Fox
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"Wraith, of the Kinigosi," the metal alien replied. "It is a pleasure to meet all of you; I hope for a good hunt." She disembarked by somewhat more mundane means than her companion, casting her gaze around the landing site and reaching out with finely-tuned senses for predators...or prey. "We will want to leave this area quickly," she noted, head rippling as she started to extend some odd spine-like structures before apparently thinking better of it. "If the ship was noticed, anything coming to investigate should not find us here. If the ship was not noticed, we gain time."
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Wraith just looked at the strange green man for a moment, trying to form the sum of her life experience into words. She was warrior caste, though, neither scholar nor artist - eventually she just shrugged. "You could accuse me of deceit, though it is not my preference. I am a hunter - I become what I must to better stalk and defeat my prey. I believe you are asking after my character, however, and not my body. I suppose...." "I suppose I am me," she replied, gesturing with three-clawed hands as if it was self-evident. "It is enough."
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Toughness Save vs. Antibody, DC25: 1d20+7 19 Ow. Fail by six; bruised & dazed. I'd reroll, but her odds wouldn't be good even then!
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Wraith's expression at the telepathy was difficult to read, in that her only facial features were her trio of eyes, but their expression as she turned to look at him was apparently...surprise? Surprise and a minor dislike for being touched mentally, maybe. "I am Kinigosi," she replied, aloud. Her metal form dropped from the ceiling, what had been her head splitting into a pair of humanoid legs while the rest of her formed a similarly humanoid upper body, eyes reappearing on the still-featureless but now-less-inhuman face. "And, no, I am not related to the Communion...nor am I mechanical or some form of nanomachine being," she added, having apparently had this conversation before. Still, her tone was polite as ever. "Though, yes, I am made of metal; we are shapeshifters. I do agree that this Communion is unworthy of being good prey, though - we have hunted worse, my friend and I, but not by much."
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Wraith glanced between Kimber and Tarva for a beat, eyes uneven in an approximation of a mildly disgusted raised eyebrow (which was, really, no small feat for a being with no eyebrows) - it was only a moment, though, before she remembered their surroundings and their situation. "...yes. We are leaving," she announced. It wasn't, apparently, an optional statement; already her form was shifting, dropping her to the ground on all fours. And what a four they were: lean, powerful, and multi-jointed, with heavy claws and what seemed to be powerful muscles that didn't quite connect to all parts of the leg, leaving gaps and an oddly skinless appearance. She gave Eve just long enough to grab Bluebird before sprouting three long, thick tails with grasping hands at the ends, each snagging a passenger (some more gently than others) as she oriented toward the corridor that led to freedom. Hopefully. "I am sorry for the whiplash," she apologized, and then there was a sound of metal on metal as she took off like a bullet, dragging friends and villain alike behind her. "I will attempt to control my speed to keep you from banging into things. I apologize in advance for bruises, too."
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This kinda thing is why I love shapeshift. Utility on a budget! Wraith shifts something terrible and weird: Additional Limbs 3 (+5 limbs) [3pp] Leaping 1 (x2; 32' long jump, 16' standing, 8' vertical) [1pp] Speed 2 (25mph / 250ft per move) [2pp] Super-Movement 1 (Wall-Crawling 1) [2pp] Super-Strength 1 (effective str. 29; 446lb light load) [2pp] 3+1+2+2+2= 10pp For the sake of my own math fun, Eve's a scant 110lb and presumably Kimber and Tarva together don't weigh more than 336 pounds; at 25mph Wraith could make a thousand meters in pretty good time - about a minute and a half, plus or minus going all-out and/or what obstacles she runs into. (I was tempted to do a clean 50mph, but it'd be over so fast! And, y'know, whiplash.)
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"You heard 'em, and if you weren't, start paying attention!" It was the most authoritative Eclipse had sounded yet - the kind of not-quite-bark that didn't demand respect, but came from experience having it. "Look to your left and right, team: your parents and friends taught you the buddy system when you were little terrors, and nothing's changed just because you're big ones now. Rule one: nobody gets left behind. Rule two: if you can't find me, form up under Jacia," she pointed toward the combat engineer from earlier; when one or two of her group started to protest she just cut them off with a vicious grin, adding, "because I said so, and because she's got explosives. If you can't find her, attach yourself to someone else's squad until you can find her or me." Her grin was downright cheshire-like by the time they'd reached their destination, and there was an awful ticking sound as her tail extended, spine-like segments separating as it reached its full length and coiled around her like a snake. "Cheer up, terrors. Soon we get to show the rest of these teams why we're the best."
