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Samira Amirmuaz     A futuristic Earth on the surface

    Across the planet surface, people had been spending the past several days preparing for Unification Day. The city centers were filled with densely packed people, all filled with excitement as they went about on their last few errands before they went home, or to designated plazas to watch the Speakers annual Unification Day address.

    However, not everyone was here to partake in merrymaking.

    The coordinates sent on the old XCOM channels leads the gang to the streets of New Providence in what was formerly the Eastern United States, now known as Precinct 5. The city center is actually quite pleasing to look at, if a tad sterile; the buildings were composed of clean white and grey walls mixed with glass, while plazas along each of the blocks showed off various forms of greenery contained by upraised white walls. Most of these streets were well-lit by ground lighting and street lamps, while others were lit by brightly glowing holographic displays variously showing off Gene Clinic shots, ADVENT Burger advertisements, and news shows helmed by attractive (by various means of attractive) hosts.

    The easiest things of note, however, were twofold. One, the streets were absolutely packed, at times rubbing shoulder-to-shoulder as they made their way along cleaned and manicured sidewalks. The second thing was the soldiers: ADVENT troopers in black and red, most of their faces obscured by their large helmets, were patrolling most of the street corners and checking I.D.s with biometric scanners. Whenever someone gets tagged for an I.D. check, they raise their hands and call out in a harsh alien tongue while the person in question raises their hands and waits further instruction. Thankfully for the group, the crowd is so large theres no way they can scan them all.

    What ISNT to be seen is anyone who might have sent that transmission. Everyone here looks like either a regular civilian, or ADVENT.

    Some of the news casters are actually talking about the terrorist attack last night, calling the attackers by such terms as deplorables, murderers, and paranoid, delusional terrorists by anchor and pundit alike. It seems theyre all working on a holding pattern while they wait for the Speakers address which is kindly given a timer at the bottom corner of each of the screens in view. Ten minutes.
Courier Six     If you were to ask Johnny, which you probably aren't he'd say that this place was too much of a good thing. You got your fancy alien shit, your 'happy people', you 'very obvious police presence', and your 'occasional acts of brutality'.
    That said, Bradford had been a good fellow nad X-Com a trading partner back in the day. And if they managed to survive in a place like this, well. They deserved to get their shot. The old cowboy probably looks a bit out of place though, what with the heavy duster and the Pip-Boy on his wrist. There's also an air of 'please start something' about him, as he scans the crowd, cheerful enough with the civilians, but carefully working to avoid the Federales.
Alexis Maaka     Maaka was quick to respond when she got the message. The old XCOM frequencies aboard her ship had been dead for months, but this kind of activity was enough to get her curious.

    She and Kotone had been on-site for the past couple hours, using the alleyways for cover as they made their way through Precinct 5. "Unbelievable..." She mutters through her helmet, voice filtered by the mask. "The XCOM we knew would never have stood for this. Think they're the ones who sent the message?" She asks, EM rifle in hand as she covers an alleyway the cyborg advances down.

    Ten minutes till the big address, they need to get moving if they're gonna make it in time.
Reina Kinney The moment Reina Kinney turned on the news and heard about the terrorist attack, almost immediately her thoughts went into high gear. The familiar symbol, the method of operandus, all of it... it was too similar to what she'd dealt with when XCOM was still around. She'd thought that the extraterrestrials (or whatever they were called) were finished, but apparently, she forgot the golden rule of being in the Multiverse.

Expect nothing and be ready for anything.

Unlike some of the others, Reina had teleported down from her personal craft, and then attempted to blend in so she wouldn't look out of place. Despite the fact she was attempting to look like an ordinary person doing their ordinary thing, there was a sign of anxiety on Reina's face which those who were good at reading faces might detect. Which is why she keeps her face down for the most part, trying not to look at anyone for any reason.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone's long experience in the multiverse had learned to never judge a world by it's surface that would be fatal in some cases. She and Alexis has been here for some time, it seemed mostly peaceful but she saw a heavy armed forces presence but then again given the holiday and the terror attack. There was something about the armour the ADVENT troopers wore was disturbing to her she'd seen similar armour, hell she'd worn it. Yet she'd remained hidden she was on edge something didn't feel right here, her Ghost kept whispering that much to here. She'd kept cloaked, checked public access wifi and any public broadcasts she could find at all. She clutched her battle rifle which didn't match the rest of her kit, it as clunky a bit dirty and had hatchmarks on it's butt from alien kills in the past.
Staren     Staren travels with Maaka and Kotone. Given what the ADVENT troops are wearing, if anyone caught a glimpse of his power armor, it'd be immediately obvious as 1. combat armor and 2. not ADVENT. That's why, for the moment, he wears a chameleon cloak like a hooded poncho. It might not stand up to advanced sensors, and there's an obvious blur when he runs, and he can't effectively fight in it, but if he slips up and gets spotted, it might buy him a chance to escape -- or a few seconds to surprise attack.

    He knows this is not the XCOM Earth he visited previously. The coordinates are different. His guess is an alternate universe of some sort.

    The obvious presense of Big Brother constantly checking random citizens is a concern, but Staren doesn't want to guess too much about what's going on. Perhaps this is an alternate universe where America happens to be a tyrannical regime when the Ethereal war starts. Or maybe this is the future and someone used the chaos of the Ethereal War to take over America. Who knows?

    Staren would /like/ to know. That's why he's having his systems automatically scanning TV and radio signals (do they still have those?) and wireless networks, trying to find a connection to get more information on what's going on.
Rory White Sensing something was amiss shortly after examining the coordinates of this mysterious message, Rory White's decided to come in discretely. Her bluenette morph's lacking the traditional flowing robes and the hair's been bound into a ponytail softly bound to her back to keep it out of her face. Well yes, she has blue hair in a world without it, but that's probably not so odd when people can dye it...

    The fact that she's in SKINTIGHT METAMATERIAL ARMOR would probably stand out, but she can't stand out - she's sticking to alleys and side ways wherever possible...

    But she doesn't really need to move around much because hovering at twice the height of most buldings is a small silvery frisbee-like drone that just wobbles to and fro in the heavens. Its propulsion source isn't apparent to the naked eye, and it's communicating in only short bursts of encrypted laser light to hide it from wifi sweeps...

