|
Post by Zeno, Lord Camelith on Mar 15, 2010 21:37:11 GMT -5
Raising his shotgun, Vasily blew what would've been a sizable hole in one of the dogs, just to have it vanish. "These are projections!" He shouted, "But don't let that fool you, they can still harm you just as a normal one can. Don't waste your ammo on them, at this range even a slight disturbance can cause them to dissolve, stick to short controlled bursts." Turning back towards the road, Vasily dealt what would have been a devastating kick to one of the illusion dogs, causing it to disperse. Slinging his shotgun onto his back, he drew his Colt and shot another one of the hounds.
"We need to keep moving!" He said to Seth, "If we stay here for much longer, enough of them will appear to completely surround us. At the rate this thing is going, I'd give us around 10 minutes before this thing has spawned enough illusions to kill a dozen psuedogiants." Returning his attention to the dogs, he resumed firing. He could just see one of the hounds from the corner of his eye, but before he could turn and shoot, it had leaped at him, colliding with his legs. Falling over backwards, Vasily smashed the grip of his pistol into the dog's head, it seemed only to aggravate it. Vasily groaned with pain as the psy-mutt dug it's teeth into his leg. Pressing the barrel of his Colt into the beasts neck, he fired, causing the horrific apparition to vanish. Pulling his Mica from his belt, he quickly stopped the bleeding, and pushed himself back up.
|
|
|
Post by Διμι on Mar 15, 2010 22:08:52 GMT -5
Taking out his USP, Seth shouted "Everyone disperse! Into the forest! All of these things are still controlled by one psychic brain. If we're all in one area, it'll have an easier time coordinating its attack!" With that, the Freedomer dove into the undergrowth, two dogs hot on his tail. A round from his USP caused one to vanish with a loud pop, and the second destroyed itself as it tried to claw itself through the brambles toward its target.
Seth could dimly see the rest of the group scatter, as dogs began to swarm the area, each following a different target. At least five of the beasts surrounded Thor, attempting to get a grip on his armor as he smashed phantom after phantom, tearing the rest apart with machinegun fire. Sokol dropped the AW50 to the ground. The gun would only hinder him, and would be of little use as an overly expensive bludgeon. Instead, the gangly Freedomer swept at the beasts swarming him with a large knife, the slightest nick making the copies vanish.
Three more copies leapt over the shrug, attempting to corner Seth. The Freedomer let loose a wide arc of .45 ACP bullets on full auto, annihilating two of the copies. The last wolf, which was hit in its hind quarter, barely even flinched at the damage done. Instead, it leapt for the Freedomer, slamming into his chest and knocking the gun from his hand. The two went rolling on the ground in a blur of green fabric and white fur, Seth holding the massive canine by the throat as it attempted to close its teeth around his own. The creature's mouth snapped open and shut as its clawed feet tore about, making deep slashes in the outer layer of the Freedomer's suit. Seth's strength was slowly ebbing. The rest of the group was distracted by the dozens of copies now filling the area. He could not last much longer before the fangs snapping an inch from his head closed in around their target.
Then he felt himself and the dog both lifted in the air as something enourmous slammed into them both. A giant fleshy claw curled underneath the psydog's abdomen, ripping the beast away from Seth's body. Seth flew through the air, clipped by the extremity, as the attacker and wolf landed a distance away. The Freedomer scrambled to his feet to get a clearer view of his savior. The chimera!
The beast was roughly ten times the size of the wolf, but already copies were swarming in towards the two mutants locked in combat at the ground as they sensed their master's distress, leaping at the massive mutant, tearing the thick hide with claws and teeth, and disappearing with loud cracks as the massive beast rolled about, blood splattering everywhere. The two headed mutant could not place a killing bite without its main head. Finally, with a loud slam, the beast held down the white wolf with all the strength remaining in its one arm, and dropped heavily on top of the mutant as it's life finally went out, weakened by the numerous wounds it sustained. Seth could hear an audible crack as the psydog's rib cage shattered under the weight and folded flat.
All the copies disappeared immediately, a substantial cloud of smoke filling the area. Slowly, the Freedomer rose and walked over to the two bodies. Both mutants were clearly dead. He muttered a near silent word of sincere gratitude to the ravaged two headed hulk that had saved his life before turning away.
