<> <> <> <> * Zeke is Zeke Chezik, Slayer of Muppeloths. His drones that delivered bodies to Amadeus come back outside of the ship as he comms, ~The sloth-like beings are all dead or unconscious.~ * Tomas peeks back outside at Zeke's prompting, ~What? There were like 20 of them. Whatever. Let's get the other three goatees then.~ * Tomas dashes back out and past Zeke at full speed, ~You coming Lex?~ * Zeke starts walking forward. ~I believe it is likely there were ten of them, as I did not vaporize any.~ * Lexi continues to float towards the location of the other crew members. ~I'm already on my way, Mas.~ * Amadeus continues to frantically work on a nano-cure, hopefully with Kyle's help! He is no good at the robots. ~Aye, aye~ <> * Zeke just keeps his gun out. Both he and his birdsect are visually sweeping as the drones fan out in front of him. ~Perhaps they angered the sloth-like creatures as well.~ <> (I call dibs on the tech!) * Amadeus blinks and wows at that, definitely recording it away. (Lexi?) (Set of rustling? Meaning one of the baddies?) <> * Lexi quickly directs her gaze in the location of the rustling. ~Tomas! Look out! More creatures in the grass!~ <> (That seems likely, since he ran forward and I am just moving forward at a reasonable pace.) * Tomas continues running, but scans hastily in all directions, ~More sloppets? Where?~ <> <> ~There's one to your left! And another incoming from straight ahead!~ (Do they have heat signatures?) <> (Have I used that term before?) (Carbon/Oxygen, i.e. Earth-like life) (At some point. Maybe not here.) (So I can see them through the grass.) (Ish.) <> (1 KM IR.) (ha.) <> * Tomas scans more intently for the ones straight ahead, ~How far off, Lex?~ * Zeke's birdsect takes off from his shoulder as he and his team advances, swooping forward and up at about 60 miles an hour. <> * Zeke comms, ~If your visibility is limited, it might be good to retreat. Lexi, the remaining crew went this way, can you see them yet?~ * Tomas disappears from view for a moment in the tall grass. He's espied again launching forward into the air over and beyond the sloppets straight ahead, landing in a roll across the ground, back onto his feet, and into a run. <> * Lexi goes the direction that Zeke is indicating. ~Nothing yet, Z.~ < stimate, seem to be groups of ten. As Tomas plods onto the scene and Lexi floats in, their heads swivel to look at you with beady black eyes.>> * Lexi stops in mid-air. ~That's not good.~ * Zeke replies, ~What is not good.~ ~Sloppets. 100s of them.~ ~What now?~ ~We found the rest of the crew. There are 100s of sloppets surrounding them.~ ~They're just kind of sitting there though. Mostly looking at us.~ * Lexi nods. ~Right. Well... Time to go. Tomas... you may want to run.~ She grabs the crewmembers with TK and starts to fly away with them in tow as fast as she can. (Wow, she called Tomas by his name!) (I know... that was my mistake.) (She must be sobering up.) (He's standing there stunned right now, wondering who she's talking to.) <> (PHONE PICTURE UPLOAD TIME) <> * Lexi continues flying away. ~Huh... there's some weird symbol thing on some doors down here.~ * Zeke doesn't fly away. Or walk away, as the birdsect lands back on his shoulder: it's not worth trying to fly over the forest and see things. ~ Doors indicate construction. ~ * Amadeus sounds tense: ~If you feel you have to investigate, can you do it after you bring the other crew members back?~ ~Construction indicates civilization.~ * Tomas nods and follows Lexi back to the ship. * Zeke lets Tomas and Lexi retreat, but his drones move forward to look at the door. <> <> * Tomas scoops up an unconscious sloppet on his way back to the ship! <> <> * Tomas chucks the unconscious sloppet into one of the many cages in the cargo hold. * Zeke doesn't shoot anything yet as he and the drones examine the door. Good times. (Can I set up a testing environment for it, or would that take too long?) ~Should I grab cages for when the Black Orchid crew comes to?~ * Amadeus bites out an annoyed, ~No,~ as he finishes his work on the nanites. <> <> * Amadeus finishes his tiny, tiny controlled environment testing and takes a long breath. "Time to see if this works," he mutters to Kyle as he fills a syringe, wipes down the first crew member's arm, and administers the shot. (Roll SCIENCE!) <> <> (Apparently I'm so awesome I don't HAVE to roll SCIENCE!) * Amadeus monitors for a little longer, then starts shooting up the other crew members. Hooray for SCIENCE! * Zeke's drones stop, and he comms, ~The sloth-like creatures are actively protecting the door.