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Topic:  Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
Garryll Gates
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Garryll Gates
 
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  Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 1, 2012 3:30:19 PM    View the profile of Garryll Gates 
With a shudder, the Dominion slammed back into realspace. In the cruiser’s bowels, Stormtroopers barely paid it mind. Most went back to what they’d been doing; smoking, playing cards, buffing their armor or checking their gear. A few, however, had a other things to worry about.

Garryll Gates stood in an auxiliary hangar of the huge craft as the small transport scooted through the field generators. The transport landed heavily, and the ramp descended almost immediately. Two soldiers in matte black armor walked briskly down the ramp, rifles slung and still kitted up. They held their helmets under their arms.

One face was far more familiar than the other, but Gates remembered both from their briefing, barely more than forty-eight hours ago. Havock stepped forwards.

“Where’s the rest of the team, Whiskey?” she asked. “Dead?”

“Not last we saw,” the ARC Commander replied. “Orr sent us out of there when the situation went to hell.”

“Well, we better get you debriefed then. No time to lose, if the emergency pulse you sent was telling us about this,” Gates said, then turned to the squad of Stormtroopers they’d brought as guards. “Briefing room one, sergeant.”

“Roger that, sir. Corporal, you have the guard.”

The other ARC trooper, the man who called himself ‘The Duke,’ had slipped into and back out of the transport without Gates spotting him, and had a half-dozen odd datapads in his hands. The two Army officers wheeled about and led the ARCs deeper into the embrace of the Imperial cruiser.

*** *** *** *** ***

Gates leaned back, cursing softly. Havock nodded in agreement. “This is big. I’m glad we brought Phoenix. We need to figure out what the hell is going on here.”

Havock stabbed at a button in front of her. “Get me the squad leaders in here.”

Gates threw a suggestion into the mic. “And get a platoon leader from the shipboard Stormies in here, too.”

One by one, the asked-for soldiers appeaered; Eclipse’s leader, Second Lieutenant Skarr arrived first. The newly-elevated Corporal Crest of Blackjack entered discussing something with the Raiders squad leader, Sergeant First Class Jaenna Caldwin. The last arrival was an unfamiliar face, a scarred and middle-aged man with lieutenant’s bars; his chest label said ‘Cortez.’

“Phoenix. Good to see you all again,” Gates said in greetings. “I wish I could greet you under better circumstances, but as usual, we’re going to be calling upon you to be the tip of the spear.”

He clicked a button on the table, and for the second time that week, the planet of Shumongi rose before him. “This is the planet we’re currently in-system of. We’re concerned with a facility in the mountainous region.”

The hologram zoomed in, highlighting a sprawling facility.

“Intelligence says this is a base owned by the organization ‘Flail.’ ARC troopers have investigated, and that’s true. It’s also home to some pretty screwed up shit,” Gates said carefully. “Most of the ARC squad we sent in has not returned. Two-thirds of it, to be exact. We’re going in and getting them out, and we’re going to finish their mission, and, if the facility poses a threat, we take it out.”

“What kind of opposition are we facing, here?” Skarr asked.

“ARC says that Flail forces pulled out when the containment alarms went off, but if they return, they’re basically a private military company. Training, weapons, gear; they’ve got it.”

“Did you say ‘containment?’ What was being contained?” Crest asked.

“These,” Gates said, and pressed another button. A helmet-cam view of one of the ARCs - the ID in the lower corner said ‘Duke’ - floated by hologram. Gunfire spat from the rifle that was held before the view, and its targets -

“Gods,” muttered Cortez, making a brief motion with his hands. “What are those things?”

“We don’t know,” Gates said simply as Duke’s shots slammed into the shambling human-sized creature in front of him. “But they’re persistent and tall in numbers. Their vision is...lacking, but they can hear pretty damn well.”

The creature rose in the cam, but got put down with another shot. The Duke ran forwards and kicked it in the neck on his way past.

“So how are we going to play this?” Jaenna asked, leaning back in her seat.

“We have three goals: the ARCs, figuring out what the hell is going on here, and securing the facility. One squad will have each goal, and Cortez’s forces will secure secondary objectives, Gates said, and flipped the hologram back to imaging of the facility.

“Blackjack: you will insert via the roof; we need control of this facility. That means that we need control of their command center. That’s your job. Secure the center and get our techs eyes and ears.”

Gates shifted to a different part of the facility. “Eclipse: you’ll be following in the ARCs’ steps, so you’ll enter here or here and get into the hot labs. ARC didn’t get a good look at them, so you need to do the honors. Expect a lot of resistance once the lockdown is lifted.”

The Tactical Officer shifted the view again. “Raiders: we need to get the ARCs back. Orr said he’d take them into the bowels of the facility, where they’d have room to play hide-and-seek with these things. You need to get down into the storage facilities and find them, and prep them to get out.”

“Cortez, I want you to send some squads to secure parts of the facility along Phoenix’s routes. Insert with the Stormtroopers, but you’ll break off and take defensive positions and explore the facility. I also want your guys to lift the lockdown. That’ll give us free rein of the facility.”

The SLs seemed in agreement. “Got it? Good. Transports are being prepped right now. We deploy in an hour. Let’s do this.”

OOC:

Eclipse: The western approach has several ground-level access hatches. Use one or more of these to get into position to complete the ARCs’ mission and investigate the hot labs.

ARC trooper intelligence suggests most of the mutants are trapped by the lockdown. It is unlikely you will face too many before Cortez’s squads raise it.


The lockdown will be raised on Wednesday, July 4 at or after 11 PM EST. Look out for a post from me then.

Company Commander of Phoenix Company |Tactical Officer of the Army | Adept of the Dark Jedi Order | Captain of the
Bloodfist in the Osk Company
TO/CPTGarryll Gates/3SQD/1PLT/1COM/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE [SCP][RoM][ICE] [IH] [CCA] [BC] [SRP] [AS-4] [ES1] [CoS] [EW1] {RESx3} [ESC09] [RoTx2] [CRoS] [AoT] [CoZ][CoDS][VT][CRoM][KAD][RCA][*QW 12*](3.1)(1.1)

SM/DJK Gates/Eagle Sect/Lopen/VEDJ/VE (KC1)
Longtime leader of Blackjack Squad
For Tadath, for the Empire.

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Skarr
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 2, 2012 10:51:05 AM    View the profile of Skarr 
With deployment arriving in the next hour, there was no time to waste. The 2nd Lieutenant stood from the table and threw Garryll a quick salute. The images of the...things were still running through Skarr’s head as he left the briefing room. He did not know what exactly they were, but it was Eclipse’s job to wade into the thick of them and find out. Skarr pulled his datapad out of his pocket to go over the mission briefing again. The ARC troopers’ original objective was to find out exactly what Flail was doing and gather data. Now that was Eclipse’s objective. It made the man wonder if High Command was insane. A team of highly trained ARC troopers had failed the objective, why did they think three SCOPE squads could do it? Granted, we brought a few platoons of grunts with us, but High Command is still out of their fierfekking mind.

A few more minutes of walking and Skarr arrived at Eclipse’s suite. He smiled slightly, Skarr was used to small rooms all throughout the ship. On the Dominion however, Eclipse had a whole suite of rooms for their use. The center room was a lounge, filled with couches and consoles for reading and viewing holovids. To the back of the suite was a smaller room, but still large enough to hold a whole squad of troopers. The smaller room was the briefing room for the squad. In the center of the room was a simple table. Off of the lounge were ten different rooms, one for each squad member. Although there were currently an excess of rooms. The door opened into the lounge to reveal all of the squad sitting on the various pieces of furniture in the room.

The room felt slightly empty with the absence of Anival. After the last mission, he had been transferred to Blackjack. Skarr jokingly thought it was because Eclipse had too many loose cannons on the squad. After last mission, he would not doubt it. Skarr looked over the soldiers of Eclipse, smiling. They were his family, his home. Meteora, Therex, Beta, Razor, Balac, and Terre. All of them he considered friends and all of them he trusted. He motioned for them to follow him into the briefing room.

Skarr did not bother to look back to see if Eclipse was following them. He knew they were already. If there was one thing Skarr had learned from his time in the Army, was that he could have a very commanding presence. He walked around the durasteel table in the briefing room to stand at its head. The squad followed him in and spread out.

Beta was the first to speak, “So what’s the take, boss?”

“Heh,” Skarr answered, “Not good, I think. It seems a team of ARC troopers have gone missing. Well...most of them. Two came back, the others didn’t.”

Balac sat forward, his voice full of incredulity “They’re sending us in to rescue ARCs?”

The squad leader shook his head, “No, they’re sending RAIDERS to rescue ARCs.”

The squad traded a few looks amongst them. Skarr could sense that they thought the notion was ridiculous as well. Razor finally broke the small silence.

“At least command is sending the whole damn platoon. So what’s our objective?” the Zabrak asked.

Skarr shrugged, “To do what the ARCs could not. We’re inserting into the facility, the same way the ARCs did. And then we’re going to make our way to the labs. I want you all to carry some heavy firepower with you. I don’t know what these things are that even ARCs were overwhelmed by, but we’re not going to be so taken off guard. Is everyone clear?”

There were quick statements of assent. “Good. Mission details will be sent to your datapad. We deploy in less than an hour. Get your gear ready.” The squad threw Skarr a few quick casual salutes before ducking out. The Lieutenant sighed, he was not going to like this mission. He could already feel the creepy vibes of it. Throughout his military career, Skarr had seen a lot of weird stuff, from zombie like creatures to fierfekking werewolves. All of those missions had been borne from someone’s careless experimentation in creating an unstoppable army. Frankly, Norith was tired of it.

The Eclipse squad leader left the briefing room, heading to his own room. He told the squad to be prepared and he was no different. Skarr’s room on the Dominion looked like a personal armory, which it was. He started assembling his SCOPE armor while he looked for weapons. His knife and two pistols were easy choices. His next two choices were just as easy. He chose the A280 rifle and a submachine gun. On his belt went several grenades and spare clips. Skarr mulled over bringing a rocket launcher before choosing one of the smaller portable ones to throw over his shoulder. He would be prepared for whatever those things were. The things that scared the hell out of him.

OOC:
WC: 841

AND THE ESC HATH BEGUNETH! Prepare for deployment! In the next few posts have use deployed and on planet. Please and thank ya!
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"May God have mercy on my enemies, because I won't" General George Patton
"A leader leads by example not by force." Sun Tzu, The Art of War
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Skarr
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 4, 2012 10:17:02 PM    View the profile of Skarr 
The shuttle dropped out of the sky. It was occupied only by Eclipse and the gear they were carrying. Sensors had indicated that there were no security systems active at the moment, meaning that the shuttle did not have to be stealthy. The members of Eclipse rocked slightly as the ship broke atmosphere. Each of them were feeling slightly nervous. Not many of them had been around when the weirder missions had happened. The ones who had seemed even more nervous than the ones who weren’t.

That would change soon, Skarr knew. When faced with the unknown or some faceless horror, it was tough not to be afraid. Norith Skarr hated that fear. He was surprised that he could still act when faced with such fear. That he could keep a cool head, but even still he had to fight the first instinct. The lieutenant had faced men two times his size, he had tackled Mandalorians, he fought in large scale battles, he even faced down a giant war machine once, so something like these creatures should not inspire fear.

As scary as they were, Skarr knew he would have to face them all the same. His squad could not see him running in terror away from the abominations. He pulled up the images from  Duke’s helmet again. He figured if he looked at them long enough, he might stop fearing them. Watching the ARC team take down the monsters did not help settle his fears one bit though, so he soon switched off the feed. By the time he was done doing that, the shuttle touched down.

The squad leader stood from his seat and walked back into the crew bay. The squad looked up at him from their seats. He nodded to each of them and they stood. Skarr was the first one off the shuttle, his blaster rifle raised. His eyes scanned the area quickly, his HUD set to detect motion. The shuttle had landed in a small clearing next to the western side of the facility. This was near to where the ARC team had started the mission. The forest was off to his left, the facility was on his right. He could see the hatches that the ARC team had entered through. Unlike the ARC team, Skarr intended to use only one.

The squad jumped to the ground behind him, each one of them with weapons raised and their eyes trained on their surroundings. It was unlikely the creatures were anywhere outside of the facility because of the lockdown, but Skarr was not taking his chances. They covered the ground to the facility quickly, not wasting any time to gawk at scenery. When the squad reached the access hatches, Skarr stopped them. A quick hand motion ordered Balac and Razor to pry open the hatch.

The hatch creaked open slowly, but soon it was opened far enough for them to squeeze in one by one. Norith chose to take point, his rifle still trained in front of him. He entered the darkness slowly and carefully, allowing his HUD to adjust to the dim lighting inside. There were no warning signs to his eye, so he gave the clear signal. The squad followed him in.

“Gates. We’re entering the facility now. On route to the labs,” Skarr reported in.

“Acknowledged,” came the Captain’s reply. When the whole squad was inside, Skarr had Balac and Razor close the doors once more. As they pushed the doors into place, Norith took the time to look at the hall they stood in. It was large enough for two people to walk side by side, and other than the dim lighting did not look the least bit foreboding. The walls and floor were meticulously clean. It was not what Skarr was used to on this sort of mission. Usually there were scratches or blaster scores. Sometimes blood.

With the door closed, Skarr began inching forward down the hall with Eclipse at his back. The hall continued on until it split into an intersection. Skarr surveyed the small map on his HUD and continued forward. The two side passages led off into different parts of the facility. Not the ones that Eclipse needed to go to. The labs were still several passages away. His eyes were still searching for the abominations when the squad encountered a wall in their path. Skarr would have ran into the wall if not for Balac placing his hand on the lieutenant’s shoulder.

Norith murmured his thanks to the Mandalorian. He looked at his map only to discover that it was not a wall they had ran into, but a door. The squad leader sighed and clicked his comm onto Garryll’s channel.

“Gates, we’ve hit one of the blast doors. Our progress is blocked until the lockdown is lifted. I don’t see any controls.” Skarr said.

“Cortez is nearly in position. Give him five minutes.”

The squad leader turned back to the squad, “We’ll you heard the man, we’ve got five minutes. Take a break, but keep your eyes open and alert.”

OOC:
WC: 846

Waiting for next objective now.
SL|CoT:A|PC/'2LT Skarr/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
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"May God have mercy on my enemies, because I won't" General George Patton
"A leader leads by example not by force." Sun Tzu, The Art of War
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Garryll Gates
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Garryll Gates
 
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 4, 2012 10:34:43 PM    View the profile of Garryll Gates 
Cortez’s First Squad dropped down their lines a minute after Blackjack did, their dropship neatly sliding into the vacancy left by Blackjack’s.

They entered via the same doors that Blackjack had, but quickly turned off of the Phoenix squad’s route. Theirs was a different mission. As they entered, a couple more of Cortez’s squads dropped in. They’d spread through the facility and secure key positions and take up defensive formations to keep some of the pressure off of Phoenix while the cream of the Stormtrooper crop went about their business.

The First Squad found an access shaft and went down a level; they moved quickly, scanning warily for the monsters they’d been briefed on. One stumbled into the hallway before them, but the squad gunned it down quickly. It twitched on the ground as they passed it, burning from the dozen blaster burns it had suffered.

The security station sat before them. The emergency lighting led up to it like some sort of guiding light, and the squad leader ordered a stack-up. His troopers dutifully assumed their positions, and on his mark, slammed the door open.

Point men scrambled inside and scanned for hostiles. They found none, and shouted ‘clear,’ one by one. The squad leader waved half his squad in, and deployed the rest in a defensive position to cover their backs. Their slicer moved forwards and hooked into the defense grid of the facility. His gear hummed and beeped for a few minutes as it chewed over the codes that Flail had used to guard the facility against such an incursion. Finally, it beeped positively.

“Control achieved, sir. We can lift the lockdown,” said the slicer.

The squad leader nodded and tapped his comlink. “This is First Squad. We are lifting the lockdown. Be ready.”

“Do it.”