    This eye in the sky is what Rory's using to see goings-on...
Samira Amirmuaz      Johnny's presence certainly isn't ignored by the populace at large. His attire is archaic compared to the simple, clean lines and muted tones of the people around him, and it earns him more than a few stares. Meanwhile, a PA blares away not far, calling on all citizens to 'report suspicious activity to your nearest peacekeeper. Only you can keep your home safe!' The cheeriness of the announcement's tone would probably make it clear how common this is. As he goes he winds up passing near a light post guarded by a Trooper and a red-clad officer (with a swank heroic scarf), the lamp post beeps and sends out a scan!... To the person directly to his left, who gets stopped and checked. Lucky gambling Johnny. Reina gets a similar scare, but with the crowds as they are there's little chance that they'd be picked out directly.

    Most of the rest of the gang is trying to be sneaky by staying away from the main thoroughfares, and that's probably the best idea considering the covert nature of their contact. Not much is turning up on radio scans, though wifi and internet pulls up some information about Unification Day, along with the rest of the Big Brother easy-to-digest stuff. Unification Day, it seems, was the day when the 'Elders' convinced the remaining Earth governments to surrender unconditionally and form into the ADVENT Coalition.

    That was, evidently, twenty years ago.

    The timer runs out, and the various pundits and anchors announce the commencement of the speech. The camera shifts immediately to a lectern set in front of a screen displaying a golden ADVENT symbol over a red background. A second later a somewhat tall and thin man dressed in snappy, understated black clothing steps up to the platform... his eyes covered by round glasses, an easy smile on his lips, and what appears to be some skin discoloration like scales along his collar.

    "A small number of dissidents again repeat the mistakes of the old world, striking as we celebrate the benevolent savior who time and again offers only friendship and compassion." A few of the screens display what appears to be ADVENT police actions against ratty-dressed humans wielding old ballistic weaponry.

    "Yet these trivialactions could never break the bonds between the humanity, and the Elders." Hhe lifts his hands in reverence, smiling joyously. The screens shift, images displaying thousands of ADVENT troops and white MECs saluting and marching, lead by red-clad Captains.

    The image flashes back to some pundits, who smile as they proclaim that 'pre-emptive arrests of known terrorist sympathizers' are occuring as they speak. Some video is shown of people's homes being broken into, people being thrown into the street and into the back of black vans.

    THey had already figured it out, but something is... definitely wrong here.
Courier Six     BEEP BOOP PAPERS PLEASE. Johnny clicks his teeth as Lady Luck passes his way once more, turning that scanner to the left instead of the right. He rolls his neck slightly and fiddles with his collar an the radio built into it. "This ain't cool. Any one-a those scanners will see all the crap I've got packed up in my duster, man. And I din't come loaded heavy. I could have but I didn't."
    ...Come on X-Com, give us a sign here.
Alexis Maaka     Maaka frowns behind her helmet. No local comms, not even a radio station of some sort. That's giving her enough reason to be worried about the fog of war here. She tries scanning for any sort of wireless signal using her comms software, all the while trying to get a good look at the crowd from the alleyways.

    "...that's a fuckin' Thinman." She growls, crouching behind a trash bin with her rifle shouldered. Maaka remembers the interrogation she took part in with a Thin-Man prisoner, and the guy speaking is hitting most of her checkboxes. "Looks like they upgraded their disguises, not to mention acting skills."

    She tries to get a good look at an MEC, studying the mechanized trooper carefully.
Staren     Staren hides in the shadows of an alley as he watches the TV broadcast. Hooray for humanity being really, really slow to change broadcast format standards! He doesn't see anything odd about the man -- the disguise is that good. He goes back and looks again when an ally declares it a Thin Man, and he /still/ can't tell. Could they be paranoid? Still, /something/ is obviously up here, and the reverence for the 'Elders' seems to all but ensure that this is a Bad End timeline. Shit. <"Keep moving towards the target coordinates. Whatever is going to happen there... may be our only chance to do something meaningful for this world.">
Reina Kinney Reina narrows her eyes briefly as she gets a look at the familiar figure known as a 'Thin Man.' And then the MEC. She shakes her head in disbelief. "Just as I thought," She whispers to herself, before ducking into a nearby alleyway. "I can't believe it's come to this!" She says, shaking her head.

For a moment, Reina briefly peeks out from in the alleyway, but mostly keeps out of sight, not wanting to be spotted by anyone who might realize that she's got a different agenda in mind. Because she does, in fact, have something else in mind.

After moving a little further back into the alleyway, making sure there's no one waiting to sneak up behind her, Reina snaps her fingers, and her rifle materializes in her hands. She then crouches down behind a nearby trash can, trying to stay covered as best as she can. She doesn't want to blow her cover just yet, but given that the enemy has shown itself, things can go to hell rather quickly.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa gets some information of interest, the basics on unification day but the net doesn't feel right it's strangled it's not wild and free as one might expect an information network to be. Kotone keeps an eye on the ADVENT troops and also listens to the speech. Her eyes narrow at the likely Thinman 2.0's words. Kotone's eyes narrow a good deal at the Thinman's words. She's got to admit they had improved how they worked and there was no accent anymore either.

She wondered, was this Thinman a vet of the war two decades ago? He seemed to mean his words...the likely unmanned Mecs get Kotone's attention. She was part of the MEC project seeing this made her feel a feeling of dread. If they had MECS? Did they get Shen's research? What happened to Dr. Shen? She had to put that away as the mission came first. She pressed on to the location that they'd been given, their answers would be there she suspected.
Rory White A THINMAN ON LIVE TELEVISION! What on Earth?! ... Well nothing OF Earth, at least. In her alley, Rory White's face goes even blanker than before. It's so troubling that she has no energy left to make a decent face.

    Her Saucer continues floating lazily around, but tries to stay hovering low over rooftops after the Thinman appeared, to minimize the chances that bystanders will see it and point fingers. Still, its mobility range is limited when it has to stay line of sight with Rory over in the alley to tight-beam data back to her.

    Eventually she decides that she's seen enough of the streets!

    Time to hurry further along to the coordinates. Now she has a map of all of the ADVENT soldiers in the nearby streets and so, she decides to risk slipping out into the streets and moving further along.

    Of course she can only hope this means she can slip past ADVENT troops this way and the scanning range of towers...
Samira Amirmuaz      As Kotone and the others might have guessed, the MECs seem to be made of a similar design to what XCOM used to have. It appears that they're automated, though; no sign of any operators! As they move along, the exact location of the coordinates appears a couple blocks down: a Gene Therapy Clinic just like the one in Paris.

