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~ Per-Perel is the second continent of Second Earth, however it contains no major cities or civilian populus. The majorityof the landscape is dominated by jungle and mountains. The mountains conceal the peninsula from outside eyes, and a government barrier prevents anyone from entering further south. The public belief is that there is a large volcanoe dominating the centre, which the Gureino have found great interest in.
Tigersura
As the many stars surrounding the planet offered little light to see, the young man viewed his surroundings from his mountainous viewpoint. To his right, the high peaks of the border spread for miles, offering little vision of what lay in that direction. To his left, he could see the dark blue rhythmic swaying of a large bay that spread out into the Izquierda Gulf. Along the shore, what looked from this vantage point only to be small houses, were infact huge ports which sanctioned the delivery of arms and forces into this area. As to why they were being delivered was why this man was here. He began his journey in Viridia, at the secret headquarters of the Freedom Power Rebels. Althought its position remained a secret in paper, it was not the most difficult hideout to discover if you spent more than two minutes looking. This trust in the lack of patience of those in the Gureino Government assigned to look for the FPR was what kept it hidden.
From this hideout, the young man had moved discretely across the extremely tight protected borders of The Gureino Government and had smuggled himself aboard a military transport vessel. This process, as he discovered, was not going to be as easy as his bosses had informed him. Instead of simply sneaking past guards with erotica magazines covering their snoozing faces, he had to follow a young recruit into a toilet, dispose of him, take his uniform and join the ranks. This, however, also proved not to be as easy, as the man had chosen a day where a high ranking Gureino official had come to see the troops off. Performing a vaguely remembered Salute routine from his days as a Gureino soldier among a platoon of monochrome recruits, he borded the military vessel.
This 2 day journey brought back awquard memories of his days in the service. From the outside, in public performances or recruitment adverts placed through Sabelle, the Gureino services seemed extremely enlightening. Lifting homeless children from flood planes of Vermilla into medi-evac helicopters, playing sports with children in insurgency villages and having an overall good time with your fellow men was far from the truth. Everyone in the forces was either there through force, either by families or state regulations, or there because they wanted to be the best. Both of these scenarios made each and every recruit smug, agressive and eager to, if not kill, then harm considerably. Despite this making it slightly easier for the young man to fit in, the living conditions were still poor. The clichés of luncheon lines being served a greenish grey paste and the sleeping quarters consisting of poor quality hammocks only half a metre distance from the recruit above or below you were both lived on this vessel. By the time the agent had left the vessel, he almost forgot that he was no longer part of the service...
Having then escaped the ghosts of his past, he moved swiftly through the jungle region of Per-Perel. Despite having visited all the states of Sabelle, the new environment troubled the young man. The eerie noises of undiscovered animals and the thick shrubery rustling in the dark kept the agent at full awareness and pace. As he headed north-west from the ports, the scenery changed from jungle, to open flatland, and finally to the mountain range. A 3 day hike up a sometimes vertical mountain face proved no challenge to the agent. He enjoyed the mixture of adrenaline and fear, one forcing him not to look down, but the other edging him to jump into the abyss. Although he had spent his hike having no visibility of what was around him beyond a few meters, when he reached his vantage point only 200 metres from the peak, he was surprised to have a clear view. His superiors told him that the suspected volcanoe in the centre of this region created spontaneous plumes of hot air, that gave someone high enough a view of the entire region.
A sudden pocket of hot air against his chilled face brought Tigersura back to the present. Moving his vision from the left to the centre, he faced his next obstacle. Although thousands of meters up, the blue ambience of the mile high plasma gate was easy to see. This oddly beautiful structure stood between two unpassable lines of mountains, meaning the gate was blocking the only passage to the other side. Although plasma in its regular state was viscous, the voltage regulators around the frame of the gate created a lethal power. It was easy to pass through the gate, just staying alive was difficult. Removing his binoculars from his pack, he looked at the frame. Althought from afar it looked simply like a box, on closer inspection, smaller lines crossed horizontally across the box. Taking his mind quickly to the 5 explosive charges in his pack, he quickly decided against demolition. Any act of terrorism in any square inch of the planet was quickly reported to the high office in Neguro, and every platoon within 100 miles was airlifted to the region. Tigersura then thought a more job-descriptive approach was nessecary. Rolling out his bedpack, he led down, closed his eyes, and waited for morning.
Sorry if its long, but all my games are broken, so my time is not the best spent thing ever.
