head in and find your spot, your clothes are probably there, which is why ten wasn't worried, you were already on the way to them.

afterwards some exploring seems like a good idea. if asked just say you are familiarizing yourself with the ship in case you are needed anywhere.

First step is to get geared up, and equipment ready, rather than half-naked in your cryo-suit.

And I'd think if we're about to be deployed, your time might be better spent familiarizing yourself with your unit and allies than exploring the ship. They're going to be immediately relevant to the tactical situation on the ground- the inside of this ship, not so much.

get geared up first

You collect your issued equipment and step into the barracks room. The first thing that hits you square in the face is the... difference... this room has to the rest of the ship, and furthermore, what you were led to believe. Unlike the stark, lifeless rooms of the Psy Industries facility, or the ordered rooms of this very ship, the barracks you'd just stepped into was an example of utter chaos. And yet, even without touching anything, you could easily tell who's stuff was who's. Somehow, even with all the clutter, there were definable lines that were not crossed. Still, with all the bunks built into the walls, no one seems to be interested in whoever came in, as all of them have the separation curtains drawn shut. You scan the room a moment, and your eyes settle on the one area that doesn't seem to have quite as much clutter as the rest. You make your way over to it, and discover one of the bunks is neatly made, with standard uniform laid carefully on top of it. You check it to find it has the customary cut along the left shoulder, displaying your manufactured nature to the world even while dressed, and you quickly begin changing. You're about halfway done, just finishing with your pants, when curtain on your neighbor is pulled aside and a woman, naked except for the underwear covering her lower half, rolls out, standing and stretching. Her right arm makes beeping sounds as it moves, the cybernetics of a low grade and easily identifiable for what it is. The arm is barely even the right size for her torso. You find you also subconciously place identifiers on her, looking for ways to pick her out of a crowd if need be, a holdout from the tests the scientists used to make you do, and you note absentmindedly the stylized wolf tattoo emblazoned on to her chest. It's then that she notices you, eyes flicking open to stare back at you without emotion, before a massive grin slides onto her face.

"HEY! A NEW GUY! You're our brain, right? Hi! I'm Wolf, one of the Steelworks in the crew! It's nice to meet you!"

The woman bounces over to you, and extends her metallic hand, clearly thinking you'd shake it. You pause a moment, considering the offered appendage. Then, hesitantly, you extend you hand, already expecting what was to come. Sure enough, whatever trauma she had to lose her arm hits you like a ton of bricks, and you stumble backwards as pain flashes into your brain and you relive the sensation of having your arm suddenly gone. The woman jumps back at the same time as you do, clearly surprised, and when she sees the pain on your face, she seems to start panicking.

"Oh god! Oh god! Ten is gonna KILL me!"

"Now why am I gonna do that, Wolf?"

"Oh shit. Hey Ten! How's it going?"

"... Why is h- Wolf?!"

"I didn't do it, I swear!"

"It... wasn't her... wasn't her fault."

You pull yourself back to reality, letting the feeling fade as quickly as it came and steadying yourself. Both watch you, as well as a third person, a much older looking woman with scars all over her face. Once you are clearly ready, that same woman steps forward, no concern on her face at all.

"You're Grey then?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"Barbie. I'm Barbie. Not ma'am. We're all manufactured here. You've met Wolf, clearly. I'm gonna take it by your response you're one of those mind sensitive types. What did our last one call it... Empathy?"

"Yes ma- Barbie. I can Map as well."

"Well at least that's something. Empathy doesn't do a lot of good on the battlefield. Not if you're going to be doing that all day long. We've got a couple of minutes before the jump, so do what you want for now. If you have any questions, Wolf will get you sorted out. She's technically your bunkmate after all."

Wolf gives you a grin, then starts going through her own gear, humming a tune. With her back to you, you notice the implant along her spine that lets her interface with the TacArm system she likely rides into combat, and you finish dressing as you think about what you might want to ask.

Of course, you're still aware enough of your surrounding to note that Barbie and Ten are in the corner talking, there are three others currently in their bunks, and Wolf keeps glancing at you like she wants to ask a question but doesn't know if she should or not.

>>>Input Command

>Empathy doesn't do a lot of good on the battlefield
Not immediately, but it's good for things like after-action intelligence gathering, accurate interrogations, and things like that.

...and if we can sense who stuff 'belongs' to, that might be good in avoiding walking into traps. Material and environments might have echos or traces of the enemy who passed through or set them up. We might be able to pick up empathy left in objects before we get close enough to map ambushers, say.

>what do
Stick with your bunkmate, for the moment. See what she has to ask you.

you gonna need to work on ignoring pain echos. would make doing any medic stuff impossible, having a squadmate die only because you can't stop the bleeding would be really bad.

wait a moment and if wolf keeps tossing glances your way just say "if you want to ask just ask"

"I felt the pain you went through before getting that cybernetic arm you have now. Is that what you'd like to ask me?"

"Sorry about that, I am a sensitive little snowflake: I shook your hand and felt the pain that went along with losing the old one and getting your replacement.
"I don't need that 'gift' to see there's something on your mind though, what's up?"

You finish dressing yourself, pulling on a pair of gloves to keep physical contact to a minimum, not that it helps much. Still, the comfort is there, and it should help you remain focused. Through out the entire episode, your bunkmate continues to throw glances your way, and once you're done with your task, you turn to her with determination.

"If you want to ask, just ask."

The woman immediately bounces to her feet, a sheepish smile growing on her face, and all at once words start pouring from her mouth.

"You're psychic right? What kind? I don't really know much abut psychics, our last one didn't like to talk much. Talked less after that training accident. Anyway, he could move things with his mind! Can you do that? What about making things explode, can you do that? Or what about that weird healing thing I've seen some of you guy's do? Barbie said Empathy, what's that? Or that other one... Map? What's that do?"

The barrage of questions takes you off your guard for a moment, before you compose yourself and explain everything. No, you can't move things, or blow things up, or heal yourself. You're a Sense psychic, meaning you reach out and touch objects, people, emotions, feelings. Your area of expertise is the mind, and while you could learn others with practice, you are just barely out of the test facility. And no, you can't read mind

Not yet, anyway.

Wolf seems a bit disappointed, but quickly bounces back and welcomes you again to the group. She goes over some of the others, pointing out their bunks if not them. You note that she skips over one, another bunk that seems empty, except for the uniform placed on the bed, neatly folded and waiting. You reach out slightly with your senses, and feel... nothing. No amount of lingering emotions or thoughts. It was like it had never been used before at all. You frown a moment, but Wolf doesn't notice or chooses not to as she moves on to other things.

"We're part of the advance group. The 'Tip of the Spear' is what Barbie called it. Means we get shot at first. Anyway, we're do to jump soon, I think... Which reminds me, I better start getting ready, don't want to mess everything up because I'm not ready. Ten might actually send me out the airlock this time."

Wolf strips completely, and pulls out of a drawer and suit made of a thing, rubbery substance. You absentmindedly remember the training videos regarding Steelworks. A major rival of Psy Industries, the two were constantly at odds thanks to their differing beliefs about which companies creations would win the war for humanity. Most manufactured didn't care either way, their lives were already decided for them, but that had meant you'd gotten a rundown at least on the suit. The article of clothing was infused with tiny nanite machines designed to regulate body temperature, absorb shock and mitigate feed back from the TacArm itself. It also provided a way for leaders to monitor the life signs of the pilot's within, although that was much less a concern for a manufactured.

Wolf slides the thing on, but glances over at you as you watch with disinterest.

"So, you got any questions for me while we're here? Don't worry, I'll let you know when the jumps about to start. I don't think you've jumped out of cold sleep, and you're probably going to want a trashcan for that. First time is always rough."

>>>Input Command

ask what her Tac is like. is it standard or got some specials?

actually, lets get a rundown of what everyone can do.

Ow, ow, ow, ow! Way too many grammar/composition mistakes where someone used a homophone instead of the right word. 'Pilot's' instead of pilots, 'do' instead of due, and 'companies' instead of company's are just three of them.

"Who are we, how bad is command's disinterest in keeping us alive, and what are the three things I most need to know to get through our next mission in one piece?"

Any idea what we can expect?

>how bad is command's disinterest in keeping us alive
Well, we're the tip of the spear, and we're manufactured, disposable clone-troops.

any ideas on what we're going to be fighting down there or did command leave that for a little surprise to us?

>>548712
so as long as fixing us is cheaper then getting a new one, they will.

>>548719
While it's cheaper to keep us around, there are other assets that are less easily replaced. Makes us much lower priority, and in war where some losses are going to happen regardless that's pretty damn close to disinterest.

That's without taking into account valuing natural humans greater, and thus prioritizing them in situations where it's close or a toss-up between us and them in terms of value.

>>548712

I was mostly trying to fix where on the spectrum between being commanded by General Haig and General Patton we are. Are we supposed to run out of the trenches into machinegun fire when command blows a whistle or are we actually going to do sensible things?

You frown a moment, a few questions popping into your head, and you figure, what the hell? Why not ask them all, one by one.

"So... what is your TacArm like?"

"Mine? Standard issue really. Twin Carnivore Chain-guns mounted to the arms, Catapult Missile Launchers on the shoulders. Nothing fancy. I mean, I kinda got screwed outta anything fancy. What with getting my arm implants and all. If you want custom though, you'd have to talk to Mech. She's not in our group, but damn. Her TacArm makes mine look like a toy."

Wolf keeps droning on, starting to break into technical terms you are not familiar with. Probably Steelworks specific terms. You drown her out for a moment, as you consider when you might be able to break in and ask another question, when she provides the chance for you.

"- can't believe they let her get away with having one. Anyway, probably don't like to listen to me talk shop, so, got any other questions?"

"Yes, actually. I wanted to know who we are, what I can expect for this mission."

"Heh. Can answer that easy. We're on the recon frigate Kairos Vengeance. Named after some hero from the First Contact War. Anyway, we go in, land, blow some shit up,,, test the waters, you know... recon stuff. Of course, they don't expect to ever have us come back... at least, not many of us. Still, I don't think this ones gonna be too difficult. After all, this is the first strike, and from what I can tell, the xenos don't know we're coming. It'll be fine. You'll see. Anyway, we're supposed to jump in with four other recon frigates, drop into an enemy comm station, blow the shit out of it, the the rest of the fleet can jump in and do clean up and prep for the next jump."

"So... we are the first ones on the ground?"

"Yup. Most likely to die, too. That's why they use us manufactured. Easily replaced. Mostly."

You feel rather than here the subtle change in the droning engines noise, and you find yourself bracing uncomfortably. Wolf frowns a moment, then nods her head and smiles at you. She finishes sliding into her TacArm suit, then grabs a nearby bag and hands it to you.

"You're probably going to need that."

"Why, are we jumping so-"

And then the world stops making sense.

-----------

Minutes earlier, five frigates separate from the fleet and start forward, tightening quickly into a simple, claw formation, the comms crackled to life, the center ship acting as the lead for the jump.

"Recon Frigate 20873, to formation, please respond."

"Recon Frigate 20874, responding."

"Recon Frigate 20913, responding."

"Recon Frigate 20966, responding."

"Recon Frigate 20745, responding."

"All responses clear, prep for space fold on mark... mark."

And then, five ships simply ceased to be in one place, and start existing in another.

---------------------

After the minutes of hurling into the bad are done, you find yourself back to normal, your mapping already confirming that you are, in fact, still aboard your ship and not in some place vaguely resembling the inside of a disemboweled cow. You straighten yourself slowly, wary of any lasting nausea, before you find Wolf calmly waiting for you to be done, looking slightly concerned.

"You alright?"

"Yeah."

"That was a little rough, even for a first jump."

"I'm... not good with that sort of thing."

"Okay... well, they'll have us on alert now. Should be a little longer till we're needed at the ships, but I gotta go early, cause I need to get suited up. If you have any questions, go ask Wash-Out, he's in that bunk over there, pretending to be asleep."

There's a loud thump heard from the indicated bunk, and a carelessly hurled out cuss word aimed at Wolf, which is responded to in kind. Still, Wolf waves goodbye before disappearing out into the corridor, and you're left alone with your thoughts. A few minutes huh, doesn't seem like a lot... perhaps now would be a good time to consider doing some actual prep work for the mission. Like putting on your armor. Of course, you're still not quite sure what to expect, other than things blowing up, and questions seem scarce, but... As far as TacArms go, you don't know a whole lot. Still, Wolf mentioned something about someone called Mech. There's always asking about anything Wolf didn't get to as well.

>>>Input Command

well we don't really need to know much more about tacarms, since we lack the sockets we aren't going to be in one any time soon.

see if you can get wash-out to start talking while you get your gear on. ask him what his deal is, what's he do?

>That was a little rough, even for a first jump.
One situation where all those extra senses don't help at all. (I wonder if we can chose to damp or shut down passive mapping as much as possible next time? Assuming there ever is a next time).

>Mech
I don't think a better understanding of custom tacarm stuff is going to help us right now. Nor that we have enough time to learn it. (And logically, shouldn't Mech be off suiting up, too?).

gear up for sure. Last thing we want is to find out our ship is getting boarded and you still don't have your pants on

Get your gear ready to go first, don't want to have Barbie come along and find you unprepared.

>"That was a little rough, even for a first jump."
If anyone else asks about the jump, just mention that it's unpleasantly like being drunk.

Shit, we're on a Haig whistle-blow if we're being thrown in as a suicide-strike against an unscouted enemy. We're gonna have to be really damn careful about where we are and what we're doing, and may end up KIA/POW/MIA despite everything if our mission is a failure.
Gear up, and keep the questioning of Wash-Out below a level of volume/irritation at which we get glared at. I'd nominate the following question: "What's our unit good at and bad at?"

Landfall Grey 2013/11/19(Tue)06:58 No. 549086 ID: d77784
File 138487309044.jpg - (135.00KB , 1600x749 , mech_warrior_jp.jpg )

You take the opportunity to put on your armor, the basic vest doing little to offer you any amount of comfort, but still better than nothing. You place the holster on your leg, and double check that the weapon you've been issued works properly before sliding it into place. The small comm system that hooks into your belt and ear are just as easily readied and put on. You make sure you have any other gear you might possibly need thrown into a smaller rucksack meant to be taken with you, then head over towards the one called Wash-Out, frowning slightly at the hostility you feel coming from him.

"Excuse me. I have a question."

"Joy. Well, come on then. Let's hear it."

"I would like to know the strengths and weakness of our group."

"We rely too much on those TacArms. I mean, sure, the Genetech guys do work as well, myself included, but overall, the TacArms hold the central position. Mobile tanks and all that. Whatever happens, we lose one of those, and we're hurting. Badly. Unless you can pull something out of your brainy ass."

Wash-Out looks at you as if expecting some response to his comment, but you just stare blandly at him, already used to be treated differently because of what you are. He sighs in annoyance at getting nothing, before an alarm bell starts to go off and he glares at the suddenly flashing lights.

"Drop time, new guy. Let's get going. Don't want to keep them all waiting."

The man who emerges from the bunk is normal enough, a soldier in everything. The only odd things you note are the cybernetic fingers that are present on his right hand, and his eyes glowing softly as they almost literally zoom in and out to get a better look at you. He shoulders a rifle as he stands, then gestures for you to follow. After another confusing jaunt through the corridors and hallways, you find yourself emerging into a hanger containing only four dropships. The machines look like little more than hunks of metal with two engines strapped to them, clearly meant to take a few hits before anything actually penetrates, but you can't imagine the thing will be able to take off after entering atmosphere. In essence, this will be a one way trip until they decide to come get you. If they decide to come get you.

The next few minutes are a whirlwind of activity, as equipment is moved, systems are prepped and the ships manufactured cargo are loaded in and strapped into their seats. For a moment, you wonder how your Steelworks companions are getting down, but as the dropship lifts off the steel floor, you see the bottom open up and clamps reach down from either side, fastening themselves to the outer framework of two massive metal forms. The clamps retract quickly, dragging the machines into it's belly before closing itself shut again and shooting out of the docking bay. You immediately feel the loss of gravity, and your senses feel... empty... as the voids of space hit you like a punch to the face. Still, the trip goes quickly, especially as you begin to feel it. The anticipation. What you were born to do. To perform the acts of war. To fight until your last breath, or until there was no enemy left to fight. Soon... so very soon...

"We hit atmosphere in three minutes. Prep for gravity."

You find yourself counting away the seconds, one by one, until mere moments before the expected weight of gravity, you brace and take it without movement or comment. Similar things happen among the ships other occupants, although Wolf crackles over the speaker, complaining about the hell this is going to put on her machine. Barbie promptly tells her to shut up as the engines kick in and you begin to decelerate from free fall. As you near the ground, the belly opens again and the two TacArms are ejected roughly, Wolf whooping as she slams into the ground, the other remaining silent throughout. The dropship itself closes up again and impacts the ground seconds later, and within two minutes of hitting ground, everyone is unloaded and pulling security around the craft. Comms crackle to life quickly, as Barbie starts handing out orders.

"Ten. You take your group, head towards the comm station on the far side. You remember where it is. Circle around if you can. Stupid, you're group is with me. We're running distraction. Grey, you're going with Ten. You'll be of more use with him then with me."

You nod your understanding, and hurry after the other man, silently identifying your companions. Ten, Wash-Out, someone else. You thought that there was one mo-

Then it comes rumbling out of the tree line, practically uprooting the offending foliage as it positions itself in the center. A stylized wolf's head has been painted onto it, and you can't help but feel slightly awed at the massive machine. It stands 3, maybe 4 times your size, and it's guns look unashamedly deadly. You find that you'd be even more surprised though, if you hadn't already seen one of your "brothers" literally crush one of the poor things using his mind. Pilot inside didn't even stand a chance. As the group moves in it's circle around the enemy, you find your mapping doing little, as you are staying well out of range of any xeno encounters. The vegetation starts to fade away and be replaced with a more urban setting the closer you get to your destination, and soon, the group halts, a good distance from the comm center, and Ten falls back to talk to you.

"Hey, Grey. You said something about being able to Map earlier?"

"I can, yes."

"You think you'd mind doing some scouting? I want to see if I can set up Wash-Out in that building over there, have him snipe people, but I think you'd be more reliable as a spotter than anyone else. I don't want you doing it if you don't think you can though."

You pause to consider a moment, weighing your options. While you could go forward and designate targets easily, you weren't sure about being able to be quiet about it. Psy Industries didn't particularly care for that kind of training. Still, the alternative was likely a complete frontal assault, which might prove easier if you use strike fast and hard.

>>>Input Command

can you increase range of map without using more power by cutting the detail? just label things human or xeno and their direction from you rather then coat everything in psychic energy or what have you.

if so then do it. if not then say you can but it would also be like holding up a flare. everything will know. if ten still says to risk it then sure. if not then say you can stick with the main group and tell them which way hostiles are coming.

Well, an Urban environment means you'll make less noise just walking around, as there's less to step on or bump into. Depending on the range of your mapping, keeping to alleys and buildings(from side entrances where possible) while avoiding windows and taking cover whenever in the open might be enough. Not the worst place to try and sneak around for an amateur.

That is unless the aliens have some sort of scanning tech.

The big advantage that sniping gives though is that we can take out those carrying heavier weapons first to ensure Wolf's safety. Ten said we rely on Tac Arms, so minimizing the threat to is a priority for the safety of the entire team. This is also why striking first and hard may not be the best idea, as Wolf will be a big target very early on in the mission. Also, if the sniping draws them to us, they won't have emplacements, we can set-up, maybe lay an ambush/traps and depending on how many and where the enemies come from Barbie may end up dealing less of them.

If it's not clear by now, I say we go spotting.

>We rely too much on those TacArms
Well, then the best use of our abilities to identify threats that could take out that lynchpin before they have a chance to.

Remember that while mapping might allow you to spot enemies, empathy might allow you to pick up on a trap or ambush before you see the xenos (assuming they left psychic traces in the material or enviroment they prepared).

>No stealth training
Well, at least you have the advantage of range. If you're lucky, you're going to know they're there before they see you.

Go spotting / scouting.

Concentrate on being hidden visually. You can be spotted from afar, but it's less likely someone would hear you until you're already in mapping range.

We have to hope and pray that our mapping and empathy are equal to the task of proceeding in hostile territory unmolested, because otherwise I'm guessing the range of our mapping ability leaves it generally inferior to what our own eyes could do from a good sniper perch. Ask for a stealth CQB tail to take advantage of targets of opportunity and rescue your dumb ass if it turns out the enemy has capable detection power of their own.

You consider your abilities for a moment, then nod to no one in particular. You should be able to do it. If need be, you could probably remove some of your concentration from detail to go for distance. You've done a few tests with similar parameters back at the labs, so performing the same thing shouldn't be too difficult.

You give your agreement to the plan overall, although request that someone be ready to come in if necessary to back you up in case something goes wrong. You're assured that if shit goes bad, they'll be pushing in as hard and fast as possible, and, after taking a few more minutes to allow everyone else to get into position, you set off, using the terrain to your advantage as best you can. As you pick your way through the environment, your mapping picks up on one xeno a little late, and without thinking you duck into a nearby building as the thing comes around the corner. You freeze, finding your breath coming in easy, measured steps, completely opposed to your quickly beating heart. Soon, however, the alien passes on, and you pause only a moment more before continuing on. A few minutes later, and without any further close calls, you get yourself into position inside a building with little traffic from the enemy, and you relax your body as you begin concentrating. Your mind reaches out, shedding the mundane senses of your physical body to increase the strength of your mind's eye.

As your senses reach out, you find yourself picking up on everything around you. There's the comm building, its halls filled with aliens. Not too many, all told, only about seven, maybe eight in total. You doubt all of them are armed as well, too many of them are working on what feels like consoles. There and there, though, are clear guards. You tag them in your head and move on, searching the rest of the buildings around you. You tag more, and eventually come to a grand total of fourteen guards, five "workers". You identified clear groups of the enemy, and unfortunately, can't really identify who would be a threat to Wolf and who wouldn't. It's a bit difficult when your knowledge of alien weapons goes about as far as "they have guns that shoot beams/balls/bullets made of lasers/plasma" or whatever else people can guess. Humanity didn't exactly get a large chance to study the things the last time. It was mostly just running and screaming as people died. Given, lasers and plasma weapons had been invented by humanity in the past two decades, and shielding against those weapons as well, but you weren't privy to that kind of information.

Regardless, you'd identified three major groups for Wash-Out to possibly put down. The first was the main ground force. By thinning them out, you would make it easier for your fellows, and yourself, to push into the buildings and get to cover. Unfortunately, this left Wolf exposed, as her TacArm was too large to enter the safety of the building.

The second group seemed to be performing a perimeter guard/overwatch function. Most likely they'd be the ones to alert their fellows to an incoming attack. If you dealt with them first, there was a slim chance that no one would be alerted at all of the sniping, and you could hit another target as well. Still, that chance was small, and you'd have to time it just right. They seemed to report in rather frequently, and not having that report would serve just as well to warn the others.