    MEANWHILE, two blocks two east of the gang's current position...

    John 'Central' Bradford waits in line to be cleared through an ADVENT checkpoint. Not far away, Jane Kelly makes her way towards the same checkpoint from due south. "Looks like they got their hands full today," she intones darkly.

    Bradford's response is simple and quiet. "Stay focused. Prep Gatecrasher, sixty seconds." He finally makes it to the head of the line, only to be stopped as an alarm rings out. THe ADVENT captain guarding the checkpoint calls for identification in his harsh voice. When Central doesn't give it, the Captain rifle butts him and demands it again. During the distraction, Kelly steps up and plants an X4 charge on a nearby van. As soon as Bradford knows it's ready, he gives the word, Kelly hits a switch...

    KABOOM! The ensuing fireball is easily seen from the group's position, blowing the Captain and the troopers away as Bradford crouches under it. Almost immediately, panic hits max level on the street; people start fleeing from the direction of the explosion as fast as they can. THe troopers response is similarly quick; they start making their way to the site, and any unfortunate bastard in their way gets clubbed the fuck down by their blocky black firearms. As Johnny noted, their movements are of trained soldiers... but there's something eerie about it. Like how they're all stepping in sync despite all of the chaos around them, in a perfectly straight line...

    Somewhere far away, Lily Shen is monitoring the chaos on a screen, before transmitting a go-ahead for the Gatecrasher team. Not long after, the gang might see what looks like an aircraft slip through the spires and buildings surrounding the Gene Clinic with impressive speed, only leveling off when it reaches due south of the clinic, before quickly zooming away again in their direction.

    In fact, it looks strangely familiar, if a bit smaller and a lot faster than the old Skyranger they knew...

    Chaos in the streets, gunfire erupting from the explosion site, and about twenty ADVENT closing in from their direction. What's the team to do?
Courier Six     Aaaaaaand here... we... go. The explosion comes and the radio comes alive and Johnny grunts. There's a roll of his neck, he slaps at the Pip-Boy... and then there's a gun in one hand... and a Power Fist on the other.
    Bradford sounds grumpy and he doesn't blame him. It's a rough awakening for the X-Com... well, it's not a proper military anymore, probably. The Courier lets out a piercing whistle into the noise to call attention, and follows it up with two shots in the air to discourage civvies from being in his genral area. "COME ON YOU BASTARDS, COME DANCE WITH THE KING."
Alexis Maaka     Maaka is about to get moving, just in time to begin hearing a familiar voice.

    She blinks, and then exchanges a look with Kotone as they pick up familiar chatter over the tactical band. "...it can't be him can I? Or at least -a- him?" She asks, before shrugging.

    As everything goes tits up, the cyborg begins to move from cover, advancing down a back alleyway towards the gene clinic, before she begins to use her STALKER suit to get a boost up to the nearest wall. Her suit's climbing equipment will carry her to a convenient perch, and Maaka hooks up for Kotone to follow her with. After setting up, the cyborg takes aim with her EM rifle, scope targeting the arriving ADVENT troopers. Setting the rifle to sniper-mode, she begins to take shots, counting on Kotone and their respective software rigs to help spot targets for her to fire on.
Staren                                    *KABOOM!*                                  

    Well, that sure sounds like the start of an operation! Staren gets moving. He considers taking the chance to shoot ADVENT in the back, but... there's too much chance of civilians getting caught in the crossfire. He'll use this time to get close, and unload on ADVENT later. Besides, with all the chaos of fleeing civilians, it's much harder to pick out the distincive blur of the chameleon cloak, or the glimpse of booted feet just poking out from under it.

    Staren runs for the 'gene therapy clinic' at a power-assisted 40 mph.
Reina Kinney As soon as the fireworks show starts (as she calls it,) Reina's out of the alley and moving as quickly as she can, her rifle no longer visible for the time being, as she doesn't want to risk any civilian casualties. She can sense Bradford's mighty unhappy right now, and when someone's that upset, Reina doesn't even think of being sarcastic. Call it a survival skill, because her sarcasm has gotten her a good reaming from Laia a few times.

Unlike Staren, Reina has no way of cloaking herself, so she relies upon using whatever she can cover, moving only when she's sure it's safe. She knows she has to reach the target, but doesn't want to make herself a sitting duck either.
Rory White "Why do people insist on cramming the hardest-to-believe facts at people at the worst times?" Rory White aka Seraph bemoans, exasperation in her tone. She has her eye in the sky and the moment that the situation goes live... a signal's sent to her recon drone in the sky. WIFI IS RE-ENGAGED and she dashes out into the streets, hanging low. There's something weird about HER movements too...

    For starters, no human could run QUITE that fast, a few notches beyond Olympian athlete levels. Second, few would run while staying low to the ground in an unusual posture while holding up a short-but-heavy looking weapon...

    She's on a mad dash for the ADVENT troops! But she's quick to duck and take cover behind one of the scanning towers. She did hope to not reveal too much to ADVENT, but...

    It was, really, the best cover available.

    "Take them out!"

    With Wifi Re-engaged, Staren, Maaka, and Kotone all receive an uplink to the TACTICAL NET. ADVENT troops get marked in a harsh red, Strike Team in green, and Bradford's crew in a friendly blue.

    Rory emerges from cover, takes aim with her weapon...

    Instead of a sharp 'BANG' or the silent burn of an invisible laser (well, HERS are silent and invisible... because science...), rapid 'fwt!' noises and whistling sounds are the only warning that a few of the ADVENT troops get of the hail of tiny metal shards flying at them by the dozens... at LUDICROUS velocities. It's like combining a shotgun and a machinegun at once!

    Shredders are nasty little weapons.
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone was right they would have their answer shortly in the form of a ADVENT van going up in a fireball she seems to now get the idea of what's going on. Gatecrasher team was moving and Bradford was deployed? Mother of God, if he was on the ground? Things had to be serious as hell and with a few words on the radio, it's time to move. This operation just got hot, Kotone was keeping her cloak up for now, her rifle's safety was flicked off.

