixed in short order.


Unit 4965 You sit there and wait for a moment while Hema proceeds over towards the alien shield generator thing in the middle of the pit. When he finally starts moving, you follow - a bit confused as to what he wants you to do. Hema told you to stay at the back, but he told you to scan, too? What does that even mean? Maybe he mentioned you once on accident, you decide. Then, upon further reflection, you decide he must've mentioned your name twice on accident - he must not really care if you eject! That would be glorious! You could begin building.

"4965," Hema orders, "I want you to scan that building!"

"Scan it with what?" you ask, slightly irritated that he's interrupting your artistic processes. "I have a scanner?"

Still... You'd like to at least scan the thing first, with your... CASKET thing. You poke around at your controls, trying to figure out how you're supposed to do that, but eventually give up. Whatever. It's not like it really mattered anyway. The important thing is building fortifications - and entirely out of crossbow ammo.

You open your canopy, grab all your gear, and jump out, falling a few meters to the ground. Your landing is as graceful as that of a drunken cross-eyed giraffe.

"The scans, Unit! The scans!"

Grumbling, you get out your PDA, repeating Hema's words mockingly under your breath, and scan the stupid structure thing. It has power. That was obvious. It seems like it's made of metal. That was kind of obvious too. And it is definitely making both sets of force fields - the ones around it, and the larger dome up above your pit.

