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Eryl Fairfax     The truck the kidnappers used has been traced to a dustbowl in Summer. The vehicle has been left idling on the side of the road next to what appears to be a massive, sprawling, militarized industrial grain mill. High walls have been built around it, bearing a tarnished plaque identifying it as 'Fort Teamsters.'

    Ten sets of footprints lay in the sand around the truck. Nine kidnappers plus the target. They're not exactly recent, and they all lead into the fort. Which means they've had time to dig in and prepare.

    The main gates are open, one of them having fallen completely off its hinges. On the east side however is a natural ramp formed by dust and stand blowing against the fort walls. On the north side is a fallen crane arm that has made a hole in the wall. A bit of a tight squeeze, but one could infiltrate the structure from there.
Big Boss An important VIP. Dangerous intel. That's a mission that can't be left alone.

Big Boss is here, wearing his muscle suit and trenchcoat. He slips forward, trying not to be seen by others, as he goes NORTH, moving to squeeze through the hole the crane-arm made. He's completely silent, ignoring Cantio's radio, trying not to be identified as 'here'.

Instead, he queries Intel Team. Boss wants as much information on the facility as he can get, whether it's maps, secrets, or bonuses. Anything that can assist in Recovering the VIP, he'll take.
Xion A dustbowl.
A missing man.
Nine mysterious agents who've spirited that man away.

Xion has found a cowboy hat and some novelty spurs for her Action Teenager sneakers. She jangles as she walks, assistend in part by the new wallet chain hanging from a thin black belt and tucked into her pocket.

Crouching by the front gate and with her finger and thumb in the shape of an L against her chin, she growls out her musings like a child thinks a gritty smoking badass sounds like.

"Reckon the entry was forced." She decides, completely ignoring the OBVIOUS BMX BIKE ramp and the CRANE HOLE, as she is an Objective Marker Follower.

Big Boss is currently her icon, so she's taking this crouched and gritty.
Cantio      Nine obstacles. One target. The ten sets of footrprints lines up with what Cantio is looking for, and she turns her phone around briefly to get a better shot from her prone position in the sand. She's watching the gates cautiously at first, scoping out the place and taking note of both the sand ramp and the crane hole before finally getting up.

    <<"This place looks like it might have been abandoned a while ago, so be careful around anything heavy-looking.">> She issues a quiet warning to the others on this mission, pulling her hood tighter over her head to keep the sand out.

    Can she trust them? For now, at least. It wouldn't do for the target to get killed or for the kidnappers to get sppoked before anything useful can be obtained, at least. Climbing up the ramp on the EAST side, she peers over the wall first to make sure the coast is clear before dropping down the other side. Once inside, she starts listening for footsteps while sorting through her disappearing inventory of stuff, pulling out a small cube and preparing a noisemaker drone without turning it on just yet.
Eryl Fairfax     The Intel Team reports back to Boss with some baffling background information. Supposedly this place was once fought over by two corporations, Reliable Excavation Demolition and Builders League United. Tensions between these two companies eventually reached the point where mercenaries were hired to do battle over it, but the guns eventually fell silent.

    But the relay of information is cut off as someone suddenly yells into his headpiece, "Boss, get down! The enemy sniper!"

    A gunshot rings out, and a bullet whizzes past Boss' head, having been fired from the control cabin of the broken crane.

    Xion approaches from the front, mashing her face against anything in the way like a real RPG hero. Through the front gate is a road that goes between buildings on both side, all of which are in an advanced state of disrepair. The ground is littered in brass casings, spent long ago.

    But someone is awaiting to add to them.

    "What SICK MAN sends BABIES to fight me?!" someone shouts in a thick Russian accent. Emerging from one of the buildings is an absolute unit of a man, with shaved head and 9 o'clock shadow. But more importantly, he is holding a minigun that seems better suited for mounting on a jet fighter.

    "TIME TO RUUUN!" he bellows as the weapon spins up and sprays the road with an enormous amount of lead.

    Cantio mounts the wall and clambers over. As she starts gearing up, footsteps are indeed heard. Fast ones. They come to a stop right in front of her, catching her in the middle of preparations. "Yo, wassup?" their owner says, being a somewhat scrawny young man wearing a baseball cap and radio headset. He taps a shotgun against his shoulder lackadaisically as he appraises Cantio. "Here for the nerd right? Well, I know where he is. Be glad to tell you over dinner... but ya gotta catch me first!"