*** *** *** *** ***

Cortez’s Second squad had gone in after Eclipse, and was hunkered down by the time the Lockdown was lifted. The soldiers prepared themselves in the semi-darkness and flicked their safeties off. Power was the name of the game, power and rate of fire to down the shambling creatures they’d been warned of.

Second squad’s leader scanned the distance behind his HUD, his view playing over the dozens of doors and off-branching hallways that could, at any second, be swarming with adversaries.

A tremendous ‘thud’ echoed from a dozen feet before them, behind one of the doors. It happened again and again, and the squad hastily adjusted their views and gun barrels. With a final smash, the door fell over.

“Hold...hold...” the squad lead muttered, raising his rifle.

A huge form ducked under the door frame, turning sideways to get through.

“What in the gods..?” whispered one of the Stormtroopers.

“Enemy contact!” bawled the squad leader, both to his squad and into his comlink. “This wasn’t in the briefing! It’s huge!”

The squad opened fire, slamming the creature into the frame. With a deep roar, it ducked lower and grabbed the solid durasteel door that it had knocked in, and held it up to protect itself. The door quickly began to melt, and it roared again as the metal got hot and scorched its hand.

With a final roar, it gripped the door with both hands and threw it at the Stormtroopers. A man screamed as it bore him down, crushing him and killing him instantly.

“Contact! Contact! We need support!” screamed the squad leader as another of the massive creatures began to shove its way through the doorframe.

OOC:
Surprise! You’re not fighting the zombie-things! Lockdown’s done, so here they come; consult the info page for more on what you’ll be facing (Class-II mutants): here!

Company Commander of Phoenix Company |Tactical Officer of the Army | Adept of the Dark Jedi Order | Captain of the
Bloodfist in the Osk Company
TO/CPTGarryll Gates/3SQD/1PLT/1COM/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE [SCP][RoM][ICE] [IH] [CCA] [BC] [SRP] [AS-4] [ES1] [CoS] [EW1] {RESx3} [ESC09] [RoTx2] [CRoS] [AoT] [CoZ][CoDS][VT][CRoM][KAD][RCA][*QW 12*](3.1)(1.1)

SM/DJK Gates/Eagle Sect/Lopen/VEDJ/VE (KC1)
Longtime leader of Blackjack Squad
For Tadath, for the Empire.

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[This message has been edited by Garryll Gates (edited July 4, 2012 10:39:47 PM)]
THX1138
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 5, 2012 1:17:32 AM    View the profile of THX1138 
It didn't take a doctor to see that this creature wasn't natural. But Therex was a doctor. And that didn't make it any easier. It stood almost three meters tall and was the most horrendous example of human experimentation he had ever seen. He knew it was a human because certain features hadn't changed. The face was distinctly human, but it almost looked like it had been stretched to fit a skull twice it's normal size. Small ruptures could be found on the skin. It was also horribly scarred, not from combat, but it looked more like something caused by a careless surgeon. Several even looked like they were caused by primitive forms of bone-saws.

Therex's pondering was interrupted when the creature let out it's bellowing roar. He pulled his rifle out, realizing that maybe opting for rate of fire over pure force wasn't so smart. He began spraying fire down the hall, trying to keep the creature back. Something like that looked like it could do some serious damage up close, and Therex didn't think he could patch up that kind of wound.

The rest of the squad joined in, landing several well placed shots, yet the creature kept coming. The words "biological zombie" crossed Therex's mind. He didn't believe in reanimated dead, but he had done a lot of research since the incident with the werewolves. If you shut down the right parts of the brain, you would essentially have a killing machine, impervious to pain.

A scream rang out, bringing Therex back once more. But this one was more familiar. Looking over he noticed a member of the Second squad had been impaled upon the wall. A pipe protruded from his chest piece. Looking down the hallway, he saw the beast grabbing whatever it could find and hurling it down the hall.

"Find cover!" Skarr yelled, ducking behind a support frame. Therex joined him, letting his rifle fall to his side and pulling out his Pup, a single shot, handheld grenade launcher. Leaning out, he fired it. Before it made contact, Therex pulled himself behind cover again. As the explosion lit up the room, Therex smiled in triumph. Peeking out, he waited for the smoke to clear. He couldn't see much past two feet, and there was a smell in the air. Almost of burnt flesh and hair, but with something more... horrid mixed in.

Switching to a thermal filter, he scanned the hallway. A large bloom of heat filled his vision. The explosion made the walls of the  hallway hotter than most life forms, so he had trouble distinguishing anything. Re-holstering the Pup, he brought the rifle back up and waited for Skarr to give an all-clear. When he received it, Therex crept out, the rifle lined up under chin. Looking straight down the sights, Therex tried more filters, hoping to see through the smoke.

Right before they reached the thickest of the smoke cloud, Therex stopped. Switching back to thermal, Therex noticed the hall cooling off. Yet, there was still too much residual heat to tell if anything was alive in there. Next to him, a stormtrooper stepped forward, leaning into the cloud, hoping for a better look. Just then, something amongst the bloom of heat shifted. Therex grabbed the soldier, just as something grabbed him as well.

Before he knew it, Therex was being pulled, through the trooper, into the cloud. He became immediately disoriented, forgetting to switch back to normal vision. He was surrounded by oranges and reds of all shades. When he finally resolved his vision, things weren't much better. Therex was whipped around in several directions, and someone was screaming. Praying that it wasn't him, he looked up his arm at the trooper and the massive arm clamped onto his helmet. The skin on the arm was a dull gray. The trooper's helmet was crumpled in several places.

Therex saw thearm twitch, and suddenly the screaming stopped, and Therex was holding onto a tumbling, headless, ragdoll. Next thing to hit him was the wall. When the trooper slammed into him, Therex's head bounced off the wall behind him, making his vision go dark and blurry. Barely concious, he switched on his comm.

"Skarr," he said, gasping and fighting to stay conscious. "It's still alive. I repeat, it is still alive."

Then the world went all the way black, and Therex slipped into the cold abyss.

OOC:
WC: 734 Therex is unconscious, and I didn't kill the creature. Have fun.  
"He has his orders, and when a Chiss accepts orders he carries them out, period."

And now Autolite brings you Therex Whitestone, in Vast Empire, a tale well calculated to keep you in suspense.

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razorsedge
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 6, 2012 2:04:19 PM    View the profile of razorsedge 
Skarr entered the common room and as had become customary they all went into the

Razor chuckled to himself as he flipped his signature ka-bar up into the air. The slight insanity that had set in during his last mission still slightly removing his inhibitions. He deftly caught it.  The motion was so practiced from hours spent waiting and hoping for an actual combat situation to arise.  He slotted the sharpened blade into his boot sheath. Next he reached into his foot locker and pulled out his DXR6 blaster carbine.

The Carbine would provide medium ranged firepower for him to support his squad through their movements.  It had been through battles with him before. The powerful bolts it fired could rip through armor and destroy small turret emplacements. It was essential to his assault load out. 

Finally Razor reached inside of his weapons locker and pulled out his two DC-15S’ he slotted them into the twin holsters on his hips.  He stood then, brushing off his gunmetal grey armor. Razor kicked the door to his room open and burst into the common living area.  Razor looked around at the squad that had formed up inside of the common area between all of their rooms.

Quickly the squad moved to the launch bay and boarded the Eclipse Squad private shuttle. Razor hummed happily to himself as he slowly eased into his battle mind.  Darkness began to close around him as his brain analyzed only friendlies and threats. 

The shuttle sped towards the planet surface.  No security alarms were activated as they flew down or as they touched down in the small clearing on the west side of the facility.

____________________________________________________________________

The landing seemed like years ago as they again ran forward to engage the massive creature that had appeared out of nowhere.  Its assault was brutal and relentless.  Razor did not know where it came from, but a grenade flew past his head, slamming into the creature and blasting it into a cloud of smoke.  Therex and another trooper approached.  They both disappeared into the smoke. 

Then the screaming started.  Razor rushed forward.  The screaming stopped and a headless body slammed into him.  Therex’s body flew out and slammed into a wall.  On Razor’s HUD Therex’s brain functions dropped.  He was unconscious possibly concussed.  Things just kept getting worse.  Razor rolled the headless body off of him just as the beast rushed forward.  As its foot descended toward Razor Skarr and Terre leapt over Razor, a durasteel wire wrapped around the upper torso of the monster.

The off balance monster stumbled backward and the two troopers leapt up and landed two hard kicks on the monster.  It fell backward.  Razor jumped up and onto the monsters body.  He drew his boot knife and slammed it into the monsters eye.  It roared and then was quiet. 

“What does it take to kill one of these things?!” Razor screamed as the monster continued to roll on the floor moaning.  The squad emptied their clips into the monster and, finally the charred corpse stopped moving.

The squad moved their one casualty off into a small storage closet and shot Therex up with a stim.  Therex sat upright in a flash and instantly moaned as he felt the beating he had taken.  The blurry trooper in front of him came into focus and he saw Razor’s grinning skull faceplate. 

“You ok Therex?” 

“I’ll be fine.”

The squad moved on down the hallway.  There were mostly storage rooms all the way down.  In the last room of the hallway the squad turned into a huge morgue.  It couldve been mistaken for a lab if not for the bloodstained sheets covering misshapen forms.

OOC:
YAY For ominous bedsheets! Yup.  time to find out what these are or how they’re made.
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Completed Ancillaries: [A7]
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Skarr
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Skarr
 
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 9, 2012 8:54:45 PM    View the profile of Skarr 
As Razor injected a stim into Therex, Skarr brooded over the body of the brutish creature they had just killed. This had certainly not been in the briefing. The large carcass was a mass of stitched tissues and bulging muscles. It was grotesque and made the young squad leader nearly sick by examining it. The acrid smell of burnt flesh wafted up towards him, and even through his helmet, Skarr nearly vomited. He rolled the corpse onto its back and put a few high powered bolts into the brute’s head.

To Skarr, this mission was getting a hell of a lot worse. The intel, as always, had been severely wrong. Unless the husks had grown larger while the two ARC troopers had escaped the facility, these were completely different beings than what the intel had hinted at. Duke’s recording had none of these monstrosities running around. The squad leader took a deep, calming breath before he turned back to Eclipse.

Therex was up and trying to shake his vision clear with Razor supporting the bleary Chiss. Skarr nodded his head to the man. He had taken a direct blow from the brute, such a blow that Skarr was surprised that Therex had not suffered more damage. The Chiss are made of tougher stuff that I thought, Norith thought.

Without speaking, the squad leader spurred his squad into motion. They left the regular stormies behind, setting up defenses and preparing to sweep through other parts of the facility. Skarr was sad to see they would not be accompanying the SCOPE squad on their mission. The brute had taken so much damage that Skarr could not see how the squad would handle another one. Hopefully, there were not more lurking around.

The hall continued on for what felt like hours. They passed storage rooms on both sides. Skarr was beginning to wonder what all the storage was for. But he did not dare look at what was in the rooms, least one of the many horrors were in there. That was a job for the regular troops to engage in. For now, Skarr was content with quietly moving down the hall, his squad behind him.

At long last, the hallway came to a dead end. Skarr turned into a vast room filled with tables and freezers. He mistook the space for a lab until he caught site of the bloodstained sheets silhouetting bodies on top of the many tables. It was a morgue, or some sort of sick operating room. Skarr’s lip curled in disgust. His hand rose to motion the squad inside. They spread out, eyes scanning for enemies. But like Skarr, their eyes were drawn to the bodies on the tables.

“Keep your eyes on the bodies, any one of them moves, put a bolt in em. Go ahead and remove the sheets, I want a look at them.” Skarr ordered, his voice oddly calm despite the way he felt. The sheets were removed from the bodies with small flourishes from the squad. Norith heard Meteora choking down gagging sounds and heavier breathing coming from Razor’s mic. The corpses were missing...parts. Some were missing arms, legs, flesh, muscles, and organs. Some of them had larger frames than others. Brutes in the making, Skarr guessed. Others had blades grafted to their arms.

The squad leader checked his HUD to make sure his recording device was still doing its job. He did not want to, but he made himself look at every single body that was not in a cooler. With every corpse examined, Skarr was ready to depart. Something, however, made him stay. Off in the corner was a computer console. The sleep light was slowly blinking. It was what had caught his eye. He walked over slowly, being careful not to make any sounds. The room was still and tense, the lieutenant felt as if the dead would awake if he was too loud.

A few key taps was all it took to turn the computer back on. Suddenly, the last recording ever made blared on. A harried looking man looked out from the console, in the background there was screaming and the sound of roaring animals. At least, that’s what it sounded like to Skarr.

“This is Doctor Hanson, if you find this recording then you have made a terrible mistake by breaching lockdown. These things cannot be stopped. Security has had only marginal luck in killing the smaller ones, the husks. But the brutes, they rip through the facility. Killing anything in sight,” the doctor paused and looked off into the distance for a second. A scream had sounded very close by.

“The Class-III mutants are even more difficult to kill. We succeeded in creating an unstoppable army! But they cannot be controlled! If you are from Flail, I urge you to quickly take whatever research you need and bombard the facility from orbit. Be quick about it, even the dead ones are waking up. You must be careful. Gods speed.” A great crash sounded from off camera and brute charged into view, lifting the doctor into the air and smashing him down in the ground, killing him instantly.

Norith switched the console off before the recording could continue. He turned to his squad, who were all staring aghast at the console. “Let’s move out, squad.” They were about to leave when a blaster rang out. One of the bodies fell off the table. Meteora stood, a still smoking rifle raised.

“Kaye...what the he-?” Skarr began.

“It moved. The body moved.” Meteora said defensively. Skarr sighed deeply and was beginning to order his squad along once more, but something stopped him. The whole room had become suddenly alive. The bodies were slowly climbing off their tables. Even the one that Meteora shot started to climb to its feet.

“Oh shit.” Skarr breathed slowly before he raised his rifle and all hell broke loose.

OOC:
WC: 987

You all have your next objective. Kill them all! Remember the Doc's warning, they are very hard to kill M'effers. A note though, the brutes in the morgue are not finished. They are not as big and strong as the one we faced previously. The ones with blades grafted to their arms are also not as powerful.
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(WoS1)

"May God have mercy on my enemies, because I won't" General George Patton
"A leader leads by example not by force." Sun Tzu, The Art of War
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Balac
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Balac
 
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 12, 2012 9:39:36 PM    View the profile of Balac 
Balac looked over the numerous bodies, rechecking to make sure his E-45 was truly in his hands. Very little managed to disgust him, but what they'd faced so far, and what they were looking at now caused his stomach to flip a few times. Not since stories of the Mando scientist Demagol had Balac heard of medically related atrocities.

Balac could hear the recording from the console as he slowly walked by the tables, observing the grotesque bodies laying upon them. The one closest to him had a slightly misshapen clawed right hand. The left hand seemed to be nothing more than the stump of a wrist. A roar sounded from the recording, followed by a heavy thud, pulling Balac's attention towards it. The doctor who had once been speaking was now laying in a broken heap, his place taken by that of a huge brutish figure. Skarr switched off the recording.

"Let's move out, squad." Skarr spoke, the silence around them seemed offended at the sound. Balac took a step.

A shot blasted the silence to pieces; a disturbing thud followed. Balac turned as Skarr spoke, "Kaye... what the he-?" Skarr started.

"It moved. The body moved." she said defensively.

Skarr began to speak again but stopped. The sound of flesh squeaking across metal reached Balac's ears... from behind him. He turned, once again looking at the clawed thing. It's hand slowly contracted as it began to move into a relative sitting position.

"Oh shit." Skarr let out.

Balac snapped into action as rifles went off around him. A strange guttural roar leap from the throat of the creature in front of him as it sent it's clawed hand thrusting towards his throat. He stepped left, narrowly missing the hand as he let go a burst from his blaster rifle. The thing jerked with the impacts and slipped off the table, thumping to the floor. Balac watched for a few seconds and started to turn his attention to the next nearest creature. He crouched, and attempted to move closer to the rest of the squad. One of the larger creatures went down under combined fire from the squad. Another shook under multiple impacts and lost its footing, falling to the floor. A groan nearby caught Balac's attention. The clawed creature pushed itself up and turned, fixing its gaze once more on Balac.