~ * Zeke's drones slowly skitter back. * Amadeus responds, and he sounds much calmer than before: ~Well, I can tell you this: with the amount of amphetamine they likely go through when stressed and their sizes, they're bound to crash after about half an hour. So if we ever actually want to get through that door...~ * Tomas laughs, ~We just need to rile them up and wait?~ * Lexi lands after floating the crew members in. "Okay... so now what do we do?" ~They have not begun attacking yet.~ <> ~Rile them up and survive, yes.~ * Amadeus goes about making the Black Orchid crew more comfortable, now that he's not entirely focused on saving their lives. ~With flight capabilities, that should be straightforward.~ * Zeke starts going back to the ship for real. ~You suggesting we take potshots at them from the lander, Z?~ ~Or the Fate Breaker itself, yes.~ (Assuming I'm not jumped, I could even get back to the ship!) <> * Tomas gazes out a porthole at the approaching Zeke and thinks, ~Any chance you could turn those nanites into a vaccine for this virus, Doc? Assuming we're going to go exploring, of course.~ ~No. The best chance they have for survival is getting back to RNYC immediately. So we should definitely do that.~ ~We can come back - we'll probably have to, if only to drop them off.~ ~There's serious cell damage here...~ ~It may be possible to pilot their ship back to Mars.~ ~Whatever we do, can we please do it soon?~ * Lexi shrugs. ~Just tell me what you want me to fly, and I'll fly it.~ * Zeke and his drones all load up on the ship, and he closes the airlock. ~There is little benefit to flying their ship back for them immediately. If they need medical attention, returning now should be reasonable.~ ~Right, let's do that.~ ~Let's get them back. I'd hate for our first mission after suspension to be a failure because one of Don Goatee's people died on us.~ ~While they're laid up and without ship we can come back and check this door out.~ * Lexi nods and hops into the cockpit. ~Alright! Prepare for take off!~ <> * Zeke is very clean. <> <> (Well, we pretty much get to keep the muppet in the cage.) (Guess it's time to jump back. Does anyone have any specific gear they want to get?) ( I'm diseased! :D) (And quarantined, thank you.) (What would it take to refine the nanites to something more stable that we could use as a backup for suit slashy?) (I wonder if anti-sonics would be of any worth, personally, but beyond that...) (Zeke's good to go back.) <> <> (Seems like it. I can't think of any research outlets to find out more on this.) <> <> <> * Zeke sends his birdsect out to check if the door's being mass-guarded again. "Is the aerial attack still acceptable?" <> ~I highly doubt they have the ability to sprout wings and fly, so it should be fine - assuming they return to guard the door, anyway.~ * Zeke nods and comms, ~They are still in the trees, and will likely return to guarding the door as we approach.~ (Best explorers ever. "Strange guarding behavior from animals. What should we do?" "NUKE THEM FROM ORBIT") (I do not want to nuke them from orbit. :/) (We just wanna rile them up, then tuck them in for a nap.) (I just want to throw rocks at them until they pass out.) ~Right.~ * Syzix is now known as Kyle (Okay, I am finally return after many delays. What's going on?) <> (Well, all we really need to do is lay down significant enough covering fire to freak them out.) (If Lexi doesn't think she can fly it, she should say so! Zeke's just gonna shoot things. He's very multipurpose.) (She'll try!) * Lexi shrugs at Zeke. "I'll try and fly the Fate Breaker through the forest. Hell, I'll try anything once." (HA, you can't anyhow, the ship's not Hover.) We should only need to fire enough to anger the guardians. (Or is it?) (No, seriously, is it? It doesn't appear to be on the stats.) (Flight is always omnidirectional unless you stat it otherwise.) (Okay then.) <> (I kinda have to be hanging off the ship or something. <> (Oh. Even better.) (Let's blow some shit up!) (SO DO IT) (I'm playing the guns today? Sweet.) (I'll gun too to speed this up. I gun on occassion.) (Someone has to! Nobody else is actually doing anything.) (What? I'm not a gun person. D:<) (We only have one helper on the ion cannons. I'll get it.) (That's what I was looking up.) (ahh. Go for it then, boxcar.) * Zeke is totally personning the ion cannons, and when they're ready, he'll say, "Firing," and fire a loud autofire blast into the scenery. Gotta chew up that scenery! So, hit'em from the sky? * Tomas watches out the front view window, ~We don't have to hit em. Just scare em a bit.~ (why are you talking in comms <_<) (~Because we can.