Scene #6437: #04: Message - Search for Companions

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Gideon Kaspar	It's nice that for once it's someone else's job to track down the elite team that, between the four of them, supposedly hold some kind of critical data that Sangvis Ferri has been chasing after for months, following whatever the hell happened at that completely wrecked facility seen last time. The 404 had seemed . . . a little quirky, but certainly reliable enough last time, and certainly four people especially trained and built for long recon, night missions, espionage and sabotage, will have an easier time moving around than half a dozen or more fantastical weirdos who largely specialize in going loud. It feels almost kind of weird when the notice comes in that 'hey, someone else found the girl of the week, come pick up' despite the fact it'd certainly been a lot of effort for them while people weren't looking, and even weirder to realize that M-16 (which the other three girls have been drilled to the point of joke rehearsal not to use the serial number anymore, but 'Hazel' to complete the colour-coded flower-themed name set) is the last one of the bunch. There's a bit of tension, but also seemingly high spirits. The weird cherry on top the sundae of relieving anticlimax is that, though today looks to be another shootout, rather than one of those missions with more elements to them, dropped off in the middle of the snowy lower mountain valleys and rises, it looks like a pretty trivial one. Though this is deep in Intruder's territory (indeed, G&K has started drawing up and providing maps from all the gathered intelligence (read: stolen hard drives) thusfar that break up S.F's corporate territory into something like a map of feudal states ruled over by regents) it seems calling on the 404 was the right choice, as there's been no militarized response in this direction. No big counterattack. No race against the clock in an explosive and bloody climax. At least, the sole complicating factor seems to be that after the 404 had reported M-16's location, they'd gone completely dark. That isn't too unusual for a group like that, but it is worrying enough that they didn't call for a pickup in the intervening 24 hours. The idea that there's been some elaborate and deadly trap based around on Intruder already knowing M-16's location and lying low to ambush whoever comes for her isn't nearly out of the question, but actually having eyes on the site, it seems pretty unlikely.
Gideon Kaspar	The target location appears to be little more than a storage depot built against the side of a mountain road crossing a steep pass with sheer walls, but only a shallow drop into a broad snowfield with scatterings of trees and a frozen river running through it. It's more of a supply dump, if anything, presumably used by the employees and military contractors of Sangvis Ferri when any humans lived here a little less than a year ago. The parkade is barely enough for four frosted over vehicles, and the T-Dolls that apparently seem to run the area now have no need of any of the supplies within. There's also not many offensive or ambush positions for a military detachment to take. There are small blockades of troops a ways down either end of the road, an overlook tower on the opposite side of the pass, and a patrol down in the snowfield, but they seem to be just border police alert corps around a more critical strategic area miles ahead. The only part that stands out is the harsh angles and arctic camo paint of actual government military automata, comprising a handful of what look to be self-propelled small artillery near the guard tower. There isn't a pre-existing military outpost here. They must have been hijacked; stolen from the army itself, from some vulnerable area. Hacked, if it's Intruder's doing. A raid, even a small one, on the military, is pretty brazen for Sangvis Ferri at this point. Even if PMCs do most of the fighting now, it still seems the army is not to be fucked around with, and S.F has been reasonably held in check with the PMC to PMC conflict so far, with G&K at its borders. Overall, it seems M-16's strategy was to hide right next to the enemy, which seems to have been paying off so far. It's something that seems to be working out for now. No wonder the 404 could have snuck in here at night.
Tomoe	Things had gone well so far right? The first three T-dolls have been located and rescued, they knew the last one was alive, active and well. They just had to get to her, though disturbing team 404? Was not found at the moment as they'd gone dark after reporting the location of M-16. Did something happen? It's been a whole day with no word from them. Something may have happened to them. Tomoe has made ready for the mission with a mind to keep an eye out for team 404's fate. The supply dump has her wary even if the androids who now controlled the region didn't need it. They would certainly know anyone operating in the area might indeed have need of them and likely /are/ keeping some level of an eye on the location in some way shape or form. Tomoe had kept her own deployment on the ground> Flying might be faster but it might darn well get her noticed in short order so she's been keeping it slow. Sadly she has no real stealth training, still, she's doing her best to keep quiet as she approaches the site on foot and tries to keep a low profile as she does so. She has to wonder is M-16 still there? At least she hopes so, she takes keen note of the military grade units that are there and will try to find something to hunter down at while she gets a better lay of the land before doing something foolish like just racing in there. She tries to get an idea of if the drones are in low power mode or currently active from observing them.
Nova Terra	Initial recon of the area had indicated limited approaches to the site. For what little fortifications were here, they didn't need much given the surrounding terrain. While a full on assault, possibly with drop pods, was a possibility... It's not really Nova's style. Indeed, Nova's style is obviously to not be obvious. So she's come in alone, taking the long trek from a hidden landing site while under cloak. She finally reaches the depot, though on the opposite side of the pass. The watch tower there represented not only a troublesome threat, given its sight range of the surroundings, but also an excellent sniping position, given its sight range of the surroundings. Thus, Nova carefully makes her way towards the tower, avoiding intentional engagement with enemy troops for now in the hopes of getting to it unnoticed.