<<You heard them move it they need to get whatever the package is out and it's major. Given Central is here. What ever the nation of the world it's still Central so lets move!>>

Kotone uses several techs and her body's own native system to boost up like of all things a Thinman to get to the roof where Kotone is going to start spotting for hostiles, she has her battle rifle out and ready as well, she's knows she's going to need it before this night is done.
Samira Amirmuaz     Once the chaos kicks off and the Skyranger drops them off, Peter Ossei and Ana Rodriguez, aka Crasher 1 and 2, are already making their way towards the rendevous point. Of course, it wasn't going to be so easy for them; all the explosions drag away a some of the guards, but five remain.

    Two of the troopers go down in an initial rain of surprise fire, but Crasher 2 gets a little too overzealous, pushing too far ahead. And then...
Staren     The tacnet comes online. Staren needs a moment to mentally process it... Shit, they already lost someone?

    Staren takes cover behind a building corner, and then tosses the cloak off his head -- it remains attached to he back of his armor like a cape, to avoid leaving it behind at the scene, and he's holding a laser sniper rifle (not of XCOM make) which he levels at one of the ADVENT guards focused on Crasher 1, firing a three-pulse burst.
Reina Kinney Already lost someone? Damn, this is bad. Well, you have to learn to adapt to changing strategy on the fly.

Reina attempts to get her rifle back into her hands, snapping her fingers and getting it back. She spots another ADVENT guard nearby, and decides to take the initiative, opening fire with a three-round burst. "This'll teach you to pick on our people!" She yells out angrily.
Samira Amirmuaz     As gunfire rains down on them from on high somewhere behind them from Kotone, Maaka, and Rory, several of the ADVENT troops go down to surprise fire, three in all. The rest turn on their heels with disturbing symmetry, a red-clad Captain pointing out the general direction of the fire before they all split up and go for various types of cover. Lamp psts, planters, trees, benches - all are put into use. Once the captain calls out 'FIRE' in his language, the ADVENT troopers start returning fire towards the sniper's nest. Most of it is ineffective, but the Captain takes the time to put a holographic mark on Maaka's position, making the fire there a lot hotter than it might have been before.

    Staren and Reina basically manage to get free reign to move to intercept Crasher 1, whose still battling the remaining defenders of this entrance. Once again flanked and taken from surprise by Staren's gunfire, another Trooper crumples to the ground with an agonized, harsh scream. Crasher, to his credit, takes advantage by flanking the second to last and unloading three rounds into it's helmet.

    The last one is trying to approach Crasher 1 from the opposite direction, but as she comes close another gunshot rings out from behind her, and she drops to her knees. She reaches up to tap at the helmet where her ear would be, managing a few words... before Central emerges from the smoke and nastily warstomps her on the back of her neck.

    As shown by his voice, this is not the old Bradford. Well... he is old, and scarred, and looking none-too-pleased that this all has gone down the way it did, but he's not the same Bradford as before. "Central, reporting in," he grunts irritably.

    Across the band, Lily groans in frustration while Bradford kicks over the corpse at his feet. "Where were you? You're late." His response is 'taking in the sights'... and by that he means the obvious genetic manipulation on the trooper below him, as the face falls off to reveal a ridged forehead and a snout-like nose. Both Bradford, and Kelly behind him, grimace at the view.
Samira Amirmuaz     True to form, Johnny's display sends what remains of the citizenry scrambling away from the firefight with their tails between their legs, and drags some of the heat off of Maaka and Kotone's nest. Which leaves him staring down sixteen pretty upset ADVENT troops on equal ground with them. Three of the larger squad detach and go to cover in the gambler's direction, using some statuary and planters as full and half-cover. When they're in position they open up quickly, thier magnetic rifles making their own strange sounds as they spit off hyper-accelerated bits of metal that flash with a blood-red strobe with each shot.
Staren     A familiar face at last! Staren's face lights up, even if Bradford is old and grizzled. He hurries over to the man, "Good to see a familiar face, sir!", then gasping as he sees the ADVENT soldier's helmet come off. "They're aliens?!" Hybrids, it's explained. Staren nods.

    Staren's white and sea-green armor is of neither XCOM nor Ethereal design... also, it might be a bit odd that the helmet has protrusions to hold his ears, and he clearly has an armored tail twitching now and then.

    "The last we saw of the other timeline, XCOM was still in the midst of the war against the aliens. So that you know what page we're on."

    Staren glances over the tacnet in his HUD, watching for incoming trouble. "What do you need us to do?"
Courier Six     Sixteen to one. Hrm. The 'men' all start taking cover, and well... Johnny can't have that, now can he? No, no he can't.

    The Courier grumps, and holsters his gun as he takes cover himself, the flashy scanny PAPERS PLEASE pole the best cover he can get at this second. That'll change though. A hand moves inside his duster, and he hucks a plasma grenade into a Cluster of Assholes.
    "HEY FELLAS! GOT A PLATOON, MY SIDE." No need to bother using the radio now, really. He draws out That Gun, you know the one, and whirls in place.

    Thirteen to One. They don't stand a chance. And as the magbolts slap into his armor, VATS activates... and with an unerring, errie speed, that gun snaps around to hose down five shots into the ADVENT troopers.
Alexis Maaka     Magnetic rifles aren't just exclusive to Maaka it seems. She growls as she feels herself targeted by the captain, as well as getting a few shallow hits from ADVENT rifle fire.

    She does however mark the guy that called at her though, the one in red, identifying him as a priority target. He definitely seems the officer type to the cyborg commando. The color-coded tacnet helps Maaka with picking out the bad guys from the good guys, both civvies and XCOM friendlies alike.

    She takes careful aim at the Captain in red, before she squeezes off a high-velocity slug towards his ugly mug. Or at least she assumes he's not much to look at, the helmets make it hard to judge. "Friendship and compassion my ass, fucking xeno fascists." Careful, Lex, don't wanna sound too much like an Imperium type there.
Rory White With the troopers going down, Rory takes off in another of those high-speed dashes! By now, her Morph's undergone so many tiny tweaks and upgrades that its robotic speed is plain to see! For her sprint is quick and strange-looking as before...

    She comes to a skidding halt in a daring manuever like one might see in an anime, taking cover near Bradford and the rest of his team. Just in time to get a look at the unhelmeted soldier herself.

