Scene #7259: Terms of Service II

Owner	Pose
Zero Kiryu	Dorado Warpgate Station #76B Despite being called 'Dorado Warpgate Station', the paired stations that have been erected some distance down the Warpgate network from the Grand Dorado are among the most distant from the Concord's headquarters while still being considered within 'their' territory. The station spans two areas: 76A occupies the far space of the station, the "last stop" that the Concord has firm and undeniable control over, or interest in control over for the moment. 76B is the near side of that station, though still quite distant from Grand Dorado itself. << This one isn't an enemy that can conceivably be recruited. The only goal is to cut them down and retrieve the package. You won't have a problem identifying them. >> Zero instructs through psychic communication, dully. True to his word, it's really not hard to figure out who the enemy is. One of the loading platforms of the junctions -- where a hover train is currently sitting idle -- has been overrun by an enormous swarm of giant arachnids, mixed with an assortment of other bugs. Ants, mostly. The ants have seized a specific segment of the hover train and begun to march it back towards the gate leading to 76A. They're not particularly quick about it, but they're not slow either. The arachnids seem to be acting the part of soldiers, though insofar as there is a fight with local security, it's largely turned into a 'contain and wait for reinforcements' matter. A scattering of disabled security forces have been webbed up on the main platform, although no deliberate coup de gracing seems to be occurring. On the other hand, there's a fair few casualties who got caught up in the heat of the scuffle bleeding out or dead.
Guzma	"You sure they can't be recruited, yo?" That's Guzma's first reaction, as soon as he arrives and realizes it's a hive of insects. Insects are cool. Murdering a bunch of intelligent giant insects is lame, but...if they're robbing the Concord, they need to be punished. As he arrives alone, without his squad, dressed in his normal jacket and bling and with a pokeball in his hand, he glances out, rolling the pokeball in his hand. He slings it without a word, probably alerting the bugs he's there, but before they can attack him... "Thunderbolt." Vikavolt, the long-mandibled flier, appears out of the flash of the pokeball, and moves above the swarm at the platform, Guzma getting in shouting range so he can call out attacks. Vikavolt's mandibles charge up, and lightning surges from their mouth, moving to strike straight into the spiders attacking the disabled security force and try to fry them!
Yuuki Kuran	It is required, by building code, for train terminals to be well lit during all operational times. Otherwise, accidents could happen! This is a conclusion nearly every world with basic human rights or worker loss prevention concepts comes to when it comes to train stations. Where there's lights, there's lightposts. That's just science. And where there's lightposts... There is a convenient perch to stand on, dramatically, with a softly fluttering scarf and the rustling of the left and right tips of her light coat in time to -- Well, the explosions and such. Sometimes, making an extremely shoujo manga entrance requires some setup time that makes helping out harder. Aesthetics, you see, are the true endgame of being extremely Normal. "Guzma! I thought they were yours, for a little bit!" Yuuki Kuran calls down to the Team Skull boss. Crouching down, she smiles from her perch at the insect trainer. "You can catch some if you want. I just don't think they can be reasoned with in the normal way. Sometimes, a giant ant is just a giant ant!" Hopping from her perch down onto one of the soldier ants, a single foot leads down for a 'dainty' ballerina-like landing on the head of the large insect. The force of her impact is wildly disproportionate, smashing into the ground with cratering force.
Mauve Gauntlet	Mavue hooks her way over to help...and cringes a bit at the giant bugs. "Eeeeeeeeewwwwwww..." Mauve says, looking at the swarm. She then takes a look at Guzma's Pokemon squad. Guzma's Squad of giant bugs. "N-no offense!" She shouts. She then fires both fists at one of the carrying Ants, anchoring herself to the platform and trying to pull the ant away from the train.
Priscilla	"I am in as much surprise as thou art, Sir Guzma, that of the few who wouldst purposefully seeketh to cause so much difficulty for Sir Kiryu, any wouldst look as this." says the unmistakable voice of Priscilla, to the bug-training poke-slinger on deck. Given where Stations 76A and 76B are (that being nominally 'in Grand Dorado'), it seems as if she hadn't been as keen on the perfect entrance as Yuuki. Or, looked at alternatively, given that Priscilla is Priscilla, dropping dialogue lines before loading in is a matter of preference. "In either regard, however, the answer changes not. A particularly bold and daring attempt, with sufficient measures of wit and might, orchestrated by a gifted individual; then, perhaps. But we extend not the open hand to those who find courage enough to oppose the Concord only in numbers." A big, snowy, theatric swoosh blows down the anti-gravity tracks, slightly closer resembling stylistic depictions of winter winds, done in white and pale blue brushes, than the real thing. Deep drifts of glittery ice-dust pile up to a daunting height and depth further down the line. Splattery paint blots of glowing frost crackle and crawl over the ground from where they're flicked, making sounds like slowly fracturing glass windows, and then blowing up like land mines of ice and cold sorcerous energy where giant bugs dare to tread. Then webbing starts cutting itself and security casualties are magically tossing themselves out of the way one by one. The spectacle of doing it that way is just about an incidental factor of it being more inconvenient to 'be visible' for it.
