Bright plumes of superheated air flare up out of the hole in which 'Masque has taken cover, the cooling systems of the P-beams barely able to keep up with the constant fire as volley after volley of subatomic destruction hurtles downrange into the enemy advance, sporadic return fire flashing from his armoured body, prompting a battle cry of "Za Rodina!" as threat icon after threat icon flashes in his vision.

 With 'Harmons help energy weapons simple disspate upon contact, something that brings a hearty, "Maybe magic is having some use, thanks!" from the 'Borg before a stuttering volley of railgun fire walks over his entrenchement and spangs noisily from his armour, pumelling his head and shoulders, just in time to drive him into cover from the oncoming missle as shrapnel and flame envelop his position.

 As for the creeps... well, 'Masque has known for several days that 'Arven is a pretty deadly gunman - and in turn that he himself is a pretty deadly 'Borg. As long as they're on the same side he's not minded to make an issue of the matter, but it's still a hellishly impressive display of concentrated firepower that the shocktrooper himself would be hard pressed to match.

 But match he must, or at least make the effort - choosing to spread his fire across the front rather than concentrate and kill, hoping to force the enemy into taking cover instead of advancing, trying to buy Mithas the time he needs to pull 'Fearless into shelter, "Bullman, get over here!"

   Lotus doesn't bother ducking for cover after firing her first shot from the flame thrower, instead preferring to remain visible and attract as much attention as possible.  She continues to parry and reflect the weaponsfire back to their sources and she turns her gaze towards Mithas and Fearless struggling to escape death.  She wills her not insubstantial mental powers to help by telekinetically pulling them forward.  She doesn't have the strength to lift them all the way, but by applying a force of over two hundred pounds, she can certainly make the crawl across the ground a lot easier.  If she can, she will try to direct them right into the hole from which Zephram appeared as that is likely the best place to take cover in the vicinity.
   Lotus does not stop reflecting the weapons of her enemy, hoping they don't "get a clue" and stop shooting at her.

_"Bernie..." Calliandra says softly as her 'bot falls.  The girl's shoulders droop for a moment, and a soft sigh can be heard through over the radio before she moves down the defenders' line to the left, towards the oncoming Terror Troopers.  When closer, she throws herself to the ground behind the best cover available and seems to tune out the surrounding battle.

Mithas can feel that Fearless is getting weaker and weaker.  Bits of ground are "popping" around the two of them as they crawl their way back to cover.  Mithas feels a few pings in his back as he continues towards the group and he wonders how much longer this spell is going to work....

Suddenly his upper body hits the ground as his right arm gives way from weakness.  He pushes himself up, grabs Fearless by the collar again, and begins to crawl forward again.  He and Fearless are now getting closer to Pluto company and can hear some of the commands being yelled about.  Mithas tries his best to keep Fearless from taking any more shots, and knows that when needed, he will cast his last armor spell and hope he can make it back to cover..... when within a REASONABLE distance and being cover by the group, Mithas will take Fearless over his shoulder, and run deeper into the forest to find cover and anyone who may have some medical supplies or even bandaids or gauze to stop the bleeding.
This message was last edited by the GM at 03:23, Fri 08 Sept 2006.

The Coalition troops keep coming, stepping over the fallen ones, or crouching down and using them as cover. Gunfire is exchanged, many more are hit and killed. A grenade goes off among Sharp, and Anniyan - sending them both to the ground. Obidiah charges into battle alongside Scope, and takes the grunts hand to hand - The massive Golem ignoring the incoming shots, and the juicer dodging nearly all of them. Soldiers are dropped and begin to clear away from Obidiah. As he advances, they fall back - continuing to pummel him with their laser rifles and rail guns.

Mithas pulls, as hard as he can, and Fearless slips out of conciousness. Mithas is pulling the full weight of both men now...

The Terror Troopers come closer, each armed with rail guns as big as a man. The entire left flank of Pluto Company falls under fire as the Power Armours trample over trees and press on. Arven becomes target number one for these metal behemoths as he has proven he can drop one in under 5 seconds. The Rahu Man will be forced to take cover...

Braga shows himself, he is crawling backwards taking fewer called shots, as opposed to firing wildly while moving backwards. Over him Silvermasque belts out shot after shot - spraying the front lines as the troops move around the fire/explosion left form Sharp's bike.