The last was an odd group. They seemed to have no set pattern, moving about the complex somewhat randomly. You had no idea as to their function, as they didn't seem to be doing anything particularly important, and you didn't feel anything odd about them. The only really strange function was that they seemed to move along the sides of buildings, not across the ground. You weren't sure what taking them out would do either, although killing them would certainly set the rest off.

Regardless, it was time you relayed the targets to Wash-Out, as well as decide what you were going to do when the rest of the group pushed in. You could try to join up with your allies, or you could push forward on your own to try and take a few enemies by surprise. Of course, any other plan you might be able to come up with would serve just as well.

>>>Input Command

i would say the second group. even a CHANCE to maintain the element of surprise for an extended time is good. would say to shoot whatever one currently has out their communication device right after they finish using it. then shoot whichever one takes out their communicator when that one goes down. preventing them from making the call is more important then killing them all.

Hrrm...Report back all three groups, we're here to scout and find out stuff, making tactical decisions I don't think is what we were spawned for.

I would agree that the chance for surprise is worth taking.

And I'd feel better joining up with our allies. Ranged sensory powers could go rather well with a kickass stealth build (see: Polo) but you don't exactly have the right training and equipment to function in that role. (Unless you get lucky).

As is, with just a sidearm (you'd think a standard kit would include some kind of rifle) you're better off supported by a group, and your powers could be well used trying to support your fellows.

>>549253
There is that. If the others know or recognize anything from that report, that might change the course of action. Although we're still free to give our opinion as to what looks the better target.

Report back and let Ten decide. If he's second in command I'd expect he's at least read some sort of reports on the enemy, and he knows the groups capabilities better than us. He's better equipped to make this call than someone fresh off the boat.

call ten and let him know what you found. If he leaves it up to us then I say hit group two and when the fireworks start I say try and stay out of the action and just keep radioing to you group where the enemy is, or you could hover around the group and try and flank enemy groups that give your group trouble.

Walking on walls suggests that this third, *odd* group has mobility capabilities which may make them the biggest threat overall in an open battle as they come at us from unexpected angles. Everything else, in contrast, looks relatively conventional and therefore less threatening to a unit that depends on comparatively low-mobility armored units.
But agreed, we aren't even a sergeant yet, let alone unit commander. Report, and if our commander has ANY brains at all they probably find that wall-walking stuff just as worrisome as I do.
There does remain the fact that our objective is to stop this communications post from sending a signal, so therefore we don't get a choice: Our objective is drive hard for the facility and hopefully evade both group 2 and 3 until they're toast, and then hopefully pull to good positions for fighting them (possibly a fighting retreat into the open).

You double check your work, just to be sure of the numbers, then start relaying information to Ten. He takes it without comment, and once your done, tells you to hold position for a few minutes. The silence and waiting does little to help your nerves, but soon enough, the comms crackle to life again.

"Grey, I've got orders for you. Once Wash-Out does his thing, I need you to immediately regroup with Wolf. I want you to help cover her from any threats, using that Mapping ability of yours. Myself and TNT are headed straight for the comm system. You and Wolf are going to pull the enemy as much as possible, Wash-Out will help cover you once he's done with his own targets. Understood?"

"Understood."

"On my mark."

You check your weapon as you wait for the signal, and brace yourself to move. A minute later, the signal is given, and you here the crack of a gunshot, followed almost immediately by one of the odd signatures disappearing from your mapping. He'd gone for the mobile ones. Within minutes, every single one had been dealt with, leaving only the more normal ones, but the entire complex had been alerted. Not that it would help much.

Wolf comes into your senses, although it wasn't necessary considering the high-pitched whine and the sound of steady gunfire filling the air. You move from your own position, taking the most direct route to your comrade, even as you feel Ten and TNT slip around the fight and into the building. Wolf focuses most of her attention on the building in front of her, continually hammering it with her chain-guns, which leaves you open to focus on other things. Not that you expect to be able to do much with your little pistol.

"Grey? This is Wash-Out. I'm free to engage targets. Send me locations."

Or you could do that too. Still, as you focus a little more on your mapping, you begin to identify targets coming around the sides, likely aiming to flank the TacArm. Wash-Out won't be able to deal with all of them. At least, not the first two. They seem to be working together, attacking at the same time. You'll have to deal with one, while Wash-Out can deal with the other. Only question is, which one? And then of course, what to do afterwards. Wolf is making a lot of noise, but isn't actually hitting anything really. Maybe if you directed her towards something...

Regardless, the flankers have to be deal with first. A quick check reveals the first to be coming from a higher floor inside a building, while the other is moving through the rubble on the ground. Both will show themselves about equally. How to deal with them...

>>>Input Command

wash-out takes the one high up you take the one low. shes taller right now an thus can get a better firing angle on something higher.

Wash-Out hits high, you hit low, and Wolf I think should be directed more towards that overwatch group, so the soldiers lose their intel on the big picture. Easier to deal with at that point.

Yeah, give Washout the higher flanker while you hit the one on the ground. (Can you use mapping to plan an approach that gives you the best ambush? Hit the enemy from what should be a bind spot).

On the way, maybe pass wolf the general direction to be firing, ie, where they're hunkered down from her fire (since you can see through walls, and she can't). Finer spotting will have to wait till after you deal with the flanker (assuming you don't get yourself killed).

You direct Wash-Out to the flanker coming from higher up, and he acknowledges the directive. You stretch out your senses to get a better picture of the other attacker, and decide to try out flanking him yourself, hopefully getting the drop on him and making it easier for you. As you start to head out, however, you take a moment to redirect Wolf's fire towards a more focused position, her chain-guns now ripping into the cover of the overwatch group. You hear her mumble about maybe wasting some missiles on them, but she discards the idea, apparently worried she might need them for something long range later.

You quickly move into position, using your mapping to keep an eye on the enemy and you easily deduce the xeno's intended path. Soon after, you're in position, waiting patiently for it to arrive. Seconds tick by, and then the enemy comes into view, and you get your first, actual look at it.

The thing stands maybe a foot taller than the average human, and its limbs are larger and more muscled. It seems to wear little in the way of conventional(a term you use loosely) body armor, instead having what looks like an organic, armored carapace that covers sections of its body. In its hands it holds what you can only assume to be an alien equivalent to a rifle, the weapon long and thin at one end, which you assume to be the barrel, and more round and bulbous towards the others, which you can only assume houses the power source. Then, observations done, you explode into action, handgun spitting lead towards the unfortunate enemy. At almost the same time, you hear the crack of another rifle shot, and Wash-Out confirms his kill. Unfortunately for you, you can't report the same, as, maybe because of all the psychic prodding back at the labs, you were never all that good with a gun. You shots bounce off of the thing's carapace, and it spin on you, roaring its anger and rage. You fire off another few rounds, and these, thankfully, hit their mark, taking the thing in its more vulnerable neck and mouth. The xeno collapses to the ground, and you find your own breathing erratic due to the sudden change.

"Grey? Grey? Are you alright?"

"... Yes... Yes... I'm alright, Wolf..."

"Okay... Well, I got em pinned over here, might've hit a few of them, too. Can't really tell."

"Give me a minute, Wolf."

"Alright. See you in a bit."

You take a few calming breaths in, then scramble out of your hiding spot and get a closer look at the enemy. Nothing really seems to have changed now that it's dead, except maybe that it has holes in its throat and head. You bend down and frown though, at finding the alien rifle still intact. Maybe you should bring it along. Or, you could try Empathy on it. Never know what you might find.

>>>Input Command

Do we have any data about alien arms and equipment?
My thinking is that you're probably right about this being some kind of equivalent to a rifle but we don't know how to use it. Even if we figure that out, we don't know what traps may have been intentionally left in/on it. Even if we find those we don't know if it has features that make it unsuitable for our use like a tracer, user-hazardous radiation emission (radioactivity), ergonomics you can't work with because it's built for a non-human, excessive recoil, deafening noise or other operational hazards beyond what we can handle, and poisonous elements. That's an awful lot of potential hazards to check for and not all of them will be something that you would necessarily be able to find even if you were actively reading the mind of an alien trained in its use--I bet we don't have sufficient good data about what they find poisonous or what their radiation tolerances are.

My suggestion is that you tag it for recovery, since you're vulnerable light infantry dealing with something that could easily be a bomb as well as a rifle (a sufficiently large clip of ammo is a bomb). We don't even want to be near this thing until the battlefield has been secured.

>>550037
except empathy can trace how it WAS used. it is a very interesting power.

take a good hard 'look' at it, but don't try to use it until you are sure you can.

Take the rifle. Accuracy may not matter as much if it packs enough of a punch.

Wait a tick before using empathy to try and understand how to use it. You've been distracted from the larger conflict and focuses on your own one on one conflict. Take a moment to pay attention to the mapping, see if anything significant has changed, and maybe give Wolf that direction she was looking for.

Then scan it. (Unless something comes up).

Remember where it is, but don't take it yet. It's meant for something bigger and stronger then you and you can't afford to carry it if you can't use it. Empathy might let you use it, but Wolf is our heavy hitter and empathy will keep you from directing and keeping an eye out for her.

It might be a nice benefit down the line, but not one for right now.

You take another moment to inspect the weapon more closely but find nothing new about it. You mentally tag it for later, as well as memorizing how it feels in case you need to find others like it, before you make your way back towards Wolf. Your passive mapping doesn't pick up anymore flankers, and just as you reach your destination, the comms crackles to life again.

"Alright. Bombs in place. Everyone pull back. This is gonna be a nice big boom."

Wolf starts her TacArc backpedaling, and you move with her, making sure to keep a mental eye out for anymore nasty surprises. Still, with Wolf hammering away at the enemy positions, there isn't any reason to worry about an assault from the front. Once you get behind cover, it's just a waiting game, and a minute later, the explosion that follows your retreat rocks the earth. A quick mental inspection reveals only a few stragglers among the enemy, quickly disappearing as Wash-Out sets to work, and Ten calls everyone to regroup as soon as possible.

"The comm center is in ruins now, and that means the rest of the fleet can move in. Barbie says they got no problems on their end, this operation went smooth as ice. That leaves us to wait for pick up. Still, I don't want us running into any nasty surprises. Wolf, you stay suited up, Grey, keep an eye out for any trouble. The rest of us will take shift for perimeter guard till we get out of here. Anything else you want to do, it's your choice. Consider this the closest you'll get to free time for the moment."

The group splits, TNT taking first guard shift, while Wolf lumbers over to a shadier spot and powers down. Everyone else seems to find a nice place to sit. You guess that means you can do as you like for now, as long as you keep your mapping up.

>>>Input Command

"Command, I may be able to use empathy talents on enemy remains, equipment or material to learn more about them and their capabilities. Potentially we might discover something useful about their technology or force disposition doing this and maybe even make use of their gear. Unfortunately, I don't have a lot of experience looking for traps, trackers, bombs, and other possible problems the xenos could have left like that, and I can't do it at the same time as I keep up mapping.
"If you can establish a well-secured perimeter I may be able to find out something useful. Do you want me to try that sooner or should I just gather up what I can find that might be worth salvaging or studying later?"

Well, if it's nearby, we could try using empathy to examine an enemy weapon, try see how they work. (Just warn the others what you're doing first. We don't want the others firing on your position if you get an energy blast off).

talk t whoever is nearest. about what the plan was, did the commander know what the wall things were and that was why he had them hit first?

You have a few things you want to do, but all of them require you talking to Ten. Which is easy, since he's right here with you. You wander over to your leader, and he stares at you questioningly, clearly expecting something from you.

"I had a couple of questions, if I can ask them."

"Go ahead, Grey. You helped out a lot today, and I don't go ignoring soldiers that help."

"Alright. First, why did you make the call to kill the oddly moving things instead of another group?"

"Ah. Yeah, you wouldn't know about them. They gave us a little xenobiology lecture before we came down here, but it didn't really tell us much. What we did get out of it wasn't pretty. To answer your question, one of the alien critters is what we've taken to calling a 'spider'. Things are humanoid, ish, but have claw-like things on the ends of their hands, for climbing. And killing. They also tend to jump around a lot, or so I was told, so I figured killing the things would turn out for the best. There weren't many of them, but none is better than some. They probably would have gone for Wash-Out, then we'd have been dead."

"I see."

"Anything else?"

"Yes. To be truthful, I was wondering if I could try reading something off of the alien weapons. Maybe figure out how they work."

"Uh... No."

"May I ask why?"

"That isn't your job. Unless you somehow get moved to RnD, it will continue to stay not your job. For now, just wait. Once the main fleet hits, they can figure all that shit out."

"Understood."

The hour is spent in silence among the group, as you wait patiently for something to happen. You keep your mapping passive, although nothing dangerous comes around, and soon enough, the word comes down that extraction is on the way. Another hour later, and you're are back aboard your ship. The rest of your group heads off towards the barracks area, while Ten and Barbie disappear somewhere to report in. Wolf, you notice, remains behind, disembarking from her TacArm but almost immediately opening up panels along the things shell, inspecting the device.

At the same time, you feel a throbbing in your head, one you're familiar with. Psychic potential is building up in your skull. You'll need to take the time to meditate on that and focus that potential into something constructive. That can be easily done while back at the barracks.

And there's always things to do. You remember being informed on the flight back up that you'd have roughly a week of downtime before you're jump into the next system. You, of course, are manufactured, which means that downtime is more like helping out around the ship time. Or improving yourself. It might be best to find someone who can help you find out what needs doing.

>>>Input Command
Psychic Points Gained: 1

>world cleared!
Huh. Not much there. I guess there would have been a lot of simultaneous attacks, though.

>spiders would have gone for Washout, then we'd have died
Good call letting the people who knew more than you make the call.

>no alien gun
Dangit caution, look at where you got us. First significant deviation from pre-reboot. Although we managed not to get anyone killed this time, so I suppose that's an improvement.

>what do
Meditation first. First thing Wolf did on getting back is to look after her gear. That's a good philosophy, even if your gear is your mind. Helping out around the ship can wait till you've got that in order.

Not sure where to spend that not-XP, yet.

We are a rookie, barely past seeing the elephant's eye. I suggest we talk to our commander about our advancement path. Emphasize that we are inadequate in many, essential, basic training skills like stealth, hand to hand, marksmanship, survival, basic gear maintenance and such. They also should know that our psychic potential has barely begun to develop.
Chances are the team would benefit most from us improving our mapping talent to increase its range and sensitivity. We don't even know what the range of options is yet though, and if there are easy options for increasing our mobility or adding offensive ability those should be considered too.

Let's go look up R&D. Being able to tell them what an alien doodad does before they start tearing it apart would be useful, if they don't already have empaths of their own.

There's so many options that bombard your thoughts, things to do that all sound like good ideas. Still, mediation does not take long, and can be done within moments provided you find a good enough spot, one with little noise or activity. You could keep an eye out for one as you perform your other ideas. The first thing to do is report to your superiors, which would be Ten or Barbie, you suppose, but they've gone off to a meeting somewhere, and won't be back till later.

Which leaves RnD. You'd always felt comfortable talking to scientist, maybe because you'd spent most of your life around them, but a ship like this one wouldn't have an RnD department per say. They would, however, have an medical center, which is about the closest you could get. You inquire the location of the place, then quickly find your way there. Upon entering, you're immediately assaulted by the smell of charred flesh. It appears some others weren't as lucky as your team.

"No, no! Not that one! Get me the skin gel! The SKIN gel, you moronic machine!"

A human doctor is working quickly on the patient laying on his table, muttering curses as his equipment attempts to retrieve what he wants, only to malfunction and retrieve something else. Finally, it seems the doctor just sighs and gives up, laying his tools down and looking a bit depressed.

"Well, there goes another one. Can't say I'm surprised, given this shoddy piece of junk... oh! Yes. Manufactured, are you? Here for an implant? Wait... Psy? Probably not an implant. I don't have any medicines to boost your powers, you know."

"I am... aware. I came because I was looking for where they might be studying the alien tech we recovered."

"Ah, yes, that. Well, unfortunately, we are only transporting it to a capital ship. The teams there will be having a look at them. Although why you would want to visit them I have no idea."

"I wanted to see if I could help somehow."

"By what, getting shot at? No, wait, keep forgetting, your a Psy Industries creation... Psychic powers?"

"Yes."

"Discipline?"

"Sensory."

"Both?"

"Yes. Although barely. My power is... undeveloped."

"I see... I might have been lying earlier when I said I didn't have anything for you. Standard Implants, of course, I have plenty of, and I know THAT machinery works fine, with all the Steelworks coming in and out. But... it might just happen to be that I have an... experimental... implant that I wouldn't mind trying out. It's supposed to remove the subconscious neural inhibitors in your brain, allowing for access to more psychic power for a short period of time. It's mostly untested of course, but is proven to be safe. Or, at least, your brain won't explode.

"Of course, as I said, if you want I could hook in some of the more standard implants. Mechanical limbs, artificial lungs, hearts, reinforced skeletons. That sort of thing. Only one though. Because you haven't 'earned' more."

>>>Input Command

"I was trying to hold off on that kind of decision until I could consult with my team and commanders--I'm still too new to have a good idea what they need from me during missions besides performing sensory recon.
"If you have any particular insight on that question that would be appreciated, but since I'm here I'll first ask if you can use assistance with triage and treatment."

let's be sure about this. sounds like getting t in wont cause any problems in itself. but when activated you can do a lot more psychic stuff for a bit. and what happens when that bit is over? are you exhausted? or is it just unusable again for a while? ether way it sounds like getting it in wont hurt.

I think for now I'll settle for simply assisting you here..
As far as that implant...Depends. While yes, it COULD be nice to have, we're sensory- a boost in power isn't really necessarily that useful for us, right now. Even more so depending on the side effects of that thing.

Is power what we need? I can see how raw power would boost defensive or offensive powers, but sensory is kind of trickier to imagine hold that works.

When it allows you more power for a short time- does that mean you crash afterwards, or return to normal levels?

I would tell him we'll consider it, for now.

it's an umbrella. we have no idea if it's gonna rain, but i would rather have it and never use it, then not have it and need it.

I don't want to take it. He says we haven't earned more. Sounds like getting something here might prevent us from getting something somewhere else. Even if not, I'd still like to hold off and perhaps evaluate other options. And if we've only earned one thing, they're probably lower quality. Not sure I want lower quality implants if we're whole and healthy.

I used the wrong quote earlier, it seems.
We need gear, we can't afford a crap-ass, experimental implant that isn't guaranteed to do anything useful at all because if we take that we won't get any gear.

>>548864
> Nothing fancy. I mean, I kinda got screwed outta anything fancy. What with getting my arm implants and all.

So, no empathy-ing the xeno gun? Oh well, maybe we can play with our radar and see if we can refine it for range/sensitivity/direction etc?

>>550917
When he says 'we haven't earned any more' he wasn't passing judgement on the (dubious) quality of the implant offered, he was talking quantity. Our performance has earned enough for one augmentation, not to strip out and replace every system available.

>>550943
Oh, I'm not saying the implants are of "dubious" quality, but I doubt they're all are made equally. He called them Standard after all. Some will be better than others, and while we might have earned some sort of basic implant, better ones are likely off the table for now. And I'd rather not have invasive surgery for something we'd likely want to replace later at the cost of other equipment when all we've got is basic gear and a pistol.

he has standard AND the special one, which is a prototype, meaning there is literally no better versions of it.

It doesn't sound like the implant will deliver any real benefit, and may have unforeseen drawbacks.
>>550976
Psssst. Historically, prototypes have been functionally inferior to completed products, with the exception to the added redundancy of some validation prototypes.

You pause to consider the offer for a moment then shake the thoughts from your head. There's no reason to say yes or no now. For the moment, you tell the doctor you'll consider it, then take your leave. There's nothing you can do in the medical bay other than getting overloaded with feelings of pain and misery, and you don't relish those particular feelings. You make your excuses and leave, returning to your barracks in hopes that your leaders have returned.

Thankfully, they have, and as you enter, Ten walks up to you, handing you a small scrap of paper.

"There. Thanks for a job well done. Or rather, that's the only thanks you'll be getting from higher up. That'll get you one of anything when it comes to gear. Well... mostly anything. You'll have to collect those if you want anything good. Still, basic stuff is simple enough. You can head to the armory to use that, or head up to the medical bay for implants if you like."

"I was just there."

"Really? Well, doesn't matter. For now, you're on free time. If anything comes up, we'll let you know."

"I had a question, in regards to my abilities. I was wondering if you wanted me to do anything specifically. I'm underdeveloped, so I can teach myself any number of thins..."

"Well, I don't think I have anything for you in that regard. We don't focus our power on psychics, we're a TacArm heavy group after all. Still, if you want my advice, then go with what you think is comfortable."

"... Understood. And about my training..."

"Again, that's up to you. There's facilities all over the ship for things like that, just take a look around. I'm going to get some shut eye, so you do whatever you want to do."

"Understood."

Ten leaves, and you glance down at the "ticket" in your hand. It's nothing remarkable, essentially just a scrap of paper with a barcode on it, but still, it's something. You decide to hit up the armory next, if for no other reason than to see what they have, and you make your way there based on memory. Soon enough you've found the place, and you enter with a little hesitation, uncertain as to how the system works.

"Who are yo- Oh. The Brain. Great. Just what I need. Whatever. What is it you're looking for, hurry up and spit it out."

The man waiting by the door is pure human, large, muscular and somewhat intimidating. He's had both legs replaced with cybernetics, good ones by the looks of them, although you're no expert. Your attention however, is drawn primarly to the equipment that is stacked against the walls. Weapons, armor and various combat tools cover every available space, and you regard the armory with interest.

So many choices... well, first, you have to consider what you might want...

>>>Input Command

I'm thinking one of several ideas-
One- trade up our pistol for something more useful than what we've got.
Two-Assult Rifle-esque weapon.
Three-Higher quality Body Armor.
I'm leaning towards two or three, personally.

i say get an assult rifle, the closest brush with death you had today was when your pistol didn't penetrate the thing's armor. so a higher power weapon would help with that.

I say we ask about anything that helps with stealth, specifically for a very amateur scout/spotter. And actually, ask more generally what this guy would recommend for someone who's training only touched on actual combat, but who has mapping. If he seems disinclined to help, play up that he knows what he's doing, and he's definitely our superior on such matters.

"I don't know yet. My training focused on being a psychic and I don't even know what all of this stuff is. Who should I ask?"

"I was thinking of acquiring an assault rifle, to perhaps increase my ability to hurt the enemy, but honestly, I am unsure. I've only touched on real combat, and have only the very basics of training when it comes to weapons."

"Well then, you might not want a weapon. Just because it seems a good idea don't make it one. Still..."