    He aims and fires the gun over Cantio's head before booking it, moving absurdly fast as he ducks and dodges between the alleys of the sprawling structures.
Big Boss Boss listens to the intel. He stops, lighting a cigar, when-

The cigar is nearly blasted out of his mouth by a bullet. Boss immediately dives forward, rolling, aching bones and all, and rolls to turn towards the cabin. The first bit of cover he can find, he takes it, as he draws his pistol.

He didn't bring a rifle. This is 'pistol and OSP' only. But allowing a sniper to be loose is Bad News. Memories go back from an old sniper he once fought...

Sadly, he can't just drop a bunch of cargo on top of this guy's head, so instead, Boss tries to figure out his position, and also find the next closest location there. He's gonna cover hop, taking any detours that may mislead the sniper in the process.
Xion After lovingly dragging her face on every BIG QUEST SHAPED OBJECT, Xion is stopped at the broken door by a man with opinions on babies.

A huge, russian man with a huge rotary gun and an opinion about area denial that begins and ends with 'boolet'. The ground is chewed up in a massive cone of destruction, and cover is few and far between with the belching weapon throwing up a hail of metal between Xion and her opponent.

"Vulcan Raven?!" She calls downrange, jumping behind the base's wall and immediately having to run along it as her cover is blasted in sequence. "I'm not a baby, but it'd take a baby to just fire all your bullets! How long can you really keep shooting?"

Xion doesn't know. She doesn't understand. She expects a fair fight. She expects, in her tiny brain, some reality.

"Once you stop shooting, I'm going to be all over you!"
Cantio     "So much for keeping a low profile..." Cantio mutters to herself with a quiet sigh as she hears the gunshot somewhere on the north side, freezing up briefly once she notices the approaching footsteps.

    She really wasn't expecting that kind of greeting after hearing the earlier gunshot and someone shouting about baby fighting. "Er... Hello there. Noooo yes." She admits with a slight sag of her shoulders, keeping the cube drone firmly in her palm as she takes note of the shotgun and the cap.

    Somehow, that reminds her of someone she knows. "A... Dinner? What? That's very kind of-" His odd invitation catches her just off guard enough that she yelps at the shot going wide over her head, then starts chasing after the man herself. "Wha... Hold it!"

    Cantio doesn't have time to actually process why she's even chasing him, but it's as good of a lead as any. Although she lacks in the raw speed, maneuvering ability, and familiarity with the location that the young man might have, she can at least keep up well enough to see where she's going.

    She also has a good throwing arm. During the chase, she jabs at a few buttons on the drone, then hurls it skywards aiming for somewhere vaguely in front of where he's going. Once it hits the ground, it starts emitting sounds of her saying "There you are! I've got you now!" as though she was already in front of him somehow.

    In reality, she's just using it to project her voice waaaay over there while she tries to catch up.
Lilian Rook     Completely unrelated to the attempts on the fortified granary going on below, one (and only one) agent of an organization that actually wants to see this mystery VIP returned, has made it her business to avoid barging in through front gates entirely. Her presence is not incidental, for having come here for the exact same thing as the rest, but she's only just become aware of them as the vehicle rolls up and they run into the first wave of mercenaries.

    Lilian had thought to take this as a 'relaxing', small time operation, for some time alone to focus on work, after a previously scheduled operation fell through. Now, with all the screaming and gunfire indicating other people on the scene, it might become 'interesting'. She isn't sure if she likes that or not.

    Hers is the route atop the crane arm, though she hardly need walk it. While several of the mercs are distracted on the ground, she sends out one of her crows to reconnoiteur the area. It's of little more use than a drone, though marginally less likely to be noticed in a dust bowl like this. It flies overhead in wide, vulture-like circles, scanning for any points that look like an obvious choke for a defender to jump out of, while she gradually makes her way towards the hole in the back of the building.
Eryl Fairfax     The way up to the crane controls is a convoluted one. The ladder has long since crumbled, and would leave him a sitting duck anyway. But, when the crane arm broke off, the stump was left exposed to a higher walkway that would allow one to traverse the girders and get inside. Getting up there requires passing across multiple windows that the Sniper fires through at every sign of movement. If they're looking away for other targets, they don't show it in the least.