__________________
hello boys im baaaaaaaaaaaack
Last edited by Ringlets; Aug 14 2007 at 05:03 PM..
Reason: Left out area description/adding random things.
Sleep offered few dreams for Tigersura. "Once you've seen most of the world," he thought to himself after waking up after hours of darkness "you have nothing to dream about". This night was no exception. He had often been encouraged by friends in the Freedom Power Rebels to go and see a psychiatrist, but he waved them aside. He would joke about finding the stereotypical long shrink-sofas uncomfortable, but this was simply a mask covering one simple truth. He was afraid of the past and the truths it would reveal about him and his lifestyle. It was as he thought this when the first speck of sun light appeared over the hills and stirred his mind from restless nothing. It was time to go.
Having impatiently scoffed a handfull of rations, he began to roll up his bedpack. It was now when his SD4 portable phone began ringing its annoying interpretation of Beethovens 5th. Tigersura immeadiatly recognized the caller by the ringtone, and made no rush in rummaging through his pack to find the device. Finally finding the small, silver-chrome flip-phone, he flipped the top and pressed the cell to his face.
"I'm busy," he said bluntly.
"Sleeping, eating rations and packing up your bed?" Replied the Mission Director of the FPR Michelle Littlewood.
Tigersura despised the woman, not simply because she despised him, but because she didnt trust him. In her own words, she "didn't trust him as far as she could throw him". Tigersura couldn't help but laugh at the irony when he was told this. Michelle Littlewood was easily stronger than the average FPR recruit, and her combat speciality was hand to hand. He pondered for a split second as to how she knew he was doing little, until he caught a reflection of the sun from the corner of his eye. He spun round to see a floating sphere of metal, only 20 centimetres in diameter with a camera lens protruding from the front, facing him.
"Smile, Tigersura. You look so sad on your own."
"I wouldn't be so goddamn annoyed if you hadn't insisted i went alone. Now is there a reason for you using an unsecure line to contact your currently most secretive operative?" As he said this, the phone clicked off.
Tigersura closed the lid, placed the phone back in his pack, and turned back to face the X-22 Surveilance Camera floating at head height. The sphere was currently making a series of beeps and clicks, meaning someone was engaging its telecommunication systems. The X-22 was the FPRs most widely used form of surveilance. Its hydrogen propulsion engine meant it could sustain power at full speed for over 48 hours (its full speed being a staggering 40mph). Its platinum shell meant it could withstand any acidity and pressure, and could withstand tempuratures all the way to 500 degrees. It had been the X-22 that had been spying on secret meetings in the Daon Tower and had discovered the Gureino Government had operations based in the supposedly empty Per-Perel region. It was this machine that Tigersura had to thank for being where he was now. As he thought this, the machine emmitted a quick burst of highpitched feedback, as if someone was holding a microphone to its speaker. Tigersura clapped his hands to his ears in pain and glared at the sphere in anger.
"Oh, whoops!" The Director's voice emmitted from the X-22, clearly enjoying his pain.
"Stupid bitch! You know the Gurei bastards have alti-phones embedded all over these hills, are you trying to get me killed?! Now is there a reason i'm being bothered by you?"
"Calm down, alright. What i'm about to tell you might help you," Tigersura couldn't help but laugh at this. The best help he would expect Michelle Littlewood to offer him would be a cyanide pill. "We managed to get this X-22 over the plasma gate last night and found these switches in the guard house," as she said this, a flap opened on the side of the sphere and projected a small holographic image of what appeared to be 3 red levers embedded into a wall protected by two guards armed with highly powered ion-guns.
"By the security we can only guess that these switches control either the security cameras in the area, or hopefully, the plasma gate itself. Whichever scenario, it means that we can get more agents over to aid you in your surveilance of the area. Turn these levers off, your reward is increased by half. Can you get that around your tiny brain?" Up until then, Tigersura thought she might go one breifing without insulting him.
"I turn off these switches, you send over inexperienced fodder from your platoon to do my job and i go home to more dough? Sounds good. Whats the kill limit here?"
"You have clearance 5. Be glad the higher ups have faith in you. If it were up to me, i would've sent you over naked with no more then a tatoo on your forehead saying "whiney bitch" ,"
"Listen you fu-" Tigersura geared up his insult wheel, but he was interrupted before he could go any further.