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"<The language learning was not by choice,>" Wraith replied in English, with the flat tone of voice of someone who wasn't even enjoying the memory of those times much. Having been roommates, Ghost Girl would have had no illusions as to Wraith's impatience with sitting down and studying. "<My native language and...I think some Terrans call it 'galstandard'?...were easier; like many races, Kinigosi learn languages faster when very young. Earth languages were...not easy.>" Her head descended from her body like a drop of mercury, and she didn't so much turn to look at the screen as slide her three eyes around its surface to orient her view. "An urban area is good, though a mixed blessing," she noted, pausing to translate for Ghost Girl while memorizing as much of the area's layout as she could given the information on hand. "Plenty of cover, good hiding spots, excellent for stealth while still allowing for fast travel if needed. Good climbing. Many ambush sites and abundant opportunities for enemy emplacements, though; that may not work in our favor if they design ground defenses around their networks."
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"Stealth or not, might be our only option," Dragonfly mused, frowning. She'd almost been ready to suggest the creation of some kind of defense against the storms, but the sheer weight they brought to bear would mean that'd take more time than they probably had. Retrofitting stealth, too, against a being with who knew how many exotic senses.... She tapped a finger against her leg, frowning, and trying very, very hard to not calculate odds. "No sense waiting, then. Gorgon could have swatted us already; guarantee it either knows station is here, or doesn't care. Should start our work before it decides we're in its way."
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GK: Fortitude Save vs. Zero-G Sickness (1d20 + 13=18) Tiamat: Fortitude Save vs. Zero-G Sickness (1d20 + 10=21) Huzzah, fort-heavy characters.
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Gaian Knight tried not to think about how close the new scratches in his breastplate had come to being scratches in his own flesh - instead, he concentrated on spreading his arms wide, fingers spread, in apparent disregard of the two monsters trying to kill him and the one monster still coming his way. He gave the latter just enough time to get close before snapping his hands together - the Communion drones may or may not have followed the gesture, but the shards of stone that were lining both sides of the hangar certainly did. As his palms clapped together two near-solid walls of fragments slammed into the hero's foes, carrying each, tumbling, in their wake. He gave them just enough time to make sure they weren't going to get back up before exhaling, rocks clattering to the floor as he caught his breath and gathered his wits. "Gaian Knight here; hangar's clear...again. They're persistent, I'll give them that."
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Well! Alright.
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Right! Well. GK would like to not get clawed open by a heroic antibody, please, thank you. So: Standard Action: Area Blast. All three baddies if he can manage - preferentially the two non-heroics if he can't. DC23 Reflex, DC28 Toughness as before. SURGE: Standard Action: Obscure. 100' radius, all visual senses, independent, total fade after 10 rounds. Move Action: Disengage from melee with whoever's left, move away.
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Wraith hunched in thought, mind racing as she turned her head back the way they'd come and tried to calculate their path to here. "....we may require a new transport, and may need a faster way to get there. A place such as this must have ships - Bluebird, are they closer to us than the one we came in with, by the eyes? And you," she added, turning to Tarva. "I am likely the fastest person here," she noted - not bragging, just her own assessment. Even as she talked, one of her knees twitched, reversing as if to reform into something to match the conversation at hand. "If we require a fast exit, I can carry us, and perhaps protect others hazards for very, very short times." She didn't seem to like the prospect of that option much. "...but I cannot touch Ghost Girl. Is it within your power to allow me to carry her as well?"