Now that you're done with your scans, you finally put the PDA away and take out your crossbow ammo - the regular bolts. You're ready to build some fortifications.

~~~

It turns out to be a total disaster. Sure, they made great welding material, but trying to build fortifications out of the little metal sticks turned out to work as well as building one out of toothpicks - using more toothpicks as glue. If you worked long enough and carefully enough, then sure, maybe - but you're not convinced anyone could manage this task. You feel rather bitter about the whole project, and wish you'd just tried to make another one of your show-stopping pinwheels. At least that wouldn't have wasted your entire supply of solid bolts.

You sit down on the ground in dismay beneath your CASKET (still hovering a few meters up in the air, well out of your reach) and look gloomily upon your half-built shoddy creations - weird metallic structures that more resemble washboards from a Picasso painting than actual shield walls.

As you watch, one of them crumbles. Broken and bent bolts fall apart from each other and tumble away in all directions.

You sigh miserably and flick the crossbow-bolt pinwheel you hold in your hand to make it spin. "Why," you groan softly, "did we have to get dropped in the one area where there isn't any wind?"


Dak Perkins You poke around at your CASKET's computer for a bit, trying to figure out how to get it started up. You think it's off - none of the screens are saying anything useful or computer-y, and so you go through the buttons on your dashboard that look like they'd be most likely to get the damn thing going. One, after another, after another: some of them make things worse. One of them opens your cockpit canopy. You close that one back right away. Finally - you're sure you've found the appropriate button, and you facepalm at yourself for not having figured it out sooner. It even says, right there on the label: POWER: ON/OFF. If that isn't clear, you don't know what is.

Of course, as soon as you hit it, every screen in your CASKET shuts off. You should've figured that would happen. You never were the best at using computers. ...actually, you always really sucked at it. You remember that one time when ... actually, you'd rather not remember that one time. You hastily turn your attention elsewhere.

Hema is ahead of you, flying towards the central structure. You start to follow him... but then decide that... maybe... it would be nice to explore some on your own. You turn your CASKET to the right - towards the cave entrance, and start moving in that direction - slowly but surely. It's almost a kilometer away - so you figure it'll take a minute or two.

As soon as you reach the cave, you notice two things: One, it's going to be too low to bring your CASKET along, probably - unless you're really good at flying in small spaces. The second thing is - it doesn't look like a cave. The walls are too structured - too orderly. This is a tunnel that the aliens seem to have dug out of solid stone - and it angles downwards in a gentle slope.

The structures are somewhat more interesting. They're piled on top of each other, climbing the wall of the cliff - little rectangular metallic buildings interconnected by what seem to be enclosed walkways - but there are no clear signs of any way to get in. That... or you're just not looking hard enough.


Triggerhappy You REALLY want to shoot something. You kind of hope something shows up and starts attacking you just so you can fire back and blast it into pieces. That's what missions are about, right? Combat? All the time? All day, every day? You've been really looking forward to this.

...so it kind of figures you'd be trapped in a shield bubble next to another shield bubble in a dusty little hole in the ground with absolutely nothing to shoot anywhere in sight, with a squad leader that wants to investigate shit instead of just blowing it up. Really, what kind of pathetic, boring squad leader would do that? Who gave him the right to be in charge? That should be you. You'd make sure everyone had a good time.

Bored, you fly over to Hema and just... watch. Nothing much happens.


Servius After receiving Hema's commands, you poke around at your ship for a while, wondering how to get the diagnostics scan running. Computers have never been your strong point... Or, actually, that's an understatement. You suck at using computers. In fact, you're so bad, you somehow actually manage to freeze every screen in your cockpit. Totally frozen. They won't budge. You tap on them a little bit, hoping they'll pick up and start moving again, but nope - you've actually caused them to crash. It felt sluggish and cheap anyway, before they stopped working.

Then the screens shut off. You shrug. Probably better that way anyway. You've never had any good experiences with computer equipment to begin with.

Settling back in your rather cramped seat, you look around... and don't see much worthy of note. There aren't any enemies out here. Nobody's really doing anything interesting. The only mildly interesting things are the shield generator building next to you (which is itself shielded) and the cave entrance that Dak is flying over towards.



SQUAD 3: Foreigner, Fawkes, Blake, Nequeba, Quackshot
Foreigner You poke at the buttons for your Proton Sword, figuring there ought to be some way to get advanced control of it. It surely can't be that hard, right? There must be an advanced mode for advanced users such as yourself... or so you figure. Unfortunately... there isn't. Not that you can see. You feel rather disappointed.

Heaving a quiet sigh, you give out another order to your squad. "Start approaching the structure," you tell them. "Don't overdo it. Hacking, scanning, eye-balling - you know the drill. Find good, well-defended positions."

You begin flying gently, quietly towards the alien structure. It's small - somewhat well-proportioned, with the signature quantum look to it - silvery metal with golden cubic accents, and a total disregard for the laws of gravity. It's even made out of a metal you recognize as being similar to the one the walls of the Childendorn base were composed of. No crystals here, though. Perhaps they didn't feel it was necessary - or perhaps they were only there to protect from the pulsar.

You do notice, though, that the dust around your COFFIN is gradually growing thicker. Very, very gradually. Your visibility started out at a few kilometers; you could've seen the other squads, if you'd tried. Now it's slowly closing to a kilometer and a half.

You feel like someone is watching you.

While you drift forwards, you try to collect all the data your CASKET has collected and send it to Dr. Cha0zz... but this doesn't go as well as you might have hoped. You actually can't find it - not at first, anyway. You grow more frustrated as you go on - you're sure it must be there somewhere - and then you start to wonder... maybe you deleted it. It's certainly possible. You aren't very good with computers. You hope that's not what actually happened though. Obviously, that would be bad.