"No more talking. I'm bored with this breifing. Do your duty, then fall off the mountain or something, i don't care. Have fun"
Before he could reply, the X-22 accelerated behind him. Calmly, retaining his anger, Tigersura reached to his waist, pulled out his pistol, inserted a magazine, cocked the gun, took aim, and fired. The X-22 exploded in a small puff of smoke, sending tiny components down the mountain face. Slinging his pack over his back and placing his pistol back in its holster, he jumped off the mountain ledge, landed in a ditch of deep snow, and continued towards the plasma gate. As he sprinted down the face with extreme agility, he remembered what he had been told.
You have clearance 5. Clearance 5. Kill that which needs be. Althought nothing ever needed be killed in these situations, Tigersura's anger would get the better of him in the upcoming combat.
__________________
hello boys im baaaaaaaaaaaack
Last edited by Ringlets; Aug 14 2007 at 06:23 PM..
“Yup, dead, all dead.”
Although not as exciting as combat, checking if a foe is dead by kicking their helmet off was a lot easier than fighting them, especially in the conditions Tigersura had left himself with. For starters, he was angry. Because he was angry, he rushed into combat. And because he rushed into combat, he didn’t take the time to engage celerity or to scan his opponents. His foolishness had now cost his a small portion of his thigh from a hidden sniper. Although usually agile regardless of condition, managing to still dispose of the sniper with one shot to the head from 100 metres, without celerity, he couldn’t avoid the ion-charged sniper bullet now lodged into his calf. Looking at the small gouge in his flesh, he unsheathed his sabre from his back. About to manoeuvre the blade into his flesh to remove the bullet, he noticed the dark shimmering substance.
“Friggin’ Gurei blood.” He murmured impatiently. He remembered how he had begun the skirmish forgetting the limit of his abilities. Attempting to dispatch two guards by throwing his sword in such a way so that it dispatched his foes and then boomeranged back to his hand proved useless without celerity. Instead, the blade met his first target, and embedded into his chest, rather cutting it and moving around to the next target. As the combat continued, he guessed that as his blade was left unhandled, the guard’s blood simply seeped onto the blade, leaving Tigersura with what was now drying quickly in the midday sun of the guard outpost.
Wiping the substance of on the khaki armour of the nearest guard, he could truly admire the sabre in its glory. Crafted by the smiths in Kowbault as a leaving present from his father, the sabre stood at 4 foot, with a gentle curve before reaching the tip, and unlike most sabres used by the sub-elite guards of the Gureino’s nobility, the sabre had a much wider blade. The hand guard was hemi-spherical, crafted with a mixture of gold and platinum, given it all the beauty of jewellery, but the defence of ten inch thick tank armour. Moving up from the hand guard, the bottom of the blade had three ribbons of varying colour wrapped around it. The one closest to the guard was light blue, symbolising the tranquillity required to engage celerity, the next one up was gold, symbolising the concentration celerity needed to be engaged, and the top ribbon was a dark red, symbolising the blood celerity would shed if engaged correctly. Tigersura grimaced at each of these ribbons, annoyed as to how sloppy the previous combat had been. He began to remove the bullet.
Clearing his mind of mistakes, he turned around. There, right in front of him, was the plasma gate. Stretching his neck as far backwards as he could wouldn’t allow him to see the brink of this mammoth. From this close, he could see that the ten horizontal lines he had seen before were support structures. In-between each of these were ten more, smaller support structures. He remembered from his school days that plasma could be wrung together into a fabric-like substance a few metres in length. The support structures, he thought, mush be a) holding the plasma together and b) keeping the voltage in them. Even though the danger still posed, Tigersura couldn’t help but laugh at the poor security.
“The best kept secret on the planet,” he said to himself “and the best security they can come up with is a mile high wall with a virtual ladder placed next to it”
Placing himself almost next to the wall, he glanced up, spotted the first support beam, crouched, and leaped. Barely reaching halfway, he landed back in an angry thud.
“Fucking celerity…”
Standing back up, relaxing his shoulders and closing his eyes, Tigersura began to breathe deeply and calmly. The dirt around his body started to brush around in a small cyclone, the centre of which was him. Soon the dust was spinning around so fast that his body was almost invisible behind the wall of brown. Suddenly, all the dust blew away, leaving a faint gust emanating out from his feet. His black hair shaking lightly in the wind, he opened his eyes. They had become a lot more alert now, and so had his mind.
“God damn waste of time if you ask me.”
Walking back up to the wall, he crouched, and sprung up, this time nearly beating his past height ten-fold. Passing the third support beam, he reached out his right hand, grabbed the beam, and dangled underneath it. Bringing his legs up, he jumped again for the next beam. His climb had begun.