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"So, uh...ma'am? Sir. Ma'am." Eclipse was watching Wander's leadership skills with great amusement when the voice appeared at her shoulder. She couldn't really bear to take her eyes off the little Terran's scene, but she did at least cock her head toward the soldier at her elbow, raising an eyebrow. "Hmm?" The soldier was young, and standard humanoid - hard to tell what species exactly, under that suit. Lor, maybe? "So, the, uh, the guys and I have a...disagreement? And if you're going to be our leader, we wanted to settle it. My dad was Lor military, see, and he described you and some ops team dropping in to help during some kinda raid on one of the moons at Anos - you're, uh, distinctive, I guess. Not that many cyber-tailed Alar, right?" "Guilty as charged," Eclipse replied, sounding amused. "I am wonderfully unique." "...I don't...okay. Right, so, thing is that the Kharg over there-" she paused, gesturing at a four-eyed bruiser type who was busy looking none too pleased and hanging back with the rest of the group, "-he says his brother rode with you during a Khanate raid on some convoy." "To be fair, it was a slaver convoy," she mused, waving at the Kharg - who responded mostly by looking even less pleased than before. "They kinda deserved it." "So...what, you're a pirate?" "Nope." "....so you're military." "No." "...then, uh." She paused, glancing down at the tail. "...so, whose side are you on?" "Usually mine," the grey-skinned cyborg replied, flashing the girl a grin. "And, today, yours. Tomorrow, too, probably - we'll see when we get there. I like you, kid - my group's got a big old Kharg and at least a couple mercs, and you - little scrap of, what, field engineer? - you're the one who talks to the scary cyborg lady. Congrats, you're officially my second-in-command," she announced, throwing her arm around the woman and turning them toward the rest of the team. "First order: tell me to my face when you think I'm wrong. Second order: introduce me to the rest of the group. I need to know what I'm working with before we arrive, because there's never going to be time after."
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Dragonfly brought a hand up as the battle spheres went off - her shield didn't come up quite in time for the entirety of the blast, bits of metal soundlessly scraping past one of her shoulder plates, but it bore the lion's share of the attack. The gravity blast, as it turned out, rather worked in her favor: it was almost visible as it interacted with the bent fabric of her shield and force field, streaming outward along their surfaces as it came and pulling the shrapnel with it. "Fine here," she replied, touching down on the lunar surface. "Lost a drone, but no other harm done. How long can you hold that shield, Jill? Can try to create something to shore up dome until safe evacuation - Miss Americana or I can - but might take a few minutes. Otherwise we need to evac now. While dealing with our unexpected guests. And hoping that ship doesn't come back."
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"If you were on them and are still here, they were not truly suicide missions," Wraith politely pointed out to her fellow ceiling-dweller, head rotating bonelessly to regard the hanging alien. "And I do not think we shall be so easy to kill. Or able to be killed, perhaps!" She punctuated the amused-sounding point by extending a tendril and poking it through Ghost Girl, taking a moment to quickly translate the conversation into English. "It is a useful advantage, I think. Besides, we are...hmm. Wandering into an insect hive? If we are quiet, and quick, and do no harm, we are perhaps beneath notice for long enough to get what we need and leave. Possibly."
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"Depends on the size of your stick," Dragonfly deadpanned, cocking her head at the projection. Under normal circumstances she'd have loved to study pretty much everything here in more detail: the station, its inhabitants, the technology, the physics of the gas giant (albeit not the giant itself; she wasn't much of an astronomer), the Gorgon. But she'd been close to the Gorgon before, part of the team who obtained a sample from it during the Earth invasion - she'd really, really hoped to never have to get close again. You don't always get what you wish for. "We might be able to help you with your signal, if it isn't reaching her. Doubt she thinks we're important right now. Creation is...interesting, though. Seemed more interested in preservation in earlier encounters; difficult to preserve a gas giant. Can't detect what she's doing through the gas layers?"
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Tiamat was still grumbling about the unsatisfactory size of human dwellings when she rounded the corner, boots skidding slightly on the floor as she belted down the corridor. "--at least twice as wide and half again as tall to even hope to permit any reasonably-sized creature - GK! I'm here, you stupid earthmover, so you'd better have left me something to play with and youuuu are not the knight." She slid to a halt as Comrade Frost and 'friends' came into view, the few locks of crimson hair that had escaped to slump across her face not quite managing to hide her confusion, and then her ire. "....of course," she growled, brushing the hair back. "Of course I'd somehow end up fighting alone with the ghoul. Tell you what, machines," she offered, cracking her knuckles and marching square-shouldered toward the antibodies, "you help me find an airlock to toss him out of and I'll kill you quick-like instead of having some fun first."
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Just got home, writing it now.