Lotus stands her ground, with all the chaos exploding around her. She manages to avoid being hit, and deflects the majority of the incoming shots back to their sources. She has caused a great deal of confusion among the Coalition ranks, as dozens stop advancement to take cover - much to the disagreement of their officers who are seen animating several orders over their radios.

Hulan is struck with a mini-missile from one of the borgs. She is knocked back slightly and it is obvious her magic field has dropped. She ducks for cover, and begins casting another spell, when she is hit in the neck. She falls to her back, grabbing the wound as blood literaly shoots out. She can only gurgle as her life is quickly slipping away.

Mithas can feel his armour getting weaker, the chances of him reaching the rest of his platoon are dwindling.

Lieutenant Xion holds the line, firing, and reloading. Watching in horor as his men hit the ground. With the Major down, it will likely be up to him to get everybody out of here... or will he go down in history as keeping everyone here to die... Xion watches two of his shots pierce the faceplate on one of the CS officers - looked like a Lieutenant...

From above several SAMAS have made their way through the forest canopy and are approaching the ground around Pluto Company. Explosions and rail gun rounds litter the area...

A bright light which could be mistaken for heaven absorbs all the explosions, blinding the entire company.

Behind the platoon Lady Marlene, and a man - unknown to the mercenaries, but famous to the Tolkeenites - Malik Savant - the youngest member of the Circle of Twelve - both appear from the source of the light. The entire area is almost immediately filled with mysitcal smoke and rolling winds. The SAMAS pilots manage to waste a few seconds re-adjusting.

One of the Terror Troopers has made it almost to the group, when it stops, and turns to face his fellow troopers. The Power Armour opens fire on his own men! Unloading everything it has, before falling under fire itself. Two of the other Terror Troopers are stuck wrestling with men of Earth, as Zephram's Elementals stall them a little bit longer.

Marlene casts her spell around several platoon members and they are teleported to safety. Mithas worries he will be left behind, jsut as he takes a shot in the back of the head, and his armour drops. He feels an unkown force pulling him along the ground as he crawls, it trips him up at first, but he adjusts. He is within 10 feet, and stands with the orc over his shoulder, Silvermasque reaches out with his extendable tentacles and pulls the two men closer.

Obidiah, the two juicers and Sharp fall back to the platoon. Gunfire exploding all around them as they race for safety.
Malik Savant casts his teleport spell, transporting the rest to the safety of Tolkeen.

OOC - Those too heavy, or too dedicated to teleport away may still post in this thread - everybody else is in Tolkeen. Feel free to deside whether you are to dedicated or not in the OOC thread. Then post here. Silvermasque - I suspect you are still here... Obidiah? Harmon mentioned he may stay behind. Lotus suggested she had another means of escape. AnNd Xion said he may stay...

Obidiah falls back to the original line but stops short standing resolute in the face of the enemy. His swing his lightblade like a golem possessed. It looks as if he intends to make his final stand but then it would be the second for the day and the third since Harmon met the man trapped inside the magic steel body. Obidiah attacks mostly grunts trying to decapitate them with his mystic sword. He is trying to give Silvermasque and any others who were too heavy to teleport some time to escape should they want to.
This message was last edited by the GM at 05:12, Fri 08 Sept 2006.

When the bulk of the Terror Troopers turned on him Arven dove for cover popping up and shooting then diving again. When the "cavalry" arrived he popped back up and was pouring the fire out again until he was suddenly teleported out...

Harmon struggles to pick himself up from where the impact of the rail gun blast had thrown him to the ground. The scene is chaos and getting worse from there. He can feel death all around him, and any moment a missile is going to explode at his feet.

When the light flashes and the mages arrive, he is discharging his rifle desperately at any soft targets that present themselves. His first thought is for Callie, and he starts to run to her in his awkward waddling way. Seeing Bernie downed, he scans for his red-headed friend and catches a glimpse of her whole and seemingly healthy.

She can leave the bot and get to safety now, he thinks with relief. His next priority is the tiger. He had promised the fellow merc a way out, and it was up to him to deliver. Damn you CS bastards. My time hasn't come yet! he calls out defiantly amongst the shouts of the field.

Shouldering his rifle, he pulls out a shotgun in each hand and fights his way towards the big cat with fireballs and booming blasts just as the others are starting to teleport away. To late for me.... be safe everybody.