The man disappears off into the shelves, and comes back with an assault rifle, the weapon at its barest with no attachments. He places it on the counter for your inspection, and seems to nod slightly in approval as you strip the weapon down, inspecting each piece. As you do so, he starts rattling off information you are already aware of regarding the weapon. A 2nd Generation assault rifle from Genetech, it has only marginally better range than the first generation, but uses a larger caliber round while still allowing for a high rate of fire. All in all, a decent weapon. You put the weapon back together, but the man just stares at you.

"You taking it?"

"Maybe... I was wondering, do you happen to have anything for stealth?"

"Not for one ticket, no."

"I see... and if I were going to try and get something for stealth?"

"... I'd say three tickets off the top of my head, but I'd need to check the exchange rate."

"Understood."

You pause, contemplating your options. You suppose you could just leave this rifle here and hold on to the ticket. Or you could take the rifle. Or you could get something else, whatever that may be.

>>>Input Command

Hrrrm...
I think we should take the rifle-it'll let us do more actively as a soldier instead of just being a scout/intel support to the rest of our group.

We woudln't need to buy a rifle if we're kept the alien one. :V (No, don't say that out loud).

Sure, get it. We should have some minimum stopping power beyond a sidearm. Linda can get away with handguns most the time, but that's because your average breaker is just as squishy as any human.

Do we have to purchase ammunition, or are we given a stipend of ammo per deployment, or?

>stealth
I assume, if we keep our equipment in good condition, we might be able to return the rifle (or other equipment we purchase) towards credit for something else. A trade in. (A military should have no problem reusing or reassigning gear, or have a problem with us improving ourself, so long as we aren't swapping constantly).

Remember to hit up the range and aquatint yourself with your new weapon before the next engagement.

>XP
Still have to decide what to get next. (See >>/questdis/78113 for our options). Of the available choices, I think for now we'd want empathy+ (more information, faster and easier?). Third eye looks cool, but it needs a bigger engagement to be useful (it will have limited applications while we're nipping at small outposts on the edge of alien territory). I also want to save up for the reinforcement pathway, eventually. (Be nice be be able to take some damage. And we might be able to cross-train our current sensory stuff with it for some interesting stealth boosts).

Well, I suppose ask what he might recommend then if he doesn't think it's the best idea. If he doesn't have a suggestion, I'm fine with the rifle.

For xp which we haven't spent, I want to go with Distract. Now, that doesn't seem that great at first, but if you ignore the name it's actually a great ability for us. Why? Because we can get our allies to notice things without having to actually relay information. Like in the last deployment we could have directed Wolf while we ambushed the other guy. Having both offensive and defensive purposes puts it ahead of everything in my book.

that is a good point about distract. IF we can control where they "notice" things from.

If we can use 'distract' to basically psychically stand next to our ally and point and say 'look over there!' then that is what I would go with. But if it's just a way to make attention go a bit vague at will, it's not quite as useful. I guess this should probably go in the questdis thread. whoops.

"You don't have any suggestions, then?"

"Do I look like I care about some Brain manufactured that can't figure out what the hell it wants?"

You don't even need to use empathy to feel the animosity, but at least the man is keeping it fairly cordial. Probably because he deals with manufactured daily. Still, you end up exchanging the ticket for the assault rifle, satisfied it is in decent condition, and are informed that munitions for it will be passed out on the dropships as before. You spend another hour getting a feel for the weapon at a sim range, which isn't quite the same, but better than nothing. After all, you're not allowed a loaded weapon onboard the ship.

Still, by the time you make it back to your bunk, you feel sufficiently tired to warrant going to sleep. However, there is still the matter of your meditations, and you hastily climb into your bunk and close your eyes, warding off sleep in favor of taking slow, steady breaths and focusing your mind. You can feel nascent psychic power, churning just on under the surface of your thoughts. All you need to do now is direct it.

>>>Input Command

>direct it
Towards... what? I assume meditation is supposed to be different than a direct application of power- we're not just choosing to map or empathy something?

Turn it inwards, maybe? Flashback time.

>Distract
If distract can be used for fast, explain-less communication with allies, you're right that it's probably the most useful power.

If it can't be applied that way though, I still favor empathy+.

>>551342
This is a good idea.

I know Distract seems to be the thing we settled on, but I'd rather go for Third Eye first, then Distract.

You hold onto that feeling of undirected power for a moment, basking in the glow of it. Then you direct it with you will, sending it outwards. Sending it into the world around you. You feel your Will harden in response, allowing you greater control of your connection to the world around you without driving yourself insane. At the same time, however, you feel your understanding of emotion and feelings slip away. You remembered some of the lectures regarding this, a side effect of psychic potential meant a vulnerability to losing one's grasp on emotions or losing themselves to it completely. Still, you feel like you're far from reaching that point, and you nod silently to yourself as you feel your potential settle. Your eyes flick open a moment, and you watch Wolf enter the room, stretching as she strips herself off every piece of clothing she has on. Almost as an after thought, you snap out your mapping, and simply push your will at her. Notice. Notice it... notice the feeling of something inhuman watching you...

For a moment, there's nothing, then Wolf seems to pause in her actions and glance at a corner of the room nervously. You hadn't intended for her to look at any particular point, but your experience with this newfound power is... basic at best. You'll have time to experiment later. For now, you smile to yourself, satisfied with your first try, and let yourself drift off to sleep.

-----------

The next day promises no chance of any engagements with the enemy. The next week would be more of the same. The manufactured were expected to better themselves or aid in work on the ship. Either could be useful, as from what you can gather, working provides another way to acquire those tickets for gear. Regardless, the weeks activities need to be planned out accordingly. There is jobs for anything and everything one could imagine on the ship, as well as any facility you could need to improve your own abilities. Still, you get the feeling that this idling is something rather pointless, a feeling shared by many of the manufactured through out the ship. Why couldn't the scout ships hit the next target as the rest of the fleet set up the command post around the planet?

You brush the thoughts from your mind eventually, content to let the leaders decide what they will. For now, you'll take advantage of the time you have.

>>>Input Command
Distract Learned
Will: 5
Personality:3

Hrrrm...
I'd like to say let's go down to R&D and try to empathy information out of things, but if that's not workable, I'd say maybe just help sort out equipment in the armory-good way to get more familiar with the arms at our disposal.

Any other psychic types you might be able to learn from or whatever? Otherwise, let's practice fieldstripping our rifle and then hit the armory for fun and profit.

>increasing mapping means hurting empathy
...darn. If that will up personality down (and vice versa) happens with every mapping / empathy upgrade, we're left with the disappointing choice of investing mostly in one tree for good stats (with minimal investments in the other to keep the stat from falling below dangerous levels) or balancing our growth and keeping our stats low and level.

Unless there are other means to increase or train those stats.

>what do
There's basic abilities practice. Try out distract on crewmates in unobtrusive ways (see if you can get people to notice specific things, explore the limits). Spread it out- don't focus your training on a person or small group, or you run the risk of being noticed, or disruptive. Once you've got the hang of that, test with Wolf or someone who won't be upset at your intrusion if it can be used a means of communication (if we ever need to get someone's attention, or alert them to something quickly in battle, faster than we could talk, or when talking isn't an option). It's possible by being more direct, you could communicate more information (ie, instead of trying to plant the idea to notice something as if they thought of it, come openly. So they know you're trying to tell them something).

Build up a map of the ship, as you go. It's decent practice, and while I doubt there's going to be onboard combat, it may come in handy some day.

We could also try practicing empathy on some stuff. You haven't done any deliberately since you arrived, and you just suffered a hit to the relevant stat. It would be nice if you were practiced and adjusted enough to still use it well when we have reason to. (Maybe your weapons? I doubt you're the first person to be assigned them, and if a past user had more training or experience you might be able to increase your own proficiency a bit).

There's also seeing what your squad-mates get up to in their free time. You could try spending time with or getting to know some of them better. Good for moral and unity and all that jazz. (And building up personal bonds might be able to bolster or protect our personality stat, even if we focused our meditation elsewhere).

Let's look up the list of possibilities, if we're going to work though I would be tempted to try and get time in the hospital because practical medical experience is something that would be useful on the battlefield (and it would be practice controlling our empathy).
That said, we could seriously use some marksmanship drilling, tactics and strategy training and all the rest of the general soldier and field-officer training.

Over the next week, your time is spent working at the armory and refining your control over your newfound power. For the most part, this leads to a rather dull week, but it does allow a number of benefits.

The first is not what you'd think. Working in the armory did not consist of you sorting and checking equipment. It resulted in you hauling around large boxes, so that natural humans could do the actual sorting and checking. Still, you feel like over the past week you've learned a little at least, and the armory sergeant grudgingly remarks that you'll be getting an extra ticket after your next mission. It's something, at least.

Your practice with Distract, on the other hand, goes surprisingly well. You discover early on that you can designate specific spots for people to "notice", which helps immensely with your underlying goal of using it to communicate targets to others. Sort of. You quickly note that no matter how hard you try, no one you attempt to distract ever notices who sent the distraction. Even when you try to broadcastt your intent. After more experimentation, and some meditation to go along with it, you manage to figure out why.

You aren't speaking to your targets mind, your merely temporarily sending their senses false information. This causes the distraction. While you can direct where that false information is coming from, and even which of the senses detects it, you can't specify who sent the information. It's a tad disappointing, but you suppose it's better than nothing. Besides, you get the feeling that with a bit more practice, you could even cause specific kinds of distractions, such a specific noise or a blinking light perhaps.

Still, as the week comes to a close, you find your group preparing itself. It's time for another jump, the next target being larger and more organized than before. It doesn't help matters that the fleet is splitting into six separate parts, each performing a different task. Your's is the advance group, jumping the deepest into enemy territory and hopefully cutting off a communication channel, so that the enemy will be unable to alert their comrades to the danger before it's too late. Your group will be moving as a pair with another vessel as well, and as your ship peels away, you can hear the faint psychic echo of another "gifted" individual. Your sudden attention to the signs draws Wolf's attention, who wastes no time in breaking into your thoughts as she suits up once again.

"Hey! What's up? Look like you just noticed something was missing. Oh god. There's a hole in my suit, isn't there? Check me real quick, will you?"

Your companion spins herself, letting you see the entirety of the suit, although there is obviously nothing wrong with it as far as you can tell. As energetic and hyperactive as your sister-in-arms is, she is extremely vigilant when it comes to her equipment. She spent more time doing that than anything else. Still, you aren't sure whether you should be talking about the echo. It's not something that really matters, and definitely not something anyone else needs to be bothered with.

>>>Input Command

"Momentary weird psychic shit I noticed. Not sure what, or where it was, but it seemed like detecting another psychic.
"Your Tac-Arm has no problems I can see, Wolf. I'm not an expert though, is there anything in particular you want me to check or should I go back to spacing out and listening to the static at nofuckingway-long range?"

There's no hole in your suit. I just detected another psychic.

>Didn't actually get to handle any equipment in the armory
Darn. No chance to pick up empathy from the gear. Might have been a good way to slowly improve yourself from past people's proficiencies.

>Distract works by providing target with false sensory information
Hmm. Interesting. Well, it can still be used to warn allies and distract enemies, if indirectly. And if splicing in specific sounds or lights is an option we might be able to work up to, that might allow communication.

(Since most communications are heard or seen. Although getting from one beep or flash of light to speech or text is a fairly big step. ...morse code might be feasible, if anyone has a mod that will automatically interpret it. Although then we're getting to the point where our default communication channels would be easier).

>what do
Reassure Wolf there's nothing wrong with her equipment (that you can see, anyways). You just thought you felt anther Brain for a moment, on the other ship probably.

While it doesn't really matter, and there's no reason to make a big deal of it (you most likely won't even encounter them. Well, you wouldn't, except plot), there's no real reason to hide it either.

"Do you happen to know if any of our group have any psychic gifts besides me? Cuz I just got a blip on the ol' psychic radar."

"Do you happen to know if anyone else on board is gifted?"

"Gifted?"

"Uh... a term used by the scientists to describe psychic potential. Gifted. You either were or you weren't."

"Oh... no, I don't think so. Why?"

"... No reason. Just... thought I felt something. No, by the way, I don't see anything wrong with your suit."

Well, that's good. Although, no that I think about it... earlier, there were a bunch of shuttles coming in and going out. I could see them cause I was working on the exterior of Mech's TacArm. Maybe there was someone on one of them?"

"Maybe."

There next half-hour is spent in silent preparation, even if the entire group is ready in half that. The assault rifle in your hands feels heavy, but then, you hadn't really spend a lot of time getting used to it. Regardless, old training kicks in, and you know you can fire it with reasonable accuracy. Against stationary targets...

This time, you make your way to the drop ships before the jump, the plan to jump in as close to the planet's atmosphere as possible and drop the ships before pulling back. That way the quickest possible insertion can occur. The silence is deafening to your ears as you wait, and it doesn't help that you still feel the ever so slight tingle of a psychic echo, closer this time. You shudder involuntarily, but before anyone can notice, you feel the sickening distortion of your mapping as the jump occurs, and then suddenly your airborne, the drop ships in the air even before you are completely finished realigning with normal space. Instantly, you hear the comm go nuts, reports flooding in of inbound ground-to-space fire coming from the planet surface. The ships your on scream as they literally plummet towards the earth, desperately hoping to get underneath the enemy's firing range, but even as you practically free fall, a drop ship nearby explodes as it is hit with a bolt of incandescent plasma. Shrapnel is hurled everywhere, and you feel rather than see a piece of the downed ship hurtle through the air and strike one of your engines. The emergency lights flicker to life, and you find yourself bracing, preparing for the worst. The pilot is screaming something about bracing for impact, but you barely register it before the world is gone from you sight.

---------

You find you blinking away unconsciousness as someone shakes you awake, and for a moment, all you see is blurred and all you hear is muffled. Then your mind reaches out and reasserts itself. You shake confusion from your mind and pull yourself together, and muffled syllables start to make more sense.

"-ey! Grey! Wake up, come on, come on... There you are! Your alive!"

"Wolf? Yeah... I think so..."

"That's good. Thought you were a goner for a minute. You got any injuries?"

"Uh... no... no, I think I'm alright."

"That's good. Can't say the same for most of the rest of us."

"What do you mean?"

"Most of us didn't survive the crash. You. Me. Tnt. Wash-Out. Mech's alive... but..."

"What about Barbie? Or Ten?"

Wolf only shakes her head. You can tell, her emotions bleeding through her physical contact with you, that she's scared and confused. Without direction. Someone needs to take command. And quickly. Otherwise the group was going to fall apart, fast.

>>>Input Command

Well geeze, that was abrupt.

>Wolf shakes her head
...we were prepared for combat insertion and she wasn't geared up in her tac-arm? That or she was, and it's been wrecked. Not good, considering how this unit has been structured to rely on them. That, combined with a dead command structure doesn't bode well.

>what do
First rule of a military disaster- assume you're in command until you find someone who outranks you. Wolf may be your senior in combat experience, but she doesn't seem prepared. That puts you in charge.

Start directing people. We need to know how many people we have, in what condition, what we have for equipment, start securing the immediate area, and finding out what's around us.

Get mapping- dual purpose: direct your surviving squad mates to allies who may be trapped or down, or equipment that needs to be salvaged or gathered quickly. An start scanning outwards- find out where we are, what's around us, and what's coming.

Once we know what we have and what the world around us looks like, we can start making decisions. This crash sight will be visible to the enemy- we have to move fast to be ready to move out of here or defend ourselves.

Give orders as they make sense, but listen to input from the others- they've seen more action than you.

"There is still the mission-cut off their communications channel. Give me a moment to Map the area, we can decide what to do from there."
Not so much taking command as taking position as scouter, but it should help keep these guys focused, if only for a bit.

"We need to recover anything and anyone we can, quickly, and move to cover.
"My guess is that if the enemy has any ballistic artillery they're aiming towards us right now and gonna hit shortly. Then they're going to send a mop-up squad to inspect the remains and deal with the survivors.
"I'm gonna use mapping to double check friendly count and nearest enemies, and then we are moving. Wash-Out, take a look outside and figure out where we're running for cover. Wolf, TNT, anyone else who's still got some fight left, gather up and let's go!"

map the area and look for life signs. they may have missed someone under rubble.

Role call/head count
Retrieve supplies
See if any communication is possible with home base, if so, send a quick message stating what happened then GTFO of the area of the crash, set up mobile base of ops in deep cover and start re-planning the mission with resources on hand.

"We... need to get as many people as we can, and recover as much as we can in the way of resources. Then we need to... need to move. Get someplace safe, away from the drop ship. They'll come looking, or worse, they'll just start bombing the place..."

You struggle to remember vaguely explained plans for emergency situations that were given to you back at the labs. There never was much emphasis placed on such things, given what they wanted to see you do. Regardless, Wolf doesn't seem to be catching your intentions at first, so you decide to go with a tactic you'd experienced in the labs, when a human trainer had arrived to run you through the basics of combat.

"Wolf! Get moving!"

The woman snaps out of her confusion, reacting to a stern and confident order better than you expected. Within moments, she scrambling to her feet and dashing off, helping others and dragging out salvageable materials and equipment. At the same time, you pull yourself to your feet and take stock of your surroundings. Most of what remains of the drop ship is a crumbled broken mess, with some of the more delicate parts on fire, and you can see a small number of people struggling to their feet. You quickly do a head count, extending your mapping out to encompass the area around you, and you quickly count of those you know are alive.

7 total, yourself included. A little more than a 4th of the number of people contained in the drop ship. You, Wolf, Tnt, Wash-Out, who you would assume is Mech, and 2 others you don't recognize. You quickly direct the others to gather what equipment they can, while you move to investigate why Mech, and by some extension, Wolf, isn't moving at all. What you find is a downed TacArm, the thing pitched forward onto its "face", Wolf squatted next to the legs and cursing as she rips panels off.

"Wolf. What's going on?"

"Well, my TacArm is fried, most of the hull crunched. Thankfully, the emergency systems kept me alive and kicking, and I essentially blew my way out. Mech's survived the crash quite a bit better, probably because she was anchored near the rear of the ship. Didn't take the brunt of it like I did. Still, the actuators in her legs are blown."

"I don't understand. Can't she just get out?"

"Uh... no. I mean-"

A crackle is heard as the TacArm's external speakers come to life, and a distinctly robotic voice comes through, sounding somewhat emotionless.

"It is alright, Wolf. I will explain."

"If you say so, Mech. I'm gonna go check mine for parts..."

"You are... Grey?"

"Yes. You're Mech? You sound... robotic."

"I am alive. Mostly. An... accident... resulted in me losing most body functions. This TacArm is required for me to survive at all. It has been hardwired with a life-support system, to keep my body functions from failing completely."

"I... see."

"Yes. Wolf is the only one who is aware, besides central command. I am a unique case, after all... Grey, you are taking command of this team?"

"So it seems."

"Then I will say this. If you need to leave me behind, then leave me behind."

"I'm not leaving you behind, Mech. Grey, I think I can fix her TacArm's actuators. Well... more like jury-rig replacements using bits from mine. I can have it done in... 20 minutes? Half-hour, tops."

"Grey, we gathered everything we could find that might be usable and easily movable. We can get moving on your call. Mostly just magazines for standard Genetech assault rifles, some anti-vehicle missile launchers, medical supplies, a few rations kits. No radios though. Least, none that'll call up to the ship... Also, we're seeing some activity coming from a few klicks out. They'll be here soon, whoever they are.

You find yourself frustrated. You were not bred for command. No Psy Industries was. You were meant for supporting, not leading. Still, you had to work with what you had. Abandoning Mech would give you ample time to move the remaining members to safety, but you would lose a valuable TacArm, and the pilot inside. If you stayed, however, you would inevitably encounter the incoming group, almost certainly the enemy.

A quick glance at the terrain around you reveals little in the way of cover, except for the downed drop ship itself. You could, with some small effort, create semi-sturdy barriers of some kind, and hope to hold the enemy off until Wolf completes the repairs.

>>>Input Command

she said the legs are blown, but not the arms. if it has motive power anywhere, it can move. mech will crawl her tacarm's shiny metal ass to a better position where wolf can fix it. does wolf know all the parts she needs? if so then help her by doing mirror maneuvers, do exactly as she does but on the opposite leg, will get them out twice as fast.

robot crawling is probably not taught because crawling is normally a sneaking maneuver, and robots cannot sneak.

I think we should fix up Mech, and try to hunker down.
I don't like the odds of hiding away when they already have a rough idea of our location AND know we're out here.
If we put up a fight, we might be able to handle their forces and work from there, not to mention the visability of Mech will make finding us for extraction much easier.

What's our assessment of the equipment makeup of the team we have? We've been told before our unit was built up to rely around a Tac-arm lynchpin. Does that still appear to be true? If so, running without Mech doesn't leave us in a good position. We're going to see combat, even if we dodge this first encounter.

I'd see about digging in. If we can hold them off, and they think we don't have a working tac-arm, it would be quite the surprise when mech pops up and mows them down.

>crawl the mech away, repair later
Heck yes. Any prep work depends on how extensive the repairs need to be.
If it's just actuators and parts, Mech can start pulling herself out covered by half the squad, while the others assist Wolf with removing the actuators from her TacArm and carrying them out.
If it's easier just to swap out the legs (assuming they're modular), then hack off the remainder of Mech's legs below the connection point and have her move over to Wolf's TacArm. Hack off its legs above the connection point and lash them to Mech before moving off as a group.

Assume that we are in a death trap: It's already on fire and the enemy are coming. Preferentially: Drag Mech with us and some replacement parts. If that's not possible drag Mech to a defensible position and set up a crossfire. Depending on how well that ambush goes we've either just defended Mech from an undersize assault squad or they've covered our retreat under fire.

>crawl mech, repair later
Nope. This is one time we can't have it both ways.

Think about it: if the repairs will take 20 minutes, and the enemy us expected to hit us before that's complete, we didn't have the time for an injured bot to make it far enough to matter (assuming it can crawl at all). We'd still be hit, except out in the open, and with no defense prepared.

Also: repairing the tac-arm is like repairing a car. Wolf needs her parts-car to rip pieces out of to fix Mech's. We can't possibly bring the wreck with us, and trying to rip all the parts she might need in advance will take too much time, and carrying them will only further slow us down.

If we want to save Mech, we have to dig in and prepare. Simple as that. If you want to bug out, we're leaving her to die or mercy killing her.

Personally, I'm still for staying.

>Personally, I'm still for staying.

I'm not, either we win quickly or the enemy will call in reinforcements or an artillery strike when we resist them. If we don't blow them away quickly they will blow us away slightly less quickly.
A working Tac-Arm is an asset, but a pinned-down firefight is a TPK.
That's the reason for my recommendation: Set up a crossfire. If their initial wave is too strong Mech's down for the count anyway.

>>552042
...isn't setting up a crossfire just a specific method of setting up our defense, or deploying our forces? The choice is still to try and buy Mech time or cut out now.