Walking back into the center of the path, the Freedom leader yelled "Anyone who's still alive, report!"
Thor and Sokol walked out of the forest, their suits both heavily damaged. The sniper had recovered his rifle, but Thor's exoskeleton's drive pulleys in his left arm had been damaged in combat, leaving him to carry his machinegun on his back, unable to use it.
|
|
|
Post by Karcentric on Mar 15, 2010 22:32:12 GMT -5
Karc run straight for a tree with a lot of low branches dogs snapping at his heel, leaping he caught hold of one of them one of the dogs caught hold of his boot For an illusion you sure weigh a lot he thought, his grip was slipping pulling himself up so that his elbow was hooked around the branch Karc drew his colt with his left hand and fired twice dissipating the illusion, pulling himself out of the range of the dogs, firing in small bursts at the swarm of dogs gathering below the tree.
After what felt like hours of pointless shooting, the rest seemed to sprint towards something, drawn to their creator. Jumping down with gun at the ready, he fired at several more dogs, looking out through the bushes Karc saw the beast that had confronted them before, surrounded by at least a dozen snarling snapping dogs, it was only attacking one of them. Eventually it pinned one of the dog, with loud thud, it collapsed on it, all the mirages vanished.
Karc ran over to where Seth's group was. "Alive and ready. But I'll need a new boot." He turned to the Chimera which was massive, Karc patted it on the back, "Nice beasty." he said, he looked the dogs tail was sticking out, drawing the falchion, he hacked it off in one quick swing, before putting them both in his his pack. He looked around before cracking open an energy drink and waiting for the group to re-group.
|
|
|
Post by Afterburner on Mar 16, 2010 18:24:14 GMT -5
After some time, Danilov appeared, trying to keep Borisov from falling flat on the clearing. Dimitri came out of the bushes, sickly pale and clearly disturbed. Danilov yelled out :
"Reporting in! I was bit once or twice, but I'm OK! Borisov, you need to lose some weight, man! Still trying to keep him alive, but the brave lad's hardly breathing at all. The cap'n-whoops, force of habit, forgot he's not my cap'n any more-is ok, if a bit shaken up. The man's got a strange aversion to dogs, and when one grabbed him by the leg-Borisov, you're going on a diet! Ah, yes, the cap'n made such a sound that I nearly wet my pants when I heard 'im! But that gray-faced mercenary who can walk through fire and whatnot, whaddya call 'im, Burner? Where was I? Ah yes, Burner seems to have disappeared! I can't find a single trace of 'im anywhere!"
Dimitri managed to open his mouth, but something was impeding his speech. He took in a deep breath and tried again :
"Can't...Find...Him...Looked...Dogs...Everywhere!"
The man dropped down onto a stump, trying to recollect his memories
"He was coming round when those two monstrosities jumped out. He tried to get up, but then he collapsed again. A dog charged towards him, when all of a sudden something disintegrated it! But where? Where was it? Dimitri, get a grip! Think!"
His face was turning back to his normal color.
"I remember! Look for an old oak with strange reddish fungi under it!"
He got up, clutching his VAL. He turned towards Danilov, who was staring at him
"What? What is it?"
Chuckling, Danilov answered
"Cap'n, I guess the answer is standing right next to you."
To his left was a gray-faced, half-dead man, being supported by a person who looked like a stereotypical Mongolian, wearing a regular stalker "Sunrise" suit, sporting a Fu-Manchu mustache.
"Your friend nearly got what the Forest wanted to give him. If I were you, I'd give him a merciful death, a killing blow, a coup de grĂ¢ce, if you will. Now, won't you introduce yourselves and explain why exactly are you engraging the Forest?"