Come on Cat, we gotta roll. He holsters the weapons and grabs the cat around the waist casting his invisibility spell. Make for the portal, he says as they fade from sight. A doorway flashes into existence. It lies flat on the ground next to them. Looking down "through" the portal, the two can see a scene from the beyond the forest, some six hundred feet away. Though not far, it is beyond the immediate circle of troops.

Let's GO!

Quinn watches the others teleport away, and casts his own teleport spell - safely returning him alongside the others in Tolkeen.

The other borg in the group, covered with as many burn and scuff marks as the tiger, bolts to Harmon's position.

"I am gonna need to use this floor door as well fat man!"

   Lotus screams out at her comrades who have yet to notice Harmon's gateway spell, primaily Obidiah who seems intent upon sacrificing himself.  She will take a stance at the edge of the gateway, continuing to deflect any blasts from the Coalition troops as she attempts to mark the spot on the forest floor - it would likely be difficult to spot from very far away through the underbrush.
   Lotus will call out to Silvermasque as well, but he is much closer and likely is aware of the portal already.  If Obidah refuses to listen, Lotus will drop herself through the portal before any CS troops get within range to enter hand-to-hand combat.  She is not too concerned if one or two manage to get themselves into the portal as well, as they would be divided from the main group and likely an easy target on the other side.

Obidiah will be one of the last to enter the portal but he will if he is able.

 And then it's time to Odie, as his old girlfriend Disharmony would say, bless her psychotic little steel heart, Mithas fading out of existance in front of him and freeing him of the last restraint that kept him by the foxhole, the barrage of P-beam fire ceasing as steam pours from the cooling vents on his arms, two of his hands suddenly darting for the double-row of grenades on his harness and triggering a pair of smoke charges, lobbing them overarm into the field and following with two more, covering his own retreat and hopefully Obidiah's too.

 It's not invisibility, but it's the next best thing... As Harmon dives into the foxhole and tries (with exceedingly limited success) to wrap his arms around a more than five foot wide waist, only to see a massive cyber-armoured arm wrap about him in support.

 "Let us go!" he declares in agreement, barrelling up out of the hole at terrifying speed, motioning for Heinrikk to accompany them at whatever speed he can manage, giving up on weapons fire in favour of escape at the best rate of knots he can manage - and that's high indeed.

Harmon nearly jumps when the cybered arm encircles him, but he is quickly glad of it as the tiger bursts out of the hole. He finds the high speed disconcerting, given his current position as an over-sized saddle-bag.

He tries to direct the borg, but the vice-like grip around his waist combined with the bounces of bumps of the terrain choke off most of his words. All he grunts out is ...'member... in-v-ble... don't... shoot the final word coming out in whoosh as the borg squeezes more air from his lungs.

 Hitting the mostly flat ground outside his crater, 'Masque catches the hinting words of Harmon and swears a short blue streak of Russian before putting down his head and wrapping another couple of arms about the large mage before accelerating once more...

 And it's probably for the best that he's treating Harmon like an oversized Rugby ball as each thirty-foot and more bounding stride hurls better than two tonnes of 'Borg and man through the air at well over a hundred miles an hour, looking to match any reasonable pace Heinrikk develops, the smoke whipping out of the four grenades flooding the visual and I.R. spectrums with vast swathes of blank cover.

 It's not a gentle ride, but /damn'/ is it a speedy one.

Silvermasque, Harmon, Obidiah and Heinrikk appear on the other side of the mystic portal. They are about 250 feet out of the forest... The giant tiger and the fat man racing away invisibly - trying to get to Tolkeen. Heinrikk and Obidiah simply racing non-invisibly... although fast... SAMAS are faster.

Several of the patrolling armours around the forest have taken notice of Heinrikk and Obidiah, and broken patrol to come after them. It is likely more are on their way...

Cluipping along at 30mph in an open field Obidiah is a prime target for the Samas and any other CS air forces. When the fast moving power armors start to converge on their position Obidiah sends out a teleptahic message to Heinrikk the borg. "Prepare yourself for flight." The huge golem still running full speed suddenly dissapates into swirling mist. To the Samas it will seem he has just disappeared. Heinrikk is left running under his own power, as the spell Obidiah had in mind is not quite powerful enough.
This message was last edited by the GM at 23:42, Sat 09 Sept 2006.

Heinrikk, although fast... is not faster than the Coalition Air Force. As Silvermasque and Harmon "gallop" away - and Obidiah has his own methid of escape, Heinrikk realizes if he continues the run, the SAMAS will cut him down.

