4623/New and Old, Two Worlds Collide

New and Old, Two Worlds Collide
Date of Scene:	01 October 2016
Location:	Void - Space Ways
Synopsis:	When Old meets New.
Cast of Characters:	1054, 1046, 1048, Kotone Yamakawa, 673

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Elise Leroy (1054) has posed:
    Downtown Lyons, France. A small UFO has smashed into the side of a skyscraper. The civilians in the local area have evacuated and a UN cordon has been set up to give XCOM Troops enough time to get in, clean up and get out with the alien materials, and corpses. Kotone'd be able to zero in on Big Sky's signal because her permissions are still valid, bringing the Resistance Skyranger in very nearby.

    Strike One is already on the ground. Elise, along with her personal retinue, Mayhem, Spire, Jackhammer and Bishop, along with a rookie who looks nervous. Jackhammer might make the new XCOM arrivals take a second glance, the MEC Trooper clanking heavily across the building rooftop. "Fan out! Don't bunch up or the Muton's will get really grenade happy!" she says this mostly for the benefit of the rookie. The others are multi-mission veterans.

    The Commander gets a call from an unexpected source. "Samsara...? Firebrand?" she frowns, as Big Sky takes off, and the dull roar of a second Skyranger begins to echo with both in the area. "Strike Elements, we've got friendlies incoming, check your targets."

Samira Amirmuaz (1046) has posed:
    The short amount of time aboard the Avenger had been a frenzy of activity the moment that a squad had been called forth to... To go and help the old XCOM? That's what some people were saying, coming down from staff on the Bridge. Nobody can really believe that it's possible; the senior staff, Samira herself, had a hard time believing it too.

    That didn't stop any of them from grabbing their gear and moving into the Skyranger with their game faces on.

    Central's briefing on-route is terse and simple: protect the soldiers of old XCOM and eliminate all targets with extreme prejudice. Thompson the Gunner, Olivera the Specialist, and Kelly the Assault had been chosen to come along for this one. It's not long before the Skyranger's ramp light turns green and the door opens, ropes descend from the hatch, and the Resistance XCOM members dive for the ropes and down to the ground.

    "This is Firebrand. Menace 1-5 is on the board. Moving to minimum safe distance... If they need an evac, let me know quick."

    The Skyranger zooms off as quickly as it'd arrived, leaving the group in a small strand of buildings roughly ten meters south of the other group's position. Given their shabby uniforms, they don't really look much when compared to MECs and professional soldiers... but at least there's no rooks here this time.

Young Arthur (1048) has posed:
Arthur is aboard Samira's skyranger, and when it lands, he comes out. He does not look like an XCOM soldier, but he does look like a professional solder... from another time. Clad in white, with chain below his tabard, and a steel helmet to obscure his face.

A long, white kite shield strapped to his left arm, and a well-made steel sword in his right hand. Short and slender, but moving with the kind of confidence and care of someone raised to be a soldier. Someone whose combat training started the day he was old enough to walk.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa had manged to get a call off to the local XCOM, she felt it was the right thing to do, and hopefully prevent friendly fire as this is the last thing she'd like to. Shje's coming in with the Avenger crew and she's all suited up she hopes her actions can stop any combat between the two groups. She is on edge though given the level of firepower the X-rays had been using on this world. She pings her signal to both sides as she gets ready to move it's not long before she's off the ranger and moving out, cloaking but it's damn good to see that Elise's people are all right.

Rory White (673) has posed:
The Cognizant Odyssey arrives in Earth orbit in no time at all. A thin beam of light spears from it down through the clouds and to the ground at lightspeed, about 20 meters from the Skyranger! It's a teleporter signal that Leroy at least has seen before, courtesy of the Starbound Flotilla.

    And soon a new signal joins the S.C.O.P.E. Network, ID 'Seraph.' Rory White.