"Eclipse, form up!" Skarr's command sounded from the direction of the console.

Balac backed up, putting another dozen quick bolts into the creature advancing on him. It shivered and stopped its movement, looking down at its smoking torso. Without warning, the beast leaped, a dreadful snarling escaping it's throat. Balac ducked under its outstretched hand, rolling forward to prevent being landed on. The creature landed, hitting the wall Balac had been against with a thump. Balac threw a few more blaster bolts, then drew his vibroblade, setting his rifle on the table at his side. The creature dashed towards him, clawed hand raised to deliver a killing blow. Balac brought the blade up to his right as the creature brought its arm back to prepare for a slicing blow. As it brought its arm around and forward, Balac swung and met it with the flat of his blade. The impact caused both Balac and the creature to swivel. Using the sudden stop of his blade, Balac brought it down to waist level and drove the point into the creature, just below where the sternum would be. The blade stopped with just a few inches to spare.

An inhuman primal scream that was part intense rage and part pain, erupted from the creature. It sent its wrist stump into Balac's chest plate forcing him back, the vibroblade followed suit. The creature swung again, drawing marks along Balac chest plate as he barely managed to move back out of the way. It prepared to swing again and Balac readied his blade. The creature swung. Balac met it, slicing through its elbow. The creature cried out in pain as its arm hit the ground. A quick decapitation silenced the creature and it fell. A glance at the chrono on his HUD told him the entire exchange had taken no more than seven minutes.

Note to self, Balac thought grimly, never take one of these alone again.

Balac retrieved his E-45, holstering it and bringing his A280 to bear. The sound of blasters flooded back into his ears, along with calls from the squad confirming kills or curses as a freshly fallen beast tried once more to rise. Balac was in a corner of the room, the majority of the squad was near the console. He rushed towards the console, stepping over bodies of some of the smaller creatures. A quick count confirmed approximately ten bodies of varying size laying motionless and smoking. The blaster fire stopped momentarily. A look at the far end of the room showed multiple creatures still standing. A few of them were the larger brutish creatures. The majority were of the smaller variety.

The members of Eclipse hastily reloaded in expectation of another assault. The tension between the two parties could have been cut. A roar sounded and some of the creatures darted forward. The deafening crescendo of blasters sounded once more.

"Pirunir sur'haaise!" Balac shouted joyously.

OOC:
WC: 896

Okay, by my imagining, the room we're in is about 60' x 50'. We're in the corner, near the console the recording was on. I estimate strung out along a 20' width of a 50' side. Ten creatures (approximately, you can play with the numbers a bit) taken down by the squad during Balac's seven minute dance with a partially finished Class-III. On the other side of the room, I'm placing about 20+ or so creatures ready to try making friends with us again. Out of that, a few Class-III's and a few Class-II's. The rest, Class-I's. Whoever posts next, feel free to give actual numbers to our party guests.
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Pirunir sur'haaise!
ShanneTwoo
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 13, 2012 2:51:47 AM    View the profile of ShanneTwoo 
Terre stood by her footlocker, suiting up for the battle. Breath coming quickly, adrenaline already rising in her, she paid careful attention to her armor, knowing it may very well be the only thing protecting her from life and death.

She pulled on the black body glove, then proceeded to pull on the breastplate and her own belt and holsters, then the codpiece and legs. The boots were next, and she pulled them on, making sure they still fit snugly and her knives were hidden well. She slid the arm pieces on, then carefully pulled on the gloves, reinforced to make her grip stronger, powerful enough to crush bone if she tried. She looked at herself, checking all the locks and seals, and sighed, releasing some of her pent up energy. She made sure her DC-15s were fully charged, then slid them back into her holsters. She put her helmet on, opening the comm frequency, and nodded. She was ready.





LATER:

Terre hid in the back of the room, scared out of her wits and scrambling to find them before her excess waste evacuated her system. Her hands shook uncontrollably.

Cripes... That thing is terrifying! What the hell am I doing here?! I'm useless!

No, you're not, she thought harshly, squelching the traitorous thoughts. You have two good blasters to shoot with, two hands to hold them, and a brain to think it through. You've got adrenaline in your system which you won't run out of quickly and a helmet to protect you. You've got a squad of friends to back you up and a load of stormies to cover you. All you have to do is go.

With a resigned sigh, Terre leaped over the barricade she had hidden herself behind, both blasters drawn, shooting at the doorway the creature was clawing its way through.

I swear my brain is trying to kill me....

"Find cover!" Skarr yelled, and Terre obediently leaped back behind the wall. Just after I get it together... she thought forlornly.

Therex fired his grenade launcher, and Terre was glad of the shielding she got from the trooper helmet. Her vision went black, the tinting darkening to reduce optical nerve damage. She held her breath, counting to ten, then releasing and drawing in another deep breath. Her vision finally returned to normal, and she peeked over the barrier just in time to see Therex grabbed by the monster.

"NO!" she cried, bringing her blaster to bear. Then common sense kicked in and she realized she couldn't safely shoot. "Damn it!" She resumed shaking like a leaf, her bones turning to gelatin, worry filling her. She realized that once again, she couldn't protect the one she was closest to, the one she cared for most.

She felt movement beside her, saw Razor leap over the barricade and attack the monster, slaying it and then go over to Therex. Terre was shaking too badly to move from her spot. She was sure the entire squad could hear her armor plates clacking together. Steeling her nerves, she stood to see Razor helping Therex stand. She breathed a sigh of relief, then walked forward with Skarr to inspect the beast. From three feet away, she caught the smell, even after the helmet had furiously attacked the air with its scrubbers. It made her retch, and she stopped, afraid to come any closer. Bile rose in her throat like liquid acid, and she tried to choke it back with mild success. The taste stayed in her mouth, the burning in her throat, but she was able to approach the creature. Human experimentation at its worst, she thought bitterly. What life was stolen?

Forcing such thoughts from her mind, Terre rallied together with the rest of Eclipse, squeezing Therex's upper arm briefly in a show of support before falling in behind him to march down the hallway. She kept her thoughts together as they went on, relishing in the small happiness that Therex was still alive without too much permanent damage, if any. She was sure he was going to have one hell of a headache when the adrenaline wore off...

They reached a laboratory, by Terre's standards, one which had gurneys filled with mangled bodies on them. Terre retched again, looking around at the sheer horror that made the room. What sick animal created these?!

The bodies had been systematically hacked to bits, and Terre found herself shaking in pure terror. What kind of a mission was this?! Did fate hate her this much?! She stood as far away from the bodies as possible, trying to hide behind the rest of her squad, blaster drawn. She was nervous, and she knew that would make her hasty to shoot anything that moved. Her throat tightened, and a keening noise tried to rise, but she pushed it back down. No, she thought firmly. None of that.

Skarr walked over to an old computer terminal, but otherwise, Terre saw little movement in the tomb-like room. She thought she saw a movement in the back corner, but decided it was just her imagination, lowering her blaster from her chest, where it had automatically raised.

Then Meteora fired.

"Kaye.... What the he--?"

All hell broke loose. The corpses began to rise from where they lay. With a banshee scream, Terre opened fire, trying not to let herself get pinned in a corner. She leapt into the middle of it, pulling a blade out of her boot and slashing at a mutant's face. It was barely affected, growling softly in pain before reaching its one claw-like hand out towards her. She fired at its chest, causing it to fall backwards. It still tried to claw its way forward to her, its eyes showing an insatiable blood lust. With a shriek, she fired repeatedly at its neck, finally severing its head from the rest of its body. There it lay, unmoving. She hoped it would stay that way.

Time seemed to slow, every nerve standing on end, every sense on edge, as sharp as her knife's blade. She isolated sound, sorted through her sensory readings, heard an unmistakable thump-scraaaaape... thump-scraaaaape as a being lurched its way towards her. She turned and fired three times. Blood and gore spurted from the creature's gut, coating her armor with the slippery goo. Disgusted, she grabbed the creature's face, squeezing until the skull caved in, spraying more blood.

All this happened in less than ten seconds.

Having finally gotten into a rhythm, Terre turned to the next, shoving her knife into it's carotid artery, blood spraying onto her helmet, obscuring her vision for one precious second. As she wiped her faceplate, she was shoved against the wall. She realized she had backed herself into a corner. The creature pushed close to her, mouth open, as if scenting her aura, sniffing for blood. With a grimace, she shoved her blaster into the thing's mouth, firing. Its face exploded in a brilliant flash of color, bright scarlet with blood, peach and gray with flesh.

Terre gagged inside her helmet. Looking up, she realized the rest of Eclipse had taken care of the other demons. Shaking her head, she realized she could barely see. Grabbing a rag from one of her belt pouches, she wiped off the lenses and shoved the rag back into its pouch. She stood, coming out of her blood rage, and sighed.

She knew this nightmare was far from over.


OOC:
WC: 1240.

And Terre is BACK, baby! Oh yeah! And she's a scared little greenie...
--Shanne

TRP/PSC ShanneTwoo/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
[This message has been edited by ShanneTwoo (edited July 13, 2012 1:51:16 PM)]
THX1138
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 14, 2012 2:34:01 AM    View the profile of THX1138 
Zombie

The word jumped into Therex's mind, as soon as the bedsheets started moving and absolute chaos ensued. A silent cheer when up through him as he realized that he *had* packed for this trip properly. Whipping his A280 rifle up, he started spraying the nearest table.

He had heard stories of Zombies, and quite frankly it was possible. One could take a living human, and destroy select parts of the brain, and make it follow orders. Sometimes. The Chiss had experimented with it for a time. You would have a totally loyal soldier with no emotions, or pain. Put that combo in a Chiss, and you had something super-human. The difficulty was keeping them under control. After a while the project was abandoned, and the off-planet facility carpet nuked for good measure. Therex was wishing these people had done the same. Maybe he would get to do it. That thought brought a smile to his face, but it disappeared when something tumbled into him.

One of the creatures was on top of him now, it's mouth gnashing at his faceplate, leaving strange blackish amber fluid smeared across the transperisteel. His rifle pinned against the ground, he opted for something else. Using his legs, he pushed against the ground, receiving a slight boost from his cybernetic prosthesis. Impressively enough, the creature stayed latched to him through the whole flip. The minute Therex felt his rifle arm become loosened, he pulled hard. He heard a wet popping noise, followed by tearing.

Looking at his no free rifle, Therex found an arm attached to it, it's fingers still spasming slightly as the nerves died. Shaking it off, Therex fired several shots across his own chest, striking the creature enough times to dislodge it. About 12 shots later, most of which were focused into the head, the creature uttered a final twitched and stopped moving. Stepping closer, he kicked it with his boot and fired a final smoking crater into the thing's skull. The thick smoke wafted past his helmet and Therex thanked various entities that these suits were environmentally-sealed.

Turning back to the fight, he found himself facing two more of them. They hobbled towards him, obviously not quite used to their strange anatomy. However, it did little to slow down their enthusiasm. Not giving them the chance to get close, Therex opened fire, peppering both of them, alternating every couple shots between their respective craniums. When both were sufficently still on the floors, Therex continued scanning the room, assigning priorities to the various targets.

He digitally marked 12 of the lesser creatures. He assigned them a lower priority, but he knew that if he let his guard down, they could be a problem. He could see three similar to the one they encountered in the hallway, brutish creatures, and very deadly. He was about to mark them highest priority, when another type of them caught his eye. This one was the least human of the bunch. It's arms and skull seemed to be replaced with that of an animal. Even it's legs appeared to be unnatural. He almost overlooked it, but something was different, past the grotesque appearance. It was more cautious. It stalked the edges of the group, attacking weak point in the groups formation.

Marking this one as high threat, Therex began to move towards it. When he was close enough, he raised his rifle, and was about to fire, when a scream came from across the room, and his target turned towards him and charged. Barreling into his chest, Therex got a quick glimpse behind, and spotted another one.

Intelligence. Ok, so not zombies.

OOC:
Thought I would put numbers to the enemy. Have fun.
"He has his orders, and when a Chiss accepts orders he carries them out, period."

And now Autolite brings you Therex Whitestone, in Vast Empire, a tale well calculated to keep you in suspense.

TRP/LCPL THX-1138/4SQD/1PLT/1COM/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE [ES1][EW1][*QW 12*](ECA)(2.1)

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Skarr
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Skarr
 
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 15, 2012 1:15:00 PM    View the profile of Skarr 
A blaster bolt sizzled through another one of the mutant’s head. They came at the squad more and more each time. A few of the squad members had fallen under the waves of enemies, only to be helped up by one of their squad mates. Skarr stood at the front of his squad, rifle raised. They had moved out from the corner and were now edging their way to the room’s exit. The squad supposed that if he could get the squad into the corridor, they could bottleneck the mutants and eliminate them.

The lieutenant saw Therex go down. The Chiss had fallen under the charge of one of the larger mutants, the not quite Class-II mutant. Terre and Balac rushed forward to help the man. Skarr was about to step forward to help when one of the lesser husks attacked him. The monstrosity threw itself forward onto Skarr, making the squad leader drop his rifle. The mutant threw Skarr up against the wall, momentarily stunning him. However, he was still able to reach one of his pistols.

His hand came up, grabbing the husk by the throat. He slammed the thing into the wall, pressing the muzzle of his pistol under its chin. A greyish liquid splattered both the wall and Skarr as the creature’s head exploded. Norith wiped the liquid off of his visor, gagging. He turned back to the action to find that Therex was back on his feet. Looking to his side, Skarr discovered that they were very near to the door.

“Come on, squad! Into the hall!” Skarr yelled into his comm. Meteora was the first through the door, ducking into the corridor. Beta and Razor stood on both sides of the door, firing into the room. Therex was the next person through, his blaster still raised. Terre followed the blue skinned Chiss into the corridor, leaving Balac and Skarr in the room. The squad leader retrieved his rifle off of the ground and unclipped one of the grenades from his belt. Balac backed out of the morgue, still firing at the husks, keeping them off of Skarr. Norith activated the grenade and tossed it into the room as he stepped back into the corridor.

It went off with a flash and plume of flames, leaving most of the creatures beyond recognition. The few that still lived were quickly finished off by the squad. After the business was over, Skarr sank down to the floor, his back against the wall. Reluctantly, most of the squad did the same. They needed to rest, allow the adrenaline to stop flowing for even a minute.

“Gates, this is Skarr,” the squad leader said as he switched over to a private channel.

“What do you need, Lieutenant?” the gruff voice replied.

“I recommend full retreat and kinetic bombardment of the facility,” Skarr reported, “We’re not going to make it if we keep going like this.”

A sigh came over the other side of the channel, “Negative Skarr. Continue with the mission.” The comm clicked off. Bullshit, Skarr thought. He looked over the rest of the squad, who had been cleaning their weapons. Even now, they were still preparing for the next encounter. The squad leader only hoped they survived the next encounter. While their armor had done wonders to protect them from damage, the squad was taking hits. Their armor was dented, ripped open at place, and some plates completely gone. Skarr was sure that he had a ton of bruises forming under the black sleeve of his suit.

The young man let his squad rest for a few minutes more before he stood silently. The rest of the squad followed suit. None of them had spoken, so far as he could tell. Of course, there were such things as private channels. He wondered what they were thinking, but he wasn’t completely sure he wanted to know. Most of them probably felt disgust or fear, Skarr certainly knew what that felt like. He spurred the squad into motion. The map on his datapad informing him that the lab was nearby.

In fact, the lab was only a few minutes walk from the morgue. Which sickened Skarr immensely, another grim reminder that the morgue was part of the experiments Flail was partaking in. When Skarr seen the doors of the lab, he stopped in surprise. The doors were bent outwards. Something big had broken out of the lab. Maybe one of the brutes.

“Gates, this is Skarr. We’re at the doors of the lab. Awaiting the next order.” 