Haguro	Haguro's looking somewhat anxious as she arrives at the designated location, looking out towards the storage depot and the sporadic patrols leading towards it. It's been a fair while since her last outing, and she's running over all sorts of ways things could go wrong in her head. Ambushes, VIPs suddenly appearing on the scene, or even unforeseen technology that could overwhelm any number of troops. After a minute, though, she smacks her cheeks and starts talking to herself to psyche herself up. Just because she doesn't have the bitey heads attached to her anymore doesn't mean she can't still take them on up close! Besides, now it's easier to skulk around and not draw unnecessary attention with that entire appendage missing from her belly. The new gear and mildly confusing abilities certainly won't hurt her in the ambush department, either, but that will remain to be seen. Part of her still misses those little buggers, though. Checking her turrets and gear over, Haguro takes a deep breath to mentally steady herself before starting to head down the road. She sticks to whatever cover she can find, trying to keep herself out of view at least initially while keeping her gaze focused further down the road towards the tower. There's little doubt in her mind that they'll encounter resistance, but keeping the smaller groups separated from any potential reinforcements later is her current priority.
Gordon Freeman	Thank god this is just a supply dump. No more running around wide-open streets. Gordon's gotta get inside fast, but once he does, he's going to have a much easier time in an interior space. That's all, of course, assuming he can get inside in the first place. That part's tricky. Doable. But tricky. Tricky in the way that needs a fast, hard approach. He's going to have to improvise this, because he can't see from this distance what needs seeing, but he has to trust that his intuition for getting into difficult-to-access places will serve him as well as it always has. He's clambered up along the sheer walls nearby, trying to get an advantageous upper position, one that will let him leap into the area hard. "High impact reactive armor activated. Have a very safe day." His armor gently synths. Then he takes a running, strength-enhanced jump. Arcing high, he's hoping to land on the weakest-looking supply crate he can find to use it to break his considerable impact force on the fall, then roll out of the jump, draw his shotgun, strike at whatever he needs to, and find a place mostly in cover in the interior space!
Tony Stark	Squad 404 had given Tony a really good impression on their first encounter, despite the 'grr grr I'm vaguely anti-Hazel'. In fact, it's clearly vaguely endearing to Stark, and the combination of 'mild' cross-team aggression and clear professional attitude means leaving things to them is very natural. There's clearly no reason Tony Stark finds kinship with the aggressive professional lady 416 and her sleepy friend. Especially when dealing with a grizzled professional coworker. No reason. Flying over the suspected zoner as Gordon makes his entrance to the supply dump, Iron Man starts sweeping the area with his helmet sensors. "Quiet supply area. Not many contacts. Random police blockades. This is where Hazel holed up? This is where Team 404 disappeared? I don't buy it. Anyone got any ideas or are we going with Operation Poke-It-With-A-Big-Stick?"
Gideon Kaspar	Tomoe trying her best to skulk closer isn't likely to be the stealthiest, but she doesn't need to be very close to at least figure out what she wants to know. The blockade on the road that hugs the steep rock face and winds past the supply dump proper is not a lot more than some portable metal barricades, a radar station, some proximity sensors, and a couple of squads of guards. A unit of Guard types, wielding those gigantic slab-like shields, is set up alongside a unit of close range Rippers and a unit of mid range Vespids. It's enough that charging straight at them would probably get a chunk of her HP shot off even with her shield, and then breaking past the enemy shields would be very difficult solo, but not enough to be a hard battle if attacked from multiple angles. Nova seems to have been thinking exactly what the enemy was, and sneaking up to the scaffolded tower, she finds a pair of Jaeger units lying in wait, with a clear view across the valley, where their targets would either be stranded in a wide open snowfield or stuck on a narrow road with no cover. The military cannons look to be in standby mode, hunkered down on heavy, hydraulic legs, and partially resting on huge shield plates on their front, dug into the ground with shovel claws at the bottom. The top half of them is basically just a small tank turret with its own targeting pods, likewise faced across the divide. The snag is that the T-Dolls are neither on standby, nor automatic patrol, nor active alert. When three different girls draw close, they can see and hear the Sangvis Ferri mass produced Doll units . . . idling around and chatting. It's the damnedest thing. The identical batch purple and black models are sitting on crates or idling in position, weapons only within arm's reach as they go on shooting the shit about the weather, the rumours that there's a special operations unit skulking about, whether or not 'the boss' will catch them, what they think it'll be like tomorrow, their deployments, and other random small talk and gossip, like actual, bored, slightly boring soldiers without social lives. It's super fucking weird. Even the two Jaegers that Nova finds are bitching about having to keep the cannons here and arguing over whether the military will try to take them back. There are little tally marks scratched into the interior wall of the tower box, apparently in competition. Gordon jumps off a fucking cliff and crumples an empty titanium crate underneath him. It's surprisingly not that bad, like landing on top of a car. The moment he does, the blockade he's skipped stirs into a panic (as opposed to a silent, meticulous turnaround and shoot), and one of the T-Dolls hits her radio and yells "Enemy contacts! They're coming from above! Turn on the fire support! Hurry hurry!" into it (aren't they supposed to be networked together?). He has just enough time to shotgun blast one or two from behind, and then skitter behind a concrete support when the first flash of green comes across the mountain valley and obliterates his landing spot, melting the crate into a puddle. He can see a heavy iron door with a turn crank handle around the corner of the building, with the lights off inside.