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"You can't just- you can't just up and leave the planet," the voice on the other side of the comm insisted. It matched the face on the screen: Lor, male, and exhausted. He looked like he hadn't slept in a week, and considering what had been going on, he probably hadn't. The poor witness security officer's job hadn't been easy when he'd had the full resources of the home Lor office at his disposal...and with that floating in space somewhere, dust or worse, he looked like he'd aged a decade since the last time Wraith had seen him. "How did you even get off-planet? You need to turn around and head back off that station, back to Earth, for your safety. Your parents will be worried sick." "My parents are willing to sit on Earth while people die!" Wraith insisted, three eyes narrowed into angry slits. "Just because Kinigos has not been hit yet does not mean it will not, and we do not have the population to fight even so well as your people did. We had citizens on Lor. I cannot sit idle-" She'd expected more argument out of him, but she cut off when she realized he was just...looking at her, over the comm. "....I had a daughter there, you know. Two cousins, too, and a granddaughter on the way. I can't even pay my respects because I'm too tied up keeping my charges from running off without any direction." "I...I am sorry. I did not mean to...." "...no, I don't think you did. Okay, listen, Dirinai," he continued, face difficult to read as he brought up something on a screen outside the comm's view. "I don't know half of what you've been up to on Earth, but the half I do know is terrifying. Under no circumstances are you to sneak onto any military transport vessels, like the one at dock 12, because they're all headed to Coalition bases from where you are. And you are absolutely not to make it to a base without being seen, because if they found out one of the universe's deadliest hunters made it all that way without being caught by the Lor's finest, they'd probably pull strings and look you up. And if they found half of what I've written, they'd find some use for you and that would be entirely unacceptable. You need to stay put, because I'm going to send a patrol transport over to pick you up. When I get around to it. So you can't have run off by the time they get there in maybe...three Earth hours. Do you understand?" Wraith's head cocked to the side, eyes widening to their normal almond shape as she took that in. "I...yes. Thank you, it...thank you." "Mm-hm. Don't thank me, you menace. Remember: stay put. And...give 'em hell." Amorphous metal beings had comparatively little need for seats - at least, seats not designed for them. It took about as much energy to hold herself into a seat-friendly shape as it did to just stand, so she'd opted to free the space by remaining as out-of-the-way as possible...which in this case meant clinging to the ceiling, a four-legged space-boogeyman hanging out above everyone's heads to give them more room to get comfortable. As comfortable as they could be on a little stealth ship, anyway. Getting this job had been surprisingly easy; Kinigosi had...something of a reputation, given their distinctly alien nature and the natural savagery of their comparatively untamed planet. Wraith was more concerned with coming back from this job than the occasional looks she got - but if she didn't come back, she'd at least go out doing something worthwhile. It was about all she could have asked for. And hey, with Ghost Girl along, she'd have someone to show her the spectral ropes....
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"Cheer up, kid." The voice, directed at Ekna Veiu, came from the grey-skinned cyborg - though, dressed up as she was, she could have passed for a normal fully-flesh person if it wasn't for the glowing purple irises that looked down at him, not unkindly, from black sclera. And the tail, of course: even now the long, segmented appendage flicked behind her, like something out of those Terran Alien movies, the heavy tip making little patterns in the air as it kept her stable on the transport. She hated these things; the inertial dampeners never worked right. She'd thought she wouldn't have to be on them again after leaving the Lor military, right up until she got a call from one of her old friends. An old friend with a debt to cash in on and someone with her particular...set of skills, to boot. "The trick to surviving is to not defeat yourself before the enemy has a chance. You're young and you've got something to prove - that makes you more dangerous than half of this ship." She flashed him a too-many-canine-teeth smile before making her way over to the others. "Not as much information as I'd like," she admitted, grabbing a landing strap for herself. Terran - that was always interesting. She'd expected the Lor - more Lor, really - and the blue guy was about her speed of weird alien, but the Terran had been a surprise. She'd heard rumors from the training grounds, though.... "But there never is, I guess. Wouldn't be half as fun, otherwise; I'm hoping we'll learn more when we get close. Or some military jerk is holding out on us...even odds, maybe."
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Nope, no English for Eclipse - just her native tongue and [generic space setting galstandard].
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Tagging.
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Tagging.