I still think trying to move it is ridiculous.

>>552055
Ballistic artillery is a very primitive technology. If these aliens don't have any, or anything that can fill its role, or resources for an airstrike, then we're dealing with a foe that has hopelessly overspecialized in ground-based anti-landing firepower.
I'm not saying that's not possible, but really? If they don't have a better response plan than, "Send those dudes playing videogames all day out there with some guns," they deserve to lose.

>>552080
That fails to address either point I made. Whether the enemy has artillery or not, we lack the means to move the damaged Mech a significant distance, and the choice is still either to leave her or attempt to buy Wolf the time she needs to repair.

And the question is probably more one of what the enemy can bring to bear in the time and space allowed, then that they've invented yet. This is a planet-wide attack, after all, and we don't know where we hit, or how things are going elsewhere, or how the enemy is deployed. The big guns may be busy, or we may be where they can't hit us based on current gun placement or holes in their coverage from loses.

If you pull out, tell Mech to shut down and play dead. If they decide to move in with a ground team first, they may consider her dead. Does the chassis shield thermal? Also, if you decide to dig in, the first move should be an ambush (possibly with Mech as bait). Remember, you're playing for time.

>>552082
My point is that you're insisting on making too risky of a bet. A lot can happen in twenty minutes, including the remains of the dropship we'd be stuck in exploding or burning down. Yes, that may be a risk worth taking, but only if we can beat the first wave of incoming. If we can't beat the first wave of incoming quickly the only safe assumption is that they'll call in an airstrike or artillery strike, and then it's over.

you also seem to think that mech crawling will be slow as molasses in winter. if she can get close to matching pace with the soldiers then everyone running will work just fine.

>>552094
Yes, if we can't beat the incoming enemy, we're dead. ...which pretty much describes the situation most the time. It's not as if we have good lanes of retreat when we're dropped in from orbit into the front lines and classified as disposable.

>>552098
No, I don't think a crawling mech can keep ahead of the enemy marching quickly towards us. And said crawling mech would leave a pretty good trail to follow.

And there's still the problem of the parts-mech: we can't bring it with us, and ripping out all the pieces Wolf will need for repairs in advance will eat into the little time we have to run, and carrying them will slow us down.

...and now I'm just repeating myself. Guess I'll shut up and wait for the update.

Plans form in your mind, but you find yourself having to discard most of them. Trying to drag a mass of iron and steel is not something you'd be capable of doing at the moment. And Mech can't drag herself, given as, on closer inspection, her arms on hard mounted miniguns, not graspers of any kind. In any case, your team needs the firepower a TacArm can provide, if for nothing more than to help defend itself. Which brings up another thought.

"Can we move Mech and the TacArm so that they'll be facing the enemy?"

"What?"

"Can we move them so that they are facing the enemy, so that they can fire on said enemy while you make the repairs?"

"Uh, yes! We just need something to prop her against."

"We've got plenty of metal... Wash-Out! TnT! Grab that pice of the drop ship and drag it over here, then help Wolf push Mech upright! You two! Start building up some cover. I don't care how!"

Everyone hops to it, moving to complete their assigned task. You pause next to Mech's TacArm, letting out a sigh of frustration, which earns you a robotic chuckle from your comrade.

"Well... I did not think you would stay behind."

"In some ways, we have to. Without a TacArm to form the core of the group, we might as well pull the trigger ourselves. At the same time... it just didn't feel quite right... abandoning you."

"... I see. I will try to help as much as I can."

"That's all I can ask of you."

You head off to help, and ten minutes later, the group is waiting, tense and expectant, as the approaching group gets ever closer and Wolf hurriedly extracts parts from her own ruined machine. Still, just as she finishes her task, announcing happily that'll she'll be done in another ten minutes, Mech's twin miniguns start to whine as they begin spinning. At the same time, your passive mapping picks up on the first enemy, and you identify them all to easily. Those leaping things that Ten said would be a problem for TacArms to deal with.

"Grey. The enemy has entered my sensor range."

"I felt them. Leapers, from what I can tell. Or whatever it is they were called..."

More follow in behind them, as you carefully feel out each one. Three leapers, five of the normal ones you'd felt before carrying those alien rifles of theirs, and one carrying something significantly bigger... Wash-Out informs you that he can see the leapers now, and asks for permission to engage. Still, from what you can tell, they don't know you are there yet. They are still moving with intent on speed, not caution.

>>>Input Command

wait until the big gun comes in to sight. then wash-out goes for that one, along with anyone else that can see it. rest attacks whatever they can. the leaper's are trouble in the city because they can climb above the arms. but without much climbing area they should be easier to deal with.

If the enemy is moving forward recklessly, it would be better to open fire on them when they're closer, trying to take (all, most, a good portion of?) the group off guard at once, and so they doesn't have the chance to go to cover. The only good reason to start picking off the forward-most units and allowing the rear to plan their approach is if the enemy is close and fast enough, and we have few enough weapons / marksmen that can hit the 'leapers', that we can't safely allow them to get any closer.

When we do start shooting, Washout needs to pick off the leapers (as does anyone else who is able), and the main infantry shot up by the remainder (or less precise) of our troops. Mech obviously goes for the non-leapers, prioritizing the guy with a big gun (an alien equivalent RPG? Bazooka? Grenade launcher? We don't particularly want to find out the hard way).

>but without much climbing area they should be easier to deal with
Oh. Uh. Hrmmm. The enviroment hasn't actually been described in any detail yet. If we're in an urban or forested area, or the right kind of rocky area, there's plenty of ways for them to bring the the third dimension into play. "Not a lot of cover" doesn't necessarily translate into "nothing for cheating wall-climbers to exploit).

Can you cause the one carrying the heavier weapon to 'notice' something 90° to their current line towards you? Even if it only distracts them for a few minutes, every little bit of extra time helps. With any luck, there were multiple impact sites where dropships went down, so they don't know which ones have survivors yet.

>>552163
good idea, but wait until it's in range of washout. if it stops moving for a moment it would give him a perfect shot.

You can feel the weight of everyone's tense bodies around you. Every single one of your brothers and sisters is focused, ready like a bow pulled taut. Your own eyes are closed, expectant in a different manner. Your senses are stretched outwards, locked on that single target behind all the others, waiting for those words that will signal your trick. And then they come.

"Target in sight."

You reach out with your will instantly, mind brushing against the alien's senses and causing a disturbance to simply "appear" to it's right. The thing halts in it's movements, it's fellows stopping as well, only to watch as the enemy's head explodes. You feel the weight of it's thoughts disappear, and smile in grim satisfaction.

"Target down."

"Wash-Out, target the leapers. Everyone else, fire at will."

The crack of a rifle can be heard at even intervals. The leapers prove rather elusive once they realize a sniper is about, but one by one, they begin to drop away, still, that doesn't prevent the rest from reaching you, and soon enough, the rattle of gunfire springs into the air, even as bolts of plasma begin to rain down on your positions. You quickly find your force has the advantage however, as the whine of twin mini-guns becomes a roar, and the enemy is lost in a cloud of dirt and rocks. Your mapping quickly informs you that the enemy has, wisely, chosen retreat over facing you, although the last of the leapers doesn't make it to safety before one final crack is heard and his mental signature is lost.

"Well... that went better than-"

"One of those idiots is dead. Dirk I think his call sign was. The other guy is scrounging him for materials."

"So we lost one in exchange for..."

"She's ready!"

Wolf happily bounces to her feet as she slaps one final panel closed, and Mech's TacArm rumbles to it's feet. There's an audible groan of complaint from the machine's legs, but it'll move. Wolf looks quite pleased with her work, and you can't help but be impressed regardless. The machine will help in the long run. Still, you doubt your presence will go unnoticed with the enemy having retreated, more than likely they'll have reported within the hour, if not sooner. Still, perhaps most uncomfortable for you, was that you hadn't noticed your comrade die, even with your mapping. The thought disturbs you a little, but you brush it from your mind and chock it up to no experience in leading others. The others, however, are busily restocking their equipment, and Wolf is stripping your downed brother of his gear with about as much respect as one would give the enemy. Obviously no qualms about doing what needs doing.

That leaves you to come up with a plan of action. Staying here is out of the question, but you have a few options that spring to mind almost instantly. The first is to try to push forward with the mission. You would be severely undermanned for the job, but at the same time, that might provide you an opportunity to slip in relatively unnoticed. The other is to try and hook up with someone else, perhaps one of the other drop ships that made it through the bombardment. You faintly feel a psychic echo, and you are relatively confident that you could track it down.

>>>Input Command

>>552700
If you can quickly ascertain whether the psychic is one of your group or someone who is stalking you, do that. Otherwise, we have more urgent things to do than search for nascent psychics.

>didn't notice an ally die
Problem with how we're targeting, I think. Mapping is spacial, not personal. A comrade is just another object, as far as it's concerned. And you were focusing on the enemy, in order to try and target them.

If we want to keep track of allies, it would probably be more efficient to work on the other track- tagging presences and minds. Then overlay mind-tags with spacial mapping to keep track of them. (Although you don't really want to get too close, mentally. Can't afford backlash or anything if and when someone you're tracking dies).

>about as much respect as one would give the enemy
Not much else to be done. Our survival is the only way we can pay our respect to fallen comrades- making the most of their sacrifice. There's no time for ritual, and no easy way to take them, and no home waiting for them anyways.

>what do
Obviously, get away from the crash site.

After that- regrouping is attractive, for obvious reasons. Would be nice to hit the target if we can, but throwing away our lives trying to take a target we're unequipped for doesn't help the cause, any.

What we need is more information. Is there a vector that takes us closer to allies and to the target? Be nice if we could use the furthest edges of our mapping to evaluate if approaching the target is even feasible.

What *is* our mission and the expected opposition, and do we have any clue how that fits with the rest of the attack? Without any idea how high the priorities of our particular original mission are we won't know if it's vital that we proceed to the original target or instead pursue other targets: Perhaps there are other targets which are more important whose attack groups got shot down worse than us.

I'd like to triangulate this 'other' psychic since they're likely not on our side. A planet is a big place; whether or not we can do anything about the psychic depends greatly on where they are.

> Your's is the advance group, jumping the deepest into enemy territory and hopefully cutting off a communication channel.

they know we are here, and probably already sent out a comm. so the mission is FUBAR, linking up with other elements is our new one.
take the downed guy's dog tags.

>>552745
Well, actually, they might not have. We don't know how ftl communications tech works in this setting. If it's as easy as picking up a radio mike, or hitting send on a computer, yeah, the alarm is already out. But if there's prep time, or the process involves charging up, or they have to make sure they have a beam perfectly aligned with a moving target light years away... we might still have a window.

Obviously there must be some small delay between observation and reporting in. Or else our initial plan (attack!) wouldn't have a chance of working at all. The question is- how big is the window, and how long until it closes.

>>552755
Maybe our attack window was unavoidably too short and we failed the first mission because it was impossible. That could certainly explain why they were ready for us when we dropped in. Either way I guess a communication channel is still useful to the enemy even after they've given out the initial contact message, so we should proceed with the objective.

Since they've probably already sent out the warning by now I'd say targets of opportunity are on unless they have unacceptable risks or supply-costs (ammo, explosives).

okay, asked in the discussion thread and it seems comms can take several hours to activate from cold start. if the system is already hot then its too late. but if it's cold we have a chance.

With your group ready(or as ready as they can be), you set off, heading towards the nearest known location of a planned landing sight. There's no smoke coming from the site, so you can only assume that they either landed safely or were blown off course, much like you were. Regardless, you take the opportunity provided by the others strapping packs onto Mech's TacArm to reach out with your senses, trying to feel out the psychic echo you'd felt.

At first, there is little to go on, other than the feeling you'd received, but careful examination and coaxing begins to reveal information, at least a little. The thought pattern is decidedly human, or close enough to be recognized as such, but it is coming from a direction that had no planned landing sites. Therefore, you conclude that there is a friendly psychic, other than yourself, out there. What their purpose is here, or even how they arrived on the planet, remains a mystery, but as your group continues to trudge on, you eventually close in on the psychic's location with you passive mapping. It seems whoever they are is currently moving through an abandoned human city. You detect the presence of alien life within the city as well, and little else, but... you could easily divert your path and go in after him, if you wanted.

Or you could stick to the original plan and regroup with more well known human forces. You can already feel a human strike team at the edges of your active mapping. They appear to be holding position, although what they are waiting for you cannot guess.

>>>Input Command

By abandoned human city with alien life and little else, does that mean it's devoid of humans and such, or devoid of say, weaponry/tech/ect, even alien stuff. Basically, is it coming off as occupied by aliens vs occupied by alien forces. Cause, that's a pretty big difference.

As much as I'd love to head after the psychic, we have our team and mission to consider. Unless it's feasible to distract ping them a path out of the abandoned city that allows them to avoid aliens and hope they follow it, I don't think we should head there. Regroup with friendly forces, making the tactical decision that our primary objective is impossible with our current forces, and reinforcing them or possibly diverting them if ours is the more critical mission.

the psychic has been here this long with aliens all over, they can last a little longer.
regroup with the others

Huh. Is it possible the psychic wasn't on the other ship at all? That he or she's been hiding out on this planet since humanity lost it, years ago?

Which direction are they moving? Towards any of the human groups, or a potential enemy target? Is there any indication he or she is aware of you?

What happens if you ping them? Can you toss a distract, at this range? Another psychic might recognize it as an outside contact.

>easy to divert towards them
As in, mostly the same direction as our objective but off to the side, or wrong direction but easy to reach from where we are?

>does life mean alien life
Yeah, there's a difference between a human city overrun by the local wildlife, and one held by occupying forces.

>what do
I'd be tempted to pick the psychic up, if it's on the way. If it's an ally we could use, that's a good thing. (That said, if the circumstances are wrong, we can hardly surrender our objectives to go chasing ghosts).

>another team inserted who nobody knew about, at significant distance from a big botched landing op after being jumped right into the firing basket of the STO defenses
Sorry guy, I think you were The Distraction.

You pause for a moment, as your team trudges on, to consider the psychic presence you feel. You can tell, just from how they are moving, that they haven't, or more likely can't, notice you. You would guess an internal or external psychic then. Further, after considering the alien presence you feel within the city, as well as the movements of the person within, you are fairly certain, with some... concentration... you could, perhaps, lead the other to you. You try an experimental distraction, just to test, and sure enough, the other psychic begins to move towards the place you'd targeted. You'd have to stay within range, which would mean holding position for awhile, but it could be done.

"Grey?"

You glance up to find that your team has halted in their progress, and Wolf is now standing in front of you, looking puzzled. You pause a moment, organizing your thoughts, before speaking your mind, half wondering what your companions might think.

"There's another psychic."

"What?"

"There's another psychic. Here, on the planet. That way."

You gesture in the general direction of the city they are in, and Wolf turns to take a look, squinting into the distance. She pauses for a moment, then turns back to you, still looking confused.

"Ok... What exactly are you asking?"

"I want to know if I should... help them."

"You can do that?"

"I could lead them to us. Maybe. It would... require a lot of... effort... but I could do it."

"Why haven't you?"

"I would need to stay in one place. Concentrate everything on my mapping."

"Ah... that could be an issue... Well, we'll follow whatever you decide. Give you support if you want to stay here."

The other nod their acceptance, and you find yourself standing there, confused and uncertain. Being a leader is still... unsettling. Regardless, you pause a moment, all of your teammates watching you patiently, as you consider what to do.

All right- first consideration. Is bringing the psychic to you faster or more efficient that going to them? (Presumably one person might be able to move quickly, and avoid contact with the enemy).

How long would you expect this to take? Helping someone is all well and good, as is reinforcement by a potentially useful psychic, but we can't afford to ignore the mission forever, either.

How exposed are we where we are? How close are any enemy? Is there anything to be gained by spending several minutes moving to a more secure or better hidden location before going immobile? Are we putting ourselves in any extraordinary danger by staying put?

Assuming none of those answers come back with a good reason not to do this, I'd be inclined to try and pull em here.

maintain map for a moment and scan for contacts that are probably leapers. if you can't find any then we should at least be relatively safe.

You consider a number of factors, and find yourself wanting for any reason not to try and bring the psychic to you. Even a quick active scan with your mapping reveals little within the immediate area that could pose any real problem to you. A another brief moment passes by as you silently consider what you are about to do, then you take a seat as you focus on Wolf.

"Have everyone form a perimeter around me, nothing too wide or anything, just enough to provide some measure of protection in case something comes. I'll be focusing on my task, so if you need me for anything, you'll have to make sure I notice."

"Understood. You heard him! Let's get a perimeter set up-"

You quickly tune out your comrades as you descend into meditation, eyes no longer seeing, ears no longer hearing and body no longer feeling. Every ounce of concentration is focused on your sixth sense, and you easily find the psychic again amongst the ruined city, milling about where'd you placed your last distraction. You tag the person, then quickly cast you senses out, finding what you hope is a simple, easy and expedient way out. After a few minutes, you quickly find a mistake in your guidance, but are easily able to remedy the issue, at least partially. As the figure makes it to the outer edges of the city, and almost to safety, a sudden alien presence seems to come as if from nowhere, and you silently curse to yourself, realizing too late that as the psychic had grown closer to reaching the city limits, and farther from any alien threat, you'd relaxed your focus. You hastily try to prepare a distraction for the alien, hoping to buy the psychic some time, but you find that you needn't have bothered. The alien life blinks out of existence, even as you feel a small pulse of psychic energy. A familiar pulse. An external then.

A few more distractions, and a few more minutes later, and you feel the psychic presence growing stronger. You release your hold on the active mapping, dropping back into passive, and as you come back into the realm of consciousness, you catch Mech announce that something has just entered her scanner range. You stand and look to where you know the psychic to arrive, and watch as a young woman comes into view, looking puzzled as, once again, she finds nothing that would cause a flash of light to occur. At least, until she spots your group.

She scrambles back into hiding, or as best she can given as every single person here saw her, and you feel her psychic power go active, preparing to defend herself if need be. Still, your empathy, or at least, what it can pick up at this range, assures you that there is no overt hostility. More like a flight or fight response than anything.

"Fuck... that girl was almost feral. You see her clothes? Can't believe anyone lived out here. Certainly not one of ours."

"I would have to agree. It seems likely she is a survivor from the First War."

"That's... insane! No one could have survived on their own that long!"

"Perhaps, then, she isn't alone. Grey? What are your orders?"

You listen in on your comrades conversation with only a passing interest, most of your attention focused on the psychic in front of you. While you agree that the woman hadn't come from your assault, you don't have the time to consider other possibilities. You needed to figure out how to get this woman to come with you, or decide if you even wanted to try. You did, after all, have a mission to perform. Or at least a command to report to.

>>>Input Command

"she is alone, and a powerful psychic. while guiding her here an alien managed to get the drop on her. was my mistake i admit that i failed to notice it. but there was a burst of psychic energy and the alien was gone."

then turn towards her. and move to the front of your group and and point at a rock and ping it at the same time, then a different spot, then yourself. make her understand that you can do mind things to. then hold out your hand towards her.

Wait, how far back did the big gene-corps start mass-producing manufactured for the war effort? Didn't the xenos kind of catch humanity off guard and curb stop us pretty bad in the first war? If she's a survivor from the first war, does that mean she might be a natural psychic, and not one of Psy Industries?

>how has she survived out here?
Either she's not alone, or she's strong and/or very clever. Any of which is very useful to us, since we're low on manpower, ourself. And a familiarity with the area, or the aliens who inhabit it, could make any assault or approach to our target go a lot smoother.

It's worth trying to talk to her, I think. You already invested the time bringing her to you. Unless she's gone insane in her time alone out here, it's probably safe.

If based on history she's likely to be psy industries, I think showing your Psy Industries logo and using distract to draw attention to it might be a goto plan.

If she's a natural psychic... I dunno. Go out alone with hands over-head and try talking/empathy?

The first successful "birth" of a manufactured was recorded two years after the end of the First War, or roughly eighteen years ago. Psy Industries didn't begin producing manufactured until they were banned the use of human test subjects ten years ago, and didn't succeed in creating a gifted manufactured until two years after that. The possibility of her being a manufactured are slim, and completely destroyed by the lack of an identifying marker on her left shoulder. Or rather, the fact that she's even covering her left shoulder is significant enough to mark her as trueborn human. And while rare, natural psychics among the trueborn aren't unheard of. Their powers tend to be volatile and erratic, however, as they don't usually gain the benefits of Psy Industries strict training regimen.

"She is alone, as far as I can tell, and a powerful psychic."

"How do you know that?"

"I can feel it. She's stronger than me, at least."

You step forward, eyes locked on the place you know the woman to be, and you do your best to appear peaceful. For a moment, your empathy still picks up that fight or flight, but as time passes, second by second, curiosity is slowly starting to win out.

"Miss. I'm a manufactured of Psy Industries, serial number U-173-49628. Casually I am referred to as 'Grey'. I am at your disposal."

You try going with the predetermined introduction of a manufactured to a trueborn, and for a moment, you detect confusion, once again replaced by curiosity. Seconds tick by, then the woman slowly emerges from her hiding place, her readied psychic energy dissipating as she takes a cautious step towards you.

"... What... What do you mean? Manufactured..."

Her words are heavily accented with something you can't identify. Lack of use, perhaps. Still, you can make out her words clearly enough, even with the distractions of your comrades behind you.

"She doesn't even know what a manufactured is?"

"Wolf! Quiet!"

"I was built, Miss. Everyone here was."

"Built...?"

"Yes, Miss. I would like to explain more, but... we are not safe here. I felt your presence before, and thought you might need some help."

That makes her angry, or at least annoyed, as her feeling project hurt and rage. You find yourself quickly back stepping, quick to correct the mistake you just made without realizing.

"Not to say you needed it! I was just... unsure. We were not aware of any survivors from the First War."

"Father used to mention that. The First War. Said that's why the the others didn't like us. You... know what the First War is?"

"Yes. But... like I said. It's not safe here. Are there any others?"

"No... no, I'm alone now... Why... why are you here?"

"We retake the planet."

"I... see..."

She seems to drop into thought, and you take the opportunity to consider the woman in front of you. Now that you have more of an opportunity to observe her, it becomes quickly apparent that almost everything she has on her is scavenged. She doesn't have any obvious weapons on her, but you suppose with the gift, she doesn't really need any. You frown slightly, taking a moment to check your active mapping, but find nothing anywhere near you. Good. You haven't been detected yet.

>>>Input Command

that that one of the reasons you came looking for her is to get HER help. she is another psychic, and knows the land. alone each would be an asset, together makes her invaluable.

when she asks about psychics explain that you can't kill things with your mind. then when she asks how you saw hat say that that is your power, you can see things with your mind's eye. and you picked her up from far away because psychic power can detect more psychic power easily.

You should tell her your mission, actually. She might have useful things to say about it, and your path of travel.