Gideon Kaspar	Tony, flying up above, can't find any sign that there are units lying in wait to ambush. If there were a small army lying in wait in the snowfield, they sure didn't join in the contingent of Vespids and Dragoons now rushing up the slopes. He does, however, see the walking cannons powering on, lifting themselves to a crouch, planting themselves in the rock, swiveling their turrets to track the Elites spotted on the road, and their rectangular barrels warming up yellow to bright blue, and firing blinding flashes of cyan energy across the gorge, landing on the other side with pinpoint accuracy and demolishing huge chunks of the road. It looks like a different tech base than the particle rifles the jaegers are using. Aside from being a different colour, the projectiles are significantly slower (albeit still as fast as a real tank shell), burn much hotter in flight, and devastate everything in a thirty foot radius from where they land, rupturing into huge thermal fire blooms on impact. It's the first look at real 'artillery support' used by Sangvis Ferri so far, stealing from the military what they haven't added to their repertoire with new Doll units.
Haguro	The addition of banter to the S.F T-Dolls has Haguro on edge. Are these T-Dolls becoming more intelligent, or is it just a computer simulation sort of thing? She certainly found it easier to shoot them when they were (mostly) just faceless macines, but depending on the answer to that question... Well, it wouldn't make that much of a difference. She has her job, they have theirs, and things sound like they're getting started once Gordon makes his entrance. Spying those cannons powering up, Haguro turns on the boosters on her armor as those massive beams rip into the terrain before her. At the last moment, she blasts out from behind her cover, stumbling briefly and barely able to stay upright as she zips across the road with lights flaring up behind her from the boosters on her armor. She'll get used to it sooner or later. For now, though, she has to improvise with her newfound speed as she finds herself barreling straight towards the Vespoids and Dragoons. She's moving too fast to fire on them effectively, and trying to punch them might not be the best idea with the sheer number of enemies around. Plan C, then. Loading her wrist turrets with grappling knives, Haguro launches them out haphazardly as she aims to bowl straight through the T-Dolls while simultaneously flailing her knives-on-chains around wildly to cause as much chaos among their ranks as she can.
Tomoe	Tomoe is not the stealthiest person here and she knows it, but she's aware of this which does keep her from trying to do something very foolish. Like thinking she actually stealthy and trying to get closer. She does scope things out taking it in and updating her own internal plans for just how to deal with these problems. She takes note of the blockade, the radar, the proxy sensors, those are going to be a thing she's pretty certain on. The also get a good idea of the units that are there. Rippers, Guards, and some Vespids. Making a push alone would be bad, but if more than one was pishing she could do far better not having the full force of the troops there focused on her. She will have to wait for her allies to move Gordon gets their attention fairly quickly, and she knows Nova is there too, and with Tony the Iron Man Stark staring more attention? It's time for Tomoe to go, she'll pop most of her defence buffs ready her sword and shield and then she'll flare our her wing making a blitz for the position ahead hopefully with her allies drawing attention they all won't be able to focus at her, with flying low as she closes she'll also fire off several spells, and keeping to the air even low might help her avoid setting off any landmines that might be laying in wait. Also with Haugro doing her thing she'll draw a lot of attention and it was up to Tomoe to help make sure someone she sees as a fellow tank not have to deal with /everything/ on her own.
Nova Terra	Nova glances at the large cannons as she climbs up the tower. They look nasty. Nova highly doubts she would like being caught in their blast radius. Even with her suit. Reaching the top, Nova would indeed find it odd that the Jaegers are complaining. Openly. In fact, has she ever even heard the mass produced units talking before? Something's not right... Something's also being attacked! The large cannons begin to fire. It seems some of Nova's allies on this mission have been noticed. There's little time to act now. Knowing snipers as she does, plus having previous experience with the model, Nova expects their close combat abilities to be lacking at best. So the first sign of Nova's presence is her cloak shimmering as she rushes the closest Jaeger, attempting to leverage her the psi-enhanced strength provided by her suit to knock the T-Doll's large particle rifle from its hands. She then quickly follows up with a telekinetic blast at the second Jaeger, attempting to stagger it and possibly smash it into the railing along the sides.