    She can't help but FROWN at this. "That looks human. Not just humanoid like the Thin-men, but modified from human..."
Reina Kinney Just like Rory, Reina can't take her eyes off that strange soldier as well. "What in Falz's name is that?" She mutters to herself. "Definitely not human, but something's very wrong!" She takes out her binoculars and tries to get a better look at it. "Definitely not something we've seen in XCOM either!"
Kotone Yamakawa Johnny has done a fine job of getting the civilians to clear out, which means the Strike Team? Can now use heavier weapons. She tracks the ADVCENT troops painting those who seem to be major targets then they lose one of the crashers. Two is gone and one's in a very bad spot. She does what she can to paint some targets neat him for Maaka to take out. She's still wondering will it just be ADVENT Troopers? You think XCOM remants would get things like actual X-rays deployed to stop them?

Worse more ADVENT are coming, Kotone's old style XCOM rifle rattles off as she opens fire on the nearing ADVENT force as whell while she keeps spootting.

<<I got a load of Shen's specials if they get closer. Let's see how they like some ofthier own grenades used right back at them! Also keep the heat off the Crasher units!>>
Samira Amirmuaz     Bradford remains calm and collected next to the disgust of the people around him, along with Staren's well-meaning greeting. He still doesn't look particularly pleased, however. "They're hybrids," he explains simply to Reina and Rory. "Shows how bad it is, but if we find what we're looking for, all of this is gonna change." To that end, he looks up grimly at the Gene Clinic, then jogs to it and smashes his way through the window while Kelly falls in behind him. Ossei takes cover behind a futuristic car, recieving orders from Lily to maintain overwatch.

    Which is good, because suddenly a burning red flare falls to the ground and splits into a neat little square south of their position. "Reinforcements are coming in," Lily reports. "Hurry, Central!" Reina, Staren, and Rory have just enough time to take cover in the building with Kelly, or on the street with Ossei, before a black ADVENT dropship moves over the designated landing zone and behinds unloading a squad of five, four Troopers and a Captain. Time to get serious!

    Johnny's three adversaries continue to pour fire on his position while they try to slowly advance... but a plasma grenade is a big boom, and one of them gets torn apart and flung out of cover while the other two get struck by the gambler's rounds, dropping both. He's free to move up and engage the rest of the group on the ground, possibly even to get some flanks going.

    Maaka's duel with the officer continues, and her shot is lined up well... at the last second, however, he manages to get himself mostly into cover, and the magnetic round passes through his armor, then his bicep, before smacking into the ground. The officer reels back in pain, but continues to stand and try to fire, albeit with greatly reduced accuracy. They still have the advantage in numbers, so they start to move forward as best they can.

    Inside the building, Kelly kicks at the door leading to the back of the facility with a frustrated growl. "It's locked! The damn thing went into lockdown when the firefight started. Hey, one of you assholes! Got something for this!?"
Staren     A flare hits the ground. Staren wonders what that's for.

    Reinforcements are coming!

    A dropship appears on the tacnet..

    Staren cackles, and waves Reina, Kelly, Rory, and Bradford on. "I got this." And he goes to peer around the corner of the building, watching the dropship.

    As the dropship comes down, the missile racks on Staren's shoulders pop up, and when the doors open, six mini-missiles launch, guiding themselves to the interior of the vehicle and airbursting there, plasma warheads designed to superheat air to the point that even /one/ makes a 30ft-wide fireball of plasma when it detonates.

    If /that/ didn't solve the problem, he fires a quick snapshot from the laser rifle and beam cannons at the troopers, while making an unsettled radio transmission about them being tougher than they look.
Reina Kinney Reina knows when to move and when to attack, and this is definitely the time for moving out fast. While holding her rifle carefully, Reina rushes towards the open door, taking a leaping dive and rolling on the ground once she gets inside to give herself a little extra distance. After that, she looks to make sure the others get in quickly.
Courier Six     Johnny snarls as he's hit several times, but drops the three in front of him. Then there's reenforcements coming in, and he grunts. "BRADFORD YOU'RE RUNNIN' OUTTA TIME HERE, DO WHAT YOU'RE DOIN' AND GET OUT." A snap reload of That Gun, and he snaps it shut again, the cylinder locking into place. He lifts the heavy pistol, and pops off a few more rounds at the incoming ADVENT, trying to suppress them and keep their attention.
Alexis Maaka     "Dammit. Went wide." Maaka narrowly avoids getting a nasty shot to the head, feeling a bullet grazing the side of her helmet as she growls in anger. This guy is swiftly pissing her off, and Maaka begins to load out some HE to the underslung launcher on her EM rifle.

    Firing the grenade rounds, Maaka lays down a thick blanket of fire on the Captain's position, intending to bury him in ordinance and possibly eject him from his hiding place. That is assuming of course he survives that barrage of high-explosive rounds coming his way.
Kotone Yamakawa The Term Hybrid simply matched up with some thoguhts Kotone has had.

<<We have a partial answer if they are hybrids looks like the Elders want a new warrior caste, smarter than Mutons>>

Kootone hears the warning that more are coming in. She takes several troopers down the last ends up taking a shot in the head. HybridS? But what did the Aliens cross them with? She'll fuind out later for now they have more hostiles inbound.

She does do her best to take the time now to line up a shot with the CVaptain who seems to be going after Osssei. The guy was brave but it could get him killed also there's little she can do for allies inside a building right now.

<<We need to get that package then get everyone the hell out.>>
Rory White "How did you manage to smuggle MISSILES into the city?!" Rory 'Seraph' White asides dumbfoundedly to Staren! She doesn't appear to be paying a lot of attention to her surroundings, but that's because she has everyone else's eyes working for her, and her own in the sky. Her two eyes in person aren't reuqired too much...

    And that's also how she immediately knows that Kelly needs help.

    So the blue-haired woman dashes straight over and pulls out an Ecto - a PDA. "I shall TRY... shaped explosives are a bit more practical on the fly though!" And those sh DOESN'T carry with her, or know how to safely use...

    Regardless, she gets to trying to ack the thing wirelessly...
Samira Amirmuaz     Back on the north side of the building, the battle was still raging between the huge ADVENT squad ad the offworlders, destroying the nice and neat terrain and leaving scorch marks and yellowish trooper blood everywhere. This place looked officially ruined... good on them for wrecking havoc, at least. Facing fire on all sides in front of them, the trooper advance ends up slowing to a crawl, leaving the remainder - twelve now - on the defensive. This number changes again when Maaka fires a series of explosives in the Captain's direction; the saturation is too much for him to be able to escape, so he and another two end up going up in balls of flame that fill the air with the rancid stench of burning meat. In the chaos, Johnny manages to get another one, leaving the opposing force down to eight.