    Boss arrives to the last room before the crane, a tall room with a staircase leading up to the landing that would give him access. But someone is already there. A man in a yellow hard-hat and goggles sitting in a reclining chair next to some kind of automated dual-rotary turret that immediately beads on him. "Howdy!" the man says with a wave right before the gun goes full auto.

    As Xion runs for cover and shouts that she'll be 'all over' the big fellow once he stops shooting, his uproarious laughter can be heard even over the thrumming base of his gun. "KEEP CRYING BABY!" But even has he taunts, the fact of the matter is that firing that gun with any reasonable amount of accuracy demands moving slowly, so Xion ducking out of the base and running immediately breaks line of sight and puts enough distance between them that continued shooting is a waste of ammo.

    "SOLDIER!" the big man screams. This is met by a distant explosion, and a scream. One that goes above, and then descends, getting louder and louder. "aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA" shouts a fellow in an army helmet that hides his manic eyes. He descends on Xion like a punch from God, one hand clutching a rocket launcher, the other a trench shovel, which he uses to try and cave the Nobody's skull in.

    The scrawny man is fast, but never so fast that Cantio loses complete sight of him. Whether it be she can keep up, or he's slowing down to mock her remains to be seen. Her drone trick catches him by surprise as he rounds a corner, causing him to backpedel and shoot it. He then looks back at her and says, "Hey, nice lil' robot you got there! Just kiddin', it freakin' SUCKS!" After negging her, he vanishes through a doorway.

    And as Cantio rounds the bend to enter it, she spots him, alongside a dark-skinned gentlemen in a beanie and an eyepatch. Both are laughing at her. The reason why becomes apparent when she realizes the internal frame of the door is packed with small, spiky explosives that all detonate at once as she passes through.

    Lilian's crow circles overhead and spots the three conflicts taking place. The bird is almost clipped by the man with the rocket launcher as he ascends. With him, the big man, the sniper, and the fast moving boy, she can spot four of the nine kidnappers. But upon seeing a man in a doctor's coat waiting beside a camper van near the centre of the fort, she makes five. The van was parked recently based on the tyre tracks in the sand.
Big Boss As Big Boss gets past the sniper, narrowly, moving from window to window between firing times, he gets to the room before the crane. There's a turret and an engineer.

Right as Big Boss spots the turret..."An automated dual-rotary turret?!"

The gun goes off, as Big Boss quickly moves into a dive to get as much distance as possible. He sweeps to his feet to not become a sitting duck, as bullets ricochet around him, several smashing into his musclesuit. Despite the man there just lounging...no, a single shot won't do it.

This man's an ace, isn't he? They're all aces. One of them would be a perfect wrench in things. A wolf among the dogs. Perhaps even find out who hired them. If he can't get the VIP, it won't be a wash in this case.

Trying to maneuver to cover inside the room, if there is any, Boss draws his pistol - a tranquilizer type - and fires it directly at the Engineer. A shot for the head, two for the chest. It's unlikely the turret is linked to his consciousness, but that'll prevent direct control if he can get him down or otherwise sluggish.
Xion Xion is called a crying baby. Normally, this would be highly affective against an Action Teenager, who are basically babies swinging rattles loudly around while expecting to be taken seriously.

Xion is a bit too taken by the next thing out of the Heavy's mouth. Harkened with a mighty detonation, the parabolic arc of BONK that drives a trench shovel into Xion's guard. He exploded himself! FOR AIRTIME!

The meaty metal ker-KLANG of shovel-flat against metallic 'shwink!' buckles Xion under the airborne assault, forced to brace the length of her Keyblade at mid-blade with her other hand against just the one-handed assault of the Soldier. "You exploded yourself!" Xion gasps, from her half-kneel, shoving foward with her blade and rolling for distance as she comes up. "You've got a bazooka and you're using it to hit me with a shovel!"

Xion's guard drops. "You're totally awesome! Why are we fighting again?"
Cantio     "Wha... That's just uncalled for...!" Cantio complains as she keeps the chase going, only sparing her busted drone a brief glance. It's enough to have her reconsider just hurling more of those drones out for the time being, and it provides the scrawny man an easy enough time luring her further inside through the roar of multiple people yelling and screaming around the fortress.