Gordon Freeman	He's already in cover and going when he stops to consider something, blinking and confused. Were they speaking? But, Gordon is focused and determined. These... may be /unusual/ SF forces, especially right now, but he's gotta assume they're still with the main SF forces, especially if they're talking about things like the 'boss'. Aren't they supposed to be network-operated drones? Well, they're enemy forces, and this is his target, so he's gotta press forward. One. Two-- Two and a half. About two and a half seconds for full target acquisition from that sniper! Shit. Gordon can't crank that door handle fast enough to get inside with that blaster blasting the way it is! But still, he has to do his best. His mind races; his suppressing fire from the shotgun isn't going to keep enemies away long, he's got less than ten seconds before they turn this around on him, and only a handful of rounds before he needs to reload. Think. Think. He whips around, seeking out more unloaded crates, more hollow metal that has been unpacked and stored away in the supply dump. He kicks one hard, slamming it out from behind the support, then yanks a handle on another. First, get the tracking off of him. Then, get the sniper having to track a second target -- Gordon himself, diving out towards the door. He's blazing away with his SMG in one hand, rapidly moving with the crate in the other. He starts part of the door-cranking. One. Two. And--! If his guesses on timing were right, he has to dive low and kick the crate up for cover! He needs to use it as a shield, because his armor may be /tough/ but it doesn't make him /invulnerable/. Hopefully this can buy him another second, maybe two, before he's reacquired as a target, and then he /might/ be able to get that door all the way open and dive into cover inside before it melts him! Fast! Have to do this /fast/!! Tony's questions hang on his mind, but they're in the back seat. It's why he's not focused on killing so much as blasting right through and inside. He'll have to run fast in the interiors, but at least they're more advantageous to his style. And if 404 went dark here, he's gotta look for them too! He has no idea what he'll find inside, but he's ready to keep momentum and dash hard if his scheme to survive breaching the door works.
Tony Stark	Flying has always been Tony's joy. Fighting had been a necessary inclusion in his first model of his armor, but the ones not made in a cave with a box of scraps had been flight pieces first and fighting armors second. The necessity of fighting had come later, but the simple pleasure of being above it all and cruising - ensconsed in augmented reality displays and his eyes fed data of every sort from helmet feeds - with a thick layer of armor, and the best defensive countermeasures he could think up between him and harm. It gave Tony perspective, unlike the hectic chaos down below of exploding cannon shells. "What sort of network activity are we looking at. Is Intruder here?" "There's a network - but activity's low. No sign of coordinating presence. Compared to previous encounters, it's terribly underutilized." "Yeah... Add another scratch under the 'weird' column." Tony quips, glancing down at those artillery cannons. "Well, can't let the pretty ladies have all the fun." "High-grade explosive rounds fired from advanced firing platforms is fun?" Friday wonders, a hint of wry humor in her tone. With a smirk, Tony dives down, a halo of guided ordinance splitting off from ports along the suit to saturate the ground the cannons are firing from with at least a hail of debris and dust if not damage if they're heavily armored, following it personally with a red and gold missile of man and metal as he crashes into the rearmost cannon to tear the firing tube from the mount with his not-at-all bare hands. "Friday, see if you can jam their firing calculations to pull the heat off the girls and Doctor Freeman." "Accessing network."
Gideon Kaspar	Haguro charging the slope to plough face first into the snowfield reinforcements will certainly waylay them at least. Since it's mostly flat terrain where it isn't a steep cliff, she at least doesn't have too much to crash face first into or trip over. Snow and ice count as water, right? Either way though, she's opened fire on the moment she clears the ledge. The T-Dolls coming from the center of the valley don't seem to be intimidated by the charge. The Dragoons keep charging on ahead, revving up their autocannons and blasting Haguro with high density particle fire, while the Vespids take a knee halfway there and begin focusing her down with their rifle shots. Even in the middle of it, they're all calling out to each other and using a comms frequency for battle chatter. One of them yells "Collision course! She's going to try and charge into you! Look out!" to one of the lead Dragoons when Haguro ploughs right in going full hellnoodle with her chain blades. One of the Dragoons is crushed dead on by her ramming action, while the two nearest to it stumble away with multiple lacerations carved all over the hull, one of the riders being thrashed right off immediately. A fourth crouches to flex its legs, and then jumps over Haguro, crashing into the snow behind her and lighting her up from the back. One of the Vespids runs ahead and grabs hold of the dismounted rider, missing an arm and bleeding in the snow, and begins dragging the damaged unit back out of the battle zone like a casualty. Tomoe comes under fire the moment she leaves cover, but that's part of the plan. At least when she's up above, the only direction she can be shot from is 'below', and she only has to aim her shield in one direction. The Guards and Rippers on the ground don't really have the range to effectively hit her with more than scattered chip damage if she goes high over them, and soon the Guards are rushing to hold up their own shields in turtle style over the heads of their comrades, protecting them from the hail of spells that comes pelting down. Gordon spraying with his shotgun and SMG from the opposite side strikes down two of the Rippers with crippling injuries, and takes the knee out of one of the Guards, instead turning its shield towards him and protecting its wounded comrades. One in the formation calls for "Sniper support on my location!" and the twin bolts of whizzing hypersonic particle fire come after him just a moment later. One of the girls is yelling about 'anti-air' over and over again, diverting the mobile artillery from shelling the shit out of the bridge and instead aiming up into the air, where most of the enemy is now. Nova is correct in that sneaking up behind the snipers is a bit of a joke encounter. She could have gotten away with just about anything, with both units prone and focused ahead, relaying coordinates to one another and staring down their scopes. One of them deforms the wall of the flimsy tower when it's smashed into it, its visor display sputtering and going dark as it slumps over. The other one's rifle flies out of its hands with a cry of shock, and it turns on Nova drawing a sidearm, firing wildly at its best guess of the invisible telekinetic bullshit, yelling "He's here, he's here!", apparently mistaking her for Raziel???