In a dimly lit room, somewhere in Per-Perel, filled with thousands of buttons each lit different colours, on a rectangular screen in front of a small man in a lab coat, the sixth light from the bottom began flashing wildly. The man, knowing instantly what this meant, reached for the phone next to him, dialled five numbers, and waited. As the phone rang, the light moved from the sixth to the ninth, then the twelfth.
Someone is climbing the gate.
The phone clicked to life. Before the receiver had a chance to respond, the small man spoke in a frightened, nasaly voice.
“So-someone is t-trying to climb the g-gate”
In Neguro, the special forces had mobilized before the phone was hung-up.
"Argh! God damn plasma!" yelled Tigersura, having been shocked for the fifteenth time during his ascent. He was glad that his black climbing gloves had leather fingertips. Having been climbing for well over an hour now, his muscles were beginning to ache and his ascent decelerating. Thankfully, though, he could see the end of the plasma gate. Now he began to think about what he would expect to find during his reconnaissance. He had been told to investigate the sudden increase in Gurei activity in the centre of Per-Perel. He could remember the breifing with Littlewood.
"We sent an X-22 to the volcanoe to find out whats going on. Turns out theres something catching the attention of the Gureino's researchers. We want you go there and discover the truth. Whether its new technology or if they just found a new type of rock, we need to know."
"Why not send the goddamn X-22 to find out?" he questioned.
"Uh, hello dumbass? The security around the complex inside the volcanoe is better than Daon Towers. The only way in is down the volcanoe. X-22s cant stand that massive heat" she backlashed.
"Oh, fantastic. Send one of your best operatives to a friggin' volcanoe. Why not just throw all of Waan's donations in there as well?!"
Just as his anger began to well up, his hand fell through thin air. He thought he was falling off the gate, but realised he had reached the top.
"About goddamn time." He brought his leg up and over the lip, so that he was stradling the gate. He found this humorous.
"So, uh, how long you in town. Ha! Haha! Ha...ah... God dammit make the jokes when other people are around."
Tigersura began cheering at his own accomplishment, however this joy was short lived. Looking right towards the northern mountains, he saw a small black speck. The speck became a blob, and then it became something Tigersura couldn't help but wimper at. Coming closer and closer to him was a Falcon, Gurei's most prized military secret. The jet black military transport chopper, from the front, looked
like something out of a nightmare. The two pulse engines on either side resembled those used in the old Harrier jump-jets, that were used even until the destruction of the first Earth. The rings of light blue could been seen pulsing from the jets from a mile away. The dark green visor concealed the pilot, however as the visor was also a HUD, so the eerie shots of white could be seen as the height, speed and target displays were updated. The Falcon came to a stop, hovering only a few metres from Tigersura. As he stared at the pinnacle of military transport, it began to rotate, slowly showing him more and more of the machine. As it faced him side on, a large square portion of the side began to slide downwards and place itself underneath the Falcon, leaving an open view of its contents. Inside, Tigersura was faced with a worse sight than the Falcon itself.
Inside were half a dozen men armoured in black Special Forces terrorist warfare outfits. The thick Kevlar peices placed over the chest, neck, shoulders, upper arms, thighs and waist protected the unit from both gunfire and stab/slash wounds. Half of the men were equipped with shortswords of no distinguishing nature, whilst the other men were equipped with high-tech firearms. The soldier closest to the exit hatch moved forward and looked at his opponent. Tigersura instantly recognized his face. The man was Lawrence Terna, the most distinguished SF soldier on the planet. He had recently been praised for his 500th Freedom Power Rebel kill, and as a result was the most hated man among the FPR. Terna had obviously recognized Tigersura's black uniform and the insignia on his right shoulder, and spoke something to his men. Half drew their guns, whilst half drew their swords and positioned themselves on the edge of the exit hatch.
They're going to jump.
Tigersura had seconds to act. Drawing one of his pistols with his right hand and a magazine with the other, he loaded the gun within half a second. Some of the SF men looked taken back, obviously unfamiliar with someone unafraid of their unit. As quickly as he had prepared one gun, Tigersura unholstered his second and armed it. Aiming both at the SF unit, he began to fire. What happened next almost tore out Tigersuras heart. No sooner had the high calibre platinum armour peircing bullets left his pistols than had they barely but scratched the bullet proof invisible plasma sheild protecting the transport compartment. He kept firing, hoping that he might at least shatter the sheilds power units, allowing him to jump aboard and destory the unit with his sabre, however no such luck or firepower existed.