Zero Kiryu	<< If the question is, 'Can they be swayed to the cause.', I'm sure they can't be. Whether you can assert control of them, I couldn't say. >> Zero replies to Guzma. The problem with fighting a swarm is that getting a bead on a significant mass of them is difficult. The appearance of Vikavolt causes them to scatter into what must be some kind of attack pattern-- and it makes it difficult to nail multiple bugs at once. The ants in the back don't seem to acknowledge it at all. A front line forms -- oddly, of the smaller spiders -- as larger, highly bristled spiders in the back begin to hurl sharp spines towards Vivavolt. Applied to somebody human-sized compared to the spider army, it would merely be annoying. But applied to a human, it's more like having a porcupine's spines fired at high speed. The front line doesn't approach. They're just stopping easy access to the rear-- though a few of them get crispy and wounded near the front, collapsing into a twitching heap-- though they seem more incapacitated and wounded than dead outright. The ants, for all their lifting power, seem more fragile. They're also not /attacking/ -- another one emerges from the direction of the gate itself, heading to take the place of the one that just got crunched beneath Yuuki's foot. What retaliates is a scorpion, ensconced within the middling ranks of the nearby swarm but with a stinger tail reach sufficient to lance across the top of its compatriots and strike towards Yuuki's center mass. << Using giant ants to move goods is actually sort of clever... >> Zero's voice remarks, to Yuuki. Mauve manages to seize hold of another of the giant ants a moment later, dragging it away from the car that it's helping carry. The absence of two ants slows the progression of the car considerably, but that won't last indefinitely-- it looks like a second is coming from the gate to replace it, too. Unlike the one that Yuuki just killed though, it's not being cracked open. It's just being manhandled. Which /does/ cause it to attempt to back into her and sting her, which is rather more like having a lance thrust towards you at these scales. To Priscilla's remarks, Zero replies, << I do not think they would have troubled me on their own initiative. Somebody probably fed them an opportunity. Twice isn't quite a pattern just yet, but... The thought trails away. Freed security casualties that are well enough to try scramble away as soon as Priscilla interjects on their behalf, and any thought of pursuing them is quickly put to rest when a line of ice races underneath and begins exploding, chips of ice peppering the undersides of insects all around. Guzma's lightning-struck spiders are finished off by this, and the rear line behind them -- considerably squishier -- are sent scattering and reeling. The same scorpion that dared lash out at Yuuki draws its tail back and fires a spray of liquid toxin in the general direction that the column of ice came from, melting a path through the ice and beginning to eat -- though not for too long -- through the platform beneath it.
Guzma	Porcupine-like spines come from the giant tarantulas. Guzma calls out, "Swap out!", but before he can toss the pokeball, the spines skewer Vikavolt, injuring wings and sending it flying backwards, wounded. It whines the best a bug can do, as one of the spines nearly hits Guzma, sending him to the floor in shock as it jabs right next to him. "Cripes!" Vikavolt is returned to its ball, and another Pokemon sent out. "Scizor!" 5rThe bipedal metal mantis leaps out, as another spine comes forth and hits the metal. Unlike how it'd just body Guzma, Scizor is able to survive it, as if it possesses a full suit of armor, so it moves for a counter attack. "Bullet Punch!" Scizor dives into the fray of tarantulas and moves to just rip them apart with punches of giant pincers, over and over, trying to blow them apart. There's no convince button, so Guzma's not even trying, though if he can spare one of the tarantulas wounded, he'll try. He can send out Ariados later to web it up.
Yuuki Kuran	"I don't really think it's bold or daring at all. Rather..." Yuuki taps her the side of her jaw, cupping her elbow with her other hand as she steps out of the crater she placed the ant into. "I don't think there's really an example to be made here. There are two kinds of things that cross the Concord: people who think they can get away with it, and groups that don't think about that at all." Yuuki is 'struck' by the scorpion's tail-lance, the tip sending her skating back and windmill-arming but not doing much more than jabbing a large stinger-hole in her top. Gripping the barbed stinger with both arms, Yuuki kicks a foot up and yanks, heaving back on the meaty tail to bring the whole offending scorpion with it, and powerbomb the whole thing behind her - chunky buggy boi body and all. "If you want to try catching one that's stunned, try this one! It's a fighter!" Yuuki warmly encourages Guzma, sprawled out on the ground, propping her head up with an elbow and hand against the floor. She looks ridiculous trying to play that specific maneuver off.