Gideon Kaspar	Tony and Tomoe, being the aerial targets, come under fire from the cannons. It's easier to dodge than tank shells might be just for the bright blue glow, but they retain their velocity a lot higher, having little mass to suffer air drag. When dodged narrowly, the bolts radiate such incandescent heat that they still scorch and burn, liable to blister skin even through armour if evaded by only a couple of feet. A direct hit would of course be catastrophically nasty. The shower of missiles on their position seems fairly effective. While they have huge, heavy pavises mounted on the front, obviously rated to withstand counter fire from enemy heavy weapons, the turrets are plated 'as much as an advanced tank' on the top and sides, and the legs and back are less armoured than that. Missile hits to the front are marginally effective, but hitting the thinner portions takes out critical joints and motors, blowing a leg off hear, snapping a turret train there, and leaving one unable to shoot at anything useful, and another only able to fire at a fixed position right next to the supply dump. Hacking the rest of them takes the anti-air pressure off immediately. It seems that they hadn't really fixed the same backdoors they'd used to get into those units in the first place. It seems they'd also been yelling for anti-air as the helicopter makes its return, the fast, low-flying stealth model this time carrying the three existing members of the A-R team, and a cadre of Gideon's own personal T-Dolls, importantly featuring the sniper Autumn and the bomb-happy assistant Krysanthe. It buzzes around the corner of the pass and swoops in over the blockade, and on order, the eight T-Dolls on board open fire with automatic assault rifles, heavy anti-materiel guns, and a shower of grenades, both powerful incendiaries and high explosives, dropped out of one side on the road unit, and the other on the snowfield unit Haguro is fighting. Another half dozen enemy T-Dolls are destroyed immediately, with others now running from the fierce blazes, or staggering out in disorientation from the edges blast craters. One of them is wildly yelling for reinforcements, while yet another is calling for a retreat, trying to marshal the able-bodied robo-girls to grab the damaged and cripples ones off the field. Gordon, without the sniper interference, is free to crank the door and get inside. Nothing unusual pops out at him for the first few corridors, until he starts finding broken open supply crates and destroyed Sangvis units, much more recent than 24 hours ago, still having some battery juice in them, and the synthetic fluids not being fully dry yet. Around the corner, he can hear "Why . . . I am obviously the outstanding T-Doll . . ." "Experience, reaction, training. You fall short in all of the above." "You never run out of excuses . . . M-16. Tell me, what am I to you?!" "Hah. Oh please. You really wanna know? Then I'll tell you, 416. You mean absolutely nothing to me. Got it? You're worthless. You're boring. You're nothing to me." ". . . that's what I hate about you, M-16. You always look so self-assured no matter what situation you're in. Don't you have a single weak moment you bastard?!" There's a pause, and then a sigh. "No T-Doll is completely emotionless. That's the problem . . . Right now, a gal is anxiously waiting for me to go home. I'm in a rush. You can hear it outside, can't you? So stand aside, 416. After all, you don't really have the heart to pull no punches with me, do you?" "So that's your weakness, M-16 . . ." ". . . Learn when to keep your mouth shut. Remember this lesson. Or I'll make your AI compute a reasoning to commit suicide."
Tomoe	Tomoe is going to owe Nova once for keeping the Jagers very busy, she's coming under fire but with her vector of attack which she's learned to use form past experience with the T-Dolls of this world leave her better able to focus on the attack as they come she is taking damage but it is not as bad as it would be had she gone in before everyone else made their moves. "Hello girls! I'm back!" She calls out as she gets closer she doubts she'll get a response from them, yet who knows. She'll notice their teamwork and take note of that she shifts from light rays to using lighting bolts as she makes her attacks, she wonders how good their surge protectors are, and she'll keep dealing with the fire well until the anti-air shows up. That would be a drone tank or is it a T-doll tank?! The shells are no joke and rather than trying to take them she is forced to evade rather than try to tank the hits. Several get close and Tomoe will feel the eat and take injury form it her HP bar dropping more. She does not want to take a direct hit here and is going turn her lighting on the tanks. So once again with the norse and the runes she goes. It's not so much expecting to just short them out, but hoping the lighting will do a fair bit of damage as their armour might not be made to handle that sort of damage as well as other attacks she can muster.