     Of course, all that noise and the adrenaline from the chase means that Cantio does't quite notice the rigged doorframe until she's already standing there, confounded by the pair laughing at her. "There you are. Now-"

    And then she explodes. It's quite a large explosion, too, enough that it knocks Cantio clear off her feet and leaves her covered in burns whilst laying on her side as the smoke clears. Alas, she does't stay down for long, and she's not even gibbed despite the sheer number of explosives. As Cantio gets back up with blood pouring down her face, a large slightly off-gray off-pink blade shimmers into existence, and she props herself up with it while leveling the deadliest glare at the two she can manage with only one eye not covered in blood and debris.

    It's not nearly as scary as she hopes it looks, especially considering that she's also tearing up a bit between the insults, the laughter, and also everything hurting a lot. The brief bout of muttering to herself as she casts a healing spell on herself might help make her look at least a little more threatening, though! Maybe.

     Not really. "Is that the best you can do? It's my turn, then. Get ready!" With two targets in front of her, Cantio opts to rush both of them at first, then focuses her attention on the one-eyed gentleman, slicing and dicing with more speed than technique to try and overwhelm the one she can only assume would be slower on his feet than the youngster.

    She's not aiming for the head or chest, at least, but it also doesn't seem like seem like she's trying that hard not to dismember him. "Take me to the captive, or I can't guarantee either of you are going to come out of this unhurt!"
Eryl Fairfax     Taking cover behind an abandoned cherry picker, Boss puts his plan into action. Lining up his shot, he nails the Engineer right above his goggles. "Ow! What the hell?" he asks, reaching up to pull the needle out. As two more slam into his chest he looks down before climbing out of his recliner drunkenly.

    "When ah... get mah hands on you..." he slurs, accent thinking. "... structurally superfluous... behind..." He flops down, passing through his turret's line of fire which seems to trigger some safety mechanism that shuts it off.

    One down.

    With a resounding clang, shovel meets Keyblade as the Soldier finds his footing and hops back just as Xion rolls. He brings out a shotgun, but pauses as she describes his suicidal method of airtime as 'awesome.' His square jaw splits into a grin as he rests his weapon on his shoulder. "Well, good to see there's still some red-blooded patriots among the misguided youth of today! What's your name soldier?"

    Past him, Xion can see Heavy poke his head around the gate to see this going on. She can almost swear that he rolls his eyes before withdrawing.

    As Cantio gets up from what should have been a lethal explosion, the scrawny guy screams "OH MY GOD!" in shock. The dark-skinned man on the other hand just laughs. "Didn't ya see the bloody bombs?" he asks, in a Scottish accent for some reason.

    She rushes with a sword, and her digistructed weapon clashes with steel. The one-eyed man has produced a claymore and matches her challenge. "I'll warn ya now wee lass. This blade 'ere can't be sheathed until it's take a head!"

    The two exchange sword rushes, but it becomes clear that this may not be the fellow's primary skillset, as Cantio begins to overwhelm him, opening up more and more wounds.
Cantio     "I did." Cantio lies (and bleeds) through her teeth as she keeps on chopping and slashing, keeping the offense going while starting to regain some of her poise thanks to having some time to recover from the shellshock of literally having explosions replace everything in her vision seconds earlier.

    The blood will still be an issue, and she still needs to keep an eye on the Scout, but it's a lot harder fighting with only one eye open than she expected. Even with the difference in their skill, Cantio's still taking cuts here and there, all without enough time to focus on healing magic to get herself back into ideal fighting form. "But as the Drive Core Candidate of my nation, I can't let a bomb or..."

    How many were there, anyway? This man certainly didn't sound like the type to hold back, but his technique with the sword does leave a bit to be desired compared to his skill with explosives. "... Seven stop me. Now-"

    She pauses for a brief moment, even holding her blade still in mid-swing to stage whisper to the sword-bomber-man and the runner if he's still there. "Vice-president. Or heir apparent?" And then she's back to swinging, holding off on most fatal and/or dismembering attacks in favor of those aimed at just leaving him unable to keep fighting back.

    "If I beat you, will you take me to the captive? Or am I going to have to break out the expense card and solve this another way?" She's totally bribing him. He doest' need to know that she doesn't have complete access to her country's finances, right? Right.
Big Boss As the Engineer goes down, as does his turret, Boss considers fultoning this guy immediately. But...the Sniper will just take down the balloon. So, checking his pistol - five darts left - Boss moves to push out towards the Sniper's position.