Mauve Gauntlet	"GGH!" Mauve grunts, as the stinger scrapes against her armor. she unhooks from the platform, and tries to get underneath the ant, aiming to lift the whole thing up over her head, and throw it at the advancing spiders.
Zero Kiryu	Scizor is able to wade into the tarantulas and start wounding them heavily in short order. Snapping pincers produce flashes of white blood here and there, though with an undirected assault he is wounding and causing retreats -- odd, that they would retreat like that -- rather than getting a lot of kills. One of the spiders does lose enough legs that it isn't getting anywhere without being dragged away, though whether it's desirable to hold onto and do anything with... Maybe you can graft cybernetics onto it and have a giant cyborg tarantula. There is a general falling back of the giant spiders as the battle with the scorpion progresses. They are just in time for Yuuki to bodily lift one of them and SLAM him into the ground by its tail where many of them had been moments before. Its carapace cracks where it strikes the ground, blue fluid leaking across the ground-- for an instant it seems to be dead, but soon after it just isn't anymore. It rights itself awkwardly, a colossal crack running across its body knitting shut as it does so. The flow of blue blood ceases, and it swipes at Yuuki with a broad pincer, while its tail lances out towards nearby Scizor. Meanwhile... Mauve is wrestling with a giant ant and, to her credit, she's keeping it from actually returning to its post. The procession of the would-be stolen car isn't going so well, and the display of force in play isn't encouraging the arachnids to close in around it like you might expect. It rolls out of her grip as she tries to throw it, limbs flailing wildly as it lands on its side and struggles to right itself.
Guzma	Guzma captures a tarantula. He's almost excited, until Yuuki tells him she found a scorpion. He looks over the injured spider, and sighs. "Sorry, buddy, but I got like, two of you already? It's not like - I don't hate you or anything, I just want the big guy if I can." A pause. "Maybe we can spare you and have the lab look into if there's a queen connected or something, find out where the heck you came from? Beats me, I ain't an egghead or an eggbody. If we can't, I'll make it quick on you." He hopes they can find a non-lethal solution. Meanwhile, the scorpion's tail comes in for Scizor. Scizor's pincers come up defensively, the piercing spike slashing through the metal and grinding it up to chitter in pain, but unable to pierce the metal for the fleshy insides. It definitely hurts, but any venom in there isn't going to affect the mantis-mon. Scizor's about to retaliate and take it out, when Guzma clicks the pokeball. "Return." Cold-blocked once again from being awesome, Scizor returns to its Pokeball, and Guzma sends out another. "Ariados." The giant red spider appears, and looks over the scene. Dead spiders. Stunned scorpion. Injured comrades in bugdom. For they may have chosen a human, but these didn't. If it had ducts, it may even shed a tear. "Give it some sleep poison and web it up!" Ariados chitters, and leaps at at the scorpion, moving to bare fangs and bite straight into the fleshiest part it can find, and get some venom in underneath it. The venom is non-lethal, but extremely potent. Drowsiness, slowness, some nerve shutdown, but nothing that'll kill it. Preparing it for a meal and all that, but it'll wear off. It's an extremely large dose to make sure it Goes Down, and the webs spraying afterwards are to make sure it can't escape anywhere, and also to ball it up so Heracross can carry it off.
Mauve Gauntlet	So the ant managed to kick its way out of her grasp, and Mauve kinda just..stomps like a frustrated kid. Really? "Oh no you don't! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!" Mauve shouts, and she tries to pick up the ant again and lob it, this time at the other ants trying to make off with the car.
Yuuki Kuran	Oh no! The scorpion got back up! Either its wounds sealed, or it simply ignored them and righted itself - either way, another powerful attack swings into Yuuki: a powerful claw with a boneshattering backing of carapace-clad force. The 'whumph' of air around the blow scatters curls of dust and detritus in the wake of the strike. The claw itself, however, stops dead in the air - blocked by a braced forearm and bicep. "I think the thing taken from Zero may let these bugs fight past when they should stop! Or... Maybe that's just bugs. They keep going, even when they're battered and broken. Is that why you like bug-types, Guzma?" With him focusing on the capture, Yuuki joins Mauve in chasing after the ants with the car, grabbing a spider and overhand throwing it at the ants. "Hey! Hey! No, come back!" "We really need to find the leader so we can punch them, take what's ours and go home... Wait, where did Priscilla go?" Shoujo Brain activates, dreaming up Priscilla coolly wandering off to duel the Queen Bug in a 1v1, starting with a down-point and ending with a backstab. Somehow. "I bet she's taking care of it!"