Nova Terra	Several shots from the sidearm of the Jaeger pass through empty air. Until one doesn't. It strikes something solid, cloaking field in that area briefly disrupted to reveal a shoulder badly scorched by the energy fire. Explosions then light up the tower exterior from the barrage of missiles laying waste to the artillery. Nova's cloak shimmers a little more as it compensates for the sudden change in lighting. But it then fades away completely as a wash of blue as Nova decloaks. The Ghost lunges forward towards the prone Jaeger, reaching out with one hand to try and grab for the bot's neck and drag it to its feet. And then further. Her other hand reaches for the wrist of the hand holding the sidearm, trying to grab it and hold it away so the weapon is rendered useless. If Nova can manage to grab the Jaeger in her grip, she proceeds to push the T-Doll up against the wall of the tower, trying to hold it there as she... Stares. At its visor. Through her own. Though it's less what she's looking at with her eyes, but rather with her mind. Nova attempts to probe the machine. She knows from experience that she can read the minds of AIs if they are sufficiently advanced and self-aware. And the actions of these specific T-Dolls-the strange behaviour, the talking, the kill counts-suggest that they may fall into that category. And if they do, Nova wants to know why. It's an odd divergence from the usual SF units.
Gordon Freeman	Gordon gets inside, and through the halls, he can hear... What is that? He doesn't speak up, or say anything to his companions. Rather, he just silently posts a datafeed of the exchange, something that the others can tune into. He has his own theories, his own ideas about what might be going on. Four Sixteen was part of 404. They went dark, but she sounds fine. What's going on? He kneels to check one of the bodies. He listens closely... That /is/ that voice. He's learned to listen well. He holsters his SMG before turning the corner. He doesn't want to add to the tension. He even... knocks on the corner wall, as if politely entering someone's office, just before he gets in, checking on the situation curiously. If M-16 needs any help, he's going to offer it immediately. He heard 416 mentioning she might be in a bad situation. He's also going to activate his VIP beacon, indicating he's found the target of things! Targets, plural. But... 416 seemed to have a lot of social counterweight from the rest of her unit. He's also going to look around for the rest of Squad 404, who he doesn't want to leave behind if they went dark due to their own capture scenario. But he's wary. He doesn't know what went on here, so he's concerned that mercenary forces might be looking at this situation with dollar sign eyes. But he's too trusting and positive to come into this with a hostile look, so he's going to focus on helping... unless something interrupts him.
Haguro	With Tomoe backing her up on defensive duty, Gordon raising hell on the inside, Nova bringing down the snipers, and Tony bombarding them from the sky, Haguro has some respite from all those troops firing on her! Only some, but it's enough to let her keep moving even as those particle cannons bite into her, scorching armor and uniform alike while she stays on the move to keep herself (somewhat) defended with subtle adjustments of her arms and legs to focus the attacks on those instead of her less armored parts. Good thing she's got better armor now than before. Although she's no longer in her Abyssal form (or perhaps because she isn't), her standard armor pairs quite well with the specialty armor she had received weeks ago to weather the worst of the shits she can't avoid. She looks straight at the Vespoid dragging one of her comrades away from combat, seeming confused for a moment before turning her attention back to those still shooting at her. Those two are occupied right now. If they become a problem later, she'll deal with them later. There's more dangerous T-Dolls still on the field actively firing on her and her allies, anyway, so she can at least tell herself it's just a tactical decision to leave them be. It's not as if she has to try very hard to turn her focus elsewhere, anyway, since those still shooting at her are becoming quite a pain to deal with. Literally. Her armor's great now, but that doesn't make the searing pain and shots that she takes more directly any less painful! With their numbers dropping thanks to the Elites' sustained firepower and the arrival of reinforcements courtesy of the G&K helicopter, Haguro can afford to actually use cover and take her time aiming. "It's good to have you here, ma'ams. Sirs. Er. Sir." She adds to the explosive ordinance with her own mortar fire to blast those SK T-Dolls still fighting, aiming to clear out that side of the fight more as quickly as possible. "If you're unable to fight, throw down your arms and you'll be left alone!" A beat and a glance at the helicopter. "... Probably. I can't make any promises if you continue fighting."
Tony Stark	It's a wonder that the turrets elevate up to shoot at Iron Man - but no wonder at all when even the burning wake of the shells that Tony narrowly jukes around sends his fully controlled dive into a less-than-ideally controlled spin, the sizzling heat scorching armor plate and sizzling along defense screens. Hot under the collar but not physically worse for wear, though he'll need to replace another set of armor plating (and Tony can count on one hand the times he got into a fight and didn't need to, but it had been close this time), Tony steps aside and stands up in the artillery bank clearing as Tomoe makes her own attack, smashing through one of the cannons he hadn't suborned with gusto. "Nice work, kid." He asides, looking over the supply depot from his raised position. "Carrying off 'wounded'. Coordinating verbally. This doesn't fit with what they've done previously. Intruder didn't do me dirty again either, cracking the network. It doesn't add up. But a mystery like this normally would be psychology, or advanced communication." Tony's helmet opens, revealing the shit-eating-grinning goatee of Stark. "This time, it's all coding." With a few moments of work, Tony utilizes the Sangvis network via his suit's transmitter and messing with one of the suborned cannon's physical access ports to boost himself into the Sangvis network -- and send a sleep/standby mode command to the remaining troops. Or, at least, a stand-down order. "I'd dust my hands off, but..." He shrugs, motioning with his gauntleted hand. "Kind of a hollow gesture. The outer layer repels dust anyway."