    Back on the south side, Staren's idea is, actually, pretty golden. The entire dropship erupts in plasma, sending troopers flying from within and spitting out wreckage while the ship drunkenly hovers for a few more moments before crashing headlong into a planter a little further south of the group's position. Some of the soldiers manage to hop it out, but they're cut down by Reina and Kotone in their confusion. Reinforcements gone!

    All of this gives Bradford, Kelly, and Rory enough time to crack the door's security and slip inside. "We're in," Bradford grunts into his earpiece.

    "Let's just hope our intel is good," comes Lily's voice from the tac-band.

    The rear of the building is much darker, the back wall dominated by a red ADVENT symbol. "THis is the place," Bradford breathes, before moving into a small side room containing what appears to be some kind of capsule with a lever next to it. The lever gets pulled, opening the capsule to reveal... a humanoid in some kind of full body suit, surrounded by green liquid that swiftly flows back down into the floor, leaving the figure to sag against the glass. Bradford smartly raps the glass with the butt of his rifle, shattering it, and manages to grab a hold of the suited figure and lift them onto his shoulder. "Package secured," he says with some triumph.

    ... Only to be undercut by Shen's panicked voice. "The whole ADVENT security network just lit up! Reinforcements incoming - get the hell out of there!" To state her point, another flare drops down to the south of the group... then a second. And a third. And a fourth. Furthermore, the air is suddenly filled with a strange tension, as if the whole area is being watched, bringing with it a slight electric tinge like static electricity

    Time to get the hell out of dodge.

    Ossei's eyes widen as he watches the flares descend, before quickly whipping around to the others. "Get inside! I'll cover our flank!" He even moves forward slightly, taking up a planter in half-cover as the dropships start coming in.
Courier Six     Johnny's position is much less compromised now, but with the CO down, there's a good chance to break up their curent dancemates without the rest of ADVENT coming in to wreck the joint further. That Power Fist comes online, and the Old World Cowboy huffs. He lifts something... that looks like someone took a combat stim and shoved it into a soda bottle with a needle attached, and jams it into his thigh.

    The effect is nearly immediate as he snarls and curses. Whatever that shit is, it must hurt. But there's a sudden burst of speed from the man, as he charges straight in at one of the Troopers in heavy cover and-

    The power fist comes straight through the concrete and steel of the wall, slams into the 'man's' face and goes clear through to the other side in one smooth stroke. "HRRRRRRRAAAAAAA!"
Samira Amirmuaz     Facing an inexorable tide coming from the south, Kelly comes upon the bright idea to pull a frag grenade from her belt and throw it at the ADVENT insignia inside the building, blowing it our and leaving a pathway to the north outside. As soon as he gets the opening, Bradnford is through and taking cover on the other side. He pulls out his own flare, tears the tab out with his teeth, and tosses it, creating a blue flare that immediately calls to the Skyranger. Not long after, it's hovering outside, depositing several ropes for the XCOM members to take ahold of.
Alexis Maaka     Captain is KIA, and Maaka grins in satisfaction. She gives a fistpump, before clapping Kotone on the shoulder. "TIme to bug out, we're done here!" She says, upon hearing confirmation that the team has what they came for. She takes a dramatic leap off the building, falling to ground level fearlessly as she uses her boosters to slow her fall.

    As she lands on the ground with a meaty thud, she takes off with a sprint, headed for exfil and catching up with Crasher 1. "You're good to go, bail!" She calls to the operative, taking a knee behind cover and firing upon ADVENT troopers to cover his exit. She'll be following him soon after, Kotone in tow hopefully.
Reina Kinney Deciding that she's not one to pass up a good opportunity, Reina runs towards one of the ropes. She grabs on to it and waits to be pulled up into the dropship. "Let's get the hell outta here now! This place has gone to hell in a handbasket, and I don't want to stick around to see how much worse it gets!" All the while, she's beginning to realize that she's truly let herself become deceived by the lack of extraterrestrial activity in the Multiverse for the longest time, and now it's time to get her head back in gear.
Staren     Staren smiles briefly as the dropship goes down. The now empty missile racks lower back into place behind Staren's shoulders. He can only pull /that/ stunt once. Although he has other tricks up his sleeve as well...

    <"Who is /that/?"> He asks, when he sees The Package come into Rory's vision.

    As the warning that ADVENT security is going crazy comes, and that they need to leave -- yet Ossei is telling him to get inside -- he asks, <"And just HOW are you going to get out of here, anyway?!">

    Staren follows Ossei. "I'm fine. I'm not leaving you here." And then his question is answered by the Skyranger being summoned. If Ossei gets on it, great!

    If Ossei doesn't get on it, Staren says, "Alright, I'm getting us out. Maaka, Kotone, to me!" He shoulders his rifle and puts one hand on Ossei's back, motioning for the others to grab his other hand as he starts glowing. Hopefully, they have the seconds needed for his teleporter to finish activating before ADVENT troops shoot Staren and mess it up or something -- if so, they disappear in a flash of light and find themselves by the warpgate!
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa is able to help take down the surivin reinforcement but soon? The package seems to be recovered, that's the good news. The bad news is? The Advent are going nuts and it seems even worse things are coming soon. It's time to bug out. Crasher-1 is going to try to buy some time but Kotone has other ideas.

<<We need to cover for him.>>

Kotone will leap from her current perch and bolt with inhuman speed after Alexis. She'll move to give Staren and Ossei the cover she can, she'll fire a bit wildy and toss a grenade at the incoming hostiles. Though that grenade? It's old alien tech and it will go off shortly, hopefully Staren can do what he needs Ossei out with anyone else he can.

<<We can't hold much longer, we get everyone out and go.>>
Rory White What is that strange sensation? Even Rory, a completely synthetic being, can't help but shake the odd feeling. She glances about left and right uncomfortably while Bradford handles the... captive?! What is that odd suit?

    She can only frown. "Who are we retrieving?!" They're important enough to 'turn everything around?' And important enough that Advent is THIS freaked out about protecting them?!

    Who could they be?!