    She emerges from the teleport beam already geared up for battle, her skintight bodysuit of metamaterial weave armor on display and currently shaded dark for better camouflage. A few weapons are mounted to hardpoints across her body, though she's carrying some kind of ballistic rifle. A tiny Saucer, this one modified with unfolding panels and manipulator limbs - it very much resembles a Gremlin when it does that - floats along with her, pinging the area with plenty of sensors.

    "And Seraph taking the field. It's been a while with no contact, Commander Leroy!"

Elise Leroy (1054) has posed:
    Jackhammer shifts position as the order to 'move up' comes through. The MEC Trooper hefts his Railgun, while the rest check their Laser Rifles and disperse into cover.

     Elise remains near the back, covering the group with her sniper rifle. It's a modified Barret .50cal, instead of the normal lighter weapon.

    The first aliens come into view. A pod of six Sectoids, the smaller varient, almost chimpanzee-like and frail seeming. These are accompanied by a hulking Muton and a pair of Thin Men. They know something's up, but don't seem to know exactly where the XCOM group(s) are... until Elise opens up with a booming report. The rocket-propelled Reaper Round lancing out to slam into the Muton's armoured shoulder, making it roar in pain. "All units, engage at will."

Young Arthur (1048) has posed:
Arthur rushes around slightly, to allow himself to charge at the Muton from a direction that approximately matches Elise and her troops, he's quiet, not speaking, just acting. When he gets up close and personal with the muton, he attempts to bash his shield into the lower end, to stagger it.

That's followed up by striking with his blade, the weapon aimed for the unwounded shoulder. It's a well-made sword, entirely mundane, and that Muton should be able to tell by experience that the young squire is stronger than he looks. Much stronger.

Samira Amirmuaz (1046) has posed:
    Back in the Avenger, Samira is sitting at the edge of her seat, watching the live feed coming from the Brazilian Olivera's GREMLIN. As ordered, the gang of guerilla fighters don't join with the rest of the force; instead, they creep along in cover with Kelly at their head, using the buildings to make sure that the aliens can't see them until it was too late for them to do anything about it. Still, even the slightest mention of Thin Men sets her teeth on edge. For just a moment, she can see a flash of one smirking down at her... But the vision fades when she shakes her head quickly and grips the arms of her chair on the Bridge.

    Eventually, the team came to where the aliens were standing around like idiots, hunting for their prey. Too bad they didn't know they were on the menu this time: the members of the Resistance quietly and slowly inserted themselves into cover, behind benches and lamp posts and building walls, as close as they dared get without being spotted. Once Elise starts off the party, though...

    "OPEN FIRE!" Kelly shouts, jumping up from behind a piece of rubble a few meters away from the Thin Men, starting the salvo with 12-guage buckshot. The rest of them join in, with Thompson aiming his minigun for the Muton Elise had shot at while Olivera starts herself off by plugging rifle shots at one of those non-swole Sectoids.

Elise Leroy (1054) has posed:
    The Muton roars defiantly at Arthur, but collapses under the weight of strength from the young Squire, the firepower of the XCOM troopers and their allies, and the wound already inflicted from the crash.

    The Thin Men hiss in a reptillian way and leap clear of the ambush, springing powerfully up onto nearby rooftops, before levelling their plasma rifles on the XCOM Troops. Green, searing plasma rains down from the two Thin Men.

    Jackhammer turns his Railgun on one of them, firing a burst of three hypersonic projectiles which collapse the roof and kill the alien in a burst of poisonous gas which lingers near the corpse. Mayhem, Spire and Bishop fan out to flank the other Thin Man, and open up on the Sectoids.

    The little Grey aliens look afraid, huddling behind cars and fences, while red beams of light lance out, searing away their cover, and striking the fuel tank of the car, setting it off in a fireball.

Rory White (673) has posed:
THIN MEN! Of all the things here, those are definitely the most dangerous, Rory's pretty sure. Least dangerous to her, for she cannot suffer poisoning... but the others, that is not so.

    Her Saucer gains height swiftly. Even if the Thin Men have taken their positions atop a building and her vantage is blocked... that doesn't mean that what her two eyes cannot see, she can hit.