Firing his last two shots, Tigersura ejected the magazines, letting them fall them mile to the floor. Reholstering the pistols, his fear of loss turning into a brilliant idea, he stood up on the gate. Trying to balance himself in the cold mountain wind, he reached around into his pack and removed two plastic squares. Watching as the SF unit poised themselves ready for attack, he stood in a crucifix style with one square in each hand. As the plasma sheild powered down, flashing light blue, he began to fall backwards, over the wall. Terna stared in mixed confusion and wonder, which soon changed to downright fear as he saw what was in his targets hands. As Tigersura began to fall he threw the plastic squares towards the Falcon. As the SF squad opened fire, everything slowed down. Tigersura saw the Time-based Detonation Explosives flying towards the hull of the Falcon, the bullets flying past his body, Terna's face of fear and the SF squads faces of blissfull unawareness. Just as the lip of the plasma gate filled Tigersuras vision, he could see Terna preparing to jump from the Falcon as his squad continued to attack.
Tigersura smiled.
"Those bastards never thought i could do it."
It was then when he noticed the wind rushing from behind him. Tilting his head over his shoulders, he just realised what he now faced.
"Shit shit shit. Come on celerity."
Finding it near impossible to concentrate while falling to his death, he tried to think of ways to live. Still facing the top of the gate, he had no idea how close to the ground he was getting. Trying to engage celerity again proved impossible, hearing the huge explosion of the TDXs mixed with the pulse-engines over the deafening roar of the wind.
"Once more. After that, well times up."
Taking his mind away from everything, even his death, Tigersura nearly fell asleep. He was taught to think of something wonderful when trying to engage celerity. Bringing his mind back to the current events, he thought of the perfect joy for him.
The look on Michelle Littlewoods face when she hears i climbed the plasma gate, blew up a Falcon and most of a Special Forces squad, then fell off the gate and lived.
Feeling the surge of power through his muscles, Tigersura brought his feet around into a standing position and braced himself for impact seconds before the floor met him. He landed with surprising ease, having just fell through one mile in mere seconds. Scanning around, he could see the guard house with his target levers inside on one side, a valley leading up to the rumoured volcanoe, and on the left-
"Jesus!" he yelled, as he jumped back.
The X-22 stared back at him. Tigersura could see the red light above the lens, indicating telecommunications was engaged.
"I hope you saw that!"
He could hear an obvious sigh from the Director.
"Looks like you focused just in time. Shame,"
Bitch
"Just turn the levers off." The X-22 disapeared.
Despite that conversation, Tigersura was still overjoyed, and began to walk towards the guardhouse.
Thats it i wont write anymore. I promise. For now...
__________________
hello boys im baaaaaaaaaaaack
Last edited by Ringlets; Aug 15 2007 at 04:44 PM..
What the hell was that thing, Tigersura thought as he sat in the darkness of the freezing cold mountains. Even as he had climbed through the ventilation shaft, dragging the researcher's body behind him, he could not erase the image of what he had seen. It was a rock, obviously, but inside was a girl. A human girl, no more than 15, with what appeared to be wings attached to her sides, encased in this rock covered in diamonds. As he thought about the circumstances, his eyes drifted to the still unconscious scientist laying in a fetal shape in the snow, the one who had so desperately tried to keep her work a secret. Checking the film he had processed from his nano-camera, from the 20 photos he had taken, the researcher had managed to shield 12 of them with her face and hand. Still, the remaining 8 had perfect sight of the rock, and his pay had been earned.
Glancing into the sky, as he was at a lower altitude than before, all he saw was clouds. Glancing to either side, he saw the slowly flashing green lights of the many aircraft and sea vessels that protected the two seas bordering Per-Perel. This was normal for nighttime. Suddenly, a blue light appeared amongst the sea of green. As it got closer and closer to the shore, Tigersura could see that it was being circled by quickly moving blue blurs, and that small puffs of red smoke were being propelled towards the airship. Within a minute, the dog fight was almost directly overhead, and he could see now that the airship was being attacked by Gurei assault gunships. The airship was making sharp jolts in the sky, professionally avoiding the missiles. Tilting his neck back just as the monolith plane flew over him, he could see that one missile would hit its target. Jumping on top of the scientist to shield her and himself from the shrapnel that would soon be heading his way, a tremendous explosion emanated from above. Staying low for a minute longer, he gradually raised himself from the floor.