|
|
|
Post by Διμι on Mar 16, 2010 18:58:16 GMT -5
Seth was about to spit out an acidic answer the large Easterner's ridiculous query. Enraging the Forest? Some of the more prominent druggies in his faction would no doubt give a significant sum for a taste of whatever this guy was on. Before he could open his mouth however, the Freedomer's PDA gave a slight beep. He took out the device, flicking his thumb across the screen. A new message flashed up, coming from a frequency in the Rostok area. Even more surprisingly, Seth recognized the channel as a Dutier's. 'I've dealt with your ambush, and the survivor has a nice present for you... Your friend, Lt. Rurik' Bloody hell! Seth thought. He switched the PDA to geolocation mode. The signal came from the heart of the Wild Territories. But more importantly, Jurgen's signal was now active, and positioned closer to Yantar, away from the Duty squad. Seth quickly pulled up a menu, and began writing a message to the mercenary. 'Jurgen. What happened at the construction site? What are those Dutiers up to? Get yourself back to the Dead City as fast as you can, I'll try to wait as long as I can for you there. Those people cannot be trusted.' Hitting send, he put the PDA away. The psy-waves seemed to have dissipated along with the death of the hound. Taking out his binoculars, he took a look down the road. The old man was nowhere to be seen, presumably gone with the death of his psydog. Turning to the stalker newcomer, he said "My name is Seth, former scientist and current leader of the Freedom faction. I'm terribly sorry to inconvenience you, my friend, but I'm just too busy at the moment to make bacon out of fried mercenary. It just seems I'll have to put off killing him for another time, whatever the Forest may have wanted us to do." he added snidely.
|
|
|
Post by Afterburner on Mar 17, 2010 5:40:25 GMT -5
"Despite the fact that whoever taught you proper manners should have his tongue cut out, I believe that the old man doesn't want you encroaching on his grounds. You'd be wise to watch your tongue, Seth, Freedom leader, for the Forest understands every word spoken here. Your exit is two hundred paces to the north-west, now go! You may have bested it now, but in the future, it will not underestimate you..."
Having said that, Khan dropped Burner and turned around and walked away.
Burner was coming round again.
"Ugh, my head...What happened here?"
|
|
|
Post by Karcentric on Mar 17, 2010 7:02:56 GMT -5
Karc was sitting on the dead chimera inspected the newcomer, not getting up or acknowledging him Karc listened intently on what he had to say, Enraging the forest, god I thought the zone would be free of these damn tree huggers. Old man? What the fuck? He thought to himself, drawing both of his wrist mounted knives he checked the blades, spinning them between his fingers, eventually he seethed them. When he looked up the man had dropped Burner and walked away.
Sliding off the giant beast he walked over to Dimitri who seemed unwell, despite their differences Karc wasn't angry with him, this man had answers to questions Karc would probably ask, more importantly, he knew about the monolith. "Are you alright matey?" He asked looking at Dimitri, Burner was recovering too, Karc crouched down, offering my a drink from his can, "Some crazy guy found you lurching about and dragged you back here." Offering his arm for Burner to get up. As he helped him up, he asked no one in particular in the group, "Who was that guy? Who is this 'Old Man' he mentioned?" Karc paused, looking to the forest "Don't send anymore beasts thanks, that last one was enough fun."
|
|
|
Post by Afterburner on Mar 17, 2010 14:09:34 GMT -5
"I, I think...I think he was referring to the forest, or it's keeper, to be precise. But is not the time to be talking...We must get the wounded to the mercenaries' base or God knows what'll happen.
He got up, still trembling.
"Northwest? Just follow this trail then...It leads to a mine, if I'm not mistaken, and that mine's basically on the coast."
Following the road, they reached a long brick wall. After some searching, they found a small rusted gate covered in what appeared to be dried blood, which was not a strange sight in the Zone. After all the darkness, the coast looked strangely scenic and relaxing. It was littered with rusty boats and all kinds of junk. Strangely enough, it looked...alive. Crossing the river would be risky, as Limansk was basically a battlefield, divided by several factions. The city was rarely quiet. Anatoli spat , looking at his PDA:
"No contact from any squads in a square kilometer radius, which is not really a surprise. This, my friends, is no man's land, separating the bandits and the Monolith lunatics. The quickest way to the south side, which is under our control, is straight through it.This should be a piece of...Shitcake. Sneaking's through is not really a smart option, considering we've got casualties, but it might spare us from going in all guns blazing and getting ourselves killed. Let's see... Okay, after crossing the bridge, head west, turn south west at the old townhouse. Shit, last time we've cleaned that place, we barely made it back to the base, considering the dickheads decided that a counterattack would be the best possible option..."
|
|
|
Post by Zeno, Lord Camelith on Mar 18, 2010 21:53:38 GMT -5
Vasily didn't like the idea of fighting through miles of hostile territory. The bandit's didn't worry him too much, but the fanatical Monolith goons would fight until you had dumped every last drop of their blood onto the ground. The fact that they would be carrying several wounded men as well just made the situation worse. Few of Anatoli's mercenaries remained and Burner was hardly in any condition to fight. Seth and himself were still largely intact, along with the sniper, Sokol, his companion's exoskeleton seemed to be damaged, Karc was still on his feet as well.