Gideon Kaspar	Both the road blockade and the snowfield units are badly battered. Tomoe dropping lightning bolts on the former makes it very difficult to guard with shields, as the electricity has to go somewhere and forks down and into the tightly packed mob, while Haguro's turret brawl with the riflebots and riders out in the open has swiftly turned around with the introduction of G&K reinforcements. Hails of APCR ammo come down on both sides, with a massive 20mm round punching straight through a guard shield and instantly deleting the T-Doll on the other side, and another ridiculously overblown firebomb falling down on the Vespids in the snow. The helicopter hovers low as the last of the cannonfire dies out, and ropes from both sides deploy the G&K T-Dolls on board, fanning out to sieze the barricade on the road in a rapid assault that guns down the fleeing S.F dolls that aren't already far down the road, even shooting them in the back where possible and sprawling them out on the frozen asphalt. The sniper takes the ledge and puts down one of the dragoons with a high explosive anti-materiel shot. "Radioing all clear, Commander. Of course, I'm already expecting surprise reinforcements, or an air strike, or maybe a nuclear bomb. All of the A-R Team is here in one place, so- . . . Okay okay. Fine. Be like that." "Military Nemeum units on the far ridge, just like they said. How did they . . .?" "Orders came in. Capture any units you can without exposing yourself to unnecessary risk." It seems that Nova already has one though. When the !Predator wrestles the disarmed Jaeger up against the wall, squirming in her grip, the visor falls from its face, and she can see both panic and loathing staring at her from bright violet eyes that are the first she's actually seen from any SF doll so far, as if to say 'get it over with already'. When she probes the Jaeger's mind though, instead of finding either of those motions, she detects a distorted and dizzyingly fragmented . . . amusement? Idle curiosity? Smug satisfaction. The Jaeger goes limp a moment later, discharges a flicker of electricity, and then Nova is barraged with a signal that leaps into her suit to loudly blare Tetris-A into her ears and display an ongoing game through her HUD and suit's optical camouflage. In fact, the mass sleep order drops all of the remaining S.F T-Dolls within 500 meters of the cannon, but any attempt to secure them results in the same (albeit Tony is probably more prepared for their shenanigans this time, and not likely to suck it twice). Violet kneels down to one of the bodies and attempts to use a hand tool to extract a memory unit, and obviously gets the same in her feed, frowning sourly. "What a deranged sense of humour." "No way! She's totally messing with us!" "This is . . ." Clover sighs and clicks on her radio. The holographic screen appears. " . . . Oh, M-4. I knew one of you would call~" "What do you think you're doing, Intruder?" When Gordon knocks on the wall, he can hear some rustling and scraping, and then "Yeah yeah, come in. I didn't expect you all to finish up that quickly. That gal must really be in good hands. I'm happy." When he actually enters though, he finds the yellow-wearing and hair-streaked T-Doll with the mysterious eyepatch and big rectangular case a little too small to fit a person in, and nobody else. She's seated herself on a destroyed SF T-Doll with both arms missing, parts scattered around the room, now in the process of re-assembling her rifle. 416 is nowhere to be seen.
Gordon Freeman	Gordon tilts his head curiously. He looks back, just to make sure those SF doll bodies weren't some kind of hallucination. Then he looks back to Hazel, and just sort of... accepts. The statement that Hazel's friend is in good hands is met with a kind, positive smile and a nod. He checks her over for injuries (besides the eye) and helps assemble her rifle. He's /distressingly/ good at it. Well, if 404 are involved but not acting the way he expects, he's just got to keep a silent eye on it. Perhaps there's going to be an opportunity to explore their involvement later, but PMCs are notoriously difficult to deal with in that regard. He's getting out his own SMG, but suddenly hears something strange on the radio. Tilting his head and pressing his earpiece to his ear just to make sure he's hearing it clearly, he stops for a while, before holstering it again. He checks around, as if prompting M-16. A lot of this situation doesn't make a lot of sense to him, though. Wheels turn in his brain, gears not grinding but working smoothly towards a dangerous outcome. Was Hazel captured? Did 404 release her, but abort an extraction? Was she hiding in the dump, or--? Gordon's teeth are gritted, slightly tense, and what he's hearing about the troops outside has him on edge. If you find enough pieces that don't fit together into a solution, you know the answer's big enough to worry about. No point in worrying about one clear answer though, which is to get Hazel out of there. He's going to get her towards the door he found, and try to bring her out for extraction quick. The enemies might be shutting down, but 404 mentioned Agent might show up at any time around territories like this, and Gordon isn't a fan of taking chances. Best to get them out and reunited fast.