Upon arriving at the structure, you find that it doesn't have any visible doors on it. It baffles you - how are people supposed to get inside? It's nearly two stories tall, but not quite - built low and close to the ground, and not at all sprawling. You can't imagine that it has more than one or two rooms inside - and that at the most. Doing an electrical scan doesn't give you any real information either - it seems to have gone dark.

Without anything else to do, you land and prepare to disembark.


Fawkes You hate spaceships. You feel that's worth repeating. You really hate them. What's more, you hate them when they don't function properly. Your first order of business is running a routine diagnostics check to make sure nothing is broken or malfunctioning. For some vague reason you can't quite pin down... you have a feeling that your life support has failed. Again. Like always.

Fortunately, and to your immense surprise, it hasn't! Your computer chirps its report out at you, and reading through it, you're satisfied to find that your CASKET is perfectly fine, which is definitely a relief. You can pay attention to other things... like making your spaceship be a tank instead of a spaceship. You don't mind tanks. They're low to the ground, don't spin out of control, and rarely have to deal with losing life support.

You therefore land and wait for Nequeba. She said she wanted to hitch a ride... and as soon as you land, she scurries up onto the side, right to the left of your cockpit. Once she's secure, you begin driving forwards to catch up with Foreigner. He's given orders that you follow along.

...of course, that doesn't actually happen. As soon as you reach the edge of the next dome, you eject to take samples of the dust, putting it into some of the vials in your backpack. Meanwhile, Foreigner leaves you far behind. You don't really care though. You have science to do, and after you've acquired a dust sample, you make Nequeba wait even longer while you try to do a scan of the dome with your PDA... a scan that does absolutely nothing. Maybe you had it set the wrong way, but your scan comes up completely empty - as though you weren't even scanning a thing. From so close, you can hardly see the wall of the dome at all, though your map can certainly track the edges of it. You're almost positive you were standing outside of it.

Happy that you at least got a dust sample, you climb back up onto your treads, onto your CASKET hull, and then back into the CASKET, where you close the canopy again. Then you start moving after your squad leader, driving slowly, cautiously, into the purplish dome, and drive almost a kilometer, until you're next to the structure with Foreigner, who has already landed his COFFIN.

Blake Lowe No plan ever survives contact with the enemy. On the plus side... it doesn't seem anyone was seriously injured - except, possibly, Trig. "Yo, Trig!" you call out over the comms. "How are you and your squad doing, man? You all good?"

"I got hit on the way down," he calls back. His voice is laden with static - a lot more than you had to deal with last mission. "Didn't get a chance to see where it came from, and nobody's cameras picked it up. I lost a robotic arm and two of my engines are out. I'll be okay though. Still alive!" He sounds glad to hear you.

"Yeah, at least there's that!" you radio back.

"Surprised the strength of my hull didn't do a better job of protecting me," he finishes up. "Whatever's out there, it means business. Stay alert, Blake; I can't save you this time."

With the brief conversation finished, you land your CASKET on its treads and wait for Quackshot to catch up. He's taking his time about it - a nice, slow, ambling walk over to you. It gives you an opportunity to run a diagnostics scan. You fire up your CASKET's computer systems and start sifting through the menus to figure out how to run a systems check.

By the time Quackshot finally arrives and climbs up onto the side of your ship, you still haven't managed to figure it out. Nothing seems to be working. All the menus are convoluted and confusing, and just when you thought you'd found a scan program... it turned out it was just a diagnostics debugger. Talk about bad software design, right? You could probably do with a computer upgrade later.

"All right, William!" you call out, trying to sound lighthearted even though all the evidence points to you experiencing a slow and painful death that will last for days on end and leave you screaming for mercy before it's even half over, while visions of loved ones, brutally mutilated and murdered, flash in front of your eyes and you scream to God, begging for mercy, but the only thing you hear is the voice of your alien tormentors laughing at your unbearable agony as they .... "Straight out of the book of badassery, I see! Enjoy the ride! I'll try not to get blown up!"

As soon as Quackshot is secure on your CASKET, you start driving - but almost as soon as you do, he falls off again, after making some kind of snarky remark about his butt. It looks like he was actually trying to climb on top of your canopy, but he slipped when you went over a bump and fell onto the ground. You slow down and let him climb back on, and then you're off again.

The rest of the trip is uneventful. You soon catch up with Foreigner next to the alien structure. He's already landed. It's time to decide what to do next... which is probably scanning for hackables. You fire up your hacking equipment and start a search of anything nearby - and quickly find the ships of your allies in the list: Foreigner, Fawkes, and Nequeba. Quackshot's is powered off, and everyone else's are too far away. The structure in front of you, though, doesn't show up on the list. Maybe it's without power too.


Nequeba "I'm ALIVE! Yay!" You were actually rather uncertain that this would be the case. "I'll go with Fawkes!" you say. "Fawkes, wait up for me!"

Overly eager, you open your CASKET canopy, grab all your gear, and leap out onto the ground - which turns out to be a few meters below your CASKET. You realize your mistake as you fall and hear the hissing of your CASKET's thrusters as it hovers - but somehow manage to keep from planting your face in the dust, landing on your feet. You got lucky with that landing... but getting back inside your CASKET may be a bit difficult.

You don't want to keep Fawkes waiting, though. You're sure he'll be just as eager as you are to check out that alien structure. After slinging your backpack onto your back, you jog off in his direction. It isn't much longer before you're carefully seated on the side of his CASKET, your feet dangling above his treads. "Let's go!" you call out.

And Fawkes goes. He goes like he's waited his entire life to go. He goes a total of a few meters before he stops suddenly, as though he's forgotten something, and you're forced to sit there for what feels like hours (even though it really isn't) while you wait for him to finish all his ill-timed scientific experimentation. He takes soil samples, he checks the air, he does scans of the sky of all things, and then finally, just like you're starting to feel like you'll never catch up with Foreigner (who has already gone so far ahead you've lost track of him), Fawkes climbs back into his CASKET and starts it moving again.

It isn't much longer before you all arrive at the alien structure.