    The Saucer clears the skyline, giving her a firing solution that her software quickly calculates. She takes aim with her rifle and...

    It spits hot metal! Shaped bullets with nanite-surfaces that make fine adjustments on the fly - literally! - for maximum accuracy and impact. The bullets will not do quite so well when they're piercing two or three walls to reach their targets, but hopefully the Thin Men will get pelted by a few of them ripping up from their footing!

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa gets her elf hooked up to any network that XCOM or Rory has up. She's already moving in as she spots the Thinmen she knows how to deal with this and she scoots ahead with her riflen and will be trying to draw fire, she moves about like someone out of a Wuxia movie as she fires off shots trying to draw alien fire from the rest of the boots on the ground. She being wreckless yes, but the thought of if her stunt means one other person gets out of this fight alive? It's worth it and Arthur is something new she's not sure wat to think of the young man but he is staring down a Muton...and not showing any signs of fear.

<<I'll keep trying to draw their fire.>>

Samira Amirmuaz (1046) has posed:
    The ambush hadn't been able to completely eradicate the pod, tis true, but at least one Thin Man and one Sectoid go down in a hail of bullets and buckshot, while the Muton goes down to concentrated fire from Thompson and Arthur smashing it's brains in. All in all, not entirely that bad! But, now they were exposed. Thankfully, with everyone else taking part in the assault, the team of Resistance fighters didn't need to be too afraid of being suddenly drowned in plasma fire.

    That said, Now that they were live, it was time to tip the odds just a little more in their favor. Olivera reaches into her belt to drag out their Flashbang to throw it towards the cluster of little scared aliens. They'd learned from home that a Sectoid couldn't focus enough to do a lot of their psionic crap after getting hit like that. That left Kelly to dash for cover near the burning car, startling one of the tiny Greys when she drags out her sword, and swipes - clearing one of it's head.

Young Arthur (1048) has posed:
With the Muton down, Arthur strides forward to one of the sectoids, passing by the car as it explodes. His instincts are good, and he ducks and rolls as it happens, but his tabard is singed and the edges of it are still burning. Apparently this 'White Squire' isn't afraid of getting hurt, as he strides forwards regardless of that fact.

Then, when he gets as close as he'd like, shield raised forward in the approach to try to catch any shots that may come his way, his sword seeks to behead one or more of these little aliens.

Elise Leroy (1054) has posed:
    Rory's shots rip through the Thin Man from below, earning a shriek of surprise and pain, before the roof collapses underneath it, and a plume of poison erupts from within the building. The Sectoids tremble, fearful, pitifully weak little things that they are. They shriek when blasted by the flashbang, and then Kelly charges in, slashing through one, while the Squire gets another.

    The remaining Sectoids scatter and try to run, but are gunned down by a mix of projectile firearms and lasers, bullets tearing flesh, and lasers searing it.

    "All Strike Elements, we're detecting no further activity within the AO. Boards are clear, come on home." chimes Bradford.

Kotone Yamakawa has posed:
Kotone Yamakawa does her job at pulling fire o9ff her allies and she gets a few sectoids as they run alng with everyone else. She hears teh call from Central that the last alien is down she lowers her weapon and relaxes a bit. She hangs back to look over the carnage and is oddly not thinking about that, she's jut happy Elise and the rest seem to be all right.

Samira Amirmuaz (1046) has posed:
    The AO goes blessedly quiet as the last of the aliens were eradicated, allowing the members of the Resistance XCOM to leave their cover and relax. Olivera and Thompson start ribbing and joking with each other while they come out to wave to the members of the other strike team. How relaxed and unprofessional! Kelly, at least, starts working with some decorum - specifically dragging one of the Thin Men corpses behind her towards their evac point. Maybe the Commander can mount the fucker's head somewhere as a symbol of defiance.

    Once Elise comes to join them, Thompson and Olivera do shape up again with quiet coughs, and allow her to take the lead... Kelly drags her blue flare out from her belt and tosses it to the ground, giving the signal for pickup.