OOC:
WC: 758

This objective is over. Now we wait for Gar to get the next one up before anyone posts.
SL|CoT:A|PC/'2LT Skarr/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
[CDS] [ES2] [IH] [RoT] {RES} (VT) (ECA) (WtR) (3.1) (1.1) (1.2) (A5) (AS-2)
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(WoS1)

"May God have mercy on my enemies, because I won't" General George Patton
"A leader leads by example not by force." Sun Tzu, The Art of War
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[This message has been edited by Skarr (edited July 15, 2012 1:16:14 PM)]
Garryll Gates
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 15, 2012 3:42:22 PM    View the profile of Garryll Gates 
Onboard the Dominion, the tactical screen was flashing a dozen different colors. Indicators rapidly moved to and fro. The Stormtrooper officers and two ARCs pointed at various indicators occasionally and had something to say.

Cortez was orchestrating his squads to cover one another like a master. “Third squad: withdraw thirty meters and cover eighth squad’s retreat.”

The indicator for the named squads converged, flashing to show that they were in combat. “These damn things are a hell of a lot bigger than what was in the briefing, sir!” crackled the comm from one of the squads, the voice on the link gifted a background of heavy laser fire.

“Keep at it, men,” Cortez replied calmly. “We must hold the line.”

Gates raised an eyebrow at the two ARCs. “Are you sure these creatures hadn’t been here when you were down there?”

“Aye,” the Duke grumbled. “Damage to the facility during our insertion or the lockdown lifting must have caused the other experiments to be released; you’ve seen our helmet feeds. We didn’t see anything like these creatures the squads are talking about.”

Two of the squads were closing in on their objectives; Blackjack and Eclipse. Raiders had gone too deep into the facility for the scanners to pick up on anymore.

Gates clicked a pair of controls, and the display tracked the two squads. A few notes flickered under them, detailing their second objectives. He clicked open the comm channels to the two squads.

*** *** ***

“Eclipse?” Gates asked into the link, hoping that the squad mentioned could hear him where they were. “Have you secured the hotlabs?”

“Aye, Cap’, we have,” Skarr replied. “Piping you data now.”

A flock of files flashed up on the holo-screen. The ARC troopers looked over his shoulder. “Look; this matches up with Eclipse’s second objective.”

“Alright, Skarr, we’ve got a new objective for you,” Gates said. “I’m sure you’ve been loving the shit that’s been coming at you so far, but this one takes the cake. Flail records indicate that they created some sort of ‘super-specimen,’ and it’s a few levels below your current position. It matches with extraordinary power output, so we need you to investigate and get any data you can from its holding cells.”

“Shit. Roger that,” Skarr sounded unenthusiastic, but the man would follow orders.

OOC:

A huge heat source is located a few levels below the hotlabs. Records retrieved suggest it is some sort of ‘super-specimen,’ though the information retrieved is not complete. You need to investigate and check it out.

Company Commander of Phoenix Company |Tactical Officer of the Army | Adept of the Dark Jedi Order | Captain of the
Bloodfist in the Osk Company
TO/CPTGarryll Gates/3SQD/1PLT/1COM/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE [SCP][RoM][ICE] [IH] [CCA] [BC] [SRP] [AS-4] [ES1] [CoS] [EW1] {RESx3} [ESC09] [RoTx2] [CRoS] [AoT] [CoZ][CoDS][VT][CRoM][KAD][RCA][*QW 12*](3.1)(1.1)

SM/DJK Gates/Eagle Sect/Lopen/VEDJ/VE (KC1)
Longtime leader of Blackjack Squad
For Tadath, for the Empire.

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razorsedge
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 15, 2012 7:54:42 PM    View the profile of razorsedge 
OOC:
1/15


Razor pushed his back up against a wall and closed his eyes tight.  His mind raced backwards to the training academy.  He remembered his first genetic alteration that he had done to him.  It was to speed up the reaction time of a trooper, nearly halving it.  The alteration was to simply add more of the twitch reaction synapses. Everyday that simple alteration helped him but he was also removed from the normal genetic code of his race.  In some ways these genetic mutants were more human than Razor and the other troopers were. 

Razor opened his eyes as the feeling of nausea sunk back down inside him. The bladed creature had cut off one of his arm bracers and there was a small laceration on his arm.

Skarr walked back over from his spot next to the dataport and looked down on Razor.  He extended a hand and, after the trooper had taken it, pulled the Zabrak up. 

"Alright squad,  as unbelievable as it might seem, Flail has created another version of these genetic combatants. This one is basically a super being.  It will be extremely aggressive and will have the combined abilities of all of the other mutants."

Well this is frakking perfect, we can barely kill these normal ones.  Seems like every room we get to we discover something stronger or more perverse than the last one.

A simple set of double doors, like ones you would see going into any surgery ward led into the next set of rooms.  The fact that Flail had made the small morgue seem like it was something normal made it even worse.  It made it hard to believe that this was the only Flail facility that was doing testing on humans.

Razor was first through the doors.  He sprinted forward on silent feet and slid into the shadows.  The room seemed to be a shower room.  It made sense when you thought about the unclean things in the room before.

Terre and Therex pushed up into the room moving along the left side and keeping their bodies low.  Skarr and Balac completed their security ring as they moved forward into the room.  Two of the blade-armed mutants dropped from the ceiling.  Razor dashed forward and feinted into the bladed creatures.  It was becoming a battle doctrine as they learned how to deal with the not too bright creatures. 

They two creatures raised their sharp limbs high and were blasted sideways by shots from Terre and Therex.  Razir dove in between them and rolled behind a set of crates.  Skarr and Balac marched toward the two creatures firing heavily on them.  They shrieked through their butchered vocal chords.  It was a high pitched scream that bespoke the pain of their altered bodies.  Razor jumped from behind his cover and swept low with his foot, knocking one of the mutants off of its large, swollen feet.

The other one began to turn.  The pain slightly dulling its speed and reaction time.  Razor shot upward from his crouched position, his boot knife already clenched in his hand.  The blade went straight up through the monsters chin and into its diseased brain.  The jump had carried Razor high above the two bladed arms of the creature he had kicked to the deck as it swung for him. 

Therex charged forward and put two bolts into the creatures skull. 

Nothing was said as the engagement was finished.  Razor crouched upon the beasts chest and yanked his knife out of its chin.  He wiped the grey matter on the mutants chest.  Therex nodded at Razor and they moved forward.  Razor stopped at the next door and quickly poked his extendable camera under the door.

No less than fifteen of the class ones were in the room.  There were also two class threes skulking in the corner eating rotted flesh.  One of the class ones hobbled over to the meat.  As the mutant picked it up Razor saw a piece of white armor attached to a matte undersuit. 

A piece of ARC armor!  They're devouring whatever they kill, thought Razor frantically.

That was about all he had time to think before there was a flash of silver claws.  diseased corpse flew into the air as the class three ripped the class one into pieces.  It roared at the group of class ones as they all looked at it. Then the class ones shambled in mass towards the class threes. 

Razor clicked on his comlink, "Lets take advantage of their momentary in fighting."

The rest of the squad which had stacked up behind Razor nodded.  Therex primed a grenade just as Razor did.  He swung to the other side of the door.

Razor put up three fingers, then two, then one.

The doors were booted open and the grenades flew amongst the mutants even as the class ones lept on the class two.

OOC:
WC:821.  Working as a squad now we have better ability to kill faster, harder and more.  We have begun to understand their few weak points.  Unfortunately each mutant is different so keep that in mind even as we fight them we can't kill them just one way.
TRP/LCP TRP/PVT TRP/LCP razorsedge/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/VEA/VE
Awards: {MRT}
Completed Primaries: [3.1][4.1][4.2][6.1]
Completed Ancillaries: [A7]
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ShanneTwoo
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 15, 2012 11:05:04 PM    View the profile of ShanneTwoo 
OOC:
2/15


Terre stood in the hallway briefly, taking stock of injuries. Mostly bruises, and short a shin plate on her armor, she deemed herself able to fight some more. She could replace the plate later. She had various odds and ends of armor, backups. She'd fix it herself.

Her shaking had stopped, and she was badly craving a smoke. With all the trauma that she was surrounded by, the perversity, the horrifying sights, she wanted nothing more than to black out and forget it all. She appreciated the fact that Therex had her back, and she had his. She was sure by now nothing else could scare her.

Then the squad blasted down the hallway to find the class ones and class threes. Terre whimpered inside her helmet, not realizing she still had the comlink on. She was fairly sure Meteora would make no such sound, nor would any of the men in the squad.

And the greenie strikes again... she thought.

Therex and Razor launched their grenades, and there was a bright explosion. Terre's dented helmet did its best to block the sound, and did a fairly good job of it. She ducked behind Therex, waiting for his move. Balac took Razor's back, and Meteora took Skarr, who stood between Razor and Therex.

Terre peeked around Therex, flicking over to heat vision, the height differential serving her this time. She could see the heat blast from the grenades, bright red, and various other shades of red moving inside of it, thrashing about. Then the sounds assaulted her ears.

Pained cries from damaged vocal chords erupted in her helmet pickups, Grunts and moans, whining, keening noises, a cacophony of sounds, all of pain and rage. Terre shrank away, steeling herself, then aimed up with one of the darker red patches writhing in the heat splash. She opened fire, and the shrieks became louder.

That is the creepiest sound I have ever heard in my life, she thought, pausing to let the blaster recharge a couple shots and switching over to normal vision rather than heat before opening fire again, this time on a class three. It'll take a long blasted time to take these suckers down...

Indeed, already the two class three mutants had started to group, targeting Therex and Razor as the most dangerous and, subsequently, the two squad members behind them. Terre kept firing, wondering if any damage was being done.

Then a swarm of the class ones came at her flank, hands clawing at her, mouths snapping.

In close quarters, her blaster was fairly useless, and her knife was in her boot, too difficult to get to in that moment. Instead, she beat them back with the butt of her blaster, clearing a space around her. She opened a private link with Therex, not sure if he would hear or not.

"Therex!" she said, "I'm going to use you as a corner."

"Right," he said shortly. "Kinda busy."

"Sorry." She backed up so her back was near, but not quite touching, his. Her side was near a wall, so that wasn't a problem. She started funneling the class ones through, taking them one at a time. There were five that she counted, and they were difficult to down. Though they were close to her size, to down one expended both of her blasters, and she had to wait for them to recharge. Finally, she resorted to hand to hand combat, dangerous though it was. She grabbed one by the head, crushing it, even as the next was reaching for her. She threw the corpse at a second, then grabbed one's wrist, snapping it. It shrieked, a sound straight from hell, Terre thought, gripping its face even as its teeth reflexively snapped shut in the palm of her grip. She felt the black body glove stretch, start to tear, but she squeezed harder, collapsing the things' face, horrendously fascinated.

She moved on to the next, and found herself disappointed when there were no more near her. Suddenly, she realized she couldn't feel Therex behind her.

"Therex? You alright?" she asked, trying to locate him. From the comm, she heard strangled noises. Scanning the room frantically, she saw him a few feet away, struggling to push the Class Three away from his neck. They were locked close together. He had obviously tried to take the thing on in hand to hand combat. Terre leapt onto the large thing's back, pulling her knife out of her boot and jabbing it into the small depression at the back of the skull. It shrieked and bucked, and she was thrown against the wall, her knife flying to spin a foot away from her. The large beast spun, shaking its head, eyes glazed over in pain. Terre tried to push herself to her feet, but her shin screamed in pain, and she collapsed back to the ground.

Damn it! I need that armor piece!

The thing lumbered closer, knowing easy prey when it saw one. Terre closed her eyes, saying her last prayers, saw the thing raise a foot to crush her skull...

Then it was bowled over by a ball of black fury. Therex was back, and he did not appear pleased that one of his squadmates was being threatened. He had the creature in an arm bar, drawing it close, a nasty-looking knife in hand. His eyes glowed with an unholy light as he stabbed the thing through the skull. Terre nodded in approval, then murmured, "Therex..." before slipping into unfortunate unconsciousness.



OOC:
WC: 913

Battle gets the better of the greenie.
--Shanne

TRP/PSC ShanneTwoo/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
[This message has been edited by ShanneTwoo (edited July 16, 2012 3:43:45 PM)]
Skarr
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 18, 2012 7:59:48 PM    View the profile of Skarr 
OOC:
3/15


The battle ended soon after Terre fell. Therex stood protectively over her limp form, rifle still raised. The squad leader wiped grime off of the visor of his helmet while the medic crouched over her. He was concerned, but Terre’s life signs were stable. His HUD had informed him that she had only fainted. Even in the battle, Skarr let himself breath a sigh of relief. The young man was not losing anyone this mission. Not to these freaky creatures. All it would take was a stim to get the young woman up and going again.

While Therex took care of Terre, Skarr took the chance to survey the room. The squad was still in the shower room, although it was far more destroyed now. There was another set of doors leading off of the large room that did not lead back to the labs. Skarr checked his map once again and found that it would lead to a stairwell leading down to the next level. That would be their next destination. He allowed Terre some time to regain her bearings before he spurred the squad into action.

They followed him noiselessly into the stairwell, all of them fully alert. Skarr was not sure how they were on ammo, but all of them were losing armor plating. The creatures seemed smart enough to know they couldn’t get past the armor, so they were ripping it off every chance they got. Skarr did not like the implications of that. The only good news was that the squad was taking down the husks and brutes down a little bit easier. The Class III’s still gave them some trouble and Skarr believed they still would.

It made Skarr wonder what the super mutant would be like. In fact, he did not even want to wonder about it. This would be the toughest creature they had faced yet. As the squad continued further into the facility, Skarr liked the mission less and less. A single SCOPE squad was being sent to do what ARCs could not. ARCs were the best in the business with the SCOPE squads running a close second. Skarr was not happy that Eclipse was sent in to clean up the mutants and gather data. Now they were being sent to take down the most powerful one in the facility.

The squad leader sighed and checked the map once more. The next level was labeled ‘Lab B’. The heat signature was just a level below this one. Skarr grimaced and emerged into a blood stained hall. His eyes took in the gruesome scene. Dead bodies had been discarded along the wall. It looked like something very large had thrown them limp to the side. Some of the bodies were dismembered and missing limbs. Others looked broken, folded in half. Dried blood splattered the walls and pooled on the floors.

The large man bowed his head silently for the dead, as his squad came in behind him. He heard several exclamations and curses murmured out into their comms. His feet carried him down the hall almost unwillingly. So far, they had not seen any evidence of the former residents of the facility. This hallway was a stark reminder that there had been people here. People who had families. But they had created monsters. He did not feel pity for them. Their deaths had been their own fault.

Skarr ignored the dead and began looking for a way out of the hall. There was only one doorway. The squad approached the door tentatively as it too looked like it had been ripped open by something very large. Norith was beginning to suspect that the large creature was the super mutant. He raised his rifle and stepped through the door, his boots crunching on broken glass. Eclipse filed in behind him, ready for whatever was waiting for them.

The map had been right, Skarr saw. This large room was all one level. Lab B it seemed had been full of various mutants. Lining the walls were several glass tubes, all broken and empty now. In the center of the room sat several larger tubes. The squad leader looked around to see that everything in the room had been smashed, the glass tubes, the lab equipment, and everything else littered around.

“Squad, spread out a little bit. See if you can find out what happened here. And watch out for more of these bastards,  there are a lot of tubes in this room,” Skarr announced.

OOC:
WC: 750

Giving the squad a slight break from action. The room is very large, think warehouse size. So we have a lot of room to look over. Introduce some baddies if you want, but let's try and break up the action a little bit. By the way, nobody introduce the super mutant. That will be my job in a few posts.
SL|CoT:A|PC/'2LT Skarr/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
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TRN/AC Vexus/Lopen/VEDJ
(WoS1)

"May God have mercy on my enemies, because I won't" General George Patton
"A leader leads by example not by force." Sun Tzu, The Art of War
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THX1138
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 19, 2012 12:56:41 AM    View the profile of THX1138 
OOC:
4/15


Therex was standing alongside Terre, watching her closely through his HUD, monitoring her vitals. He wasn't your typical medic, believing in healing and caring. His job was to patch you up and get you back to the fight. No one told him he had to hold their hands and sing them a lullaby. But he had a protective soft spot for Terre. He couldn't quite explain it. When they had first met, Terre had been rather shocked at his presence, voicing her hatred for the Chiss race. Therex couldn't blame her. They were all kinda stuck up jerks. Those few who escaped weren't all that bad, but some, like Thrawn, had gone too far.