The manufactured who doesn't know how to talk to real people meets the castaway who's been alone for years and doesn't know how to talk to people.

This is going to be some great diplomacy.

Are there any protocols regarding this kind of thing? I mean, obviously she's human, so as a manufactured, that kind of puts you in your place. But she's also a civilian (or outside your military structure, at least) and a hell of a potential military asset, here. (Possibly meaning we might have conflicting directives). Is she a refugee, or if she was born here, and the only human on the planet, does that make her the defacto governor? (Although, the mess of how the system would legally view her is kind of not our concern at the moment).

Part of me is concerned that we may be exploiting a certain naivete, here. And that bringing someone not trained as a soldier into combat (especially with her abilities) poses a certain risk. But we need all the help you can get.

Explain what you're doing here (trying to disable the comms so they can't call for reinforcements- that might get her attention). See if you can recruit her help- she knows the area, possibly the enemy better than you do. And she can certainly defend herself.

(If we recruit her, I suggest treating her like artillery. Ie, you place her somewhere inside or behind your formation, and try to keep the enemy from killing her, while she blows them to hell).

Also, try and talk fast. There is a war on, after all.

Your place is clear. While you and your comrades are under no obligation to follow any directives she gives you(the woman bearing no military rank), you are under obligation to place her life above your own, and if need be, sacrifice yourself to ensure her continued survival. As for her political status, your knowledge regarding politics of any kind are slim to none. It wasn't exactly the highest priority in the labs.

"Actually, Miss, we were hoping you might be able to help us."

You'd waited a few moments in respectful silence, but after a few seconds had passed without any changes, you felt the need to break protocol and address the immediate issues. The woman seems to blink out of whatever reverie she's in, only to stare at you in confusion, clearly not understanding.

"What would you need MY help with?"

"First, Miss, you are apparently familiar with the surrounding areas. Our mission is to destroy interplanetary communications, the whereabouts we have no idea of."

"... So you think I'll know where it is."

"Possibly, Miss."

"That, and your apparently another bra- I mean... Gifted, like Grey here!"

[small]"Wolf! Get back here!"

"What? I'm just telling the truth!"[/small}

"Gifted?"

"Psychic, Miss. I can sense people around me, as well as their emotions."

"You mean you're like me? You can do things other people can't?"

"Yes Miss."

"... I didn't know there were others like me... I'll help. But... I want to talk to you more, later, about... things."

"Yes Miss."

"And stop calling me that! My name is Rain!"

"... Yes Miss Rain."

"Gah!"

You turn away before "Rain" can launch into what you suspect is a rant about your method of addressing her, and instead get your group ready to move again. The woman thankfully drops the subject with a huff of annoyance before muttering something behind your back and collecting herself. You go over what you know with her, and discover that she is an external, as you suspected, but because your own talents are geared towards sensory, you have only limited knowledge of the paths her powers could have taken. Still, she'll be useful to have around.

After hearing about your original path, the one that would take you back to your allies, she quickly notes that where you landed was actually closer to where you want to go. While she doesn't quite understand what it is you want to find, she notes that a building that matches your rough description can be found along an alternate route, going in an entirely different direction from where you were. The journey should take a few hours at most, not counting any unexpected surprises. She leaves the final decision about what to do to you, however. She has little understanding of military functions, and doesn't bother to pretend she does.

>>>Input Command

If she grew up basically feral, she isn't going to be used to being addressed formally. And if she comes from a time before there were manufactured, she's really not going to understand the things requiring you to treat her differently, or be so deferential.

>regroup, or several hours going for the target?
...if it takes that long to get there, the only chance to accomplish the mission, and take out the comms before they get an ftl message out, is to head there now. It means putting your squad and Rain at risk, but the alternative is putting the entire fleet at risk.

I don't know what particular risks result from keeping their interstellar communications installations operational for longer. It seems likely that the main risk now is not that they will send a warning; I'd suspect it's that they will provide useful surveillance and analysis of our operational capabilities to the rest of their species. Secondarily, the longer they stay operational the more likely it makes sense to the enemy to attempt reinforcement. If so, it's important to take it out as soon as possible, although a few minutes either way makes little difference.

A worthwhile question to consider our place in our whole-invasion operation level tactics that depends on our position being known and predictable. For starters, predictable troop movements tend to be a requirement for artillery to not inflict friendly-fire casualties, but I don't know how much artillery we brought.

>>554167
it has been noted in the dis thread that the FTL comm system takes several hours if it was set to transmit to a single location in space a while ago. and DAYS if it was not.

so i say do some probing. go in slow and easy, see what they have before we commit. if it's too much for us to handle then we back out.

You decide, after some consideration, to head in the direction of the comm station. The sooner it's rendered inoperative, the more likely the fleet's chances in avoiding a similar fate to your own assault. Or at least reducing the information passed along by the enemy. You set your team moving, placing MIss Rain within the relatively safe center. Still, with the woman directing you, you find you're making excellent time towards your destination. Still, it's only so long before you eventually begin to detect the presence of the enemy. At first, using your abilities and Miss Rain's knowledge, you slip by them with ease, but as you draw closer, it gets harder and harder, until you find yourself only a few "blocks" away from your target, the loud hum of the FTL engine heard clearly. Mech and Wolf were even farther back, the massive TacArm unable to approach any closer without drawing attention of some kind. Still, this close, even your passive mapping was picking up dozens of aliens. This was definitely not going to be easy.

"So, Grey, was it? Grey, how are we supposed to destroy this comm thingy?"

"Generally, Miss, we blow it up, but that could be a bit harder with all these aliens around."

"Grey? This is Mech. I could provide a distraction, if needed. It would likely draw away a large number of the enemy, after all, a big metal monstrosity is probably not something they'd expect in the middle of their territory."

"You would likely be killed, Mech."

"It is our job to die, Grey. It's just a matter of when and where."

You mutter a curse you'd heard a trueborn say once, not liking the idea of sacrificing a comrade just to win. While it might become necessary, you hoped it wouldn't have to. Still, that comm station needed to be gone, and the only way to do any lasting damage to it was to set explosives within the structure itself. That would require your enemies to not be guarding it quite as well as they currently were, which meant getting them to be somewhere else. And you had to accomplish all that without Miss Rain being put in unnecessary danger, although that what constituted unnecessary was up to debate.

Time for another plan.

>>>Input Command

What if instead of using Mech as suicide bait, we use her as the lure in a trap? How potent are Rain's abilities? If a Mech distraction got the enemy to group up, or head in one direction, a large number of them might be killed with one psychic blast.

If it works, then you can mop up, clear the area, and plant your explosives with more conventional tactics.

yes. we have people get in some high ground around a choke point. mech starts a fight and then does a fight retreat into the point. emphasis on retreat. then when they get close enough everyone pops out and pincers them.

also, we don't need lasting damage. just shoot out an important part so they have to shut down, repair it, then restart. will buy time for someone else to help with this.

>>554394
Adding on to this- not only can we use mech as a big shiny metal lure, we can use distract to try and shape their formation and how they approach or deal with the target. Set them up for an ambush and/or psychic explosion.

Ambushes are all well and fun. But we need to make sure we have an escape route, multiple being preferred. I'm thinking a few that involve blowing holes or Psychically tearing them through walls(and/or the ground if the city planning includes a good number of tunnels) for a less easily accounted for route.

Does Mech have any weaponry heavy enough to damage the com station by bombardment? Even without fire control, we can use mapping to zero in on targets even with blindfire. If not, we could at least map out their their defensive emplacements and soften them up first.

An idea forms in your mind, taking shape quickly and easily. It seems, thanks in part to your malleable nature as a manufactured, that you are taking to leadership far quicker than you expected. For now though, you have questions to post to your fellows, and you turn to them quickly. Mere minutes later, you have your desired answers.

Mech's TacArm has a single weapon that could deal damage to the target building, a shoulder mounted 120mm cannon. Unfortunately, it requires line of sight to the target, which makes it unusable in the present conditions. However, inquiring if she could perform a fighting retreat yielded a much more positive response, so that quickly became the main focus. The idea was only solidified even more upon learning that Miss Rain could, if given time to prepare, create an explosion of pure fire, apparently a trick she'd taught herself for roasting anyone trying to enter her home. You also discover from your native guide that there is a tunnel system beneath the city, an old subway system apparently. She doesn't have any extensive knowledge of it, but the aliens seem to avoid it for the most part. They'll likely have just as much, if not less, knowledge regarding the winding tunnels. After some deliberation, it is chosen as you escape route, your confidence in your mapping abilities lending itself to the choice. You won't get lost. Not easily, anyway.

An hour later, and preparations are in place. TNT and the one whose name you still can't remember are poised to go in, positioned closest to the comm building so they can slip in when the guards are drawn away. Mech is ready to begin her "assault" on a moments notice, her systems currently held just under combat ready. If you could describe a machine as "tense", you swear her TacArm was just so. The rest of your group is arranged a few streets away, in a place you'd noted had only a small enemy presence already. It was hardly the ideal ambush position, but it would have to do.

Miss Rain's preparations had been completed as well, the woman placing what you'd identified as matches in loose circles on a few spots on the ground. You'd questioned her about it, and she actually seemed more confused that you didn't have "triggers", as she called them. Still, you hadn't been able to get into it much, considering your attention was need in multiple places at once.

Soon enough, however, your are all prepared, all ready, all waiting. You'd placed Miss Rain with Wash-Out, he was farther back, and therefore safer. Hopefully. You and Wolf flanked the ambush position, ready to unload on whatever survived the initial blast of fire, and anything else that came after that. You Everyone else was at their assigned places as well. You double check one last time that you have the detonator for a small explosive placed at the soon to be entrance of your escape route, before taking a deep breath and letting it out.

"Is everyone ready?"

"You've asked us that at least five times, Grey."

"Hush, Wolf. He was not made a leader. I am ready, Grey."

"In position. I've got Miss Rain with me right here."

"I'm ready to go, Grey."

"Ready."

Another deep breath in and out. All that remains is your signal to begin. You hesitate a moment, mind racing through dozens of possibilities, but you quickly banish them. You have a job to do. Now is the time.

"... Mech? Fire when ready."

For a moment, there is only silence. Then the rumble of minigun fire reaches your ears, and you find yourself descending once again into that state of readiness. You had done all you could in preparation. Now, the only thing to do was fight. The seconds tick by, and you reach out with your passive mapping, "watching" Mech tear through a few buildings and a rather surprising number of aliens before she starts to pull back, the TacArm taking slow, deliberate steps in retreat, miniguns still rumbling away. A minute passes in anticipation before your normal eyes catch sight of Mech coming around the corner, spent casings surrounding her as she continues to fire into the buildings she's targeted. Still, eventually she reaches you, then goes past your position, placing herself at her predetermined holding point, just in front of the escape route entrance. Aliens begin to fill the streets, more than you care to count, but unfortunately for them, you have a few more nasty surprises for them.

Just as the first wave begins to hunker down behind the debris that litters the streets, hoping to use it to offer themselves some small protection of the relentless TacArm, you feel the stirrings of psychic energy begin to surround you. You can't help but smile as you feel it begin to coalesce in the street, then you watch in satisfaction as the entire street erupts into flames, the aliens that weren't incinerated instantly screaming as their bodies roast. You mapping informs you that the enemies have all but evaporated into thin air, at least for a few, precious seconds. And then the reinforcements arrive.

They begin to flood the streets, and finally, after that last card was played, you being to perform the more common military approach, and open fire into the streets below. You find that your aim hasn't much improved since the last time you tried firing a weapon, but thankfully, this particular fight wasn't exactly supposed to be killing the enemy. Just delay them enough for the charges to get set.

"TNT! Give me good news!"

"Grey? Charges are set, we're on our way! Just get us one more minute!"

"You got thirty seconds!"

The rattle of gunfire fills your ears again, and you empty your fourth clip before slipping the detonator from its place. Your order Mech forwards, out of the blast zone, then hit the trigger, which is quickly followed by a solid boom and a shower of debris. Your order to get to the newly created entrance come barely a second later, and its responded to instantly. You make your way down to the street as well, and soon enough, your holding the enemy at the entrance to the tunnels below, emptying another clip and silently hoping TNT would hurry his ass up. The man comes barreling around a corner, hurling curses and grenades in equal measure, before he practically throws himself past you and into the tunnel. You order Mech into the tunnel then follow yourself, before noting that TNT had come alone.

"Where's the other one!?"

"He bit it! But he left me a little present!"

TNT tosses a bundle of something behind you as you make your way deeper into the tunnel system, and then all you get is a smirk before another loud boom echoes behind you and smoke fills the air, forcing you into a coughing fit.

"What the... What the hell was that?"

"That, Wolf, was a little extra explosives the kid had on him before he died. Figured, why not plug the hole behind us while blowing up the place at the same time, yeah?"

"Good idea. Just let me know before you do something like that again, alright?"

"No promises, Grey, no promises. Sometimes, you just have to ad lib."

"Yeah, right. Ad lib. Come on, let's get moving."

The next few hours are spent traversing the tunnel system, until you reach what seems to be an abandoned subway station. After checking the area, you discover that it's been sealed off from the surface, and given that your group has had little chance to rest, you decide the place would be idea for a much need rest stop. Everyone finds a place to sit, except for Mech, who just seems to power down a moment, and Wolf, who instantly begins checking over the TacArm's exterior for damage.

Regardless, resting here for the night shouldn't be a problem. Still, you could push yourselves and likely make it back that much faster. You knew(generally at least) where the remnants of the assault would be, and the sooner you reached them, the sooner you'd have safety. Relative safety.

>>>Input Command

The density of incoming fire during the landing, and defense at this installation, suggests we should not rely on the battle plan being at all intact: We may be MIA on an operation that's already failed here.

What do we know about alien sensors/detection capabilities? How long we should stay here depends on three things: How many defense forces for the communications installation are committed to finding us, what their density and timing of reinforcements is, and how hard it is for their sweeps to track us. All else being equal, I don't like camping in a place with one exit that may be swarming with those crawler bugs--no retreat direction is bad for defense.

>"triggers"
Interesting. Physical rituals to make the mental exercise easier. Because she's an external, or her learning / training was so different from yours? And if they are just a matter of technique, would it be advantageous for her to learn to work without them, or for you to learn to make use of them?

If we get the chance later, you two are going to have a lot to talk about, powers-wise. A lifetime of completely different training and techniques. Potentially you could both learn something from the other.

>assault
We still lost someone? That's regrettable, but at least we did the best we could. We didn't choose to sacrifice someone for the hell of it.

How are we doing on ammunition and supplies, at his point? Could we handle another engagement before getting resupplied, or are things getting spread thin?

>what do
>>554446 raises good points to consider. If any of our allies have been cut off before, they might have a better idea of enemy response times and search capabilities. As might Rain, having had to deal with them most of her life.

I doubt the mission has completely failed, but the longer we wait, the more out of date our information becomes. Granted, it won't help to push ourselves to the point of failure, but we can't really afford to take luxuries here, either.

How bare are the tunnels and how are our supplies. If possible I'd prefer to advance at a steady pace, but lay traps/warning systems. Force the enemy to either slow their pursuit or risk losses instead of run ourselves ragged to avoid them.

The problem with that is, one, that requires supplies or making use of the environment which may not be possible, and two, if instead of or in addition to clearing our initial entry-way they opt to use another entrance to the tunnels, we'll not have those advantages if we encounter them. But then, if they did that and we ran ourselves ragged, we'd not have those advantages and we'd also be dead tired.

You try to recall something, anything, on alien communications, other than your own comms being based off of alien designs, but nothing comes to mind. Even less known is what the enemy is currently doing to find you, specifically how much effort is being used. Even checking with your allies brings up little, this situation never really having come up before. Usually the assault were quick and painless, and if they weren't, well... few came back from those. With so little information, you'd have likely decided to move on based on that fact alone.

The state of your supplies just adds further need to keep moving. While your food and water could last you a few days, your available ammunition is running dangerously low, especially considering where you are. You could likely survive one more full engangment, but you don't like the odds of anything more than that. Less so because of Mech's TacArm. While the generator is still intact, and the suit itself in decent repair, the main force of your small team is capable of movement. She's running dry on ammo for her miniguns, however, leaving her with basically her cannon, which is unusable while moving. This leaves you little choice.

After another ten minutes passes, you order your team onward, and the next few hours are spent traversing the tunnels. Your mapping serves you well, and at the end of the third hour of travel, you catch what you'd hoped for. An exit, just on the edge of your senses. Another half hour, and your outside once again, exiting the tunnels at the edge of the city limits. The enemy seems to have pulled their forces inward, maybe wary of an attack, and you thank whatever higher power exists that they didn't leave any guards here at the tunnel entrance. You quickly map the area, and set you team in motion once again. Another two hours pass as you leave the city behind you and begin the trek back towards the last place you'd detected allies, but fatigue has begun to set in, and finally you order a halt, finding a grouping of rocks that should provide some cover from prying eyes. The group sets down, watch is posted, and Miss Rain starts a small fire to cook something your not entirely sure is edible. The night passes uneventfully, although you had to practically force Miss Rain to go to sleep, as she was adamant that she should have a guard duty as well, while you were equally stubborn about her being a civilian.

After everyone gets some sleep, the trek continues, and only a few more hours pass before you once again detect the presence of friendly minds on the edge of your senses. The trek after that is short, and you find yourself soon within the welcoming confines of a hastily put together base camp. Fellowed manufactured are the main force, although you easily spot a few trueborn around who seem to be leading the proceedings. As soon as you arrive, you're swarmed by your fellows, all wondering where you'd been and who you were. Soon enough, the story is relayed in a summarized form to those in command, and just as quickly, you find Miss Rain separated from you and taken someplace else. She seems a little frightened by the sudden attention, but you can do little to comfort her. She is, as you are told, no longer your concern. Before she is completely gone, however, you hear her shout one last thing back to you.

"I'll find you later!"

You find yourself doubting that, trueborn did not usually mix with manufactured, but you find that you and your comrades are given bunk space and given down time. You find yourself suddenly left to your own devices, at least until tomorrow, when you are set to appear once again in front of command to give your report more completely and be questioned on the proceedings. Until then, you are free.

>>>Input Command

>>554578
Go over what happened once more so we can give a concise and well-structured report. Then rest, who knows how much down-time we will get these next days.

>Rain whisked away
Yeah, no surprise there. They're not going to leave the human to bunk with the cannon fodder, and a real human, let alone a survivor of the first war, and a natural psychic, with possibly a goldmine of intelligence on the local situation or things she's learned about the enemy... she's mundo valuable.

Still, I don't know how much anyone can tell her what to do, either. She's grown up outside your society and the rules of conduct around manufactured. You're the first person she met in years, and the first person she's ever found who can do things the way she can. I wouldn't be terribly surprised if she did find you again, later.

...honestly, if she does want to mix with manufactured, I expect you'll have more problems dealing with the consequences of that then she'll have making it happen.

>Until then, you are free.
Well then. Go over what happened in your head, and make sure you're ready to give report. And until you're relieved of command or you're assigned a new commanding officer, you're still de facto in command of your unit. Which means it's part of your responsibility to make sure your people get taken care of. Not that I expect complications in that area, but if you're in charge, it's still your responsibility to make sure that's taken care of.

Other than that, rest, repair, prepare. Talk if anyone wants to, rest and meditate otherwise.

Very first: Get anyone who needs it medical attention.
If you aren't operating with always-on logging hardware of some kind then what's next is also simple: Write down everything while it's still as fresh in your memory as possible.

After that comes making sure everyone in your crew gets resupplied and resting is next. After that what's next depends on how much longer we have, but if it isn't that long we want to know how we're protected at this camp from enemy attacks.

Check up on Mech, in case her specific situation isn't already known to the FOB, and see if you can find Wolf a replacement TacArm (unlikely, but at this point the old junker nobody wants but gets dragged along because bureaucracy is better than nothing).

maybe meditate on how she used her powers. perhaps you can find a way to improve your own.

also when it's time to report make a case of you being the only trained psychic around.

The first thing you do, with so little guidance provided, is go in search of the members of your team. They are easy enough to find, most going about checking equipment again or getting sleep. None were seriously injured, thankfully, although Wolf, unused to moving across the rough terrain outside of a TacArm has developed some nasty blisters. Still, it's nothing that is overly concerning, and the medics can get to it when they have the time. You manage to get everyone restocked to proper amounts as well, and while no TacArms are available, there is an abundance of other salvaged components. Wolf can only be described as in heaven, and she quickly gets to work repairing what she can on Mech's TacArm and assembling... something.

There's little else to do after that, but rest and check over your own equipment. You spend some time clean your rifle before setting it aside, settling into a sleeping bag and closing your eyes, once again letting your mind once again delve into the depths of your abilities. You feel... stronger again. Your mind somehow larger, nascent energy ready to be directed to a purpose.

>>>Input Command

Psychic Points Gained: 2

Abilities Available:
External Path- Force
Internal Path-Reinforcement
Sensory Path- Empathy
Improved Empathy
Suggest
Sensory Path- Mapping
Third Eye
Fog- As long as you concentrate, you may cloud the vision of all targets within your passive mapping range.

I'm tempted to open up the internal path. There's lots of ways to blow things up, especially working with tech and allies, but there's only so many ways to keep ourselves alive.

A sensory / internal build seems interesting to me. We're about identifying threats and surviving them. Misdirection and endurance.

>>554697
while i like the build idea i dunno if we should do it NOW, it will cost both points, when we could get improved empathy AND third eye.
it's one of those depth vs breadth deals. i am sure some of the deep sensory powers would be very interesting.

>>554696
Going to have to agree with the Third Eye/Improved Empathy suggestion >>554701.

I like >>554697's internal build idea, but for two points I think we can wait.

Internal Path. We're probably going to get it eventually, and the sooner we do the better aware we'll be of our options in the future.

Also, outside of Third Eye, it's the only one that I'd consider combat viable. Considering we've been losing people on a fairly regular basis, that takes priority.

If we really get two choices here I'm thinking Third Eye is really useful for our next significant mission and Improved Empathy is hopefully really damn useful for not fainting from our delicate disposition the next time we touch someone or something with history.

All else being equal I suspect we may be better off with internal path but without more information on what's available on each side we don't know if there isn't something really, really, really useful on the external path we'd be missing. How do we get that information?

Fucking class-based limitations, having to say no to some cool stuff in order to get other cool stuff is annoying.

>>554705
You ask nicely, that tends to go pretty far when it comes to me.

The External Path of "Force" deals mainly with the manipulation of objects, movement, and the application of direct kinetic and potential energy. In essence, the ability to push and pull, waves of kinetic force, and suspending objects in the air, things like that. At higher power levels, it results in things like the direct manipulation of gravitational fields, creating things like contained singularities, and suspending objects in a form of "stasis". It is the most well known among trueborn civilians, thanks in no small part to its rather showy abilities.