"Well this is one giant problem after another." he said to himself. Turning to Anatoli, Vasily asked, "Can you get a hold of your base from here? If you can, sending some reinforcements to meet us half way could cut down on our potential casualties."
|
|
|
Post by Karcentric on Mar 19, 2010 5:54:03 GMT -5
Karc tapped his knives attached to his wrists, "If anyone else is good at silent hand combat we can deal with the bandits nice and quiet, that way we won't alert those monolith chaps with gunfire that we're here." Karc suggested "And if we have some reinforcements come from the other side, we can shred those other bastards before they know what happened, is there any way to play on their fanatic nature?" he asked. Crouching he pulled a roll of duct tape out of his bag and taped up the hole made by the dog. Annoying bastardy dogs He thought.
Standing and inspecting the make shift repair he put the roll back in his bag, it would do for now but he'd have to have them repaired to avoid radiation later. Karc was quite eager to test his knives on bandits. Karc looked to Seth and waited for an answer.
|
|
|
Post by Afterburner on Mar 20, 2010 16:01:57 GMT -5
"To hell with this! We're going straight through the bandits' territory...It's the lesser of two evils. At least we might have a chance to survive if we end up captured. Those bastards might turn a blind eye if we slip in a few rubles."
As they crossed the old ramshackle bridge, Burner couldn't help himself but notice how much the team had changed since Yantar. Dimitri was now much more open, talking and even occasionally smiling. The others felt relaxed and optimistic, like the mercenaries' base was just behind a corner.
"God, give me strength.... Anatoli, is the town hall still no-man's land?"
The mercenary turned around, stunned.
"SHIT! The main square! I totally forgot! Oh man, that thing's rigged ! If they set off the bombs today, we're doomed! I can't stop this mission, it's code A priority! Damn! The square's the fastest way through! We must get through as soon as possible! I'll try to dial in for some help, but, considering that we can't let any patrols off from Limansk duty, we'll have to wait for a Dead City group, which will take much longer! SHIT Anatoli, what did you get yourself into this time?" ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Khan was tracking his prey. A real wisent! Out here! He was not going to miss the chance. He crept through the bushes, slowly loading his Marlin. A good shot in the head would completely obliterate the beast's brain. The bull stopped, still unaware that this day might be its last.
"What a magnificent creature! So proud, yet so austere..."
He checked his scope and waited for the beast's head to line up with his sights.Closing his eyes, he fired. The great animal roared, fatally wounded. Finally, it collapsed, falling down on the ground. Khan approached his prey. It was a large wisent bull, still looking as proud as it was. He took out his knife and made a shallow cut under the wisent's neck, continuing down towards his belly. He was going to make his trophy.
|
|
|
Post by Karcentric on Mar 21, 2010 10:31:28 GMT -5
"Your saying the main path for us is rigged with some sort of bomb?" Karc asked, "I bloody hope you know what your getting us into." Reloading his P90 he got ready to move, the bandits might turn a blind eye to them, but they weren't what worried Karc, I wonder if those bandits can be tricked into helping us somehow? He was thinking, "What if we offer the bandits a large some of money, to help us fight the monolith chaps, We do the half now, half later payment, once were done with them, just shoot them. It will save us a lot of effort, even if we let them wade in and you chaps snipe some of the monolith bastards to convince them that we'll cover them, and once we're clear deal with them too?" He suggested. It wasn't brilliant, but carrying wounded through a war zone wasn't going to be easy either way they went.
Turning to Dimitri and Vasily who had been sitting quietly for the duration of the discussion, "What about you two? Any suggestions on how we should tackle the oncoming problem?" He asked.
|
|
|
Post by Zeno, Lord Camelith on Mar 23, 2010 19:14:02 GMT -5
Vasily looked up at the Merc, "We're going to have to kill any bandits we come across, even if we do bribe them." he said, "It's quite possible that the second we turn our backs on them they'll fill us full of lead, and even if we did help them kill a few of those Monolith goons they still wouldn't trust us." Vasily sat down, burying himself in thought. After a minute he said, "We could try to make some kind of a diversion and try to work our way around, but there's no way of knowing how long that will take or if it will work or not."