Zero Kiryu	The colossal scorpion takes center stage, but no sooner has it done so than it gets dosed with a massive amount of toxic powder and an ENEMY SPIDER begins the process of biting it and webbing it up. What's odd, though-- Scizor might realize that the stinger wasn't attempting to poison it. Nothing had come out. For an instant there was a suction effect on contact, but it didn't find anything, so nothing happened. What it was attempting to do becomes more obvious as it re-targets the legless spider that was moments ago abandoned, jabs it with its sting, and very very obviously sucks all the fluids out of it. The giant scorpion is apparently also a vampire of some sort, a fact that would more than likely begin registering on Yuuki's senses in short order now that it's actually fed on something and begun to receive the benefits of doing so. The divot in its carapace where it had been crushed begins to fill out even more, but even as it does so the scorpion begins to slow. It draws its tail back in and attempts to swipe at Guzma directly, but it's too woozy to get a good bead on him. Slowly, the webs bog it down until it can't move anymore. But how the hell are you going to tame a /vampire scorpion/? Mauve seizes the ant trying to scramble away and hurls it into one of the foremost ants, killing them both and jarring the retreating cargo so badly that the cargo falls off of the backs of the remaining two ants, one of which has a spider thrown at it by Yuuki hard enough to crush the joint on its fore leg. There is a general scramble into RETREAT, and an abandonment of the cargo-- not that enough ants remain at hand to carry it. Having suffered substantial abuse in the process of the attempted attack, the container car that was being lifted creaks open along the side. The contents do not spill out as such, but they do becoem visible-- a long, long length of filament. It has an organic look to it, though on closer inspection it's anything but. A bundle of cables, shining and prismatic in the few spots where their coverings are partway broken and the true equipment underneath can be seen. The whole thing has the structure of a nervous system, scaled up to titanic proportions. << You might be wondering what I was planning to do with these, >> Zero's mental voice echoes into the minds of all assembled, << the idea is to set up a central processing station for a number of psychic nodes to be planted in the vicinity of Grand Dorado. This isn't the complete system, I have numerous other parts that are coming in... >> << When it's done, though, it should be possible to implement a psionically enforced Terms of Service system that will come into effect within a certain range of Dorado. Obviously, somebody doesn't want that to happen. >>
Guzma	Well, nature happens, and the scorpion vampirizes the spider. "Aww." Is all Guzma says, but shrug. As the scorpion goes down and gets webbed up, Guzma looks over it. "Alright, you're a mean guy, but I think we can possibly come to an accord. And if we can't...R&D might want a look at you. But I'll try and work with you, break you in. You're not a Pokemon, so I can't just throw an orb at you and be done with it." And then, as he sends out Heracross to start carrying the scorpion, Guzma turns to Yuuki. "Insects are seen as pests. Bullyable. Disgusting. They're freaks of nature, right? That's what the peabrains think. But I see inside them. They're fearless. They're the smallest predators. They pack a punch despite their sizes, and despite the hate everyone has for them, they keep on living. I understand those vibes, yo."
Mauve Gauntlet	And Mission Complete! And inside the car is...Nerve-looking wire? Mauve tilts her head at it. What, was Zero going to make a giant robot with a nerve interface or something? ...Oh, no, he means something else. "So...basically, it enforces the Concords' rules when you enter our territory?" She nods. Admittedly, even in the future, skipping over the ToS is still a thing people do, and is something that Mauve herself was guilty of, but she knows what that stuff is supposed to do. Making people have to follow it is just one less person complaining when their account gets deleted, because they broke the rules, so to speak. Guzma starts talking about bugs, and she turns to look at Guzma's squad and the remaining giant bugs. "...I never really thought of it like that..." Mauve quietly says.
Yuuki Kuran	With the situation handled well and good, done and dusted, sifted and sorted... There really isn't anything to worry about! Just enormous bugs! "Huh! I don't think... I got hit, so..." Yuuki pats herself down, revealing a hole in her top she pokes some fingers through. "Well, that's a mystery for later. We got what we came for, plus extra! Good job, everyone!" She gives the team a double thumbs up and a brilliant smile. "Nice work."
Zero Kiryu	<< That is what it should do, yes. I'm still working out the particulars, but a certain minimum of self-enforcement is a part of the idea as well. >> Zero confirms for Mauve. It's probably not a coincidence that he used that specific phrasing. To Yuuki, he remarks, << We really need to find a wardrobe that matches our durability. >>