He's expecting a problem. A sniper like that probably has CQC skills. So, he'll scan with his gun out, and if he spots the guy, fire two into his chest to close up. Hopefully, he has no silly gimmicks!

They always have silly gimmicks, don't they?
Xion Xion's expression is bright, shining, stellar in the twinkle held in her eyes. "It's like you just smoke with confidence."

He smokes, literally, from the rocket exhaust caught in his parabolic jumping. But it's a kind of confidence.

"I'm Xion! I'm definitely blooded and also probably a patriot of some kind. Isn't it hard not to be? Society gives you a weird weapon and tells you 'go defeat the communists!' and..." Xion lifts her Keyblade, twirling it in her hand. "... I don't know, it's hard, sometimes. But you're really impressive! You've got three weapons, and I've just got different shapes of the one, and you blow yourself up for airtime... How did you learn to be so cool? Are all Americans as cool as you?"

Xion is starstruck, eyes fluttering as she goes 'ne ne, Soldier-sama' in cutscene wonder.

"Your baby-obsessed friend sounds like he's pretty fun. When he's not shooting at you. Are you guys rivals to Outer Heaven?"
Eryl Fairfax     Eventually, Cantio has the man worn down to the point that he slumps against the back wall. The runner points a baseball bat at her in a way that would be threatening if it wasn't shaking. "Girlie, ya'll have ta chase me to hell ta get me to talk," the swordsman-bomber says in his prone position. But his tune immediately changes when Cantio brings up her expenses card.

    "Well, we're bein' paid heaps for this job. But it's ya lucky day lass. Help me to our Medic and I'll throw in a discount since this wee sprout couldn't lift a feather." "Hey! I'm RIPPED!" the runner insists, flexing his noodly arms and winking at Cantio.

    Boss emerges besides the crane. Thankfully, it does seem the Sniper has seen fit to look elsewhere at this time, likely presuming the end of the turret fire coincided with Boss' death. Darts are sunk into his form, but before he goes down, he produces a mason jar loaded with some kind of yellow substances and wings it at Boss. "Jara..." he mutters before leaning over the window of the crane, snoring.

    Outside, the Soldier rubs his chin and nods. "I know what you mean little soldier. But don't you worry. It'll all click for you, and you'll be mowing down the godless foreigners in no time!" He crosses his arms and pushes his chin out in pride. "America is the greatest country in the world. If you're American, you're great. But the truth is, I'm easily one of the greatest of the greats. Ever since Abraham Lincoln, God rest his soul, invented stairs, the art of rocket jumping has fallen out of favor. Not many real men out there like me willing to do it."

    Mentioning work seems to snap him out of his crazed mutterings. "Outer Heaven? Never heard of 'em, must be small-timers. We're Team Fortress! Out here on an important job. So you had best skedaddle little lady. Grow up big and strong and maybe you'll kill as many commies as me one day!"
Big Boss Big Boss is splashed by the bottle of yellow fluid, and is completely caught by surprise. He inhales, and then immediately regrets it, because jarate is awful. However, his target is down. He checks his fultons...

Only one to spare, one for the target. Damn. He has an idea of who to take, but decides to query the Watch, and is basically told 'not the piss guy', so...

Boss heads back inside, and carefully moves to drag the Engineer to the closest outside area. Once they're in safe Fulton room, he moves to fire up the balloon. Hopefully they don't have more snipers.

From his vantage point, Boss decides to check the nearest way to his target. He grabs the Sniper's rifle, looking through the scope. He's not going to fire it, but it should work as emergency scouting. If he can find a clearer path, with the least amount of Minibosses, he'll take it and hopefully catch up with Xion.
Cantio     That will have to do. Breathing a sigh of relief, Cantio tosses her sword aside with a well-practiced flick of her wrist as it disappears with a brief musical tone that definitely wasn't practiced or prepared ahead of time. "That sounds lovely. Ah, of course... Ther would be a healer with your group, wouldn't there?"

    So these two, a medic, someone with a rifle, and someone screaming with explosives. That leaves four others unaccounted for. With any luck, though, maybe she'd be relatively safe if she was seen escorting one of their own to their medical expert.

    Better yet, it might not hurt to do it herself and build some goodwill that way. As she approaches the swordsman to offer him a surprisingly strong shoulder despite the build difference, she draws a few shapes in the air with her hand while light builds in her hand (before she even draws the shapes, oddly enough), and a healing light starts to surround them both, making it easier to walk and feel things again.