Shaking his head, Therex returned to reality. Peeking at the vitals monitor, Therex noticed that everyone's heartbeat had suddenly quickened. Looking through the semi transparent HUD, he saw a hallway filled with bodies. Horribly desecrated bodies. Limbs were strewn about, obvious teeth marks, slash wounds, and other wounds littering them. Some of the torsos still had bits of anatomy left from the incident. Arms had been forcibly ripped of, leaving dangling tendons, nerves, and still dripping blood vessels, creating intermittent, drying pools of reddish-copper fluid.

Others had horribly disfigured skulls, many dented inwards, as if struck by blunt instruments. Others had been pounded so repeatedly, that the skin above the dent had peeled back, revealing a shattered, pink-stained, skull underneath. Occasionally, a muscle spasm in one of the bodies, would cause a squad member to jump, but other than that, everyone was staying relatively calm. On the outside. Their vitals told a different story. Increased adrenaline, unsafe heart rate, rapid, shallow respiration.

Shaking his head, Therex focused forward, watching Skarr slip through what may have at one time been a door, but all that remained was a hole. A ghost image of the power of the creature they were searching for. Shuddering, Therex started examining the room.

Glass shards littered the room, some dripping with the fluids they once contained, others coated in the same redish-copper color from the hallway. Stepping closer to one of the tubes, Therex examined the inside. It looked like a standard bacta tank, but the fluid inside was not the same, distinct bluish color of bacta. Looking closer, he ran his gauntlet over the edge of glass, where it had been shattered. This one hadn't been blown outwards like the others. It was bent inwards from an outside force. A large, powerful force.

Is the super-mutant freeing his brethren?

Turning his attention to the next one, he noticed a similar pattern. And with the one after. They hadn't escaped. Something had freed them. Shuddering, Therex flipped on his comm.

"Skarr," he said, continuing to examine the tanks. "I think I may have found something interesting."

"So have we," he heard Skarr say. "Would you mind coming over here for a sec?"

Therex clicked the comm twice in confirmation and jogged over to where Skarr and the rest of the squad were. They had formed a circle and when Therex showed up, Razor stood aside and extended his arm, obviously proud of his find. Leaning down, Therex was shocked. There was a depression in the floor, obviously a footprint, as in the distance, more could be found. It was about five feet around and had created a pit about two feet deep. Whatever caused this was not only big, but heavy. Very heavy.

"Well?" Skarr asked, hunched over the pit across from Therex.

"I haven't even heard of Gundarks with prints this big," he stated, standing back up. "This creature is unlike anything I have seen or heard of."

"All the more reason to kill it," he heard someone remark.

"Quite right," Skarr agreed. "It is unnatural, and shouldn't exist. Let's fix that."

As the squad moved further into the room, still investigating, Therex kept staring at the hole in the floor.

For once in his life, he was not looking forward to a fight.

OOC:
663 Words. If you guys think anything should be changed, lemme know.
"He has his orders, and when a Chiss accepts orders he carries them out, period."

And now Autolite brings you Therex Whitestone, in Vast Empire, a tale well calculated to keep you in suspense.

TRP/LCPL THX-1138/4SQD/1PLT/1COM/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE [ES1][EW1][*QW 12*](ECA)(2.1)

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[This message has been edited by THX1138 (edited July 19, 2012 1:43:26 AM)]
ShanneTwoo
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 19, 2012 2:37:20 AM    View the profile of ShanneTwoo 
OOC:
5/15


Terre stirred, looking through bleary eyes for her squad. Her vision was too blurry to see, so she closed her eyes, taking deep breaths and slowing her heart rate. She pulled herself into a sitting position, and slowly took her helmet off. Her head fell backwards to lean against the wall, and she could feel her pulse quicken.

Unbidden, images of her long dead family came to mind. Her father, eyes wide, drowning in his own blood, hand reaching for her. Her mother, intestines strewn in front of her, trying to scoop them back inside herself. Her sister, running for her life, being caught by her long brown hair and dragged back, various army men touching her hair, pinning her down, slowly beating her to death, breaking every bone in her body, starting with her fingers.

Terre couldn't help herself. She bent over into the corner and started retching. She heard someone approaching, and between her sobbing and vomiting, she felt someone start gently rubbing her back, pulling her hair out of the way. Hiccuping and gulping, she backed away from the corner, wiping her mouth, collapsing against Therex. Skarr was standing a short distance away, his body language reading as concerned. Razor seemed interested, but Terre couldn't place Meteora or Balac. She squeezed her eyes shut, sniffing back a few more tears. Therex was definitely uncomfortable, but he was a comfort to her.

He pulled her close, one arm around her shoulder. "Shh," he whispered. Terre choked back her sobs, shaking silently. A few minutes later, she pulled herself together, wiped her eyes, grabbed her battered, bloody helmet, and put it on, once more shutting herself inside the walls she had constructed, shutting everyone else out. Therex helped her to her feet, and she limped forward, her leg still in pain, but not broken.

Bone bruise, she thought numbly. Standing in front of Skarr, she snapped off a salute, spine straight, shoulders squared. He saluted back, clapped one hand on her shoulder, and walked her back to the rest of the squad. They were standing in front of a massive footprint.

I knew this wasn't over, she thought dejectedly, but I didn't want it to start again so soon... Therex kept one large gloved hand on her shoulder, and she felt warm and protected. Skarr also stood close, hemming her in. Razor, Balac, and Meteora made up the rest of the circle, and Terre nodded to each of them in turn. Razor gave her a nod accompanied by an informal salute, Meteora dipped her head in acknowledgement, and Balac said, "K'oyacyi, Terre," over a private comm.

"That means 'hang in there', right?" she asked.

"Yes," he said, impressed. Terre chuckled.

"I've made my rounds," she said.

The link was disconnected as Skarr spoke. "So, ladies and gents. This is our first glimpse of a super mutant. What do we think?"

Terre spoke up first, taking her helmet off, humor in her voice. "I think I need some time personally to find some sort of an armor piece. I'm missing my shin plate, and that's already caused me a kriff-load more trouble than I care for in a situation like this. I also need a smoke and a painkiller. I could stand a power nap, and I need to use the 'fresher. I'm hot, tired, sweaty, and I just lost my last meal. My shin hurts like frell, and I need to make sure my blasters are recharged. I'm missing a knife, and my helmet is dented.

"Other than that, I'm fine." She grinned good naturedly, then walked off to answer nature’s call, giving Therex’s hand a squeeze to show her appreciation.

OOC:
WC: 612

Our first post in this story with a partial flashback. And a gory one. Criticisms are welcomed.
--Shanne

TRP/PSC ShanneTwoo/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
[This message has been edited by ShanneTwoo (edited July 19, 2012 2:43:13 AM)]
[This message has been edited by ShanneTwoo (edited July 19, 2012 2:44:59 AM)]
Skarr
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 23, 2012 5:42:59 PM    View the profile of Skarr 
OOC:
6/15


While the squad members went their different ways to catch a break, Skarr continued looking at the footprint. If it was the super mutant that had left it, it sure had left a huge imprint. This Skarr did not like. The heat and energy source was right below the level they occupied now. His map showed a small staircase leading down to the next level, which happened to be a part of Lab B. It seemed that both levels had been labeled as one. To Skarr, there was no organization to the facility. He wondered how the doctors had coped with the irregular design.

The squad leader lowered himself to the floor, his legs over the lip of the imprint. He needed a rest. Sleep would feel especially good, but Skarr could not doze during a mission. Work had to be done. He sighed deeply. After this mission, he needed a serious vacation. The man had rarely ever taken leave from the Vast Empire. It was his life. There was nothing else besides his work, his missions. The only family he had was his squad, the only friends he had were members of the Army and Navy. It did not amount to much of a fabulous social life.

A light touch on his shoulder made Skarr look up. It was Terre, helmet off, smiling. “Mind if I join you?”

“Sure thing.” Skarr answered. “Any luck finding a shin plate?”

Terre shook her head woefully. The squad leader grabbed his shin plate and unlatched it from his armor. “It’s not the same size, but it will work.” The greenie smiled and took the plate from his hand. It was a little oversized, but it still clipped onto her armor. She took a deep breath and looked around.

“Should we, umm, call the squad back?” Terre asked. Skarr wondered if she actually sounded anxious, but he nodded anyway. When the rest of the squad arrived, Skarr stood from the crater like depression in the middle of the room. The squad leader has taken off his helmet by then. It had been the first time he smelled actual air since the mission began. The air in the lab was stale, the oxygen scrubbers had recycled the air far too many times.

“Listen up squad, I haven’t made any speeches in a while,” Skarr began. He heard a few chuckles from the members of his squad. His family. “I have no idea what we’re going to find on the next level. The heat and energy emissions are definitely coming from the next level down, meaning the super mutant is there. We’re going to give it hell and make sure we kill the sonuvabitch.”

Razor threw his arm up into the air, rifle clutched in his hands, “For Eclipse!” Skarr smiled broadly as the squad began throwing out their own war cries. The squad leader placed his helmet back on his head and jumped down to join his squad. Soon, the chatter decreased to radio conversations. No one dared speak aloud as they neared the staircase. Once on the stairwell, all conversation ceased. The quiet tension that had accompanied the squad for most of the mission returned. The stairs were creaky and made a noise with every step, making Skarr nervous.

Soon the squad reached the doorway into the next level. Balac and Therex took up a guard position on each side of the door. Norith did the ‘honors’ of opening the door himself. The room beyond was just as vast as the lab above them if not bigger. Rows and rows of computers and workbenches ran through the room. A large stasis pod sat on the far side of the room, a creature unlike any other that they had ever seen inside. And just below the stasis pod was the largest brute they had seen since entering the facility.

Skarr knew without a doubt that this had to be the super mutant. He quietly entered the room, his squad behind him. Their rifles were raised, ready for trouble. The squad leader was about to open fire when something stopped him, a voice.

“You have finally arrived.” the voice called out. The squad immediately began trying to find the source of the voice. The super mutant stayed still on the other side of the room, not attacking.

“Who is this?” Skarr answered the voice, defiantly.

The voice boomed out once more, “I am before you.”

It took all of Skarr’s restraint to keep the shock out of his voice, “The brute?” His answer was a small chuckle.

“I am by no means a brute, but I see that you misunderstand. I am in this stasis pod, which is now failing.” Skarr looked up at the stasis pod, sensing that his squad was doing the same. Was the creature in the pod the super mutant?

“How can you speak?” Razor spoke up.

“The stasis pod is failing...and I have the ability to speak through my brethren,” the mutant answered.

Telepath? Skarr mused. He decided to use a different tactic. “What do you want?”

Silence reigned in the lab for several seconds before the creature answered. “Freedom. For both myself and my less fortunate kin.” Norith looked around the lab and found that several of the Class Ones were appearing from the shadows. He looked back up at the stasis pod, taking a good look at the mutant inside. It looked unlike any of the others. From Skarr’s guess the creature had to be eight feet tall. All eight feet of his was corded muscle of a metallic looking sheen. Three long claws rose out of each hand, seamlessly blending in with the skin. The monster’s eyes were closed, but it’s face was near human and looked almost serene in the stasis pod.

“I sense your hesitance. We will achieve freedom in whatever way we must. Step aside, or we will kill you, soldier.” The ultimatum was issued. Skarr sighed deeply, nothing was ever easy. He looked down at his rifle. Full charge. “I’m afraid I can’t do that. You will die here in this lab where you were born.” The squad leader raised his rifle and put a bolt into one of the husks.

“You have chosen death!” The brute reared its head and roared before breaking out into a charge.

OOC:
WC: 1056

BOSS FIGHT! Eclipse, prepare for the toughest fight yet. We have the largest brute in the whole facility and a whole bunch of Class Ones breathing down our necks. Give em hell. Oh and by the way, the large brute can not die until I post its death. Super mutant doesn't die either. Have fun.
SL|CoT:A|PC/'2LT Skarr/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
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(WoS1)

"May God have mercy on my enemies, because I won't" General George Patton
"A leader leads by example not by force." Sun Tzu, The Art of War
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razorsedge
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 25, 2012 10:39:42 PM    View the profile of razorsedge 
OOC:
7/15


The mental shockwave rippled through Razor’s mind.  For some reason his eyes focused on his cronometer that told him it was twenty-one eighteen.  He didn’t know if the screams he heard were his own or if they were coming from someone else. His battle mind was working still. He could see the enemies in front of him moving slowly as they normally would but Razor too felt like he were trapped in water.  His arms were leaden as he began to spin them in the fifth form block that he had learned in his extra martial arts classes.

The block caught the fists of one of the class one mutants that were charging at his front but it didn’t catch the other four.  As the fists landed Razor’s mind again rippled and he heard a voice.

You.  Are. Mine.

NO! Get out of my head!


As Razor flew backwards into the wall he lost his mind.  He felt it slip out of his head and into a container not his own. His body crumpled as it smashed into the wall.

Suddenly Razor sat in the great library on Tadath.  He was sitting at his favorite terminal in one of the well padded chairs.  Instantly he began to panic.  His squad had disappeared and so had all the mutants.  A stately man in a full tuxedo wandered through the aisles of books toward Razor. 

“An interesting choice of setting for a soldier.” The man remarked casually as he drew near to Razor. 

“Who are you?  And where am I actually?” 

The man reached out and touched Razor’s head. A picture flashed in front of both of his eyes. He saw his squad viciously fighting the mutants.  Bodies littered the floor Razor’s included.  His body was being avoided by the mutants.  It seemed as though the hive mind wanted to toy with the fallen trooper first.

The picture cleared and Razor was again sitting in his chair in the library.

“So, as you can see you have no choice but to sit here and do as I say.  Now as I am sure you can guess I could release you from your....”

“Let me go you bastard!”

“Now, now lets not get too hasty.  I will allow you to leave if a simple minded soldier such as yourself can outsmart me in a game of riddles.”

“This is ridiculous.”  Razor said as the screen in front of him flashed and turned on.  Text began scrolling across the screen.

If a bantha says, "All banthas are liars" is the bantha telling the truth?

Razor burst out laughing and choked through his chuckles, “This is a riddle for small children! My father used to tell me this when I sat on his lap.”

“I just assumed this riddle would be of your caliber.”

Razor’s laughter died instantly after the mutant said that.

“The answer is, a bantha cannot talk. Can I go now?”

“No, no, no!  You have solved but the easiest of my  riddles.  The next one has appeared on your screen.”

I have a head and tail but no body. What am I?   

Think Razor think!  You’re not just a simple soldier.  What has a head?  No thats too broad.  What had no body?  Dammit too broad again.  What the hell has no body but a head and tail?  Head and tail?  Head or tail?  Heads or tails?  A coin?!  It must be. 

Razor quickly typed in his answer and pressed the send button. The mutant again appeared next to Razor.

“Interesting soldier.  I guess you’re smarter than I thought.  The next riddle is hard too though. If you fail this I will consume your consciousness pass and I will release you from this prison.”

Razor didn’t say anything.  He just watched the text scroll across his screen.

If you look you cannot see me. And if you see me you cannot see anything else. I can make anything you want happen, but later everything goes back to normal. I can contain  you for whole days. What am I?   

Razor realized that much as it said in the riddle he was trapped.  He could see whatever this mirage was and couldn’t see anything else.  He raised a hand in the air and a blaster pistol popped into life in his hand. 

I can make anything happen.  I must be imagining things.  Wait! Thats it.  This is all in my imagination.  The answer to my final riddle is imagination.

Again Razor entered his answer.  The mutant appeared.  Before it could taunt him Razor shot it twice in the chest and it fell dead.  The befuddled trooper faded into black. 