    "If one thing irritates me, it's completely unknown situations. Unknown enemies, unknown timelines... information... I have no information..." Mumble mutter! Rory's frustrated as heck but still dashing off in a panic!
Samira Amirmuaz     Johnny's roid rage doesn't go unnoticed by the remaining troopers, but in the end there's not much that they can do to prevent him from moving forward and burying his fist halfway into some poor ADVENT brains. In spite of good sense, the rest are still remaining to try and continue the fight - but the moment that the package is taken from it's tube, some turn around immediately to start hustling for the blown-out entryway.

    One of them manages to line up a shot that smacks into Central's thigh, nearly sending him down. In response he grits his teeth and takes ahold of a Skyranger rope and gets pulled up into the Skyranger. REina follows shortly afterwards, along with Rory and any others.

    For a moment, it looks like Ossei is going to argue with them, but the sound of four incoming transports unloading their cargo and the fact that these guys almost took out an entire platoon by themselves changes his mind. With a grunt he stands up and starts making a run for the Skyranger...

    In a quick moment, one of the dropped Troopers lifts his rifle and lines up a shot, fires... the round passes through the back of Ossei's neck, through his spine and out his throat, decorating the Clinic wall with a spray of blood. He collapses limblessly, choking on his blood, trying to get air, until he finally goes silent.

    At least his sacrifice wasn't entirely in vain. Everyone is aboard the Skyranger, Kelly included, and the others have the perfect opportunity to escape, pursued by magnetic rounds from the troopers below.

    Aboard the Skyranger, Bradford sags with a grunt and puts compression on the hole in his thigh, all the while carefully cradling the VIP with his free arm. For most of the trip, he's silent, staring into the figure's face mask, before eventually grunting quietly, "Thank you. I don't know who any of you are, but thank you. Maybe now we can actually make a change to this fucking planet."
Courier Six     Central is secure, package is secure... and the Troopers are distracted. Johnny lets out a heavy brath as the Psycho wears off, and slaps his Emergency Teleport button on his Pip-Boy, the one that's been jerry rigged into place. Up in orbit-ish, there's a sudden beam of light, and absconds the Courier int othe sky. Live to fight another day, Mr. Tallbranch.
Reina Kinney Secure onboard the dropship, Reina sighs to herself as she snaps her fingers, causing her rifle to disappear. Then she runs a hand through her ponytail. "I really let myself get off-guard this time," She comments to nobody in particular. "I really need to keep my mind on high alert from here on."
Alexis Maaka     "-SHIT!" Maaka can't exactly do much about Ossei's death, as she's immediately teleported out of the combat zone and dumped on the warpgate by Staren. She tries to turn around, only to realize she's not in the battle zone anymore. "...rest in piece, trooper." She mutters sadly, shaking her head before she teleports to her ship.

    Live to fight another day.
Staren     Staren didn't grab Ossei, just put a hand on his back. "Hey!" he shouts as Crasher 1 runs off. "What are--" And then there's one less XCOM member. Staren gives a disappointed sigh as the teleporter activates.

    "Dammit." He stands up, looking around, scanning the area for any ADVENT activity and trying to re-establish radio contact with Rory and the skyranger. <"Can you still hear us okay? Your guy ran off and died. I'm... sorry. We escaped.">
Kotone Yamakawa There is this moment of horror thy think they are going to make it but it's too late an ADVENT trooper dying gets one last shot off. There's nothing she can do but they have to run, they haveto get out of here and Kotone moes with all teh speed she's able to. She feels a sick feeling but staying around would .... be a horrible thing. It would make things all for nothing if they didn't get away with the package.
Rory White Rory also quickly grabs the Skyranger! Up and up they go. It's an unconventional way to travel... ROPE HAULS and so on, that's kinda weird... but also exhilarating!

    She quickly finds a seat and plops down, remaining motionless for a good ten seconds and just letting herself wind down a bit.

    Outside, the Saucer drone she left behind executes its SCORCHED EARTH policy and fries itself after coming to a landing on a building top. There's nothing left in its computers that can be used to figure out where it came from or how its networking works...

    She brushes the ponytail she's sporting over a shoulder though and looks over at Bradford, with a smile.

    "Rory White. And I can all but guarantee the truth of who we are will give you numerous headaches and possibly nightmares, but we are sincerely interested in helping. Good to be working with you 'again,' sir." The smile turns a bit sad.
Samira Amirmuaz     The flight aboard the Skyranger isn't very long, though it is filled with moments of intensity as Firebrand works to avoid ADVENT interceptors and shake any pursuit. It's all very cool, tense stuff... if anyone inside the passenger area could see outside. Bradford clams up, refusing to speak much, instead choosing to keep checking the figure in the suit to make sure it's still okay. Kelly doesn't seem much of the talkative type either - in fact, she seems somewhat uncomfortable being in such close proximity to people that she doesn't know. At least she eventually offers a quiet, gruff "Thanks," when they finally touch down... wherever the hell they are.

    The landing is pretty smooth, and for a minute or so it feels like the group is going down on an elevator. When the ramp finally opens, the group is treated to the view of the armory, where upon they find a number of people: A black, bespectacled man in a lab coat, a somewhat grimy young Asian woman, and three troopers armed with rifles. The troopers are a pretty raggedy bunch, all told; their uniforms are patchwork, and one of them is the tatters of an old XCOM uniform. One of them is even sporting an eerily familiar red and orange bandana around his face.

    Once the ramp is clear, in spite of his wounds, Central hustles out with Kelly, carrying the package between them to a gurney. They aren't too gentle setting it down - Dr. Tygan moves forward with a hiss. "Carefully! There's potentially decades of atrophy to contend with!" Shen moves forward too, linking several hoses to the suit. "I wish we had more time," she laments.
Samira Amirmuaz     Dr. Tygan nods slowly, brushing his hand across the suit's faceplate. "I don't disagree, but if we don't move now we risk losing the patient." Eventually, he finds what he's looking for - the faceplate comes off with a hiss, raspy, uneven breathing coming from inside the suit. All of the members lean forward, with Tygan's face going incredulous. "Remarkable..."

    Central slowly nods. "Just like twenty years ago. We were still calling it a war back then... We had no idea what was coming."

    Shen moves away to wheel forward what looks like an EKG, allowing the members of the old XCOM to look inside. What they see is a dark-skinned Persian woman, bleached pale from twenty years without sunlight, with raven hair and brown eyes that stare out ahead, unfocused. Before they can get too good of a look, though, the EKG starts sending out warning blips.