Quackshot You're excited, yes, but as a soldier, you're calm and collected. Methodically, you land your CASKET as gently as you can, shut down all the systems one by one, depressurize, open the canopy, grab your gear, and leave. You may need your ship later... but for the time being, you're going to go on foot - and specifically, on Blake's CASKET. He seems like a decent enough guy. As you approach him, you can hear his ship's engines humming with power; he's ready to get going, but he's waiting for you to climb on. You don't leave him waiting very long. You climb up onto the side of his tank treads, then onto the CASKET's hull.

"Alright, William!" Blake calls out. "Straight out of the book of badassery, I see! Enjoy the ride, and I'll try not to get blown up!" With that, he starts his CASKET rolling forwards.

"I wouldn't say that while I've got my 'bad ass' on your CASKET," you joke. You climb on top of the canopy to wiggle your butt in his face - or try to. It's rather hard to move around while the CASKET is in motion, bumping over the ground; you end up losing your grip, tumbling backwards, and hitting your head on the tank treads as you fall - and Blake's CASKET continues onwards.

Blake doesn't move very far, though. He actually has the decency to stop his ship and wait for you to climb back on. When you're finally seated again, he starts moving to catch up with Fawkes, and together the rest of your squad moves to where Foreigner is: right outside the strange alien building.


SQUAD 4: Dinosawer, Squidhead, Andrew, Payback-13, Francis
Dinosawer "FRANCIS, THIS IS NOT THE TIME TO NAP!" you shout. You don't even have to check on him to know that he's doing it; you actually rather expected it.

Your first order of business (apart from yelling at Francis) is to land your ship on your tank treads. The feeling of them sinking onto the ground is amazing - it's a much gentler landing than you ever could've had while you were just using your electromagnetic clamps. You feel like a tank - a tank that can fly. How badass is that? Now you just need it to move really fast, too, and everything will be awesome!

But before you can really get started on the awesomeness, you try to send the flak data to Dr. Cha0zz at his request. This proves to be... somewhat difficult. You admittedly suck at computers. You're more a shooty-killy-bing-bang-boom kind of person. This technological computerey stuff... it's not your strong point. You can't find it at all. So you lean around in your seat, looking to see if maybe your CASKET is damaged. You can't tell anything from that either.

Shrugging, you drive over to the entrance of the eastern canyon. It's pretty tall - and pretty wide, too. You can't actually see all the way to the end from where you're sitting - there's too much dust. You can't actually see the wrecks either, even though you feel like they should be inside the zone of dust.

You're out of options. There's only one thing you can do.

You drive in circles for a few minutes just to annoy Dr. Cha0zz, who is flying slowly behind you. As you do this, you grin. Of course. You and the doctor were never on the best of terms (he thinks of you as an idiot, after all), so you figure if you can make his life a little miserable... it'll be totally worth it. Soon, though, this grows boring too, so you just drive on ahead at a fast, steady clip towards the location on your map that the wrecks are supposed to be.

"Forward, my mighty steed!" you cry out. "To glory!!!"

You kind of wish there were enemies to charge.


Squidhead You land carefully on your shiny new tank treads and start up a diagnostics scan. It takes some time to complete; while you're waiting, you turn on your Enhanced Spectrum Cam and start looking about your surroundings to see if you can find anything ... unusual.

You don't find a damn thing. As it turns out, the dust in the atmosphere is most certainly not nanobots - unless the Quantums somehow found a way to make nanobots out of rock dust. What you see floating around in the air about you - that's most certainly rock dust. There aren't any signs of enemies anywhere nearby, either. Everything is quiet.

Except for your computer. It starts beeping at you to tell you the scan is done. You give it an okay and read the report: "SCAN ABORTED! INCOMPATIBLE MODULE: 'TREAD'." You glare at the screen. Curse those retarded Tartarus engineers. Curse them all to hell. You swear under your breath and use these same treads to turn your CASKET westwards, looking out over everybody.

"Anyone hurt? Damaged?" you ask. "Better to fix it now than later..."

But nobody seems hurt or damaged. Dr. Cha0zz, though, wants you to transmit any sensor data you have of the flak fire... so you set about doing that. This at least turns out to be considerably easier than the stupid diagnostic scan. It doesn't take you long at all. You tell everyone else to send their data too - and some other people do. You're not at all convinced that everyone did, but hopefully it'll be enough.


Andrew "Man, this plan sure died and went to hell in a hurry," you say. It's nothing new to you, though. You remember something similar happening last mission when Foreigner suddenly decided he was going to burst into the upper hangar. That sure went well. So well, that you'd actually rather not think about it right now - so you run a check on your CASKET's systems instead. It comes up completely clean - your CASKET is fine and in perfect shape - minus a little charring to the paint on your left side. Seems you didn't come in perfectly straight, but it's only superficial damage. You're actually quite fine.

"Dinosawer," you radio out, "My CASKET is in perfect condition. I'm going to come join up with you now."

Lifting off a little more from the ground, you fly over to Dinosawer - who is running in circles on his tank treads to annoy Dr. Cha0zz. You smirk. Being in his squad could turn out to be pretty fun. It isn't long before he decides to get moving, though, and the three of you move onward deeper into the canyon, as the dusty murk begins to slowly close in...


Payback-13 "Fukc, what a ride!" you laugh. "What's the plan of attack, Chief?"

The plan of attack seems to be to spin in circles. That's what Dinosawer is doing, anyway. It looks like he's trying to annoy Dr. Cha0zz. It looks like it might be working.

To make Dr. Cha0zz's life a little easier, you gather up the camera data your CASKET collected on the way down and send it off to him. He says he wants to put it together to figure out where the AA fire came from. That doesn't take much effort for you to accomplish, at least, and before long, you're landing your CASKET and getting ready to eject. First, though - system diagnostics. Those are important. You want to make sure your ship is in tip-top shape before you abandon it... and start up a diagnostic scan.

After a few seconds, it gives you a readout of absolutely everything. The list is pages and pages long - maybe several hundred, for all you know. You keep scrolling down the little screen, but there's no end in sight. Of everything you look at, it says it's okay. You hope it's that way for everything and just give up on it.

Before you eject, you take a quick look around for enemies - and you don't really see any, which is a relief. You grab your gear and eject, leaving your CASKET behind on the ground, and start to jog after Dino, who is already half a kilometer a way... and steadily growing more distant.