Heinrikk slows his pace to a jog, saying over the radio:

"Good luck guys. Mine just ran out."

The borg turns to face the incoming SAMAS armours, throws down his rifle, and raises his arms to his head. He drops to his knees and is obviosuly surrendering. The Coalition have been known to be slightly more merciful with mercenaries...

The SAMAS armours will be on him within seconds.

   Lotus appears through the portal just before Obidiah and stands there a moment as everyone starts running off.  She wonders about the love lost between the order of the Mystic Knight and any other warrior on the battlefield.  That she should waste her energies dragging the cow and orc to safety to be abandoned like this has Lotus' mind drifting towards revenge.  Anger first, has always been a standard policy for her.  She hears the jets of the SAMAS nearby and decides it might be time to leave...
   Lotus vanishes, slipping between the layers of time and rocketting herself over the ground at the speed of a juicer.  She recasts the spell as she runs, maintaining the effect and moving farther and farther while remaining concealed.  She passes the frozen figure of Heinrikk and notices he has turned to face the oncoming horde of Coalition metal.  There is no hesitation as she leaves the borg to his fate.  Lotus doesn't see the wind-borne Obidiah directly, but spots the cloud of mystic energy from his magic holding motionless in the air.  Shortly after, she spots Silvermasque mid-leap with the portly line walker tucked under one arm.  The feline borg hangs there in mid-air as Lotus speeds past and continues forward, stopping for no one.
   When time resumes its normal forward movement, there is no trace of Lotus but a thin cloud of dust in her tracks.

 "Good luck Heinrikk!" he calls over the radio, plainly meaning it - but once through the portal it's time for business. 'Masque adjusts Harmon's position - moving him (Assuming he doesn't protest) into a cradled position with all four arms doing their best to support and shield the overweight mage as he /really/ puts his head down and accelerates...

 In the clear ground beyond the forest he moves into longer, more powerful strides, massive hydraulics lending yet more speed and distance to every bound as he heads unerringly away from the battle, determined to make the very best use of the invisibility Harmon has provided to increase their distance - and then the cyberjet nodes kick in, and every leap covers a hundred feet and more as the pace opens up to something just under three hundred miles an hour, hopefully leaving the SAMAS cordon far behind - and almost certainly catching up with the Mystic Knight before very long has passed at all...

 She could probably do with a lift.

Lotus finds herself running most of the way home. Silvermasque (and Harmon) catch up to her in no time.

Obidiah not too far behind...

4 SAMAS land around Heinrikk, approaching slowly - keeping their rail guns trained on him. He is being stripped of weapons, and forced to the ground. The Power Armours gather around him, and he is out of site. They are likely subduing him for his trip to a prison camp.

 When the time comes, 'Masque happily slows his pace dramatically to stay with Lotus, offering her a ride only if he should happen to spot SAMAS or Skycycles moving on their tails, otherwise being quite happy to pound along at whatever pace a Mystic Knight can develop - which presumably will allow the tireless Obidiah to catch up in due course.

Within a few hours Silvermasque is within decent radio range to call Tolkeen. Shortly thereafter a troop transport arrives to lift them all back to Tolkeen.

    When the white tiger borg catches up with her, Lotus is running at a speed of about thirty miles per hour.  No where near as fast as Silvermasque.  "If you've got room for one more, I could use the lift.  Drop me at a ley line and I can phase my way up to Tolkeen if its too much weight.  I imagine Harmon could do the same."
   If hitching a ride on the borg, she would prefer to cling onto his back, rather than be carried like a football.  She'll ensure all her weapons and equipment are strapped on tightly and then wrap her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck.

 "Is no problem... always happy to give pretty lady a ride on my big tiger, yes?" calls out 'Masque, happily slowing to around thirty or forty miles an hour to scoop her up and let both her and Harmon find more comfortable places to drape themselves on his frame, able to bend his arms rather further than an equivalent biological to keep them both good and stable - and even willing to adjust his webbing to let them clip themselves on.

 That done, it's back up to a comfortable couple of hundred once more until at last he gets within radio range to call for help... but up until then the two passengers are cheerfully regaled with tales of derring-do the world over, from his deadly adventures in the Russias to some extremely improbable claims to fame in this border conflict or that regional flare-up. All in that atrocious accent.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:33, Mon 11 Sept 2006.