The Internal Pathway of "Reinforcement" results in more passive forms. It deals primarily with fortifying the body with layers of semi-physical barriers and enhancements, resulting in increased performance and durability. The most noticeable form is a simple psycho-kinetic barrier(as it's been termed) along the skin that allows the user to withstand directs hits from tank shells with little visible damage, apparently by taking the energy being exerted on it and bleeding it off into the environment around it. Other applications include transferring those same barriers to others, or even entire ships, as well as manipulating what kinds of energy the barriers can defend against(i.e. thermal, electrical, etc.).

>>554716
Uh, okay, thank you but that's not much more than what we got in the disc thread. Should I post there?
The key part I'm having trouble wrapping my head around is the nature of the limitations of each. Is this a version of the Final Fantasy 'black mage versus white mage' thing (which didn't make much sense to me either) or is there some other simple distinction between the two I'm not seeing?

Um... I don't think I quite understand what your asking specifically. The distinction( or the main one), is that the External pathways focus on manipulation of energy in its various forms(Kinetic, Potential and Gravitational for the Force pathway/Thermal, Electrical, Sound and Nuclear for the Energy) while Internal focus on barriers and buffs, almost always centered on the self unless you choose to learn to transfer that power to others. In a sense, they are the "black" and "white" magic of the Final Fantasy series, with the External focusing mainly on damaging abilities, and Internal focusing more on defensive.

Still, as I said, I'm not quite sure what you mean by limitations exactly, and I suggest clarifying it over in the discussion thread.

i think he is asking why you cannot, say, use the external powers defensively.

but it's rather obvious to me. autonomous response, external powers must be directed. but an internal power shield will stop a bullet when on without you noticing it. i am sure you COULD stop a bullet with external power, if you see it coming, which you will rarely have the comfort of doing.

Improved Empathy and Third-Eye Gained

You direct the energy where you want it to go. Feel it should go. And as it takes form and merges with your already established power, the world opens up to you. Even from the bunk you're laying on, information unfolds like a picture book in front of you, and suddenly, you can feel the bags emotional understanding. Exhaustion, replaced by refreshment. You also, rather oddly, get the feeling of how to properly use the thing, even if you'd already known how. The sensation is different however. You find yourself laying down on your back, arms placed just so, as if someone else, or something else, were guiding your body to a proper rest. How odd. Still, you left yourself drift off to sleep as you contemplate this new discovery.

-----------

The next day your up early, trying your best to make yourself look presentable before the trueborn officers. There's little you can do, your uniform having been rendered useless for anything better than the field thanks to the wear and tear it's been placed under. Still, you splash your face with water and try to remove at least some of the dirt before you report in, and are brought before small "council" of five trueborn officers. Your passive mapping detects Miss Rain somewhere close by, but you note this rather absentmindedly, instead keeping body rigid and eyes forward. A few minutes pass as the officers read through preliminary reports, and you take the opportunity to examine them. Major Ashfield is the ranking officer of the post, and while he reads the reports, he looks hardly interested in the proceedings at all. It's his juniors that seem most excited, although you notice, just for a moment, that the Major's eyes seem to flicker up and catch yours.

The next hour is spent relating everything you can remember about the mission, from it's beginning on your Recon ship to your arrival at the base, as well as answering any questions posed to you by the council, posed mostly by the junior officers. You find many of the questions to be redundant, having been addressed by your report already, but you answer with the same respectful tone every time, your body remaining as rigid as possible. Your muscles groan in protest as time goes on, but thankfully, even you can tell that the officers are growing satisfied with the report. Still, as it nears the end, instead of simply sending you on your way, the Major himself stands, his full attention on you. There is a hushed silence before the Major, in a voice that seems to be filled with purpose, begins to ask you things you had not expected to answer.

"What is your name, Manufactured. For the record."

"Serial Number U-"

"I know your number! I asked for your name!"

"... Name, sir?"

"What your fellow manufactured call you."

"I am called Grey, sir."

"Grey. If I am understanding these reports correctly, as well as your own account, you took command of your troops after you were shot down?"

"Yes sir." They had asked you that question dozens of times already. They didn't seem to understand how someone like you could have been capable of doing something like that. Leadership wasn't taught to Psy Industries, specifically so that they could focus on their powers.

"And your fellows followed you?"

"Yes sir."

"Would you say they followed you willingly?"

"I would like to hope so, sir."

The Major seems to smile slightly at that, finding your response amusing for some reason that eludes you. There's silence for another full minute, and even the officers are looking confused as the man in charge stares at you from his place behind the table. Then, as if coming to some sort of deliberation, he nods his head sharply and turns to one of his aides, gesturing him over and whispering something. The officers near him suddenly break into the conversation, whispering harshly, although you still can't hear what is being said, and the Major does not look pleased. Soon, after more whispered conversations, the Major abruptly turns to you, cutting off one of his junior officers.

"Grey. You are now in command of your squad! You have the rest of the day to prepare your squad, and tomorrow, you go to take out one of those surface-to-orbit cannons. Dismissed."

You salute before turning and exiting the makeshift council room. You manage to make it halfway back to your bunk space before stumbling, mind reeling. What? Command? No... that... couldn't be right. You weren't a-

"Grey?"

You recognize the voice instantly, your mapping quickly confirming who the quickly approaching figure is before you even straighten yourself back into a standing position.

"Miss Rain."

"I think I said something about you calling me that. If I didn't, then stop that."

"Miss, you need to-"

"You two, leave me ALONE! I'm busy, and I don't like you always hovering around me all the time."

You glance at her companions, and find them to be two Genetech manufactured, likely given to her as personal bodyguards. You nod to them in respect, and they nod back similarly, all while seeming to completely ignore you. You don't blame them, the woman seems already intent on getting rid of them.

"May I help you, Miss?"

"Stop calling me th- Ah, to hell with it! It's later."

"Later, Miss?"

"Yes, LATER! Means you and I are going to talk right now."

"Miss, I have a missio-"

"Don't care. Who knows when the next time I'm going to see you is. And your apparently the only other... what they call it... Gifted! Gifted in the place. I have questions!"

You hesitate, unsure of how to deal with the situation. The Genetech guards don't seem to be much help either, as she flatly ignore them in favor of latching onto your arm and pulling you towards a set of tents you think have been set aside for her. Still, you have your mission and team to attend to as well. Now might not be the best time to answer her questions. On the other hand, she is a trueborn and civilian, and while she holds no military rank, she does, technically, hold authority over you. Sort of.

>>>Input Command

>They didn't seem to understand how someone like you could have been capable of [taking command]
There's never been a situation where a manufactured squad has found itself without a commander and someone had to take control? I find that improbable. Casualties are a fact of life. I guess the bigger sticking point is you're psy, and you weren't trained for it?

>what do with Rain
...compromise. Put off her for a short period of time. (15 minutes? Half an hour? An hour?). Long enough to pass the orders you've received onto your group so they know what's coming and they can start preparing. She can accompany you, if she wishes. You'll be back later, after you've talked with her, for planning, and to help organize what they think they're going to need. I expect they'll have a laundry list of equipment and supplies you'll be left trying to wrangle from reluctant superiors, and they'll have several competing plans or tactics for us to sift though.

I expect she'll still be in a huff about having to wait, but she'll accept it if she knows she's getting what she wants, and doesn't let you get out of sight. And stalling just long enough to pass information on to your friends is reasonable and practical, and she'll reluctantly see that.

Then you can give her some time while your fellows are scrambling and starting to prepare. Honestly, there are things you might be able to learn from her, too. And if your answers can help her in any way, well, that's probably good. For her, personally, and the war effort too.

Alright, I think I know how this works:
We grab a hold of her hand. Seriously, it could be a faster and clearer way to find out what's on her mind and what she needs us to answer for her. On the other hand, if it isn't we need to learn about those limitations of our new power before we're relying on it.

>>554852
not a manufactured. a psychic. i am sure there have been manufactured command stand ins.

anyway. "i have to follow my orders, but, there is nothing that says you can't ask questions while i am doing that" if she is reluctant then just use new empathy powers to get a surface read and answer her out load.

The moments hesitation passes, and you choose to gently break the woman's grip on your arm. This, of course, brings your hand in close proximity with her body, which provides another challenge. Without thinking, and partially interested in how much you could glean from the woman with your stronger empathy, you feel multiple emotions assault you. The clothing she wears, a uniform provided by the officers, bears no strong emotions to it, but the woman underneath practically teems with them. Fear, confusion, joy, curiosity, exhilaration. These and more tumble through your skull, and you almost hurl from the sensations. Still, you keep a check on it, toying briefly with the strength of your readings before you bring them under controllable levels. Still, the main emotions you feel are fear, curiosity and joy, with anger and pain quickly following as you pry her hand from your arm. Still not strong enough to actually read tangible thoughts, it seems, but it is a start. Emotions are what lie behind thought, after all.

"I have to follow my orders, but there is nothing that says you can't ask questions while I am doing that."

"So...?"

"You may follow me if you want."

You turn and start off, half of your mind already intent on leading you towards your destination. At the very least, you know where two of your new subordinates are, attached by either necessity or love for TacArms and there derivatives. Miss Rain quickly falls into step next to you, hastening to keep up as you take long strides to carry you where you need to go.

"Um... questions. Right. Uh... first, what's this business with Manufactured. None of the other... what did he call them... trueborn? Trueborn. None of them wanted to talk about it."

"You didn't ask these two?"

"Don't like them. They won't leave me alone."

"I see. Most of use here are manufactured. They are as well."

"Huh? How can you tell?"

"These stamps on our left shoulders. All manufactured have one, denoting corporations and serial number. Mine is the mark of Psy Industries, producer of Gifted manufactured."

"There's more of us!?"

"Yes, I am not the only one."

"But you said produce... like, raising you guys?"

"Making us, Miss. Or maybe growing is a better term."

"Growing... like plants?"

"Very much like plants... Wolf!"

You break off your conversation for a moment, leaving Miss Rain to stand in confusion as you intercept the path of the TacArm pilot. She slides to a halt, holding what looks like a mechanical arm, looking for all the world like she just stole it from somewhere.

"Wolf! We have the day to get ready. We move out tomorrow."

"Really? Already? Damn, that was fast. Uh... Mech's all ready and good to go, I'll pass the word to her, uh... I'm almost done... sorta... maybe... I'll get back to you."

"What are you almost done with?"

"Uh, you know, building a makeshift TacArm out of spare parts and sheet metal?"

"... I don't want to know."

"Good. Cause you can't see it yet."

Off in the distance, you hear someone shouting about missing another limb implant. Wolf starts in surprise, then offers you a sheepish grin and starts off again, moving a little faster than she was before. You stare after her a moment, then sigh, already figuring that she'd be a handful to deal with on a good day. Regardless, as you turn back to start your search for the other two members of your squad(such as it was), Miss Rain interrupts you, clearly wanting to ask more questions.

"You said your called Grey, right?"

"That's what other manufactured call me, yes."

"Other manufactur- What about humans? Er, trueborn?"

"U-173-49628."

"... Huh?"

"It is my serial number."

"Serial... number?"

"Like a gun. I am a tool. A piece of equipment, issued to the command of the Major. He is signed for me and therefor responsible for me. My repair and maintenance is done at his discretion and no others."

"Wait, h-hold on. You're telling me your like... like... a bullet?"

"Yes. And just as easily replaceable."

"That... that can't be right... shouldn't be right... What about rights?"

"Rights, Miss?"

"Yes! The others were telling me I had the right to vote, to own property, to... to... to find work. Happiness. Love. Everything!"

That... was the first you've ever heard of "rights". Taking in this new information... you found it oddly displeasing. The "right" to vote? Vote for what? That seemed like a largely cumbersome task, voting. The "right" to love? The concept, while not completely unfamiliar, was just as alien as a xeno's thoughts. What did love have to do with doing your duty?

Still, the issue seemed very important to Miss Rain, and once again, presented with conflicting needs, you found yourself hesitating. She wanted answers, yet you already knew the answers wouldn't please her at all. So do you give her the facts? The manufactured understanding of these so called "rights"? Or do you redirect her attention, switch your focus to something else?

>>>Input Command

she deserves the truth. and she will get it eventually if you don't tell her. she comes from before the wartime footing. when not everything was about the war.

"What does love or Voting have to do with my duty as a Manufactured?"
I hope Grey says this when he explains how manufactured rights go-it's something that I bet most manufactured barely think about, if at all, and I imagine many manufactured wouldn't care to have to deal with such an issue out of the blue.

>just as easily replaceable [as a bullet].
Well, not as easily. Bullets are damn cheap to manufacture. And they must be easier to store and transport. And they're very disposable- we don't even bother giving them serial numbers.

>vote, love
It's symbolic. It means autonomy to her. Choice. Trueborn have the ability (or right) to have a hand in deciding their own fate, and that's important to her. She doesn't understand the difference between human and manufactured. She sees you as human, and thinks you should have the same privileges as she does. And a part of her is outraged to see you denied them, or you being okay with that.

Humans... don't like for bad things happen to other humans. Or for other humans to do bad things.

>what do
She has a right to the truth, among other things. Granted, you don't need to outrage her with every abuse you've suffered that might affect her sensibilities. And you can try and temper things somewhat with your own outlook. You have a purpose. You have a duty, you have brothers and sisters, and you're hopefully making the universe a better or safer place for people.

...besides, if you weren't manufactured, what would you be? It's hard to complain about what you are when you wouldn't exist otherwise.

Oh, and part of her attachment seems to be on the both of you being gifted. She feels a kinship with you (and possibly psy industries). It might do to point out she's not the only trueborn pyschic. They're more rare but... she does have peers.

" Miss Rain, I don't think you understand precisely what a I am."

"What do you mean!? You're human!"

"That term... no longer applies. Yes, I am of the human species. But I am not trueborn. I am manufactured. I was created, grown, inside a vat, alongside 99 others who looked exactly like me."

"Wha- But that doesn't mean you shouldn't have ri-"

"What does love or Voting have to do with my duty as a Manufactured? What use do I have for such things as I place myself alongside my brothers and sisters, if not by blood then by actions? I was made to fight this war against the alien threat that nearly brought humanity to its knees. I will do so to the best of my abilities, and my life I will gladly forfeit if it furthers that cause. I am sure of my purpose in life, Miss Rain. Can you say the same?"

You suddenly realize, as you were speaking your words, that conversation and activity have died around you, the manufactured soldiers around you taking an interest in the rather odd conversation being held in between you and Miss Rain. The woman seems driven to speechlessness, obviously unsure of how to respond to your own vehemence and drive, and you realize, offhandedly, that you've unwittingly intimidated the woman. You also find, rather interestingly, that you can't bring yourself to care overly much. You have a job to do, and quickly decide to resume doing it. You nod briefly to her escort, then turn on your heel and depart, leaving the woman alone to her thoughts. Soon enough you track down another of your soldiers, Wash-Out, who's catching sleep in a sleeping bag hidden beneath dozens of others. You pause a moment, then drag the man out, surprising him considerably.

"Wha- Grey? What's going on that requires you to interrupt my sleep?"

"We have a mission. Use today to get ready. Ah... I forgot to mention this to Wolf, but if you need anything, get me a list by noon so that I can hunt it down for you."

"What, you the new Sergeant or something?"

"Or something."

"... Well, least it isn't me. You seen Wolf already? What about Mech or TNT?"

"Wolf said she pass along the message to Mech. TNT I have yet to find."

"Try the armory. He'll most likely be... preparing... some more explosives."

"Thank you. I'll get on that."

You depart, and easily find the last member of your team exactly where Wash-Out said he'd be. You let him know the details and head out to start securing what you know you'll need at least, and just as noon comes around, the team reassambles within the TacArm area, forming a loose semicircle facing Mech, contained within her TacArm.

"So then, what's it look like we're doing, Grey?"

"Apparently, we're to take out a surface-to-space cannon. I have little more than that at the moment, although I'm sure someone we'll give us at least a destination before we leave."

"Won't take much to bring one of those down, I'd think. A well placed charge on the generator and the thing will practically kill itself."

"You'd never make it out in time. It might take longer, and require more firepower, but I could strap an artillery cannon to Mech here, and we could pound the thing from a distance."

"Then we'd have to worry about dealing with defense. The charges could work, especially if we could set them without setting off any alarms. Then instead of fighting in and out, we just slip through like a ghost, and the enemy won't know what hit them till we're long gone."

The bickering between Wolf and TNT continues for a few minutes, with Mech and Wash-Out apparently not having a strong opinion either way. Of course, in the end, all four look to you for your decision, and you find yourself mulling over the options.

>>>Input Command

Woah, what's this, daylight updates?

Poor Rain. It's hard hard to stick to your morals in wartime, or when the slave you're trying to emancipate sticks up for his role. I wonder what effect this will have on her? The two obvious responses I can think of to hating this would to be either to get away from it, or to enlist and try and do something about it herself.

>artillery attack or covert demolitions run
The artillery plan is more straightforward. It's likely to work, but it's also likely to get us in a fight and make us take loses. The stealth approach will either work or blow up in our face. We're looking at reliable middle of the road versus an unknown up/down tradeoff.

Grey's abilities are kind of perfect for a stealth op, though. With sensory stuff and misdirection, we have much better odds of getting TNT's tactic to work than another team.

I think the chance of preserving troops and material is worth the risk, and that we have a decent chance of pulling it off.

Stealth means no TacArms, which means Mech is out and Wolf would need to get a load-out of NORMAL weaponry...Which we dunno if she can use...
TNT and Grey seem like both could see use fairly well either way though, but I don't like the thought of how Stealth would go down if we get spotted...And none of our group is particularly stealthy that I am aware of.

>>554888
It doesn't mean no Tac arms, just that they have to hold position further back during the sneaky bits, like when Grey and the others moved far enough ahead to scout out the FTL broadcaster, before.

think you got a little harsh on her, the truth can simply be said, not yelled. you want her to understand, not fear.

anyway, your skills lend you well to stealth. you can tell where everyone is. and if someone is in your path you can trick them into going somewhere else.

>>554881
Miss Rain wants to learn about manufactured and gifted. It is part of our duty as a manufactured to teach her, given that we are the only one knowledgable here.

However, our primary duty is to still to fight this war. Does anything prevent us from using both plans? Use the covert demolition as our primary plan with artillery if we need a distraction, support fire or as a plan b.

I'm totally confused by the assertion that using an artillery-barrage against the enemy could possibly be riskier than getting closer as long as we choose good positions and keep moving after each volley. Could someone explain this to me?

We need to keep track of Wolf's creative acquisition efforts and... normalize them with the general supply chain. As her commander we're responsible for unit discipline and theft isn't something we can just turn a blind eye to. That said, she will obviously keep being troublesome in one way or another until she has a usable tacarm.
This suggests we should try to use our newly-designated unit-commander authority to ask about those *fun* subjects like, what we're getting in assignments, temporary or otherwise, to cover our personnel and material losses during landing and our attempt to carry out our original mission under-strength.

>I'm totally confused by the assertion that using an artillery-barrage against the enemy could possibly be riskier than getting closer as long as we choose good positions and keep moving after each volley. Could someone explain this to me?
Because we're not calling in a long range artillery strike, we're strapping a building breaking cannon to a mobile weapons platform and making a frontal assault. Aterillery is really the wrong name for the mission, it's an assault. Which carries a set degree of risk and expectation of combat, while the stealth demo mission poses less combat and risk if we pull it off, and more if we're discovered.

Having the TacArms run distraction while somebody else sneaks in the demo charge worked out well before. If the artillery cannon can be made easily detachable (or if it doesn't encumber Mech unduly) then we can do both plans: soften them up with artillery and force them to mobilise to stop it (or at least keep their counter-battery occupied), then sneak in the demo charge.

In a perfect world you'd try and time setting off the charge with an artillery strike, masking that anyone ever infiltrated in the first place. That way you can use the same strategy against multiple targets before they figure out that there are infiltrators as well as the artillery.

except we held them and then ran into a secret escape route when the mission was completed. but this time we have open terrain to escape across meaning no way to hold and then disengage. we fight until one side is dead.

...Which plan is more favorable depends entirely on the destination I'd think.

I'm leaning towards artillery though, because we'll be better able to ambush those coming after us, and simply have a better ability to scout and plan. Trying to sneak through the enemies, with noone who's particularly sneaky, is not the best time to be making escape plans, changing strategy, ect ect. Scouting out a good spot to perform an artillery strike from means we'll be able to plan our escape, determine the enemies optimal cover/route and set up some surprises for them, and it lets us actually talk with our allies while we plan so we can make use of their expertise and experience without potentially giving ourselves away.

But seriously, none of us are particularly stealthy. I do not advise a stealth mission in a heavily guarded area when we're not stealth experts.

>>554945
and we won the last battle because we ran away. unless the gun is in another ruined city we will not have as good an ambush location ether.

Going with both plans won't work. If we sacrifice maneuverability and speed on the tac arm for stopping power, that'll interfere with stealth.

And I don't know why anyone would argue we're not good at it. Sure, we're no ninja squad, but Grey's abilities snuck us around a lot of enemies before. This has a chance of working.

>>554950
>>554950
The first time was an area with few enemies. The second we had a guide who knew a less traveled path, and who also knew of an area the aliens didn't go in which ended up being a good escape route once we were already deep in enemy territory. And if you recall, it's been said we're not trained with stealth.

I expect this to be much better guarded as it's purely a military asset. Even if we can get in stealthily, which I doubt, getting out is my main concern. I just don't see us managing to avoid all contact, and once a fight starts we will be far less able to deal with it. The stealth option is the one where unexpected problems will screw us the hardest. And unexpected things will happen.


Unlike
>554886
>The artillery plan is more straightforward. It's likely to work, but it's also likely to get us in a fight and make us take loses. The stealth approach will either work or blow up in our face. We're looking at reliable middle of the road versus an unknown up/down tradeoff.

I see the the stealth option as guaranteeing the loss of somebody.

>>554951
except we have a soliton radar IN OUR HEAD. and can make guards notice things. like when obiwan pinged the storm troopers while he was fucking with the tractor beam. and explosives don't go off RIGHT when you put them down. hide it and have a timer on it. then BOOM. will be searching for saboteurs that are long gone.

>>554950
The TacArm would not be part of the stealth group. It would stay far outside and only engage in battle if necessary.

"... Wolf, that cannon. How long would it take you to get it on Mech?"

"Few hours, tops. I got other Steelworks here to help me, so I can easily get it installed."

"She'll be less slower though, right?"

"Yup. still fast enough to keep pace with us, but she won't be outrunning anything faster than that. We going with my plan?"

"No. We're doing both."

"Both?"

"TNT, get those charges ready. Bring a couple sets, just in case. Never hurts to have backups. Wolf, get that cannon installed, and see if you can't get Mech ready to test fire it before sundown. I want to make sure we can reliably hit something before betting anything on it. Anyone got a list of things they need?"