Looking around, he could see large clumps of burning reckage scattered around the mountains for miles. The Gunships, assuming there would be no survivors, had left. The bright red of the flames created a reflection of something above him. Glancing up, he saw two white circles slowly getting larger and larger. Jesus, someone managed to survive that? Running in the directions of the quickly descending passengers, he could see he would land before he could reach them. Carefully but quickly grabbing a flaming peice of wood, he waved it above his head.
"Oi! Oi, you...you fucking nutters! Over here!" He shouted towards the two men. As they limped up the hill, the flames slowly revealed their faces. One man had a rough looking exterior, and had a rifle slung over his shoulder. The other looked much more inviting, with white hair and a slightly lop-sided large hat. He could see that the rough looking man recognized Tigersura's uniform immediately. As the man armed his rifle and muttered to his friend something about "terrorists" and "striking first", Tigersura knew to act. Silently and inconspicuously arming his pistols, he waited. As the larger man raised his rifle, aiming towards him, he took aim and fired without thought. Watching the man collapse and slowly roll back down the hill he had climbed, he took aim at the un-armed man.
'Oh bugger...'
Sethys watched his gunner rolling down the hill.
'I shouldn't have payed him in advance...'
Sethys re-slanted his hat and brushed off his shirt. He slipped out of his parachute and cocked his head to look at the man aiming the gun. The man was clearly a soldier but at closer inspection he didn't appear to be Gureino.
'FPR?' Sethys asked, realising that if he was wrong, he would probably die. Then again, if he was right he could very well die all the same. He fingered his ring absently as he awaited an answer.
The soldier nodded slowly, secure in his position of power as the one holding the gun.
'You?' The soldier said, approaching Sethys.
'The name's Sethys, I'm not Gureino, if that matters,' Sethys put his hands above his head. The soldier seemed unsure but slowly lowered his gun all the same.
'Tigersura,'
'And the girl?'
'Not sure, I picked her up a little way from here. She's some Gureino scientist. They've been working on some really weird stuff down there,' Tigersura stopped, realising he was saying too much to a stranger, he could be putting his payment in jeopardy.
'Don't worry about it,' Sethys said, sensing his unease, 'Hey, you got any food? My things are a bit..er..burnt,'
The girl groaned and the two men turned, almost having forgotten her presence.
'I will have to get her back to base soon, if you need to get out of here, you can come with me, but only as far as the border, beyond there you are on your own,'
Tigersura lifted the scientist up and began walking. Sethys was about to follow him when he noticed something lying in the dirt. It was dirty and singed but in reasonably good shape despite the explosion. Sethys picked up the Aurelian book and tucked it into his satchel. He then ran off to catch up with the Freedom soldier.
A mile away, shrouded in darkness, Lawrence Terna led in the frozen ice, and inspected the current events. First, he had watched as his new arch-enemy had carried a scientist all the way up a mountain slope, then he gazed in awe as his "brothers in cause" perfectly executed the destruction of the airship. Now he watched through his telescopic rifle lens, as the two men, one a survivor from the crash and the other man the one who had destroyed an entire special forces platoon, conversed. He could see, with help from the flames of the wreckage, that the Scientist still lay unconscious as the men spoke.
Thinking off why he was here only urged him more to shoot his original target. The way he had so obviously but brilliantly flawed the platoons tactics maddened him beyond normal. He had just managed in time to jump from the Falcon as it exploded, and landed just after his parachute had slowed him, still however spraining his ankles. He watched through the plasma gates transparent liquid as the agent walked into the guard house, turned off the plasma shield, and walked south down the long valley.
He realized now that if the scientist awoke and screamed at what surrounded or faced her, she would activate the alti-phones warning system, sending more gunships and troops to their exact position.
I can't let some amateur prig take my kill.
Just as he armed his rifle and slowly took aim over the scientists huddled body, a black loping mass appeared out from the darkness. Before he could move out of the way, Terna found himself half buried under the frozen, bleeding corpse of the airship crews companion. He could see in the distance that the two men were now walking away from the site, one with the scientist cradled in their arms. Half in snow, half in corpse, Terna groaned and attempted to squiggle out, knowing that he would lie here helplessly until the morning.
__________________
hello boys im baaaaaaaaaaaack
Last edited by Ringlets; Sep 11 2007 at 04:38 PM..