Haguro	With the major threats cleared out, Haguro finally lets herself breathe a sigh of relief. <<"Good work, everyone. It should be easy enough to gather the survivors now, but don't let your guards down.">> As she says that, she watches the G&K T-Dolls gunning down the fleeing troops. She frowns slightly, but there's no flinching or scolding. Instead, the shipgirl sighs lightly. "Well... They were warned." Adjusting her wrist turrets, she does a quick sweep of the snowfield before moving to help secure the ones hit by the sleep order. Her method of securing the bodies is much less advanced than Nova's and Stark's, however, relying more on physically dragging them towards the helicopter. By the arm or leg, even. It might not be dignified, but it's the only way she knows how. <<"Extraction point has been secured for the most part, Mister Freeman. We're almost finished here.">>
Nova Terra	Nova's annoyance at having classical music blasted into her headset is evident as she throws the limp Jaeger into another of the tower's walls. Where she just leaves it, the reason why they were acting strange being obvious now. Nova taps at several controls on her wrist unit, trying to get the damn music and game overlay to go away. But not being a particularly great with computers, she gets sick of it and just pulls her visor off her head. Ahhh, silence once more... Except she can still hear the damned music quietly playing from the headset. If it wasn't such valuable military equipment she'd throw it away. Oh well, she'll just have to get a tech to fix it when she gets back. Climbing back down the tower to the ground, Nova looks at the flaming remains of some of the cannons, nodding in approval. She begins to head for the extraction site, keeping an eye out on their surroundings to ensure that all goes smoothly. There's still time for a surprise attack from reinforcements and it would suck to let your guard down now just to have that happen.
Tomoe	Tomoe has had a decent amount of success with Lighting attack and she keeps going for the moment. Tony has also noticed the odd behaviour of the enemy units too and does agree she wants to know what's going on here. She'd really like to know herself just not at the cost of her mission or her allies wellbeing. She'll keep an eye on the enemy units. She'll keep up the attack on any remaining units that still want to fight but once it comes to it? She'll also scout out for any T-dolls who might still be functional but had to be left behind she will be on guard for it however maybe she'll luck out and /get/ something? She halts at the sleep order, it seems the fight is over for the moment. and will move to backup Tony in his capture efforts he knows things far better than she does. She will do her best to aid him through even if it's just to cover his back or act as muscle in some fashion. Or just helping him to find good ones to attempt to salvage. "Hopefully we'll get something useful, Mr. Stark. I do want to know about just what's going on with this. I have a mental health AI break and become aware a while back. I wonder what's going on here with these T-dolls..."
Tony Stark	Tony was waiting for the other shoe to drop all night, and had hardened his suit's systems against Intruder'ing (now a verb, you know, and the correct term is ABSOLUTELY not 'Intrusion', direct all complaints to Stark's dozen doctorates he got because Banner and Richards got uppity, that definitely happened) so when the Tetris theme begins dooting along in his ear, it's more muted and at a reasonable volume. "Huh. Nostalgic." He mutters, his helmet closing again so he can check his displays without having to resort to glasses he doesn't currently have on him. "Useful, yeah. Maybe, maybe not. But these dolls weren't acting normally, and it didn't seem like a 'joke'. You don't give back an enemy agent and lose a whole pile of troops and a base on a joke, do you?" Tony editorializes to Tomoe, watching the Griffin T-Dolls below work. "Plus, Tetris isn't a joke. It's, more specifically, a game. Quite competitive, too. Perfectly executing with hundreds of different pieces, or getting swallowed up while things get faster and faster." Tony grimaces privately, under his helmet, as his suit's anti-intrusion measures begin spinny bars to purge any influences from the active memory and then run checks on systems. "I hate to think it's all boxing at shadows - but is it worse for my worst fears to be right? Or wrong?" Tomoe is probably unprepared to answer Tony's rhetorical inquiries on the nature of trauma and anxiety on a heroic scale.
Gideon Kaspar	Without any remaining units left to stop them, the Elites can wrap up quickly. Hazel seems momentarily stunned when Gordon just begins silently helping her put her stuff together, but then claps him on the back with a big smile. The two of them come out of the warehouse with Hazel already looking out for Clover, but then stops when she sees her talking to the Sangvis Ferri ringleader in the holo-window, surrounded by curious G&K T-Dolls who also want to know what the hell the deal is. Ostensibly, they'd also like to know the answer to Tony's questions. "What is your objective here." Clover asks, straightforward and wary. "Griffin has already entered your territory a while ago, yet you have not organized any significant counterattacks." "Oh? I didn't expect I'd frighten you by doing nothing. All right, I'll tell you! The order I received . . ." "Huh?" "Heheh~ It's actually pretty simple -- Kill some time." "Kill some time? That is your order?" "What's so strange about that? If that's what Master wants, I can sit down and enjoy a nice cup of tea with you. But first . . . you'd need to make it to my teahouse." "That will not be difficult, Intruder. The Commander has traced the coordinates left behind by a squad we dispatched in advance. We will meet very soon." "Heheh~ Then I'll look forward to it." The window switches off. Clover huffs out a sigh, then mumbles. "I said that to sound tough, but I really don't know how long it'll be. What is that one up to?" "Who cares. She's Sangvis Ferri. The only good one is a dead one. If you can't do it, I'll make sure to put a bullet right between her eyes." "Yeah, she's just trying to mess with you, Clover! That one's just like that. Schemes and plots, remember? She must think her boss has some kind of master plan, but we're going to break it wide open!" "Here I'm supposed to the leader, but I'm getting a pep talk?" "Maybe if you'd act with a little more backbone, that'd be nice" "Hey now, that's no way to treat your team leader, is it? She did her best to get you all here, didn't she?"