     "Is this Medic more of a scientific healer or a magical healer? A licensed doctor, even?" She snickers at the taunt leveled at the runner, although his wink doesn't quite land this time around as she just purses her lips and sandbags it entirely by looking where she's walking.

    Cantio's probably still sore about the robot thing. "The job I have is simple. I need to bring the captive back home to find out what he knows. It'd be much easier with your team on my side, whether it's just for this one time or on a more long-term basis."

    A beat, and then she continues hastily. "I-I mean, if we can negotiate something that works out for everyone. You know, since my sister's the HEAD head rather than the... I mean, I do most of the work at home, but she works hard in her own way, too! Even if..." And then she starts rambling. About a fifth of it makes any sense.
Xion Xion produces a baseball cap declaring her baseball allegiance to the YANKEE-DOODLES and affixes it to her head with both hands - one on the brim, the other hooked around the plastic band at the back arch. Her Keyblade rests slightly jammed into the earth having been ground-stuck in an idle animation while she and the soldier talked.

"I've already got my baseball cap! I'm thinking of going pro, mister. So just wait: I'll make America proud. By the way, sir, I had a gun like that, but these red-coated commies took it from me. If you see any members of station security, they can't be trusted and probably should be truncheon'ed for good measure. Anyway thanks, bye!"

Xion salutes the Soldier with a tear-to-eye rendition drawn out of the Soldier's own heart before marching off to find Big Boss.

When they meet, she's all smiles. "Hey Boss! I met a real, American hero today! Uh, mission accomplished?"
Eryl Fairfax     The Fulton balloon ascends bearing its cargo with no fuss. Boss, via scouting with the sniper rifle, sees the big man with the big gun guarding the main road. Behind him is the van, guarded only by what appears to be a field medic. If Boss can descend the crane, slip behind the big man (who seems a little too built to easily CQC) and deal with the medic, it's likely the target will be inside the van. He could probably just drive it out with him.

    The Scottish man isn't too hard to carry thankfully, but Scout still insists on helping by lifting him up from the other side. Her joke actually does land kind of, making Scout scoff at the mention of 'licensed doctor.' That answers that question then.

    "Don't really care why people want 'im girlie. Long as the pay is better than what we're offered, you kin 'ave 'im" the Demoman grouses as you three round the corner to the van. The Medic rushes over immediately to get his fingers inside the Scot's cuts, causing him to yell. "Fascinating. Zuch clean cuts!"

    Some kind of cannon mounted to a backpack is pointed at Demoman and fired, releasing a trail of red light that instantly closes up his wounds. "Now, who's zhis young lady?" Scout explains the matter, causing Medic to rub his chin. "Well, zhis job wasn't paying much... hmmm... team meeting?" "Team meetin'" agrees Scout.

    Up above, Boss and now Xion can see the mercenaries converging around the van and Cantio. Things are getting bad. Worse as the radio on the Sniper starts squawking, calling out for him. No doubt they'll be missing the Engineer too.
Big Boss Up on the helicopter, interrogation and conversion's already beginning. Big Boss meets up with Xion, nods to her, and also smells awful. When he spots Cantio through the scope, he trains the rifle on her head and taps his radio to communicate. When he's done threatening her...

He tells the helicopter to circle around and return the Engineer once the job's done, which will probably be a Bit. Until then, he'll watch the meeting, and then prepare to depart if it seems to go well. If it goes poorly, well, the soldiers don't plan to return him either, and he doesn't care if Cantio gets killed, so he'll just leave.
Xion Xion is explained to that their mission is to get to the extraction guy, VIP the something, and solo stealth operation on site procurement sneaking mission.

"Well, then, how about... We don't worry about this, Boss? It's one mission. They're all keyed up right now. If you got their guy, just negotiate a deal. This way, you can build mercenary relationships with American Spirit, and maybe get better friends later, and you can have Outer Heaven try another interception. Not every quest ends at the first time you fail a challenge, you know?"

Turning to point at the group of mercenaries - and their elite support - she shrugs. "It's two versus lots. I can portal you, or a transmitter, somewhere , but if you want my plan, that's what I'm thinking."
Cantio That's only mildly concerning. Cantio manages to laugh it off, but she's doing a pretty bad job hiding her concern over that laugh. She almost sounds worried for them.