"Stop..." Candice murmered. She suddenly awoke to find herself floating horizontally above the ground. No. She was being carried. "Stop! Get away!" She pushed herself off the man, fallling flat onto the cold snow. Where was she?
"Get away from me!" She got on her knees and scrambled up to point at the two men. What was happening? Her hair was awry; even her sunglasses fell off, revealing her permantly enlarged pupils. The laboratory coat was partially frayed near the edges. "Who the hell are you?!" What happened to the research center? Her wrist flicked, a a pen - no a knife - emerged in her hand. She could only wait for the emergency system to respond to the node embedded near her hip.
"Fight for flight," Candice whispered to herself. A strange nostalgic memory of sitting in biology class returned to her, but she refocused on the two figures in front of her. One was from the Rebels - the other? What did they want?
'Oh crap...' Sethys said aloud,'All you Gureino High-up types have trackers...you took it out didn't you?' He turned to the soldier desperately but was greeted with a blank look, 'Oh crap, oh crap,'
The treasure hunter looked around, the only near by cover was an old hollow tree and some large rocks. They would have to do, if only he had some time.
But he didn't, even as he ended his sentence he could here the choppers approaching. He would just have to hope that Tigersura could handle himself, but the girl? She looked like she would need some help. The Gureinos wouldn't distinguish between targets and enemies if a fight broke out, which it would enevitably do.
Well, he just had one option...
...he closed his eyes...
...and vanished.
Or at least he appeared to. He merely just used his abilities, he had long since realised his best defence was to not be there when a fight broke out, or where a weapon would land so he practiced his celerity until it was almost flawless. His speed practically unmatched.
As the deafening roar of the helicopter engines became louder, Tigersura turned to look to the man from the wreckage. No one. Only him and the Scientist were visible.
"Damn douche ran off..."
Gazing into the night sky, he could see 3 fast approaching Bastion class troop transports. He drew his sword, knowing that the Gurei would conserve their troops when firearms were not involved, and forged a battle plan. Picking up a large wooden plank, blazing with a fuel flame from the airship, he ran towards the oncoming threat, hoping to distract them from the scientist...
There was a blur in the air as the treasure hunter picked up a piece of sharp metal from the wreckage.
Sethys sped up a nearby burning jut of metal from the airship's hull and leapt with the full force of his celerity. He bulleted through the air and into the open side of the first chopper, blade in hand.
There were four men in the first section, one went down as Sethys cannoned into him, the second received a piece of metal to the neck. The third was quicker and brought his gun round, but not as quick Sethys, who snatched it through the air and used it to knock its previous owner to the floor.
The man who had been stabbed had staggered back and was spurting blood over the cabin. He finally collapsed out of the open side and fell into the hollow tree with a satisfying crack. The fourth man managed to get to the pilot's door and pull it open before Sethys finally came to a stop on his back. The pilots turned round to be greeted with a grisly sight. Sethys, splattered with blood unsheathed his sword.
Four seconds later he leapt from the chopper that began its spiralling descent towards the rocky ground...
The next few moments contained new feelings to Tigersura. Just as he stood up, make-shift torch in hand, he felt something brush against his back. Thinking perhaps a stray bullet from a grounded soldier had shot through his armour and grazed his skin, he turned in the most likely direction.
What the-?
He now stood looking upon nothing. Pure darkness.
Impossible he thought. The flames from the wreckage would light the area for miles around. And the silence was also strange. Never, in his entire life of murder and industrial surveillance had he experienced silence so pure. Yet here he stood, in what many had called the void. He could not move, yet trying to would've been pointless, as he didnt even have control of his thoughts.
Time seemed to stop in the void. Tigersura felt as though he wasnt even touching ground, or touching any thing. The torch had seemed to have disapeared, and everything else he had was lost in the void. He felt weightless, empty, almost as though he and the void were one.
Suddenly, a small white blip appeared directly in the centre of his vision. Although in truth the white was a dull one, in the void, the blip had become a flood of light. Slowly, the blip became larger, and took the form of a bottle shaped mass. The bottle then formed legs and arms, and a head. The head gained features, ears, nose, mouth, and eyes. The eyes looked straight into his, then down to his chest. Tigersura felt the weight return to his limbs, and tilted his neck to follow the direction of the Scientists eyes.
The tip of the dagger could just be seen protruding from his torso, meaning that her blow had pierced through his entire chest. As an eerie high pitched whine began to form in his ears, he collapsed back into the void...