Turning to Anatoli, Vasily asked, "Are you sure there's nobody in the Dead City that could get here in time? They could even meet us at the half way point, we need every single able bodied fighter we can get."
|
|
|
Post by Afterburner on Mar 24, 2010 15:07:32 GMT -5
Anatoli sighed
"I wish... I sent a distress signal, but a patrol won't be able to reach us until we get through the main square and the town hall, and I already told you that the bombs will go off. Guys, we need to stop chit-chatting and move! Now! Stay away from open spaces! If I remember correctly, there's a route which should take us straight to the hall without exposing us to the streets. However, we should keep watch for those patrols! Captain! I assume you're not trying to sneak away!"
While the group was talking, Dimitri caught a glimpse of something in the tall grass.
"I don't like the look of this town...Danger's behind every corner. Hold on, movement in the grass!Even if it's a damned rat, I still don't like it."
To his horror, he realized that the object he was looking at was actually a mutilated corpse, with a large, rotting hole in it's chest. By the looks of it, it used to be a bandit, wearing a traditional bandit armored suit. As he got closer, trying to examine the corpse, something jumped out of the bush and snapped at him
"AGH! WHAT THE?"
The PSS fired and the thing fell limp on the ground.
"What in the blazes...A snake? Scientist! Is there something wrong with this thing? If this is a normal snake then I'm an artifact!"
The snake's head looked a lot larger then it should have,with something that looked like horns. He picked it up
"Real devil, isn't it?"
The diamond-like patterns on its back were strange, and the snake's skin itself seemed to be slightly glowing. He realized that the snake had wrapped itself around something reddish and ugly. Picking it up, he realized that he was holding what stalkers call "Stone Blood", an object capable of regenerating lost blood. It was noted, however, that the influence of such a thing greatly reduced the organism's protective capabilities. Nevertheless, he turned around and asked
"Anyone got a flask of water or something? Found a piece of Stone Blood here!"
A mercenary tossed a bottle of water and Dimitri scraped off a part of the artifact in the water, which turned blood red.
"Anyone who got hit, get a gulp of this, but don't drink too much!"
Turning to Anatoli, he said
"Don't mind me, lad. I'm not planning on running away, especially since you've invited me and all. Now, you aren't talking about old Cossack's route? That things leads straight through the goddamn sewers! I don't want to be crammed down in there!"
Anatoli responded, smiling
"Don't worry, cap'n. The sewers are an emergency plan only. I have no idea what might we find there except for old Soviet crap and anomalies, but I wouldn't want to walk through a dingy sewer again. Not after all the shit in the base..."
Burner remembered, shivering. The mercenaries who either broke a single rule in the base, did badly on the training course or simply pissed off the instructor, had to spend an entire day locked up in the sewers, which wasn't really a spectacular experience.
"All right, move out!"
|
|
|
Post by Karcentric on Mar 25, 2010 9:59:55 GMT -5
Karc let the group move out before following walking to another merc who was about 6-7 inches shorter than him, and considerably light. "Been in the zone long?" He asked the man grunted "About 6 months or so. You?" Karc nodded and replied "A little less been keeping a low profile." Holding his gun ready for a fight Karc glanced back occasionally, the alley was narrow, not an ideal place for a shoot out, especially as they would be on lower ground, Ah well, if we get caught we'll certainly give the bastards on hell of a fight. He thought.
They approached a wide section along the road. It was quiet but the group hesitated 2 mercs were sent to check the way, they came running back about 5 mins later, "There's a bandit patrol coming there's a shit load of 'em. About 20." he said. Great, they'll see us here and there isn't enough room to hide everyone. He thought looking around, there was a small shed that was out of the way, and some of the doors could probably be forced open. The merc continued, "They'll be able to see us from the street we need to hide or prepare to fight, or do both."
Wedging the short sword into a door, Karc forced the door to scrape open just enough to squeeze through, 2 mercs followed forcing the door shut and barricading it, Karc and the mercs crept up to the second story looking out of a small window overlooking the alley and the road, the bandits came into view looking down the alley...
|
|