~~~

After several minutes of jogging, you finally manage to catch up with Dinosawer, who has stopped for a moment in the eastern canyon. You're not really feeling tired or out of breath. Some people might be. You're a robot, though. There are benefits to not being a disgusting, squishy human. You slow down behind him - and Andrew and Dr. Cha0zz hovering above - and wait for them to get moving again.

((Note: walking a kilometer on foot takes 7.5 minutes under the rules I'm using. This is added to the total elapsed time after I divide it between the players. In your case it's hardly anything, because you're the only one on foot. Everybody getting out on foot could be a different matter altogether.))


Francis You doze off and fall asleep. Maybe if you stay asleep long enough you'll have a dream. Dino's probably going to wake you up, though. He's mean like that. At least you have comfy seats.

Talvieno wrote:Even more interesting, the layer formations on the tall cliffs around you seem to indicate that they're likely sedimentary - which implies that this planet once had liquids flowing on its surface. Liquid methane seems the most likely candidate to you, but then, you're no astrogeologist - just the former head of a weapons manufacturing corporation. This wasn't typically the type of thing that interested you.

((Lol, I can't believe it! I actually noticed this IRL when I saw the picture of canyons for the first time, and I almost brought it up, but I just kind of assumed the sediment strata are there just for decoration))

"Hey boss, do you think we can loot some of those buildings, like the shield generator, and then go into the cave? Dak, how are the caves looking over there?"

Triggerhappy wrote:"Hey boss, do you think we can loot some of those buildings, like the shield generator, and then go into the cave? Dak, how are the caves looking over there?"

"Well it depends on if there's anything there worth looting. I would like to scan the cave, and continue a little bit on foot. If we do that, you should look for cover wherever possible. For the time being, I need you to cover Unit 4965 until he can disassemble his structures. Once he's done, excort him to the cave so he can scan it."

"Unit 4965! You CASKET should have a scanner. Gather up your bolts and fly over to the cave, Triggerhappy should cover you until then. See if you can scan the interior to see how far back it goes, and if there are any enemies. Dak? How does that cave look? Notice anything out of the ordinary?