    "Vitals are dropping," Shen reports with a worried edge in her voice. Tygan shakes his head in frustration. "Of course they are. These implants weren't designed to be removed. We're risking severe--"

    Central cuts in. "We have no plan B here, people. /Do it/."

    At his urging, Tygan takes up a pair of instruments and forces the woman's mouth open. First one to cut an incision... then another, which he uses to yank out what appears to be a bloodied computer chip. Immediately, the vitals spike, then go dead.

    "... Lost the signal," Shen reports in quiet horror. Was everything worthless in the end?...

    A moment later, however, the signal returns, steady and normal, and everyone has a big sigh of relief. Central in particular leans forward, smiling down at the woman as she closes her eyes and drifts off into the first natural sleep she's had in twenty years.

    "Welcome back, Commander."
Staren     Three to beam up!

    Staren steps off Courier Six's teleport pad, looking around. "You made it look like a hotel?" He can't complain, given his own ship's mixed-motif interior. He finds a seat and waits for them to arrive, keeping aprised of the situation on the Skyranger through Rory's eyes. Hmm. They may need to bring air support next time...

    When they dismount Courier Six's ship, he has his visor open so everyone can see his human face, and the laser rifle rests against his back. He makes sure the guards can see his hands. Well, his gauntlets, anyway.

    "So who is this?" he reiterates, but the doctor is hard at work. He watches curiously, not recognizing Samira, of course. "Implants? What happened?" When the EKG flatlines, Staren looks to Rory and says "It's alright, we--" before it comes back.

    He looks between all those assembled here. "So... she was the Commander in this timeline? Huh..." He looks at her for a moment, then back to Bradford, the only familiar face here, it seems:

    "...So, care to catch us up on the last 20 years?"
Kotone Yamakawa Kotone Yamakawa is able to get on the Avenger eventally and is able to catch up with Central and the rest. She knows this class of ship, memories of chruslids and Secapods lurk in the back of Kotone's mind as she finds her way about the ship. If XCOM has any scanners? They would be able to tell Kotone appears to be almost entirely mechanical save for maybe most of her brain. She also seems to be looking a bit soberly she does however pause at the commander who is female and very not scottish. It just confirms beyond all doubt this is an alternate timeline. Still it doesn't matter to her she tries to smile a bit.

"Good to see we got you out, Commander."
Rory White Rory is quiet through the operation, though she takes a good few moments to study everyone around. Tygan and Shen particularly. That the young womn's name is SHEN is, to say the least, a bit startling... running quick checks suggest that she might have actually been conceived after the point in time where she met the man... something's very strange about all this to her!

    But she doesn't show it too well. She's too baffled to bother showing much feelings right now, apart from a faintly troubled look....

    "This... is too much... at once... what is going on?"
Samira Amirmuaz     Now that the danger to his commander is passed, Bradford's body deigns to remember the fact that he has a hole in the meat of his thigh. He motions for one of the recruits to help him move. "Dr. Tygan. Do me a favor and patch this son of a bitch up." His head turns to motion Shen towards their vistors. "Fill them in as best you can. I need to get down to Research."

    Tygan nods to the group one last time before turning and leading Central and the trooper down to the Research Labs, giving everyone a nice long look at the heavy scarring on the back of his head. Shen, for her part, looks towards Central and the group, nonplussed, before she eventually sighs and moves forward.

    "Leave me with this, why don't you..." She grumbles quietly. She makes a quick motion to shove her bangs back behind her ear. "I'm Lily Shen. Dr. Raymond Shen was my dad... He passed away a few years ago, working on the Avenger." Now that that's out of the way, she continues on. "Basically... You know about XCOM, apparently. The best soldiers, scientists, and engineers, intended to stop the alien invasion. Well... they failed. One month after the XCOM Project was initiated, the base came under attack by alien forces while mind controlled XCOM staff let them in. The result..."

    She sighs, and motions around, indicating their current sorry state. "Commander Samira Amirmuaz was captured by the aliens. Without her, the whole thing fell apart. The bastards killed thousands when they refused to surrender, so eventually people did. The Elders and the remaining human governments signed a treaty and created the ADVENT Coalition to rule over the planet. Some people tried resisting, but... we lacked the resources. The entire Resistance is scattered in different refugee settlements all over the world, occaisonally making attacks on ADVENT. Generally, they lose every time. Somehow we got slipped intel that the Commander was still alive, so we started planning Operation Gatecrasher... which, you've seen the result of."

    Finally, she gives a small smile. "Too bad Dad couldn't see the Commander come back to us... but we have the Avenger, we have the Commander, and we have troops. If the Commander comes out of her coma, it'll be up to her to fix this whole mess... and you guys, maybe. I guess."
Samira Amirmuaz     With the operation complete, a few members of the staff move forward, asking Shen what to do with the Commander. She sighs and waves them off. "Take her up to her quarters and get that suit off of her. Carefully - remove the suit. We don't know how thorough the aliens were about keeping her under their thumb." They nod, and start wheeling the comatose woman out of the armory, into the main body of the ship.
Kotone Yamakawa There's a look of loss on Kotone's face as she hears Dr. Shen has died, she seems to ahve known him from how she's looking. She lisen as the whole tale plays out. She takes a moment before she'll speak. "I think I'm getting the picture I think Dr. Shen. It's a miracle anything's left. I think we have Central, and your father for keeping the rermants together." Kotone pauses for a moment "You are not alone in this, I promise you that. Also I'm Kotone Yamakawa, this is Rory White and Staren Wiremu."
Staren     Staren quirks an eyebrow at Tygan's injuries, but doesn't comment. He looks to Lily Shen, nodding when she mentions her father. Frowning slightly as it's mentioned that XCOM failed. But it's not like it was HIS fault. "'Somehow, you got slipped intel'?" he echoes. "Hmmm."

    After exposition is finished, he nods. "Well. I guess it's her job to come up with a plan, huh? Me..." He scratches his helmet. "I'm no good at plans. I'm Staren. A... researcher. On my world... Ah, I'm getting ahead of myself."

    He launches into a lecture about the warpgates, and the Multiverse, and this world's location in the Void. And a brief overview of the history of the Multiverse and the part the factions play in it.

    "So, I research stuff, and shoot bad guys. You're welcome to all my records on the other XCOM and the battles I was part of while helping them. I've also got a Sectoid corpse in storage, if you want it."