Then Razor cracked open his eyes the bright light and blood that were on the inside of his helmet made him near blind for a few moments then Razor checked his HUD.  As he pulled his sword out of the wall, his timer read twenty-one twenty-one. 

OOC:
powerful telepath wc:833
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[This message has been edited by razorsedge (edited July 25, 2012 10:40:29 PM)]
[This message has been edited by razorsedge (edited July 26, 2012 3:43:10 PM)]
ShanneTwoo
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 26, 2012 1:15:21 AM    View the profile of ShanneTwoo 
OOC:
8/15


Terre felt the thing crawling around her head, and decided she didn't appreciate it very much. It felt cold, dark, malicious. Terre gasped aloud as the thing sank cold claws into her skull, digging through her secrets, the ones she tried to bury deep inside herself, the ones she tried to forget. She threw up her most basic defenses, but the creature seemed to simply phase through them, not even a hindrance. Questioningly, she prodded it, and jumped when it actually responded.

"I SEE YOU," it whispered, one claw seeming to stroke her temple as one would a pet. She winced, cringing away from the voice. It chuckled, a chilling, grating sound. She pushed it away, throwing up more defenses, hoping it would distract it enough that she could take care of the Class One stumbling into her field of consciousness. The voice stopped, apparently distracted or amused, trying to figure out one of her defensive enigmas, and Terre took her chance.

She clubbed the Class One across the head with her blaster, sending it flying backwards. It responded by stumbling backwards, shaking its head to clear it. It opened its mouth to scream, and Terre shoved her blaster into its mouth, firing twice. The head disappeared in a flash of pink, peach, and gray, the body falling backwards and twitching violently in its death throes.

Taking a few precious seconds to gather herself, Terre looked around the room, locating Therex, who was in a corner, showing no outward signs of psychological warfare. She also found Skarr, slightly closer to her. He also showed no outward signs of any telepathic suggestions. She wondered briefly if she was the only one experiencing it before she turned to club away another Class One that was stumbling closer, mouth stretched wide, possibly a broken jaw.

Then a voice from her past distracted her further. "You look beautiful, Terre..."

"Jester?" Terre asked, looking around for the young, sandy-blond haired youth that she had gone through training with.

"Baby girl, do you remember us?"

"Mama?"

"Terre, honey, come home with us."

"Papa!" Terre was turning in circles, looking for the voices.

She felt something grab her ankle, and she snapped back to reality. A Class One had hold of her ankle and was gnawing on the borrowed shin plate. She made a mental note to thank Skarr profusely with hugs and cookies later. She kicked the thing away, then pinned it with her boot, firing at its face, making the body underneath her jump and twist.

Turning away, she gulped, pushing away more memories. The voice surfaced again, whispering in another tongue, one she didn't understand, but sounded as though it came from hell. She clapped her hands over her ears as if the physical block would keep the creature inside her head and out of her friends.

"Get OUT of my HEAD!!!" she screamed.

"Ah, a loyal friend, I see..." the voice said. "Would you die for your friends?"

Terre thought for a moment, quiet, taking her time to answer. "If the need arose, I would do it without question."

"Would you do so tonight?"

"Not by your hand or for your sick sadistic satisfaction," she hissed angrily.

"It could be ruled an accident... You could be called a hero... And your friends would be safe... They would live on, live for your memory..." Terre saw images of the projected future in her head, felt herself almost wanting to die...

Then she spoke, her voice soft, low, calm, and steady. She felt the thing's rage at her answer. "Terre Rae, Private Second Class, Eclipse Squad... Terre Rae, Private Second Class, Eclipse Squad..."



OOC:
WC: 604

Sorry it's not longer, but it's hard to type on a phone. >_<
--Shanne

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razorsedge
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 26, 2012 6:33:58 PM    View the profile of razorsedge 
OOC:
9/15



Terre crumpled. 

Razor watched the trooper’s slow fall.  Even through his adrenaline filled body he felt a pang of anger at the ease with which the mental monster could destroy his squad.  To Razor it seemed as if they were all fighting in a swirling fog.  The fog seemed to slow him.  He understood that it was only his mind playing tricks on him.  Adding to the utter confusion of combat an element that the troopers had rarely, if ever faced.

The fog seemed to grow hands and wrap around Razor's arm as he swung his blade toward a class one mutant.  The blade sliced through.  Just like when he was in his mind he knew it was all a game.  He could’ve probably puzzled out a way to win if he had the ability to concentrate on it but he had to move fast enough to not die.  He also had to deal with the constant shivers running through his mind as it was stroked by the mutant beast.

The giant class two then charged out of the smoke directly in front of Razor.  He barely even had time to dive sideways before the huge foot of the beast crushed into the spot where he had just been.  The monstrous foot left a crater where it landed.

Razor fired his rifle into the brutes chest and felt some small enjoyment as he saw the smoking holes appear in the beast. Almost instantly though that slight elation he had felt was snatched away.  The holes closed and the burning flesh was covered with new pink skin that darkened and hardened almost instantly. 

What the hell?!  How fast is this damn monster able to heal from the wounds it has sustained?

The stormtroopers all healed faster than a normal man.  Small cuts and abrasions would heal in a matter of hours.  Large lacerations might take only a week or two and recovery time from surgeries was greatly lessened. Razor had never encountered anything that could take a blaster bolt direct center mass and keep walking, much less killing. 

Razor spun and lashed out with his blade again.  Its vibrocells sliced easily into the thick skin of the beast.  As Razor’s blade moved halfway through its trip that would have rent the demon in half from shoulder to hip it struck the giant creature’s spine. 

The blade stopped on the iron hard and plate armor thick bone.  Razor looked up in a moment of shock and surprise.  Had the beasts jaw not been bolted on and its face stuck in a permanent scowl from the loose fitting skin the amazed trooper would have sworn it grinned. It raised both of its fists high and bellowed.  Spit rained on the troopers face plate.

The fists came down like a space strike.  So fast and hard that any man would be crushed into a pancake by it.  Skarr’s two footed kick landed on Razor’s right side.  Razor felt one of his ribs snap under the intense pressure.  His whole body was, for the second time in very few minutes thrown hard toward a wall. 


====================Seconds earlier====================



Skarr blew the mutant in front of him away. Then he saw Razor rush the huge brute with his sword upraised.

What the hell is that fraking idiot doing?!

Razor swiped quickly upward but it seemed to have no effect.  He then swept his blade downward from high on its right shoulder.  It went about halfway through and stopped.  Thats when time seemed to slow. 

The beast raised its arms high and bellowed as it started to bring its fists down.  Skarr was moving before he even knew what he was doing. He leapt forward streaming his body forward.  His feet flattened on Razor’s ribs and he heard the wet crunch of one snapping.  He let his body ball up on Razor even as the other trooper began to fly sideways.  He pushed off with all his might boosting Razor further and sending himself flying out from under the beasts huge arms.

Razor slammed hard into the ground.  The pain in his midriff almost causing him to black out.  He managed to roll backwards as a group of class ones fell upon him.

Things.... Things just keep going... from bad... to worse. Thought Razor’s pain addled brain.

The trooper clutched his side with his left arm and took a defensive position in a corner, blade angled in front of him to fend off attacks.

“Guys,” gasped Razor into his throat mike. “I could really use some help here if you’re not too occupied.”

Razor swiped a lazy punch out of the way.  It almost seemed as though the class ones were toying with him much as predators would to injured prey, for sport. Things did not seem promising.

OOC:
WC= 825

MUTANTS FOR THE WIN!
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[This message has been edited by razorsedge (edited July 26, 2012 9:26:43 PM)]
THX1138
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 26, 2012 8:32:25 PM    View the profile of THX1138 
OOC:
10/15 | 817 words.


Two minds?

Whatever was probing Therex sounded surprised. Not easy to do when it could pry into the dark crevasses of one's mind and force itself in. He used to be like any other person. Back when he was 13, back when he known by another name, another life.

Shaking the memories back, Therex felt the presence continue probing. In addition to having a second mind to distract it, Therex was a Chiss. That wasn't just a name. It was a lifestyle. They were all raised, battle-ready, stubborn, and persistent. As such, Therex had many doors in his mind, all locked and sealed so that no one could get in. Sometimes, he even denied himself access. Slowly, the presence probed every door, checking for weaknesses. Frustrated, it turned it's attention to total control. But before it could get anywhere close, another presence, one that had already claimed the territory confronted it.

While they fought for control, Therex returned to reality, focusing on the chaos surrounding him. In the brief moment he had been distracted, several Class I's seemed to have gained interest in him. Reaching down, he unholstered his one M13 Revolver and started pouring shots into them. Several would just pass straight through, leaving a minor wound that barely slowed them down.

As one leapt at him, Therex reversed his grip on the revolver, grasping the barrel, and swung hard. The force cause the skull to dent, and spray a reddish, gray fluid. Continuing the swing, Therex flung the limp figure about four meters.

Ducking, he slid under an arm that was more or less attached to another one of the creatures. Laying the revolver down, he reached around for his rifle and began spraying at the knees of his enemies. They all dropped, but they didn't stay down more than a few seconds. One reached out and grasped his leg, pulling him back.

Keeping his balance with one hand, Therex randomly started firing with his other, eventually striking the head of his assailant. When the arm finally released him, he stood up, and finished off the other two, who were still crawling towards him. As he stood, searching for his next target, he spied Terre in his peripheral vision. She was grabbing at her head, almost insanely. Then she tumbled to the ground.

Just then, something inspired his internal self, and in a split second the invading presence was gone. Defeated. But not permanently. Merely stunned. Therex let his own presence take over.

His vision darkened, but Therex could still perceive the world around him, maybe even better than before. Adrenaline surging through his veins, time crawled by. Reaching down, Therex felt a socket on his leg open and slide out a cylinder. Grasping it, Therex yanked it out, bashing the skull of one of the creatures, before sliding his hand down the length, tapping a trigger.

In the blink of an eye, the 2 foot shaft, became a full 7 foot elecrtostaff. The favored weapon of his younger years. The tips, sparking and pulsing with energy, sheared limbs off of enemies, tearing through them, singing vessels and nerve endings. A rancid smell of burning flesh and hair filled the air around him, but Therex pressed on, swinging, as though mad, but in total control, using well calculated movements.

Within twenty seconds, which had felt like several minutes to Therex, he was standing over the prone figure of Terre, still spinning his weapon. When the area had been sufficiently cleared with his movements, Therex leaned over Terre's body and started checking for vitals. When he was sure she would live, he stood and was about to ignite the staff for another round, when one of them tumbled into him.

The staff flew from his hands, far into the distance. Turning over, Therex tried to block the frenzied blows to his face, with little success. What the creature hadn't known, was who was still in control.

On one of the creatures swings, Therex threw his face forward, meeting the fist straight on. The force shattered the faceplate on his helmet, but also shattered the creature's forearm. It howled, not in pain, but in anger. Before it could bring it's other hand up, Therex grabbed it by the face and pulled himself up, using the creature as a bracer.

It's skull still in his gauntlet, Therex swung the body around, smashing it against a nearby wall. Then, with considerable effort, Therex felt his fingers dig into the creature's skin. Soon, an audible pop was heard, and the creature stopped flailing and clawing at Therex. Soon, the same grayish-red liquid from earlier attacks, oozed from any orifice it could find.

Dropping the limp figure, Therex ripped his helmet off. It had served it's purpose, and was more of a liability than anything now. Just then, the presence returned, renewed.

So... That is the game we will play. Alright.
"He has his orders, and when a Chiss accepts orders he carries them out, period."

And now Autolite brings you Therex Whitestone, in Vast Empire, a tale well calculated to keep you in suspense.

TRP/LCPL THX-1138/4SQD/1PLT/1COM/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE [ES1][EW1][*QW 12*](ECA)(2.1)

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Skarr
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 29, 2012 12:10:32 AM    View the profile of Skarr 
OOC:
11/15


The lab was in chaos. The Class One mutants were only serving as distractions. Skarr realized it almost too late. They were running around the edges of the fight, trying to pick at the ones who were faltering. The huge brute would charge at various intervals, trying to stomp the troopers into the floor. It had almost worked in several cases. Terre had some minor injuries and Therex was suffering from some damage. Razor was suffering the worst of it. Eclipse’s leader was not quite sure how badly or how much he was injured, but he looked like he was in pain.

Skarr jumped over another one of the lab tables, putting a bolt into a husk’s face. He circled around the brute, trying to find some weakness. So far, the brute had taken everything the squad had thrown at them. The squad leader still had the portable rocket launcher on his back, but he was loathe to use it. He reasoned that there had to be another way to kill the brutish mutant. And the rocket could prove dangerous in such a space. Skarr did not want to risk injuring his squad with a risky shot.

Another husk ran at Skarr before it was felled by a strong blow to its head. The brute was occupied with both Balac and Beta. The two of them were trying to distract the beast from the front. Therex was still protecting Terre from the Class Ones that had swarmed them. Razor was holding his own against some of the Class Ones, but he was faltering.

“Meteora!” Skarr yelled into his comm.

“Little busy, boss.” came the answer.

Skarr rolled his eyes and planted another shot into a husk’s head, “I need you to help Razor. He’s hurt bad.” A click came over the comm to sound the affirmative. By that time, Skarr was clear of Class Ones and was now at the back of the large mutant. Even the creature’s back was armored, but unlike the front which was melted to slag, the armor in the back was still smooth and only had some slight blaster scoring. But above the armor plating was an uncovered spot, the creature’s neck.

A crazy idea came to Skarr’s mind. The Corellian hoped that it would put the beast out of commission, or else this might hurt. Dumbest idea I’ve ever tried in 3...2...1... Skarr broke out into a run towards the brute’s back. As he neared the brute, Skarr used one of the lab’s workstations to vault himself on to the mutant’s back. The effect was much what Skarr expected. The brute reared back, large hands trying to reach back and grab Skarr. The squad leader held onto the metal back plate with one hand, reaching for his pistol with the other. The mutant continued to buck and Skarr finally caught a hold of his blaster. He raised the weapon to the back of the creature’s neck placing the muzzle flush against the skin of the brute’s neck.

Skarr squeezed the trigger as many times as he could, placing several bolts through the creature’s windpipe and carotid artery. The brute roared, trying to throw Skarr off with renewed vigor. The hole the blaster left was large enough for Skarr to try one more thing. He was able to holster his blaster and shove a thermal detonator into the wound before the brute threw him off. The squad leader fell back into one of the workstations, making the man cry out in pain.

The brute turned on Skarr as the man struggled to get to his feet. A few short beeps started emitting from the creature. The thing stalked towards the fallen squad leader, arm raised. It was ignoring the blaster bolts the others were putting into it. Then with a spectacular flash, the brute’s head exploded, covering the squad, Class Ones, and the equipment around it with gore.

Skarr wiped off his visor, looking back at the super mutant in contempt. The stasis pod continued to flicker, slowly dying. “Squad, retreat!” He could hear the confusion in their affirmatives. They fought off the rest of the Class One mutants, helping the wounded back into the hall. Once all of the squad were in the hall, Skarr closed the double doors and barred them shut.

“We need to rest, think our plan out, take stock.” Skarr said, almost to himself. The man had no idea what the super mutant was capable of, but it was put into stasis for a reason. That reason could not be a good one. The squad leader sank down to the floor. His blaster rifle was still in the lab, fallen when he had jumped on the brute. Now all he had was his submachine gun and his two blasters. Not to mention his portable rocket launcher. And his ammo was getting on the low side.

Therex was now taking care of the two most wounded members of the squad, Terre and Razor. He shot one of the ever dwindling stims into Terre, waking her up in another daze. And he was now bandaging Razor’s wounds up with bacta laced cloth. The other members of the squad were suffering some minor injuries as well. Some of them were favoring certain limbs, others were rubbing bruises, and one of them was bleeding. Skarr noticed with a start that it was him. The front of his torso armor was covered in blood. He assumed it was the brute’s at first, but this blood was pure crimson, not greyish red. The left pec of his armor had been sliced open, the slice going all the way down into his skin, and Skarr supposed his muscle as well.