Candice stared down at the still body. The form of the grey uniform was slowly being intruded upon by the fluttering white snow. Her eyes were wide, gasping for tears amongst the harsh winds. For a moment, she thought about what she had just done, before stepping back in shock.
"Shit." She frowned, then reassured herself that is was a necessary act. There should be no regret; it was kill or be killed. As if she was still being pursued, the scientist looked back again at the carnage, before stumbling towards the forest.
The treasure hunter landed in the stabbed man. He scraped parts of the body off his shoe and walked towards where he had last seen the soldier. He could not see him until he trod on him.
'Oh fuck...'
He bent down to the soldier's body and checked his pulse. It was weak but he was still there. Sethys looked up to the sky, the other choppers were still heading towards them but had appeared to veer towards the forest...the scientist! They would be tracking her...
'Aw nuts...' the treasure hunter lifted the soldiers unconscious body onto his shoulders and lurched towards the forest, 'You'd better be paying me for this...' he muttered.
Im dead or im blind. The darkness had returned, however it was not as lifeless. Odd flashes of light often passed through his vision, creating an orange ambience through his eyelids. Between the rustling of the trees, he could hear the faint noise of the helicopters, that every once in a while turned to a deafening roar as they flew over him, search lights dancing over the area.
He opened his eyes to survey the area. The surrounding tress were littered with snow, and above them the night sky had been reddened by the soon to rise sun. He tried to sit up, but a blinding pain in his chest quickly forced him back down.
Oh yea, that bitch stabbed me.
Rolling over onto his chest and using his hands to stand up proved easier, however a sudden roar of an engine threw him back into his original position.
I lost my sabre back at the wreckage, and my guns are no where to be found...
He couldnt be spotted. Waiting for the lights to dim again, he quickly sprang up and sprinted into further tree cover. Skulking around the forest led him to a thick trail of footsteps, some bearing the Gureino symbol embedded into soldiers shoes.
I think...on a limb, that they went this way...
__________________
hello boys im baaaaaaaaaaaack
Last edited by Ringlets; Oct 18 2007 at 08:44 PM..
OOC: Ringlets - your post isn't coinciding with the details provided by Rophage.
It was getting nauseating. Candice rubbed her hand on her temples as she staggered through the dense forest. Every step she took set a throbbing pulse through her brain, and the cold weather was no help either. Indeed, the uneven terrain, litered with hidden concavities and tripping tree roots, further induced her head into a throbbing blood machine. Her eyes felt as if they were going to implode and dribble out of empty eye sockets. She rubbed her temples again, squinting her eyes to regain at least a semblance of focus. Only that dreadful dead body of the soldier returned into her mind though, and she wondered why she concerned over leaving the knife plugged into the corpse.
The noise from the helicopters were gone. Indeed, any stimuli from the wreckage - save for her own ripped clothes and disheveled hair - had dissappeared into the cold quiet forest. She wasn't sure where she was or from whom she was now running from. It was just too cold and uncomfortable.
It had been a little while since Sethys had left the soldier's body hidden in the forest. He had done his best to stop the bleeding and keep him warm but his mind had wondered to the scientist. The treasure hunter thought about his original mission. He slipped the Aurelian book from his pack as he sat in a tree.
"She's some Gureino scientist. They've been working on some really weird stuff down there,"
He hadn't reached his destination but the chance meeting was perhaps a blessing. He tossed the soldier's camera in his hand. Everything was connected...but how? His best bet was the scientist, she knew what was happening with that girl.
That girl encased in rock, with wings sprouting from her back...
It was a disturbing image and the treasure hunter lost concentration as the sight emerged in his mind. He dropped the camera to the floor.
'Crap,' he muttered and swung round the branch he was, placing the book in his satchel so that he was hanging from the tree, his legs wrapped round the branch. He used his sword to get the camera's strap hooked and pull it up when he stopped. Something was in the snow...
"Ugh..." Candice stopped, heaving in fatigue. She slapped her hand on a tree trunk, before collapsing against it. Why was she running anyway? The Rebel was dead. What about the other guy? It was too cold. She didn't care. She didn't want to run anymore. Even the ocassional searchlights and speakers shouting her name from the helicopters floating above the trees didn't induce her to stop. She didn't want them either.
Eventually, she forced herself off the trunk, fingering the cold rough bark. Her fingers were red and stiff from the cold. It was uncomfortable; indeed, the wet sweat underneath her shirt further intensified the temperatures. She didn't feel any distinct emotions. Her warm lab room seemed far away.
Mountain Range, Per-Perel border