~) (That, I don't know! That's why I used "s!) * Grysar has quit (Ping timeout) (Because h8 u.) (I assume I'm in the lab, looking at the crazy mupploth!) <> I believe it is time to go. * Lexi nods. "Right!" She pulls up hard to get the ship into space as fast as possible. * Amadeus moves out to the lobby once the thuds start hitting the ship and looks out the windows. "Oh god." (Ha ha. You're gonna put us up in vacuum? HUNDREDS OF DEAD MUPPELOTHS) (Yes!) <> (It solves the problem!) (That's really terrible. You're all horrible people. :() (We don't even know how many exist! :() (Someone can mention to Lexi that she probably shouldn't kill them all) Oh god, what the hell? (Oh, it hasn't happened yet? Cham put the apocalypse in the brackets.) (Oh well... maybe it did!) < (That's better) <> * Lexi looks back to Zeke. "Z! What's the plan now?" Is there any way you can shake them off without killing them? Spinning seems most effective. * Lexi shrugs. "Well I can try. Hang onto something... and uh don't throw up on my clothes." She puts the ship into a tight spin. * Zeke gets a hand on the console, because man, he's good at figuring this out. * Tomas braces. (:< .v. >: ) (What is that? ....) (Spinning Mupploth.) <> (The whole planet is soft.) (Maybe to a robot!) <> (Woot!) (beep) * Zeke says, once they've stopped spinning, "Now we wait for them to tire." <> Duuuuuude. They're out cold. Like, completely cold. * Amadeus looks out carefully at them. Asleep, or? * Zeke heads towards the airlock. "Then we should get inside quickly." * Kyle suits up. "Totally." * Amadeus is suited, and he moves, still not quite hiding his concern. But when isn't he concerned about something? * Tomas has had his suit on the whole time, so he exits the cockpit and heads doorward. <> <> ~So, odds that there's, like, rotten food on the other side of this door?~ ~I do not know. However, the shape is reminiscent of the movements they made.~ * Zeke heads up to try and open it, drones flanking. ~So it seems to have importance.~ ~Just to let you people know, it's about ten minutes before their normal activity level returns.~ ~Who stays behind to clear them again for our escape?~ <> * Lexi looks the door up and down... ~I'm not even sure how to open it... Oh! Do you think it's a code word!?~ She clears her throat and says in her most mystical voice ~Gynant Onic!~ * Zeke's drones start picking up and moving muppeloths. ~We have it covered.~ <> * Zeke tries to get the grip anyway. ~It is very slick.~ * Lexi sighs. ~Well I'm out of ideas.~ * Tomas steps up and tries to help Zeke open the door. * Kyle looks for any writing on the door. Maybe it says 'Speak friend and enter' or something. * Amadeus tries to look for an opening mechanism as well. Maybe there's a doorbell! * Lexi shrugs. ~I can try to move it open... you know with telekinesis or something.~ <> * Lexi concentrates on trying to open the door in some direction with her TK. * Zeke, if the door continues to not open, looks at the symbol for, like, sensors in the grooves or something. (Did you have a picture of this symbol?) * Kyle hmmms, and walks in a figure eight? * Lexi just walks up and touches the symbol to see how it feels. (http://i51.tinypic.com/25rnxon.png) (And then Lexi's and Zeke's fingers meet... o/~) (That is so shitty. I have it on graph paper, it's better.) (... it's a mobius strip.) (Like, it's a 2D representation of a mobius strip.) (That's a mobius strip, yeah.) (Yeah, but that's very hard to visualize when I say it like that.) (Point taken.) (Anyway! Any sensors or anything I can see?) <> <> * Kyle blinks and glances at Lexi. (Lexi can do it, can't she? I mean she has like 5 heads anyway, it's not like she can't work them with TK AND her actual hands) (She can, that's why I didn't exclude her.) <> (I'm assuming a drone can't squeeze through yet?) * Tomas snarls and pulls harder. * Lexi sticks her hands in the opening in the doors and tries to pull them open with her hands as well... <> * Kyle tries to see the glintingness! * Lexi reaches for whatever is glinting. <> * Amadeus tries to get a look through the crack so he can see whatever it is. * Lexi looks it over. ~Huh... Check this out...~ She floats it back out the door for people to see. * Kyle whistles and floats it closer to himself and the rest of the group. * Amadeus looks it over. ~Strange. I've no idea why the creatures would protect it so fervently.~ Speaking of, he checks the time. <> ~We should be getting out of here, shouldn't we?~ * Lexi nods. ~Yeah. Probably.~ She heads back to the ship, still keeping the doors open, until Zeke and Tomas let go. * Amadeus moves out! ~Ready, Z?~ * Zeke replies, ~Yes,~ and then lets it go. * Tomas lets go on Yes, then nods and heads to the ship. <> (THUD!) <> (And this is probably a decent place to stop.) (Hokay.) <>