“Doc, I’m gonna need a patch.” Skarr said as he began feeling light headed.

OOC:
969 words

A kind of hastily written post, but we're ready for the next objective
SL|CoT:A|PC/'2LT Skarr/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
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(WoS1)

"May God have mercy on my enemies, because I won't" General George Patton
"A leader leads by example not by force." Sun Tzu, The Art of War
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Garryll Gates
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 29, 2012 3:16:33 PM    View the profile of Garryll Gates 
The Stormtrooper officers stood in the calm of the Dominion’s decks, far removed from the chaos and violence that was taking place in the Flail facility far below them. Sensors and sporadic reports were their only sources of intel; so far removed from the combat, they could only make sweeping battlefield-wide assessments.

“Major, Captain,” said one of the two Stormtrooper’s aides, “the Commodore needs to speak with you.”

“Holo,” Gates replied. The hovering tac-map of the facility and surrounding area disappeared, instead flashing into the image of the surprisingly petite naval officer. Of average height but of slight build, the woman seemed wholly unsuited to have risen to such a high military rank.

The steel in her back and behind her eyes, and the brusque tone of voice she reeled into convinced Gates otherwise.

“Officers,” Commodore Kara Elith began. “While we’ve been in station-keeping positions, our sensors have picked up a half-dozen transport ships slipping into the atmosphere outside of any major starport hubs.”

“Smugglers?” Havock suggested.

“Pirates?” Gates added.

“Possibly. But we think they’re still moving close to the surface, and they’re in the target objective’s sector.”

“Shit. Flail’s back to clear out their facility,” Cortez swore.

“Looks like it,” Gates said. “But we expected them to show up eventually.”

“Aye,” Havock replied. “We go to plan B. Launch the retrieval shuttles and give our troops some air support. We’ll give the order to withdraw. Depending on what we find, it may be in our best interests to bombard the target from orbit.”

The Commodore nodded. “I’ll prepare my orders.”

One by one, squads commed in, radioing new statuses and getting new orders from the officers so far removed from the combat. Blackjack, Eclipse, Cortez’s squads; they all got orders directly, but Raiders and the ARCs were still buried too deep under the base to get a direct line. The Stormtrooper officers passed their orders down in the hopes that one of the squads with boots on the ground would be able to relay the orders quickly.

*** *** *** *** ***

The massive mutant was dead, its upper torso steaming across the room. Instinctively, the super mutant, deep within its stasis pod, knew that. The pinprick of light had been snuffed out in an orgy of violence, bright light and burning pain. Deep within the creature’s mind, it sighed. Dim as that light had been, it had been the only one bright enough to carry his words.

Now it was stuck in here, with only the mostly-destroyed senses of its weakest kin to glare at its enemies. Their gibbering minds knew only hunger and pain, and if it watched through their eyes too long, they would simply collapse.

It sighed again. To be free, and walk in its own skin, that was its greatest wish. For only minutes had it used its eyes to gaze upon the world; for only minutes had it been able to experience, first-hand, the taste of air and the stink of sweat.

For only minutes -

The creature’s musings stuttered out. The hell that was its physical body was...changing. For the weeks that it had been held captive, it had struggled. But its mind was disjointed with its hands, its feet, its own heart.

Now, though, it could hear its heartbeat. It could feel its fingers. It could taste the gel of the stasis pod on its tongue.

It opened its eyes, and through the murky gel, it could see its kin, heads cocked in confusion as it began to move in its stasis pod.

It did not know this, nor did anyone else, but Skarr’s gamble had done more than simply kill the brute. The grenade, buried in the throat of the beast, had turned its skull and collarbones into shrapnel scattering across the room. More than enough of the disgusting makeshift grenade had been buried in the stasis pod’s controls, and it was enough to wake the creature it hid away.

The creature did not care; it was only a thin glass pane from waking fully, standing tall amidst its kin. It drove a fist through the gel to smack against the pane, once, twice, thrice.

It shattered on the thirteenth strike, and a fist broke out of the gel like a creature emerging from the primordial muck. The hole widened in seconds, and soon, the massive creature had crawled out.

Deep within its throat, it hacked up gel and rumbled. The class-one mutants looked quizzically at their kin, wondering dumbly what it was doing.

It knew; it was laughing, and when it finished, it stood.

I...AM....FREE.

OOC:

The highly experimental mutant has been released. It is summoning many of its kin from across the facility. Escape is advised.

Company Commander of Phoenix Company |Tactical Officer of the Army | Adept of the Dark Jedi Order | Captain of the
Bloodfist in the Osk Company
TO/CPTGarryll Gates/3SQD/1PLT/1COM/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE [SCP][RoM][ICE] [IH] [CCA] [BC] [SRP] [AS-4] [ES1] [CoS] [EW1] {RESx3} [ESC09] [RoTx2] [CRoS] [AoT] [CoZ][CoDS][VT][CRoM][KAD][RCA][*QW 12*](3.1)(1.1)

SM/DJK Gates/Eagle Sect/Lopen/VEDJ/VE (KC1)
Longtime leader of Blackjack Squad
For Tadath, for the Empire.

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Skarr
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
July 31, 2012 4:39:28 PM    View the profile of Skarr 
OOC:
1/15


The squad had been successfully patched up for nearly ten minutes when Skarr finally got through to Garryll. The comms had been giving him a ton of static and he was not sure if the releasing energy of the stasis pod was affecting the comms. When Gar’s voice did break through the static, it was already relaying orders.

“All squads, we’re bugging out! Flail ships are in the vicinity. I repeat, all squads are to retreat to their escape rendezvous immediately,” the Captain’s slate like voice sounded over the comm. Skarr looked at the rest of Eclipse who had heard the orders relayed through their comms as well. The squad leader immediately sprang into action, pulling up the holo map on his helmet. He was plotting an escape route as he motioned for the squad to climb the creaky metal stairs again. Balac, undoubtedly the strongest of the squad was helping Razor support his weight.

Skarr grimaced. The Zabrak would slow them down, but Skarr would not leave the man behind. Razor had been a friend of Skarr’s since basic training. The second lieutenant let the whole squad climb the stairs before him, his blaster trained on the door to the lab. At any time the super mutant could break through. The man surmised that if he could at least slow the beast down, the squad could have a chance. Luckily for Skarr, he only heard the creature’s jubilation at being alive before he stormed up the stairs.

His holo map was still doing its job, plotting an escape route. A blinking yellow trail appeared on the map, the quickest way out of the facility. The lab above them was still empty of mutants, but it also provided Eclipse squad with another way out. The map indicated that a small maintenance tunnel connected the lab to a technician’s office. Skarr noted that the tech’s office was nearby a large security room, what had to be one of the smaller nerve centers of the facility. The security room would have extra weaponry and several controls and cameras to this section of the facility.

Perhaps, I can lock down the super mutant from there, Skarr thought. Eclipse stood at the top of the stairs and Terre was looking expectantly at him. He jerked his head in the general direction of the western wall. “There’s a maintenance tunnel over there. That’s our route for now.” Therex had a look of concern on his face, his helmet lost. Skarr knew what the Chiss was thinking. If a brute or a large number of husks caught them in the maintenance tunnels, it could mean death for the whole squad. He shrugged at Therex, hoping that the worst would not happen.

A large bang sounded from below them. Something was banging on the large steel door. Skarr looked up at his squad, infusing urgency into his voice. “Move it!” The squad members snapped to attention and began moving their way quickly for the west wall. Even with his injuries, Razor was moving fairly fast. Norith hoped the man’s adrenaline would hold out. Things were going to get tense and Skarr did not want to face the super mutant. Beta was the first one to the door and shoved it open, letting Skarr in first.

The squad leader wanted to take point. Terre was next in behind him, followed by Balac and Razor with Meteora, Beta, and Therex taking the back. The maintenance tunnels were not as cramped as Skarr originally thought, two of the squad members could move side by side. The mutants could still overwhelm Eclipse in the tunnels if they caught them off guard. They went a little slowly at first, the tunnel was full of side passages. Skarr checked each and everyone they came by. He knew it was going to be slow going this way, but better to be safe than sorry.

Eclipse came across another intersection and Skarr peeked his head around to the left. One of the husks were stumbling around, a low moan coming from it. He held up his hand to stop the squad from continuing and turned down the corridor. Luckily, the husk was looking the other way, but Skarr could not risk the creature turning around and spotting them as the snuck past. The squad leader unsheathed the knife at his hip and creeped up behind the grey skinned Class One.

Skarr acted fast, his arm snapped around the creature’s head, bringing its head back. With as much force as he could manage Skarr shoved the blade of the knife under the husk’s chin. The Class One struggled uselessly against the lieutenant’s grip. Finally, the creature dropped dead and the damage had been done. The young man realized he had made an enormous mistake as he heard a high pitched scream in the distance. Skarr had a dreadful feeling that the mutants now knew exactly where the squad was.

OOC:
823 words

Alright, first post of this objective is up! Please before any one else posts, read the squad topic I have a few guidelines of my own I'd like you to follow.
SL|CoT:A|PC/'2LT Skarr/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
[CDS] [ES2] [IH] [RoT] {RES} (VT) (ECA) (WtR) (3.1) (1.1) (1.2) (A5) (AS-2)
TRN/AC Vexus/Lopen/VEDJ
(WoS1)

"May God have mercy on my enemies, because I won't" General George Patton
"A leader leads by example not by force." Sun Tzu, The Art of War
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HammerHead
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
August 5, 2012 11:54:24 PM    View the profile of HammerHead 
OOC:
2/15
This is my first post on this story, so it may bit a little choppy. Also, I am unable to spell check this at the time being, so it will be edited later.


HammerHead positioned himself for a fight, that would most likely be his last.

After going AWOL, HammerHead was briefly assighned to a lower class squad. Soon after arrival at the Flail facility, his squad was ripped apart by the mutants. After only being at their objective point for just over a half hour, only 3 troopers remained. The Squad leader decided that retreating was the best option, so the men ran. Soon after, HammerHead was lying wounded in a service tunnel, daised and somewhat fearful.

HammerHead's vision was blurred and his heart rate was elevated; he was in no real condition to fight. As his senses dimmed, HammerHead barely heard the group of troopers that were aproaching from the direction of the noise. As the aproached the trooper in front motioned for them to stop and then motioned for a trooper near the back of the group to check on HammerHead.

The trooper removed his helmet, and HammerHead saw that it was his old squad mate Therex. HammerHead, at this point, had lost his hearing altogether and his sight was starting to follow. Therex looked him over, and tried to get him to respond but HammerHead started to slip out of consiousness. HammerHead would periodicaly wake up, and passout, wich caused him to get quite confused over the situation. He woke up to find himself bieng carriend, then woke up again to find himself being dragged.

In the end, HammerHead woke up (for good) in a room filled with tools, a few moniters, and a few shut and bulted doors. The troopers that he had seen before now occupied the room, and most of them were pretty banged up. Therex was working on HammerHead's many wounds, when HammerHead finally heard him speak.

"You lost alot of blood. There is a thick red line were we dragged you acrossed the floor."

"Thanks, I guess. Now I have to know, where am I."

Then a semi-familiar face came forward, it was Skarr.

"Your lucky to be alive Hammer. If we hadn't found you, we wouldn't have been having this conversation. As for where you are, your in a maintanence supply room."

HammerHead took one look around, and decided that Skarr probally wasn't lying.

"So what now?"

"There is a stairwell right outside hear that will take us to a higher level of the complex, and for the time being, out of trouble. Therex, can he walk?"

"His leg was shot twice, he broke his ankle, and he has lost a good deal of blood, but I think that he can put some weight on it."

"That's good enough for now. Patch up his leg, those doors won't hold forever.

OOC:
Alright, now we're on the move again.
Fear is just an excuse for someone who is to lazy to take action.
Bravery is a fools excuse for running at something without taking time to think or strategize.
Courage is being able to man up and face a problem, no matter how large or difficult it may be, and take it down.

TRP/PSC HammerHead/3SQD/1PLT/1COM/1BAT/1RGT/VEA/VE/

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[This message has been edited by HammerHead (edited August 5, 2012 11:56:07 PM)]
ShanneTwoo
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
August 6, 2012 2:31:29 AM    View the profile of ShanneTwoo 
OOC:
3/15


Terre obediently took up a position behind Skarr, torn between her loyalty to her squad leader and her loyalty to Therex, who had taken the back of the group. She had a fierce loyalty to those she cared about most, and if there was anyone she truly cared about, it was one of these two men. Unconsciously, she tapped her boot against the borrowed shinplate, as if reminding herself that they had a certain loyalty to her. She knew Skarr would never leave one of his teammates to die, and Therex had proved his loyalty to her, multiple times. Now she just had to prove it to them.

Skarr effectively knifed the Class One, and that now all-too-familiar shriek echoed in the close quarters. Terre found herself starting to black out again, wondered briefly if she had a concussion, then shook it away.

No, she told herself firmly. No. You can deal with that after all of this is over. After all of this, you can deal with everything. Just stay alive, keep everyone else alive, and get out, get out, GET OUT!

The first of the husks were starting to arrive, swarming into the tunnel, and, Terre thought, laughing, almost gleeful at what seemed an easy kill. She gulped, swallowing the sheer terror that threatened to engulf her. The husks no longer seemed the ravenous creatures they were, but rather the specters of her past. The... thing was still crawling around her head, pulling up her memories, ripping out the parts it thought it could use, twisting even her good memories, twisting them so they hurt. Terre whimpered involuntarily.

"What's wrong?" Skarr asked, the closest one to her.

"Nothing," she choked out. "I'm alright."

"Only for now, my pet," the thing whispered, stroking her temple again before diving back into her darkest corners. Skarr appeared once more at her side. His expression was concerned, but the more she looked into his eyes, the more he transformed, became a vision of her father, faded back to her squad leader, continuously switched, back and forth, leaving Terre dizzy, reeling on her feet. She turned away, looking for Therex. She saw him towards the back of the squad, nodded at him, catching his attention. He, too, morphed into a ghost, a skeleton in her closet. It wasn't a large jump, just a slight height difference, shorter hair, gaunter frame. She shook her head and the ghosts leapt back into her head, leaving the reality harsh, a stark contrast.

"Skarr," she croaked, looking for her squad leader. He had disappeared, completely gone from the group. She turned to look for Razor, but he had disappeared, too. She saw Meteora stripped away, flesh first, then muscle, then bone, simply blowing away in the wind. Balac followed, as did the rest of her squad members. Soon, she was left alone in a dark, shadowy world, one that constantly shifted, left her off balance, gasping for breath that simply wouldn't come.

"Help," she tried to croak, found herself voiceless in this cold, dark world.

"Your friends can't help you now, pet," the creature hissed, sinking icy cold claws into her cranium. Terre gasped in pain, falling to her knees, sucking breath in through her clenched teeth, air cold enough to freeze her where she stood.

"Why pick on me?" she hissed back, every nerve on edge, fighting against the pain.

"Oh, I'm picking on you all. I'm inside all of your heads. Controlling, manipulating, messing with your minds.... I may as well turn you against one of your comrades as one of my own brothers..."

"NO!" Terre shrieked. A shadow appeared in her world, one that appeared to be a husk. She lashed out at it instinctively, but it caught her arm, batting it away as easily as if it were some annoying insect. "NO!" she shrieked again, fumbling for her blaster, usually so quick at hand.

"Terre!" the husk barked in Therex's voice. She stopped, stumbled, fell backwards, shocked. The husk--Therex--reached out a hand to help her up, and she took it, confused. He helped her up, gave her what in reality must have been a smile, but in husk form, only appeared a stretching of jaws, a preparation for a meal. She found herself flinching away, trying to break free. Therex grabbed her in a bear hug, pinning her arms, talking to her in a low voice.

"Shh... It's alright, Terre. You can fight this. You can come back. You can still fight. You can come back to reality."

Reality, she thought, then this must be a dream....