There aren't thanks to the relatively autonomous nature of the camp right now. Guards keep an eye on the munitions, but in a combat environment, there isn't much point to denying your soldiers access. Besides, manufactured don't care to turn on their fellows. After making sure everyone is aware of what they need to do, you set the to their tasks, while focusing on some things you've thought of that bother you. They can't expect you to go in with only 5 people, especially against something like a military installation. Which is why, minutes later, your entering the command post and stopping in front of a rather surprised trueborn officer.

"Um... May I help you?"

"Sir. I've been made aware my team is to destroy a surface-to-space installation tomorrow. Therefore, I was wondering what, in the way of resources, temporary or permanent, would be granted to me to complete my mission. Sir."

The officer looks even more surprised, if that were possible, before he hastily scribbles out a quick note and hands it off to an aide. Barely a minute passes before the aide returns with another slip of paper. The officer scans the note, then extracts what appears to be a form from somewhere, muttering to himself as he begins filling in spaces.

"Men or Equipment, Sergeant?"

"Excuse me, sir?"

"We can only spare so much. As per the Major's orders, I've been instructed to give you either men or equipment. Well, one man or one piece of equipment. So I say again. Men or equipment? Which do you need more of?"

"I... it would depend on what I could gain from either, sir."

"For men, you'd be allowed to take an additional manufactured into your squad. Of course, you'd have to find them yourself from among those who lost most of their own, so you'd have to ask around a little bit. Equipment is easier. I already know what we have that you could easily take. We have an auto-turret lying around I think, although it's not in the best condition. A stealth suit as well, although that could be a bit harder to get for you. If you really want to push it, I could see about lending you another TacArm, but you'd have to give that back."

"I understand sir."

"So what's it going to be?"

>>>Input Command

We need to know more about what a stealth suit is good for, but if it's not essentially a magic-bullet for our next mission that just won't cut it. If it's not so helpful I'm inclined to ask Wolf if we're better off borrowing a tacarm or gaining an autoturret.

>>555057
The stealth suit would be pretty useful for this mission. Given that we will try not to engage enemies this time, I don't think the other options are as good. On the other hand, we will in all likelihood be forced to fight anyway unless we manage a perfect mission.

I'm voting for the suit for now.

You consider a moment, but eventually, you settle on the stealth suit. While the device seems a bit like it would be useless for the most part, at least in open combat, the help it'll provide for the stealth portion of this mission should prove invaluable. Besides, you're always going to want to sneak into something at some point, so it can't hurt to have it on hand. Of course, it would probably help if you knew what exactly the stealth suit did and what it looked like, but in the end, you've made your choice. The officer simply nods and waves you away, saying that the item will be delivered to you when it's ready.

You leave, headed towards where you hope to find Mech, only to be intercepted by one of those guards from earlier, the ones with Miss Rain. While his presence itself isn't very alarming, his words catch you somewhat by surprise, bolstered only by the feeling of animosity that seems to come from him, aimed exclusively at you.

"You were disrespectful to Miss Rain."

"She wanted the truth. I gave it to her."

"What she wanted was and is irrelevant. You hurt her with your words, and I am to protect her from ALL harm. You are, by my authority as her guard and protector, forbidden from continued interaction with Miss Rain, to be enforced through punitive action or, if need be, lethal force. Is this understood?"

It is, of course, this particular moment that the object of this discussion chooses to arrive, although she seems just as surprised to see you with one of her guards as her guard is to see her here at all. Regardless, your presence seems to make her uncomfortable, her emotions projecting embarrassment, confusion and uncertainty.

"Oh! Uh... Grey... uh... How... What a coincidence, huh?"

You glance between the two, mind working through the problem. Miss Rain technically has a small amount of authority of who she involves herself with, but unfortunately, her guard has identified you as a source of possible harm, physical or otherwise. Therefore, you'd fall under his authority, not her's. Sill, you could. politely, tell him to keep his nose out of your business. Or not so politely. Still, it might also be best to distance yourself from the trueborn woman. She seems to have identified as somehow being kin to you, something like a batch-sibling. That was not a good mindset for her to be in.

>>>Input Command

You're not the one initiating contact. She is. In that situation it's a question of who has more authority over her, not you. I'm guessing She has greater authority over herself then a manufactured guard.

Besides, clearly she sees greater gains, be they either emotional or in regards to information from continued contact with you than potential harm. And I think both she and the empath are both better equipped to determine what's emotionally damaging to her.

Obviously we need to speak to this guard in front of her.

"She seems determined to speak with me. If you would prevent her from speaking with me it is not me you need to convince. She can command both of us to disregard your command to me to avoid speaking with her.
"You may be right that her speaking to me is a source of harm, but you are being too narrow of your interpretation of your duties. You have failed to account for three things:
"First, I am a manufactured and it is therefore also my duty to protect her. I have judged it necessary to inform her even if this causes emotional distress, because to do otherwise is to endanger her.
"Second, as the only other psychic around, trueborn or otherwise, she would find isolation from me distressing. She has no other peers in that regard besides myself here.
"Third, you are presuming to control a trueborn civilian here without any alien threats being present. Preventing her from chasing after me when I go on my mission tomorrow is one thing, but here you overstep your authority. As someone used to protecting herself she will not stand for that.
"So do something useful instead like attempting to tutor her in her missing education or find her grief counseling. Attempting to prevent her from speaking with me is misguided and probably ineffective."

a lot of people never voted. because we all asked questions in the discussion thread abut things that would influence our decision. such as "what is a stealth suit" and "what is an auto-turret" , as such i must protest you updating like this.

and if you could not answer them out of character then SAY that instead of leaving everyone hanging. just a simple "i can't say that here" and everyone would have instead voted to ask the guy in here what those things are/do.

Yeah, talking to him in front of her will tie up a lot of this. Addressing the guard:

Your commitment to your duty is commendable, but your inability to sense emotions has given you a flawed perspective. If you consider your duty to protect Miss Rain to include defending her from words she finds painful, you will have to isolate her from far more than myself. Including the other trueborn. It is not a task at which you can be successful. (Can we try to work a bit of an example into how she feels into that? Not enough so she's upset at our intrusion, but enough that he sees her react, and realize we're right).

And ultimately, it would have been the greater harm to allow her to see manufactured as other than we are. We are on a battlefield. Can you imagine what may have happened if she continued to believe our lives equal in value to her own? Humans risk their lives for equals.

That's the polite argument- that he can't protect her from this threat, and the risk of allowing her to keep her illusions is far greater than the emotional harm we inflicted. Where we go from here depend on how he reacts:

Best outcome: he accepts our logic, and backs down, and we both brush off the discussion in front of a confused Rain.

Worse outcome: he rejects our logic, and we're left with an annoyed guard and and annoyed and frustrated Rain.

>distance yourself from her?
Even if her attachment to you isn't the best idea, it is understandable (you're the first person she met in years, and the only person who might be able to give her answers about herself she's had for her entire life). When we have the chance, answering some of her questions about her power might be a big help to her (and increase her chances of survival). There's also the chance you could learn something yourself, that would help you better do your duty.

That's worth a little emotional risk.

>>556115
Revised:

"I somewhat agree with you: Her speaking to me can be emotionally hazardous. Still, a prohibition is a mistake. I would advise against it for three reasons:
"First, Miss Rain has been in hostile territory for extended periods of time, responsible for herself. She is used to self-determination and will not give that up gracefully. Therefore you must limit your prohibitions or she will simply disregard you, as she apparently already has.
"Second, it is also my duty to protect her. You have misunderstood the risks. I explained the status and purpose of manufactured because to do otherwise is to endanger her. To her perspective manufactured are oppressed amd this causes her distress. She needs to understand that we are as we should be, at least until the aliens are pacified.
"Third, beyond merely being her rescuer I am also the only other psychic nearby. She would find isolation from me distressing for multiple reasons, including her need for psychic peers."

"Now, if you still judge it appropriate to isolate her from me I suggest you be less direct. You should give her other things to occupy her she would find preferable, or more important. Suggestions for such that occur to me include debriefing her about all she has learned of the aliens, tutoring to make up for years of missing education, and perhaps job-responsibilities to hold her attention and help her feel productive. Someone should speak to her about such possibilities."

"I somewhat agree with you: Her speaking to me can be emotionally hazardous. Still, a prohibition is a mistake. I would advise against it for three reasons:

"First, Miss Rain has been in hostile territory for extended periods of time, responsible for herself. She is used to self-determination and will not give that up gracefully. Therefore you must limit your prohibitions or she will simply disregard you, as she apparently already has.

"Second, it is also my duty to protect her. You have misunderstood the risks. I explained the status and purpose of manufactured because to do otherwise is to endanger her. To her perspective manufactured are oppressed and this causes her distress. She needs to understand that we are as we should be, at least until the aliens are pacified.

"Third, beyond merely being her rescuer I am also the only other psychic nearby. She would find isolation from me distressing for multiple reasons, including her need for psychic peers."

"Now, if you still judge it appropriate to isolate her from me I suggest you be less direct. You should give her other things to occupy her she would find preferable, or more important. Suggestions for such that occur to me include debriefing her about all she has learned of the aliens, tutoring to make up for years of missing education, and perhaps job-responsibilities to hold her attention and help her feel productive. Someone should speak to her about such possibilities."

You pause, waiting for a response. You feel that you should afford the guard a chance to respond, at least so that you understand where you stand now that your argument is made. Still, in the small silence that follows, the woman in question seems to pick up at least a little on what's going on, and is noticeably agitated, even without your empathic abilities. The guard reacts first however, seeming to come to some sort of conclusion.

"I... understand your point. Can I at least ask that you will refrain from answering questions regarding society? That is not our place to instruct her in."

"I can. I will limit myself to questions regarding myself, or regarding the Gift. Is this acceptable?"

"Wait a minute... what the hell is going on here?"

The guard tenses visibly, and you can feel agitation and uncertainty coming from him. Clearly he was expecting to have this conversation without his charge present, and you expect that he know it won't go well if she gets a clear idea of what he's doing. It doesn't help, however, that she's already heard you, and she's putting the pieces together quickly.

"Are you...? You're trying to keep Grey away from me! Who the HELL gave you the right to tell anybody what to do!"

"Miss, uh-"

"NO! Shut up!"

"Miss Rain. He is doing only what he believes to be his duty. He is not in the wrong."

"So what then? I am? Or you?"

"He is within his right if he believes me to be a-"

"FUCK THAT! It doesn't matter! I'm doing what I want to do, not what he wants me to d-"

"Is there an issue here I need to be aware of, Miss?"

The flow of conversation is interrupted by the arrival of the Major, and every Manufactured immediately drops whatever they are doing to go to attention, salutes being rendered as one. The Major gives a lazy half-hearted salute back, and the Manufactured return to their duties, but the tense atmosphere continues. No one wants to draw the current head of the command chain to themselves. You and the Guard however, remain at attention, while Miss Rain seems to deflate slightly, looking the picture of a fresh Manufactured just out of the tube, caught doing something he shouldn't be.

"Um.. sir... I um... I was just... unhappy with one of my guards attempting to restrict my interactions with Grey..."

"Grey? The manufactured, Grey?"

"Uh... yes... sir..."

"I see... Do I need to deal with this?"

"No sir. The issue has already been concluded." You cut in before Miss Rain can cause more of a scene. You doubt that would end well for anyone, most importantly Miss Rain. And you'd rather not seem like you can't command after all. That would probably be just as bad for you.

"Good. Miss Rain, walk with me. It seems I have things to talk to you about. Ah! Before I forget. It seems that a number of established squads will be dissolved before the end of the day. Of course, that is a logistical nightmare, and I'm sure that if a soldier were to be... overlooked... it would not cause too much of an issue."

The Major eyes you meaningfully, and you say nothing, as is expected of you. He departs, the guard and Miss Rain with him, and you turn away, heading instead for where you know those available for acceptance into another squad might be hiding. You take a quick look around, and identify a few that might serve you well enough.

>>>Input Vote

Your final vote can be placed here, but the details regarding the Manufactured available can be found in the Dis thread

So far the currently valid choices are:
Hive: Sensor Drone Steelworks
Bear: Close Combat Genetech
Rally: Mobile Transport Steelworks

>>556556
Rally if only for lighting strike raids but if they are out voted hive well do:)

Hrrrm...
Hive I think.
It honestly is a hard decision, but this way Grey can be more focused on doing his Distracting thing, and make our squad's point more obvious-we're infiltrators and sneaky guys.

Uh, I dunno. It seems sort of silly to stack two of the only scouting builds they have in the same squad. Shouldn't that be spread out? And the drones would only really be useful if they did something mapping can't, or if we're doing a lot of that "I need to focus on one thing" stuff.

...which could potentially happen this mission, if we're guiding a saboteur to plant the explosives. We might need someone else to watch the other angles.

Looking at the others, Bear does sort of fill a role no one else quiet does. Close combat hopefully shouldn't be necessary this mission though (or even something we should want much of, if mapping lets us choose our battles). Rally's fast movement could be a plus, especially when it comes time to haul ass out of there- although vehicles have this nasty habit of getting targeted. I'd worry about noise, but I'm sure the Tac arms are louder. ...and we can't exactly retreat at full speed with that cannon on mech, can we.

Flying camera drones could be very useful for splitting the party and scouting hostile territory from a distance, and in this case as an artillery spotter. How useful depends on the chances of enemy detecting and responding to them, which I don't know. If they could also have armed drones, or drones capable of package drops, that would be very, very nice.
Rally is the most obviously useful for the upcoming mission; a jeep would be good for drive-by shooting to harass enemy forces, or retrieve the bomb-setting squad perhaps. The problem is that a jeep can't go everywhere a person can go: Swamps, forests, stairs, ladders, hills, indoors and such are impassable for a large vehicle. I also doubt a jeep would survive our next hostile landing.
Bear is a fraction of a storm-team, and doesn't give us the rest of it. He does have the brawn to run carrying wounded on each shoulder and is a good addition to any bomb-setting team though. He probably wouldn't be slowed much by carrying a satchel charge on his back, which is worth considering since it'll let us do more damage.
I want all of them, plus a lot more damnit. Particularly I want a pilot and a vehicle more likely to come down safely than the tin can we were chucked at the ground in when we started this operation.

Mental note: The major was probably watching us, and investigating our fitness for command in that last encounter. We've just convinced him that we can control and inspire respect in disciplined manufactured, but can't calm down a little girl. We should have been reassuring her that what she feared wasn't going to happen because we had just finished making it not happen, and then distracting her from thinking about it by changing the subject. Is 50% a passing grade?

>>556556
Man it's close by I guess I'm going with Hive.

>>556857
>is 50% a passing grade.

Actually, I think we did better (and in a way worse) than that. What you're forgetting is that we correctly prioritized our mission and the conflict with the guard over the short term emotional state of a civilian. That is a good thing in a commander. Unfortunately, it also shows that we do not dogmatically serve the trueborn. So I'd say we get partial credit for our dedication to the cause and that should land us in the 65-70% range at least. Still, we have popped a few red flags today...

>Unfortunately, it also shows that we do not dogmatically serve the trueborn
Actually, I'd say our worse slip in that regard was that we added a qualifier to our statement on the manufactured status quo. ("we are as we should be, at least until the aliens are pacified"). Acknowledging things will or should change when the war is over strikes me as a pretty radical position for a manufactured to take. (Even if it's probably true, we aren't supposed to be thinking that, much less saying it).

I doubt the guard noticed the implications of that in the moment, being much more concerned with other things, but if Rain reviews our words sometime when she's not so busy being angry about people deciding her fate for her, she's going to notice the significance. That the oppressed left the door open to be otherwise. I think there's a good chance she's going to bring that up again later.

>>556956
I'm pretty sure the purpose of the manufactured is to be cannon fodder. We suffer the attrition so that humanity can survive and reverse the alien assault. There aren't enough trueborn left to staff the military with solely; we exist to do the highest-risk parts of the war and boost the personnel supply.
The dehumanizing detachment demonstrated by many trueborn is rational when one considers that our projected life expectancy is measured in months.

And upon reflection, I'm gonna support Hive too because an artillery spotter would be very useful for this next mission. We're probably gonna be stuck as part of the bomb-setting team or the feint, so Mech's tacarm team will need recon as well as a spotter.

i vote when we are done with this we spend next down time sorting things out with rain. you know, without any orders hanging over our head forcing us to choose something.

Nice Surprise Grey 2014/01/13(Mon)02:58 No. 557075 ID: d77784
File 138961073073.jpg - (615.44KB , 1280x1810 , Foto_Ghost_Recon_Future_Soldier.jpg )

The manufactured you eventually choose is a somewhat small Steelworks, typical of the manufactured produced by the company. The thing that sets him apart, however, is the drones that seem to hover around him, the things producing a high pitched whining noise that grates on the nerves. The manufactured, Hive by callsign, hardly seems to notice at all, and simply smiles when you tell him to pack his things and get to your squads small sleeping area. You get a look at the implants shoved into him as he turns his back on you, and you observe what looks like a small beacon drilled into his right shoulder, nestled against the standard nerve implant. Likely it lets him stay in contact with his drones.

You leave the man to check in on the rest of your team, and find TNT finished with his own task, charges packed and ready to be placed and used. Mech is prepped, the final checks on the new cannon installed onto the free shoulder of her TacArm running even as you walk up to ask, and Wolf seems pleased with her work. She apparently didn't finish her own project due to the time needed to ready Mech, but overall, it shouldn't be a problem. Hive follows soon after, and he is quickly introduced to his two company siblings. As it turns out, Mech comes from the same origin factory as him, and the two hit it off rather well. It's ends up being a good thing, as once the drones go out, Mech can key into the smaller devices computers and fire use them to aim her own shots, and the ring of a large caliber artillery shell being fired is satisfying, defeated only by the dull thump as the shell impacts its target dead center, cratering the ground. It seems the pair working together is extremely effective, as long as both can be allowed to concentrate on their work without interruption. Managing multiple systems is a heavy toll on Hive, after all, and Mech can't move while aiming. Still, all told, a good turnout, and hopefully a winning team. The rest of the day is spent checking equipment once again and making sure everyone is well stocked with munitions and supplies. It would be hardly worthwhile to head out only to find you didn't have the food required to make the journey.

About an hour before your due to get to bed, however, a manufactured assistant arrives, carrying over his shoulder a man-sized case. He deposits the thing at your feet and has you sign a paper denoting you the new owner of the device carried within, and as soon as he leaves your entire crew is gathered around in interest. You crack the seals, and a hiss can be heard as the locks release the case opens to reveal the prize within.

The suit contained inside is, decidedly, not what you'd been expecting. The main portion looks rather conveniently like regular combat armor, albeit with a few additional pieces fitted across the right shoulder and along the legs. A set of clothing came with it, a light material that you struggle to find an equivalent for, that goes over the wearer before the armor pieces. A backpack like computer system, complete with power-source, is also similarly covered in the material, along with some pieces of combat armor shaped around it, to provide an almost hump look to the user. This, it seems, is the central nervous system of the stealth capabilities. Similar electronic components, what you'd guess to be the control system is set alongside the computer, and a helmet jammed with various other electronic equipment is similarly placed within the case. You regard it with no small measure of curiosity, and as you place your hands on it, you feel a rush of feelings, emotions, impressions and thoughts. You find yourself incapable of extracting anything useful out of it, at least with only a passing empathic touch, and the actual use of the device eludes you, but you do manage to understand one thing, especially after checking over the receipt handed to you by the aide.

This system is far beyond what you'd expect as a manufactured to receive. Either someone has no idea what it is, or someone else is looking out for you. Of course, that does little to curb the enthusiasm among your fellows.

"What the hell is this?!"

"Easy there, Wash-Out. Wouldn't want you hurting yourself."

"Shut it, Wolf! This thing is clearly not something we should be getting. What the hell did you do to get this thing, Grey?"

"Who cares where he got it from? All that matters is we have it!"

"Wolf? Hive? Someone? I would like to know what I am missing. I am rather large to fit inside the tent."

"Oh! Sorry, Mech. It's uh... well... um... Grey? What is this thing?"

>>>Input Command

yeah explain to the team what it is, and what it does.

we have two ways to go with this. long range leader, or solo super soldier.

leader is we have someone else with the bombs go in and we communicate with them as well as lead threats away from them and tell them when to vanish

super soldier is we go in ourselves. pointing every patrol we can away and going invisible to dodge the ones we can't.

>small beacon, stays in contact with drones
Right, don't break that.

>stuff
Oh, upgrading Mech means no franken-tacarm for Wolf. Didn't think of that. Hive being able to interface wit and spot of the tacarms is nice, though. That's definitely something Grey's senses don't allow us to do directly (unless we get to the point where we can mental-interface as cleanly and with as much bandwidth as the drones and bots are doing).

>Either someone has no idea what it is, or someone else is looking out for you.
Pity empathy can't pick up on which. Problem is, whoever made the actual deployment decisions or orders probably never even touched the suit or even the box. Meaning we have no way to know if this is deliberate.

>what is it?
I requested something to assist with the success of the stealth portion of the mission. This though appears to be... much more than I expected.

Well, it's highly unlikely we'll be allowed to keep this equipment, long term. But in the mean time, the tool was assigned to us, and we have a mission to do. And it's our duty to use the resources we've been trusted with to do the best job we can- mistake or no.

First priority is determining how the thing works, or course. Then we need to decide how to apply it / who uses it. (Obvious choices would be either Grey or TNT. Is it better to have the senses guy stealth and plant the bombs, or to have the bomb guy stealth-ed while guided by the senses guy?).

"I did something very simple. I walked up to an officer and asked for additional personnel and equipment to cover our unit losses, and was offered a choice. The other options were a busted autoturret, authority to go fishing for one unassigned manufactured, and, a loaner tacarm we'd have to give back, so I picked the stealth suit.
"If you want me to speculate further the major seems to be watching me. Apparently I'm the first manufactured psychic to be promoted. Maybe he thought I had a point about being under-strength and wanted to give us something to fill the gap despite the tacarm shortage. It's also possible this was reclaimed from a trueborn that died in the drop, or a reserve spare that he wanted to assign before it got stolen.
"The important questions are who should wear it, what's our route, and what our tactics are. Anybody know who I should ask for maps? I'm pondering landmines and remote-trigger charges for this one, we're really low on personnel. If it's not too hazardous or far out of our way I'd also like to take a return-route that includes some salvage."

Perhaps instead of talking, we should step outside, and show Mech, and see what she thinks of it.

>>557075
Someone gave you Stealth Powerarmor? Huh. Maybe one of your gene-donors is aware of your existence and has a weird sense of humor.

Wash-Out knows it's more than ordinary. His input regarding it would be nice. Making Mech aware and getting her input is also probably good. Steelworks+possibly having run into it with Washout means we could learn a good bit.