Her fears are then proven right when the Medic just sticks his fingers right in the Scout's wounds. There's also a bit of pride welling up in her from the indirect compliment, and then she's immediately distracted when the Medic utilizes the healing cannon. Personal space stops being a thing as Cantio starts shifting around trying to get a better look at the machine, stopping just short of actually grabbing the thing even though the look in her eyes suggests otherwise.

<J-IC-Scene> Big Boss says, "You. The one who spoke up earlier. What is your intention for this VIP? Speak honestly, and don't alert the others - I have a bead on your head."

That's the first thing thatgets Cantio freezing up. She leaves the Medic alone and tries to look natural as the team goes into their meeting, glancing around slowly to try and figure out just where she's being aimed at from.

<J-IC-Scene> Cantio says, "Eh? Wait, Wh-what?! Aah... I'm just here to... I'm just here to find out what information the VIP has! Where...?"
<J-IC-Scene> Big Boss says, "Do you intend to return him to the meeting point afterwards?"
<J-IC-Scene> Cantio says, "There's...? Um." Throat clearing, then trying to sound TOUGH (badly) "That... Depends. What do you plan to do with him?""
<J-IC-Scene> Big Boss says, "Obtain his information, and then make sure, one way or another, he never makes it to his intended meeting."

This certainly sounds like an opportunity. She just needs to actually pull it off. No pressure.

<J-IC-Scene> Cantio says, "I see... Then if that's the case, how does a deal sound? I'm working on a deal with this team right now. If it goes through, I can make sure the VIP doesn't get there provided you don't... Er. Shoot anyone."
<J-IC-Scene> Big Boss takes a long drag of a cigar, and then- "I accept. I'll return one of their members in several hours time. If the man makes it to his meeting, they'll never see him again. Negotiate accordingly."

Holy crap, that actually worked. Breathing a sigh of relief, the tension in Cantio's everything eases immediately. She waits until the team meeting is finished (or looks finished) before speaking up. "Excuse me! I heard that one of your team was taken, but I've secured his release. The only condition is that we not take the VIP to..."

Where were they planning to bring him, anyway? "... The meeting point. I can show you which way to get to one of my nation's safe houses. Do you accept?"
Xion Xion, conferring with Big Boss, reaches into Boss' outer pocket and fishes out a transmitter. Thanks to his telling her, Xion properly codes the frequency - 140.15 - and uses her other hand to pop a piece of gum into her mouth.

Chewing quickly, she uses her fingers to manipulate a small portal open near the DOKTOR's large backpack of science.

Carefully, she affixes her bubblegum to the transmitter, and then the transmitter onto the bottom of his backpack.

There's a few moments of purple and fingers to spot the add, and, of course, the scent of bubblegum after.
Eryl Fairfax     The mercenaries all assemble. The big fellow, American Spirit, Scout and Demo, the cruel medic, a figure in a gas mask from inside the van, and a fellow in a mask who just... comes out of nowhere.

    "Vhere is Engineer and Sniper?" the masked fellow asks. Thankfully, Cantio is there to provide an answer. "Well ain't that convenient?" Scout says, getting in Cantio's face. "You /just so happen/ to have a bargaining chip huh?" The masked fellow is looking around as he produced a cigarette case, before using it to cuff Scout over the head. "Up zhere idiot."

    Everyone looks up, and sees Boss aiming down at them from the crane with an unconscious Sniper dangling from the window. "Zo... condition is we not take them to their meeting? And if this is case, we get our man back? And if we turn him over to you for information, you pay us?"

    Once this is laid out, everyone erupts into laughter.

    "What's so funny?" asks a whiny voice from the van. There they are, the target. Known only as The Civilian. Their moustache twitches in concern when they see Cantio. "Change in plan sir!" the Soldier says, putting an arm around the man. "We're handing you to her so she can take your information!" His eyes bug out before the invisible man interrupts. "And place you under her nation's protection. Our end of the deal will be met; you won't have to live in your line of work anymore."

    So as it turns out, the one who hired these nine was the man himself to escape his career as secret-keeper. The hand-off goes without a hitch. The Civilian does not attend the meeting, and so the Engineer is returned. And Team Fortress gets two payouts. Never realising that they are now being watched by Outer Heaven.

    Alls well that ends well.