She pulled away from the Chiss with seemingly super human strength and grabbed her gun, aiming it at her own temple before she realized what she was doing. She heard the report of a blaster, found she had ducked from her own suicidal shot, and found a smoking crater in the tunnels that were now returning to a normal shade and temperature. Her squad mates were still here, all of them forming a protective circle around her. She pushed forward, putting herself squarely next to Skarr.

"I think I'm a liability," she murmured in a voice so low only he could hear.

"At this point, Terre, we're all liabilities." Her squad leader nudged her with his shoulder. "We just have to look out for each other."

Terre nodded grimly, shifting her blaster to a more comfortable position in her hand. She would sooner take her own life than accidentally take a squad mates’.

"Not if I have anything to say, little pet," the voice whispered, continuing that despised stroking. Terre shuddered, knowing this voice, this feeling, would plague her dreams long after this fight was over, long after this physical beast was conquered. Suddenly, this battle was personal.

OOC:
WC: 964

And with that, squad mates, I AM BACK!
--Shanne

TRP/PSC ShanneTwoo/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
[This message has been edited by ShanneTwoo (edited August 9, 2012 1:17:26 AM)]
Skarr
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
August 6, 2012 1:08:15 PM    View the profile of Skarr 
OOC:
4/15


The squad huddled in the security room, doors barred shut. Eclipse’s squad leader stood by the door, looking out the small window set into it. He had not expected to find Hammerhead in this place. The former Jester trooper had not explained exactly why he was here, but that was to be expected. The man had suffered several injuries and was in a haze of pain killers as Therex treated him. Skarr was concerned for both Terre and Hammerhead.

Before they had found Hammerhead, Terre had nearly killed herself. The super mutant was trying to crawl its way into their heads. The only one who seemed completely unaffected by the voices was Hammerhead. Skarr was not sure how telepathy worked, he tended to keep his area of knowledge to history and military things. There were no scientists on Eclipse, meaning Skarr couldn’t even get a theory on how the super mutant could do such things.

The squad leader could only guess that the mutant had to see a person before linking its mind. He shook his head to clear his thoughts. Skarr had only seen these things in holo-movies. There was no sense dealing with fantasies. There was only one thing the Eclipse leader was concerned with, escaping the facility. He looked back at Razor and walked over to the trooper.

“How are you holding up?” Skarr asked.

The Zabrak looked up at him and shrugged, “I’m keeping it together. Might have Therex take a quick look at me before we head out.” The squad leader nodded his head and went back to his vigil by the door. Several mutants had passed them by, but so far none disturbed them. Skarr did not even know if the mutants had seen them. He turned to the room again and motioned for Beta to take the watch. He had to check the bank of computers.

The computers were all active, their displays showing data from all over this part of the facility. He rolled a chair up to the main console and took a seat. It seemed to Skarr that the whole sector was crawling with mutants from the camera feeds he seen. A nearby camera showed the super mutant stalking down the maintenance hall. Norith narrowed his eyes and began searching for the maintenance tunnel controls. He sealed every exit that Eclipse would not need, effectively trapping the super mutant.

A piercing cry went through the facility again. The powerful mutant was angry and the barriers would not hold long. Skarr’s fingers flew over the controls. He began activating turrets all over the sector, keying in the signature for the mutants and edited the turrets’ parameters to not fire on Vast Empire soldiers. He heard blaster fire coming from down the hall. The squad members looked at him in confusion, wondering what the squad leader was working on. Skarr keyed in a few more commands. Weapons lockers in the room opened automatically.

Skarr stood from his chair, “Stock up. Ammo only, unless you need a replacement weapon.” The squad leader stepped forward and grabbed a few clips of pistol ammo. From now on, his twin blasters would be his weapon of choice. The squad crowded around the lockers grabbing all the ammo they could hold. It still was not much, Skarr doubted the squad could take down a small brute, let alone the super mutant itself. Running was still the only option.

“Hammerhead,” Skarr called out.

The former Jester turned to Skarr, “Yeah?”

“Are you good to move?” The soldier nodded in reply. Balac grabbed Razor from a row of supply boxes in the corner. Beta stepped forward to help Hammerhead. Meteora and Terre flanked the door, ready to unbar it. Skarr stepped up confidently to the door. He nodded to the two troopers and they threw up the bar. Skarr pushed open the door as quietly as he could manage. The hall was strangely empty. The squad leader walked out, blasters raised. The stairwell rested to his right. His eyes continued to scan the hall as he sent his squad up the stairs.

Normally he would take point, but the camera feeds had shown that the level above was relatively clear of creatures. Terre was the last trooper up the stairs. Skarr began backing toward the steps, blasters still raised. Just as he began climbing the steps, a Class Three rounded the corner. It was running at full tilt toward the steps. Skarr knew that he could not kill a Class Three with his knife, the blades on the mutant’s arm were too long for that. So Skarr did the only thing he could, he placed a blaster bolt right into the thing’s head, but it kept coming.

The mutant swung its arm, trying to take Skarr’s head off. The young man ducked and rolled under the blade, coming up behind the Class Three. A few shouts drifted down the stairwell from the squad above, but Skarr couldn’t pay attention to them as the Class Three swung again. The squad leader retaliated with another shot to the creature’s face. The mutant screamed and lunged forward, swiping with the sharp blades. Skarr danced back and kept on firing with both blasters, attempting to push the creature back. The Class Three fell back, smoke trailing from several holes in its body. Balac came flying down the steps, blaster raised.

“About farking time!” Skarr said as he kicked the downed mutant. “Let’s keep moving.” The Mandalorian saluted quickly and the two of them ascended the steps to the rest of the squad.

Beta stepped forward, “Where to next, Skarr?” The squad leader held up a finger and checked the map.

“We’re going to keep going along this passage way. Our next stop will be the cafeteria, it’s right by the visitor center.” Skarr explained. “I guess this facility got enough traffic to actually have a visitor center.” The squad leader shrugged and motioned for the squad to keep moving.

OOC:
996 words

The last paragraph explains what's next. We're heading to the cafeteria next! Remember, we're trying to sneak past the mutants, but a small skirmish is okay now with our small ammo boost.
SL|CoT:A|PC/'2LT Skarr/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
[CDS] [ES2] [IH] [RoT] {RES} (VT) (ECA) (WtR) (3.1) (1.1) (1.2) (A5) (AS-2)
TRN/AC Vexus/Lopen/VEDJ
(WoS1)

"May God have mercy on my enemies, because I won't" General George Patton
"A leader leads by example not by force." Sun Tzu, The Art of War
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THX1138
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
August 7, 2012 4:23:37 AM    View the profile of THX1138 
Therex was standing near the middle of the group, keeping a close eye on Razor and HammerHead. It was nice to see Hammer again. After Jester had disbanded, Therex hadn't really stayed in contact with the others. He wasn't really a social butterfly.

Both of his fellow troopers were limping slightly, but HammerHead seemed to be suffering more. Usually this wouldn't have bothered Therex. Chiss thought that pain could be one of the best medicines, but Therex needed to help HammeHead pick up his pace.

Digging through a small satchel of med supplies, he really wasn't finding anything that could help long enough. He had syringes with various chemicals, a bacta patch, a roll of bandages, and a laser scalpel. not much, but he had already used up quite a bit. As he kept digging, he brushed aside a small vial that he had forgotten about.

It contained a small amount of a drug that Chiss soldiers would use from time to time because of it's benefits. It made you sharper, faster, and tougher. It had it's drawbacks though. Thinking it over, Therex finally concluded that he had no other choice. Tapping HammerHead on the helmet, he held up the vial and said, "You need a boost?"

HammerHead's voice came through the helmet filtered, but Therex could hear the obvious pain and struggle in the undertones.

"It wouldn't hurt," he said, groaning.

Nodding, Therex removed three more vials from his pouch and removed the rubber stoppers. Still walking alongside his wounded comrade, Therex began measuring out different amounts of each chem into an empty syringe. After he finished, he popped the seal on the smallest vial, containing the Chiss drug. Tapping it, he put a dash of it into his medical soup. On contact, the mixture turned a bright blue and almost started to bubble.

Sighing, he held up the syringe and removed a section of HammerHead's forearm armor. Beta slowed down to let Therex do his work. Therex was hoping that it would work. Mainly cause if it didn't, there was a 50/50 chance that his squadmate could die. His odds were slightly better being a Mando, but no one but Chiss had ever used this particular drug and survived, except one documented occasion.

For 20 minutes, a Mandalorian Bounty Hunter went from a shaking and bleeding wreck, to the slayer of an entire platoon. After the drug wore off, he had become hooked after only one dose. The Chiss thought it would have been a good chance to study the drug's affects on other species. But before they could detain him, the Mando went insane and killed five fully trained Chiss Marines with his bare hands.

Therex was using a smaller dose, hoping to merely give a slight boost and he had mixed it with other chems to dull the affect further and possibly remove any side affects. Sliding the needle through the undersuit, Therex dumped the whole mixture into Hammer's veins. Removing the needle slowly, he replaced the armor and stood back a ways. Soon, Beta followed suit as Hammer was able to stand on his injured leg.

"Phwoo Doc," HammerHead exclaimed, flexing his arms and clenching his fists. "What was in that stuff?"

Merely smiling at HammerHead, Therex closed his satchel.

"You'll hate me later," Therex said, "Either from the headache, or the inconvenient death."

Hammer's face may have been hidden by a helmet visor, Therex could almost see the look on his face.

"I'm kidding," Therex said, chuckling slightly. "If anything, you'll kill us first."

Without looking back, Therex readied his rifle and walked past a dumbfounded Hammer and a slightly worried Beta. The majority of the squad had kept moving, and Therex picked up the pace to catch up. They had arrived at a large room that Skarr had said was a cafeteria. Peeking around the doorway, Therex instantly spotted an issue. There were about six or so Class-I's ambling around the room, searching for something, most likely Eclipse, but who knew what these things wanted.

Maybe they just needed a snack.

Therex shuddered at the thought, and shook his head. Moving away from the door quietly, he stood with the rest of the squad as Skarr planned their next move.

OOC:
WC:707
Hope you guys like it. Hammer, you are not super powered or God modded, just a little harder, better, faster, stronger.
"He has his orders, and when a Chiss accepts orders he carries them out, period."

And now Autolite brings you Therex Whitestone, in Vast Empire, a tale well calculated to keep you in suspense.

TRP/LCPL THX-1138/4SQD/1PLT/1COM/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE [ES1][EW1][*QW 12*](ECA)(2.1)

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[This message has been edited by THX1138 (edited August 8, 2012 2:11:18 AM)]
ShanneTwoo
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  RE: Fear the Mutant (Eclipse ESC Topic)
August 8, 2012 3:10:54 AM    View the profile of ShanneTwoo 
OOC:
6/15


Terre was learning to ignore the voice in her head, though the constant digging into her memories, the projections of her subconscious, and the constant, numbing headache were annoying. She still had an adrenaline rush from her near suicide, and her heart still beat irregularly and erratically, her breath still came in harsh gasps. The shot had gone into the wall across from her, miraculously missing Razor, the impact point a small, melted piece of slag. Skarr had been surprisingly accepting of her actions, though she could read the concern etched into his features.

They found the weapons locker, and when her turn came, Terre stepped forward, giving it a quick scan. She grabbed some ammo for her blasters, knowing she would need plenty, and was about to turn away and make room for another squad member when a glint caught her eye. Digging through the various ammo packs, she found a knife, nearly identical to the one she lost earlier. Was that really today? Its blade was clean and shiny, between five and six inches in length, with a simply decorated handle. She turned the knife over in her hand, holding it with the blade pointing towards herself. She inclined her hand ever so slightly, watched the blade bite into her armor. She smiled.

"Sharp, isn't it?" the voice whispered. Terre ignored it, sliding the new weapon into her boot. Who knew when she would need it?

She turned away, lost in thought, fingering her blaster clips.

"I completely wasted that shot," she murmured to herself.

"What?" Therex had overheard.

"Nothing!" she said. I wasted a whole shot... Who knows who that could have saved?

"Could it have saved anyone?" the voice whispered.

Ah, we have improvement... Terre thought. It's only a whisper now...

"Whispers are more effective... You can rarely tell if it's yourself or a voice speaking..." Terre shuddered involuntarily, a cool breeze slithering up her back, even though there was no breeze to be had. She could swear there was someone, something breathing on her neck, a cold claw on her shoulder. She shook her head, trying to chase away the image.

"I'm a part of you now... You know I'll never truly go away."

Terre nodded. "I know. But I can try." She headed up the stairway, last of the troopers. A blaster report made her jump, and she spun around to see a Class Three attacking her squad leader.

"Skarr!" she cried, helpless. She couldn't risk firing one of her pistols, Skarr was too close. She knew her knife would be of no use. The best way for her to help would be to actually move and help...

But she was frozen in place. Finally, Balac pushed her out of the way, jumping down the stairs to back Skarr up. The mutant fell with a death rattle. Terre shuddered, looked at her feet sheepishly as Skarr and Balac stalked back up the steps. She trailed along behind the squad, blaster drawn, ready to help in any way she could. She was alert, and yet her senses were dulled by the hollowness she felt inside.

He could have died... And I didn't do anything to help... she thought with a heavy sigh. She turned a corner...

And nearly ran into HammerHead. She skidded to a stop just in time. They had arrived at the cafeteria. Peeking over shoulders, she saw a handful of Class Ones scattered about the room, searching, listening for that tell-tale scrape of a boot, the sound of armor clicking against a wall, anything to alert them to the squad's placement. Skarr motioned everyone back, and Terre was the first to comply, pussy-footing back to the hallway. Nervously, she looked both ways, looking for shadows, listening for the now-familiar thump-scraaape that belied a husk. She saw no sign, save some movement from the otherwise still cafeteria, and she obediently fell in beside Therex. She trusted his senses more than she did hers at the moment.

Standing here in the circle with her comrades, having just disappointed herself, she made a vow she was loath to break.

"I will never simply stand and watch a squad mate in trouble again."

Exhaustion threatening to overcome her, she sat down, her back against the wall, and took her helmet off, remaining close enough that she could hear the squad, but far enough away that she could have a precious few moments alone. She drew the knife out of her boot, turning it over and over in her hand. She took one of her modified gloves off and, curiously, placed the tip of her knife against her thumb. Almost immediately, dark blood surfaced.

"Damn it," she muttered, sucking on it. There was no pain, only a surface cut, but still a throbbing one. She slid the knife back into her boot, pulled her glove back on, ignored the throbbing in her thumb that echoed the pounding in her head, and closed her eyes, letting her other senses 'see' for her. Her ears told her the squad was talking about their next course of action, told her the Class Ones in the cafeteria were not aware of how close their prey really was. Her nose told her the husks were nearby, as was the squad. Her fingers, brushing the floor, told her that the squad was restless; she could feel them shifting. Touching the floor also told her that there was an unhappy beast somewhere close by; there was a constant rumbling, almost like thunder, rippling through the floor.

"You feel that?" the voice whispered. "That's me."

Grunting, Terre pulled herself to her feet, grabbing her helmet and slamming it on her head. She walked back to the squad just in time to catch the end of the conversation.

"--back to the cafeteria. There aren't that many, and we have more ammo," someone said.

"I agree," she said. "Maybe we can pick up some food while we're in there, too." Her stomach rumbled at the mention of metabolic fuel. She grinned sheepishly, flushing bright red under her helmet.

"If you want to go ahead, lead the way," Skarr murmured, his mood still clouded by the encounter with the Class Three. Terre gulped, then drew her blasters, steeling her nerves.

"Righto," she said, spinning around and firing into the cafeteria, catching a Class One that was just beginning to stumble out into the hallway. The other husks in the room fell silent, every one of them looking towards the doorway. Terre led the squad into the cafeteria, firing shot after shot at the husks.

And she didn't miss once.

OOC:
WC: 1,102

Criticisms appreciated, as always.
--Shanne

TRP/PSC ShanneTwoo/1SQD/1PLT/1COMP/1BAT/1RGT/Tadath/VEA/VE
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