"I requested something to assist with the success of the stealth portion of the mission. This though appears to be... much more than I expected."

"I'll say! This thing looks a little like something I've seen before. What did they call it... a Stealth Suit I think."

"... Did I hear that correctly?"

"Mech? You got anything else?"

"I... believe I do. It's a Steelworks creation, jointly with Genetech if I am remembering correctly. They are somewhat able to hide the user from being detected, by a rather large number of detection methods. I... don't recall much more than that, I'm afraid."

"Well, it's highly unlikely we'll be allowed to keep this equipment, long term. But in the mean time, the tool was assigned to us, and we have a mission to do. And it's our duty to use the resources we've been trusted with to do the best job we can- mistake or no. First priority is determining how the thing works, of course. Anyone?"

The silence that greets your question is both expected and very unwelcome. Still, you've got a little bit of an advantage on your side. You've got a Steelworks that seems to love tinkering with things.

"Wolf. Your up. Figure out how to make it work, but don't break it. It does us no good in useless pieces."

"On it, Grey! Oh man, this is gonna be fun!"

You turn away, sure that if Wolf will figure it out in time. Instead, you decide to focus on the next step, and hopefully figure out some things you knew you'd need to plan.

""The important questions are who should wear it, what's our route, and what our tactics are. Anybody know who I should ask for maps? I'm pondering land mines and remote-trigger charges for this one, we're really low on personnel. If it's not too hazardous or far out of our way I'd also like to take a return-route that includes some salvage."

"Already got it covered, Grey... sorta."

Hive pulled a small computer from its place on his hip and tapped at it irritably before depositing it in your hands. What you see before you is a haphazard map, with rough placements of possible enemy defensive positions and the ultimate goal. It was, however, not the best of maps by any stretch of the imagination, and you glance at your newest squadmate. He can answers you with a shrug.

"Most intel is derived from scans from orbit, usually from a satellite sent in before, or failing that, the recon ships as they orbit. Unfortunately, we have neither. From what I could gather asking around, the Kairos Vengeance managed to make it out before getting turned into scrap, but the Paladin bit it. We've got no eyes in the skies, at the moment. All on our lonesome."

"I... see. Well, hopefully, what we do tomorrow can help pave the way for the fleet. We'll have to make do with what we have for now. How'd we get all this?"

"Scouting teams mostly. The Major doesn't like doing anything blind, as far as I can tell. Um... there should be downed craft... here and here. We could easily sidetrack on our way back and search the wreckages. I don't know if we'll find much though. I mean, they have just been sitting there since they went down, you'd think there would have been something."

You consider the newest additions, and find that both are not far off from your possible routes to and from your destination. You try a few things in your mind first before settling on three major routes.

The first was the quickest, but it lead straight through enemy territory. It would take, at most, half a day, if you somehow managed to avoid fighting everything in your path. You counted at least three defensive positions along the route, and you weren't sure you'd be able to slip by them. Still, on the other side, you noted what looked to be a small, hilly area near your destination, and, if you were reading the map right, well within range of the artillery cannon Mech now had. You could easily set up there, and lead anyone attempting to halt the Mech's barrages into an ambush.

The second was a longer route, but bypassed most of the alien defenses. The terrain was what made it rather difficult, but you were sure that you could, given time, easily navigate it. You might run into a few patrols, at most, but nothing you wouldn't be able to handle. The issue was that on the other side, there was little in the way of defensible positions. You be embroiled in constant combat fairly quickly, and it would be a straight exchange of fire.

Of course, there was always a middle ground as well. If you tried, you think you could push through an area that has been marked as extremely difficult for travel. You couldn't hope to estimate the time needed to traverse the area, but if you made it, you'd only have to bypass one defensive emplacement to reach that defendable area you'd spotted.

Whatever route you took, once you'd reached your destination, you were on your own. Scouting teams weren't going to be wasted on alerting the enemy to your intentions after all.

>>>Input Command

What is an enemy defensive emplacement like? I'm tempted to suggest the first option simply because we are a small unit with vastly above-average reconnaissance capabilities here, but I don't know what we'd be committing to sneaking through.

Hrrm...Number 2 I think is out.
We're low on manpower and reliant on Mech to save our kissers from getting killed in a firefight I think. Straight fights are something we should still avoid in my opinion.
Beyond that...I'd say probably 3- I'm confident in this group's ability to path-find, given the mapping and drones, and I don't recall a time-limit on how long we had to get the job done, either. The only issue with it is increasing our chance of detection, but we'll be basically out in the boonies-better chances of staying undetected even if they do search for us.

>>557314
The time-limit is getting better medical facilities available for the wounded, and resupply. I dunno about you, but I'm not keen on having increased casualties on my conscience.

I would love to have a harassment/skirmishing team backing us, what are the odds the mission plan has supporting mission plans to do just that? If not, can we ask?

Huh. Okay, bit of a weird situation here.

Obvious question: which of these terrain hazards will our new teammate and the stealth suit best help us counter?

Seems to me that would probably be the first route. The between your mapping and distracting the enemy, Hive providing backup scouting / mapping when you're occupied putting your mind to other things, and the option of someone in a stealth suit making surgical strikes against the enemy when needed, we're well equipped to try and avoid or circumvent the defenses on route 1.

Problem is we really don't want constant fighting (hard to sneak up on the target if we're killing everything on the way in a strait line). It's also dependent on a lot going right around enemy troops.

Route 2 looks easy to navigate (especially with the mapping and deception) but things get a lot hairy in close. You're committed to planting the bombs and getting out undetected, or else we're going to lose a lot of lives. The squad isn't built for fair, direct fire combat.

Route 3 might work- it all depends on if your abilities would allow you to find a good route the orbital scanners couldn't. (Map the terrain? Empathy to follow routes the animals use?). It's also more of a problem if the tac-arm can't get through, at all.

Another question: you've only thought about approach. After we've blown this place, where would you like to retreat? Which routes look good for that, and does it change if you get out hot or not? (IE, if we had to blow the place with Mech's cannon, or if we successfully plant the bombs and sneak out unnoticed).

Let's look at how what we have relates to the routes.

>No. 1
>straight through enemy territory
We can distract end handle small groups of enemies. However, there is a high chance of quick hostile reinforcements should we be noticed. It's likely we would manage, but the risk of everything going to hell is too high for my tastes.

>No. 2
>trivial defenses, difficult terrain
Sound nice. Given that we have two units who are good at mapping, the way should be no problem.
>constant combat and hard to defend position once we are there
I think it's kind of safe to say this is the suicide option. Two of our units will be tied up with attacking the building and Grey is not much of a fighter.

>No. 3
>Extremely difficult to traverse area
Well, navigation is the speciality of our group now.

I think the third path is the one most suited to our group. The first might be fine as well, but it seems be a bit more risky. The second option goes straight against what we are good at and should not be taken.


>>557329
I think it was made quite clear that we are currently already far beyond the resources we would normally be allowed to use. Another whole squad is completely out of question.

i have to agree with that logic. we are a living sensor array and we have a mechanical sensor backing us up. between the two of us we should be able to find a way through.

"What are chances we have support teams providing distraction? And what are these emplacements looking like?"

"Minimal, if at all. From what I've gathered from other teams, we're all going after installations of one kind or another. Trying to do as much damage as possible to let the fleet come in. As for the defensive positions, we know they have about 30 members in each. Troop compositions and weapon placements, however, would be guesses at best."

"Right. Makes sense, in a way.... What about retreat?"

"Easiest way would be to rig the explosives we set up to blow long after we're gone. Would make leaving as easy as using one of the routes we've already established. If we make a loud exit though... well, the options we have will be more limited, and largely up to what the enemy does. There's a nearby city we can escape into if necessary, but intel on the area is limited. It'll have to be snap decisions from there."

You frown in annoyance. The amount of information you have is, from what you can tell, both a miracle and generally unhelpful. You have the barest scrapings of what you think you'd normally be getting, but you doubt you'll be able to get any more on such short notice.

The third route was looking the most tempting at this point, confident that between you and Hive, you could navigate the area, but still... if there was something that Mech couldn't traverse, you'd be completely out of luck, and stuck to only one plan of attack. Not what you wanted at all. You let the issue tumble around in your head a bit more, even as you turn to you fellows for an entirely separate question.

"Wolf! You got it working yet!"

"Mostly! Sorta..."

"She can get it to work, but she can't use it. It wasn't designed with her implant in mind."

You head outside at this, and find Wolf standing in front of a table, a shimmering form you can only guess is the suit in front of her. She taps at a few things on it's wrist, and you watch the suit flicker back into existence. Another tap of the wrist pad, and the suit suddenly lets out a hiss as steam is expelled from a vent along the back. Wolf looks properly pleased at her progress, before turning to you to get your opinion and give her report.

"I can get it to go invisible, and I activated the thermal dampening. There's a couple of other functions I haven't puzzled out yet, but give me more time, and I'll get it eventually. Still, Mech's right. It doesn't work for me, it doesn't seem to know what to do with my implant. Should work for everyone else though."

"Which leaves the question of who's going to wear it."

"Ah... yeah, that would be something to figure out, wouldn't it?"

>>>Input Command

the only person i can trust to be completely protected via our mapping is our self. so we go.

get some bombs pre-made. want small shaped charges for any sealed doors. and the big bomb that will chunky salsa the generator.

Does the suit conceal gear its wearer is carrying?

I expect there to be limits on that, which limits who we could choose / what they can carry. For instance, Wash-Out doesn't work as an invisible sniper if his rifle sticks out. Hive might also be a poor choice, since his drones would still be visible.

Second question would be for TNT. What does the person planting these explosives need to know?

Because we need to know how much expertise is required in the arming and placement of our demolition rounds. If it requires a high degree of skill or specialization, that means he's going to need the suit, and we'll do what we can to help him with ranged mapping and distraction / communication.

If it doesn't require a lot of specialization, and he can instruct us in what to do, Grey would probably make a better sneak himself, since he wouldn't need to relay the information anywhere. He could map for himself, and distract / third eye when needed. And we'd still have Hive providing eyes for the rest of the group.

Biggest drawback is that puts the person in command in a forward position, away from the group. We'd have to designate a second in command- someone to make quick decisions if they're needed while we're away, or if we don't come back (the squad can't afford what happened before, where they locked up when the chain of command was severed).

I think that we may be overthinking this: Even if we spend a half a day backtracking or sidetracking to get through the dangerous route it's still the quickest and most certain of the three choices. Some extra landmines/claymores to take out pursuit and setting up that pursuit to chase phantoms seems like it's a viable tactic if it turns out we simply can't dodge or sneak past one of them. If the optics are good Hive could send the drones flying up right now to get long range views of the three sites.

As far as the suit goes, the way I figure it we have three main options here: Grey, Wash-Out and TNT: There's little point in giving the suit to Hive because their drones are noisy and visible and they should avoid direct combat or hazard anyway if possible. Who should wear it is then further limited by equipment concerns. We may end up wearing it and playing this one as a RTS.

"Wolf, does this thing conceal gear?"

"Uh... up to a point, I'd guess. The little machines in the suit can cover smaller things, like extra magazines and grenades and a pistol, maybe. Larger things like rifles and the like are not going to work though. Too much for the things to cover. Unless you coated the rifle in the machines I guess. That might work. Wonder if I could-"

"Don't destroy the suit trying. We can figure that out later. TnT?"

"Yeah boss?"

"How much experience does someone need to plant these bombs?"

"Uh... shouldn't need any. You stick it to something, tap the switch and move on. Later, someone flips this little switch here and BOOM! Fireworks."

"I see... I'll be going then. Get everyone prepped. Then get some sleep. We leave tomorrow. I'm gonna stay up a bit, practice with this thing."

There is a chorus of affirmatives, then everyone splits off to do their thing. You stay with Wolf, who helps you into the slightly bulkier stealth suit, and she gives you a quick rundown on what she's figured out so far. The suit can maintain "invisibility" for about a minute straight before it shuts down to let the machines running the show cool down. The same can be done for the thermal dampening functions, although the cool down is much faster, but a bit louder, as it simply vents steam out the back. Both functions, however, are not perfect, and you shouldn't rely on them for perfection. The invisibility granted by the suit is much closer to simply blending in very, very well, and can still be picked out if not careful. The same can be said for the thermal dampening. All of it is triggered by the wrist computer on your left arm.

As the helmet is lowered onto your head and locked into place, images start to appear in front of you. A start-up sequence by the looks of it. The images quickly flash through diagnostics and systems tests, then bring up comms and something called an "Integrated Unit Network". That throws up an error, stating there isn't one to link to, so you ignore it for now. You spend an hour or so getting the feel for the limits of the suit and testing it as best you can before turning in for the night. Tomorrow, it's go time.

-----------------------------

The next morning is a swarm of activity as your crew gets its gear together, suits up and preps to move. Before long, your team has gathered at the edge of the camp, staring off towards your destination. From here on out, you're on your own again. Before you can say anything, however, you get intercepted by another aide from the officers, who hands you a radio.

"That's one of the few long range radios we have. Using it will give away your position, so keep chatter to a minimum, and only call if you need to. Report in when you're sure you're safe."

"Understood."

"Good luck, Sergeant."

The rank catches you somewhat by surprise, but you brush it aside. You should have expected that. You turn to leave again, only to hear your callsign getting shouted, and you barely restrain an exasperated sigh before turning to meet the next person, who turns out to be a disgruntled trueborn woman you know, arriving amongst a swirl of agitated psychic energy.

"Miss Rain."

"I told you to- Forget it! Why didn't you say anything about this?"

"About what, Miss Rain?"

"This mission!"

"It wasn't your concern."

"The hell it was- Dammit! Fine! You come back alive, you understand? I have questions you still haven't answered! And some things I wanted to talk to you about!"

"Understood, Miss Rain. If you'll excuse me."

"Yeah, yeah. Get going."

The trueborn woman leaves in annoyance, but the psychic storm brewing around her from before has calmed somewhat. You leave it at that, not wanting to delve too far into something with not time on your hands. And you finally get your mission underway. The team begins to move out, and the only thing remaining to decide is which path to take and how cautious you are being about it.

>>>Input Command

third path, it has tricky terrain but with both you and hive scanning the place it should be rather easy to find a path. main things to watch out for are loose rock and caves underground.

course, this is because it sounds like it's a canyon. if it's something else really weird then maybe i'll change my mind.

>You stick it to something, tap the switch and move on.
I was wondering if it matter what you stuck it to. Effective demolitions can require a certain understanding of the architecture of a place, and smart placement of the changes.

I suppose we can ask TNT when we see the place if he has any suggestions as to where the bombs should be placed. If not, we'll use our mapping to try and place them where it's structurally critical.

If Grey's rifle won't be covered by the stealth suit, he should hand it off to one of the others when he goes to do sneaking stuff.

>Invisibility not perfect
Hopefully we can use distract to compensate for that.

>where go
Generally consensus before was leaning towards the third path. I guess I don't really see a reason to change that. Grey and Hive are going to have to work together to find a navigable path, though.

>>558289
we aren't doing demolition, we are blowing up a specific machine.

I reiterate my (previously outvoted) support for taking the direct path, for the previously given reasons.

>>558301
Well, it's a cannon designed to shoot ships out of orbit. That's fairly large artillery- I'm assuming it's more the size of a building, and it may have additional housing to harden it from the elements and enemy fire. I figure that's large enough that a poor placement of charges could result in repairable damage instead of permanently wrecking the installation.

Although there's the added problem of how hardened the future building materials are, or how high yield our explosives are. ...problem might be moot if depending on what it uses for ammunition or a power source, and if we can place the charge there.

>>558308
>Although there's the added problem of how hardened the future building materials are, or how high yield our explosives are.

I'd expect there are generally two doctrines for deployment for AA: Mass and disposable, or hardened and resistant to return fire. Judging by the fact that this is defended from our advance by ground-based defenses and distance it seems likely to be hardened against return fire and probably defended against conventional attack. I'm hypothesizing that we're going to need the artillery fire just to deal with exterior defenses and to distract/attract the defenders in order to set charges somewhere effective.
That's why I imagine we need the most advantageous approach to the final assault possible. If we have some intel on that however....

You direct your team down the third path, hoping to avoid most of the enemy emplacements. The first few hours of travel are relatively easy, making good time across flat ground. Then you hit the rocky terrain and narrow pathways of a more mountainous region, complete with unstable rocks, and you begin having to guide your team through carefully. Mech has particular trouble with it, her TacArm having to go rather slowly to pick its way up the trails, but she manages, especially with Hive guiding her almost exclusively, leaving you free to lead the way. Another hour is spent just climbing, but you soon reach the top, and you begin making your way down the other side. About halfway down, Wash-Out spots the distant emplacements of the enemy. And you find that you can just barely make them out on the horizon. Another hours is spent picking your way down, and then the team is on the move across easy terrain once again. You've bypassed most of the enemy emplacements, and only one lies in your pathway. Thankfully, however, your team is overly prepared for bypassing something like this, and with a few well placed distractions you make it past them without any issues.

You eventually reach your destination, a small hilly area that gives you a good place to launch the artillery cannon from, as well as reasonably defensive. You let your team take a break as you eye the cannon in front of you. The base of the structure is massive, likely containing the more sensitive devices. The barrel of the cannon itself, however, is long and thin. You can only guess that it fires some form of plasma, and from what happened as you were dropping, you would guess it hurls large balls of the stuff. Regardless, you observe what you think is an entryway, and Wash-Out quickly confirms this, looking a bit unhappy.

"Hey, Grey?"

"Yeah?"

"The entryway there. It only opens up when one of the aliens goes through."

"That... could be a problem."

"Could be. I'm sure you could still get through it if you wanted to. Unfortunately, we don't really have too many better options here. There's what looks like an exhaust port too, although I can't really tell from here. Stuff comes out of it every minute or so, though. It's got to lead somewhere."

"You'd suggest I go down an exhaust port?"

"I'm not suggesting anything, Sergeant. I'm just laying the only other options I see."

"Alright. Well, I'll keep it in mind. TnT! What do you have for me?"

"I have three packages for you. You set them on things you think will cause some damage, and I'll handle the rest when you get back. Setting is easy. Got an adhesive sticker on the back of each, place it, then tap the button there and it'll arm."

"Understood. Any targets you think I should hit?"

"A generator is usually a good idea, but on things like that, I'd assume it's heavily guarded. Same for wherever they're keeping munitions, if there is any, and the command post. Otherwise, you're going to have to settle for structural damage. Go for whatever is keeping the rest of it standing."

"Alright. Thanks. Mech, Hive! You two ready?"

"Ready as we're going to be. Once Mech deploys the artillery cannon, she's a sitting duck. I'll be the same, once I start zeroing her in on targets. It'll be up to everyone else to keep us covered."

"Yeah, that's what they're here for. You got anything you think will cause a stir?"

"Well... I was thinking we might try bombarding that emplacement behind us. It would make getting out a little easier. Mech here would have to turn around though, and that means you'll get no fire support of any kind in case something goes wrong. At least, not until she turns back around. Otherwise, we can just start causing damage when things go crazy."

"Alright. I'll keep that in mind... Everyone! Check your gear one last time! I don't want any surprises!"

The whole crew goes through a final check of their equipment, and Wolf goes over your's as well, double checking the stealth suit's systems and computers. It takes a few minutes, and you find it oddly disconcerting to watch your hands disappear in front of your eyes, then simply reappear. Still, Wolf gives the ok, and goes over the system restrictions one last time. The suit works, at most, for a few minutes, so you'll have to find places to hide so that suit can "cooldown". It'll hide you from thermal and eyesight, but not anything else, although that shouldn't be an issue. You also can't move very quickly, a mild walk at best, maybe, otherwise the suit auto-disengages to save itself the computing power. Otherwise, you are ready to go.

You take a moment before setting out yourself, glancing at all the members of your team as they begin to build makeshift fortifications in case the worst happens. Was there anything else you needed to do before starting out on your own part of this mission?

>>>Input Command

i don't think so.
put up a list of all powers we have so we have a quick reference.

once we get closer we need to confirm how the door works. is it a detector or does it have a pad? if it's a pad we may be able to empathy the combination off of it. if it's a tracker we may be able to hide next to the door and slip inside with someone, if they move through the door regularly enough, do not want to risk waiting too long. if those both fail then we go for the exhaust.

First consideration: what's the time on these bombs set to? We want to know how long we have after we set them.

Second consideration: chain of command. We don't want these guys locking up if something happens and you're not here, or if you don't make it back. Meaning we should give them some standing orders, and probably put someone in charge (Geeze, who's suited for that).

(Remember, the best case outcome is we plant the bombs and get gone before anyone notices, and we're well away when the fireworks start. Fire support or blowing up the group behind us only happens if we're discovered, or we don't think we can get out or complete the mission without being discovered).

We'll pick which point of entry looks better when we get closer. Mapping lets us see through walls, after all. We'll be able to see what's on the other side of each, and what paths to possible targets there are.

>>560269
bombs are remote det.

If we're willing to make sure we take out the higher priority targets, I suppose there is also the option of using a bomb to open an entrance and use the stealth suit to get through. Not sure I trust two(or three really) charges to take out structural supports of an important military emplacement with Grey's probably less than stellar understanding of architecture.

>>560269
>probably put someone in charge (Geeze, who's suited for that)

Mech or Washout. Probably Washout, being genetech.

>>560286
unless we can use empathy to ASK the building where the most important places are.

Hindsight being 20:20, sneaking Grey through that unavoidable enemy camp and leaving a single bomb in a vulnerable position would have made for an excellent trial run of the suit and helped with opening a way to retreat. Oh well.

What we REALLY want to hit is Fire Control. Taking out a generator knocks out the cannon until they can rig another or repair it. Taking out Fire Control leaves them with a functioning cannon that can't hit shit. After that, you want to damage the barrel itself. At surface-to-orbit ranges, even minor damage will make boresight aiming worthless. Once you have mined those two, then we can hunt around for a generator or other power equipment if there's spare time and the suit is working well.

>>560299
another thing would be... what TURNS the gun? completely static emplacement blow up a giant gear and they have to IMPORT a new one.

>>560302
>what TURNS the gun?

If it's plasma it might not need to turn: Possibly they just kick a different spin or angle on the plasma electromagnetically or using lasers as it exits the barrel, which makes sense to me since electromagnetism and laser are likely candidates for what accelerates, heats and/or contains it before it's shooting off in the first place. This does however suggest that dropping a couple mortar rounds into the barrel itself could do some disabling damage.
Structural damage seems like a no-go unless we get inside and find load-bearing main supports. It's probably hardened against spaceship-scale return fire, so I wouldn't bother with external structural damage. Anything as critical as a vent is probably designed with redundancy and fault clearing/tolerance as well, damn.

It looks like we need to walk in the front door and have fun with field-expedient use of empathy and distraction powers. It would be nice if we could set a charge on it and some remote/timer activated mines for when we leave.