Emerald tail-swishes as she strokes her chin in thought. "...nope. I'm all set. But thanks, Joe. Unless you have a good, relaxing story that will help us sleep better."

Ghost stories, while still popular, tend to keep people up. And tonight's goal is to sleep.

Raichel is doing the same as her dad. When Emerald mentions good stories, Raichel gets excited. "Daddy! Tell them about that one mission you did with Sean! The one where you used the bad guys' weapons against them!" her tail wags excitedly as her ears perk up.

Mittens gets in a karate pose to face this new threat!  "You just picked a fight with the wrong..!  Wait.  You sure are wobbly, aren't ya?  Oh.  It's Pierson.  Speak of the devil.  How much you wunna bet Spaceman Sam's gunna complain that Pierson scrapped this bot beyond salvaging?"

Mittens scoops up a snowball and winds up just to say she got a shot in.

---

"That hardly seems like a relaxing story," Philip answers, "I was thinking of maybe some nice poetry."

  "The only bedtime story I remember offhand is 'Go The *censored* To Sleep'.  So, while originally written as a desperate plea for their children to go to bed on time for once, I don't think it serves our purposes here."

  When Phillip makes the poerty suggestion, he says after a moment "I guess that could work?"   Bad poetry would make you fall asleep faster right?  Would Joe have to put on a black beret and finger snap instead of clap?

After finding out he'll be bunking with Joe, Valin spends enough time making sure their tent and where it is positioned is large enough for them both to fit into it, even if he does have to be careful about stretching and remaining hunched over while inside the tent. Valin is concerned about ending up with his feet sticking out of the tent since he doesn't like the idea of frostbitten toes.

In response to Joe's question about if there is anything else to take care of, Valin asks, "Who will be taking which watch during the night? Since it would be bad if we are all asleep and a robot patrol stumbles across us without any warning."

Valin isn't concerned whether poetry or stories are discussed, as truth be told, he just wants to know he'll be able to sleep without having to worry about waking up with a SWATBot in his face.

Samuel starts laughing at everyone's reaction, which sounds rather demented and strange with the SWATBot's voice modulator working. At least until Pierson jumps at him as Samuel stops laughing as he says, "Hold on nowwww..." As Samuel doesn't want to risk an accidental weapons fire from the integrated blaster in the SWATBot suit's arm, Samuel tries to redirect Pierson by using his other arm to try to keep Pierson from slamming into him. However his sudden twisting and turning causes Samuel to loose his balance before Pierson reaches him, as Samuel falls onto his back almost spread eagle, causing Pierson to either safely hurdle over him and land somewhere else, or possibly grab onto Samuel's flailing arm and possibly ending up smacking, possibly headfirst if he isn't careful, into the snow covered ground due to being dragged down by the weight of both Samuel and his SWATBot suit if Pierson chooses to cling to Samuel's arm as Samuel falls over.

In response to Mitten's statement Samuel replies, forgetting to turn off the SWATBot voice modulation, "Quite a bit actually, since it took me a while to get this suit working and I wouldn't like having it ruined on its first field test. But I will admit your reactions were hilarious! And so worth falling over for."

Just then the snowball goes 'splat' against Samuel's helmet and Samuel says, "Okay Mittens, let's see how much do you like having snow land on your head?! And Pierson, please stop throwing yourself at me, I'm married and not interested in you." and from his prone position on his back, Samuel sees a large branch above Mittens that is laden with snow. Fortunately Samuel used the arm that didn't have the integrated energy gun in it to try and keep Pierson off him and Samuel quickly aims the arm mounted SWATBot blaster at the branch and fires it at a low setting to impact the branch enough to knock the snow off of it, but not do any permanent damage to the branch... resulting in several pounds of snow from the tree falling ontop of Mitten's current position, that is if Mittens doesn't quickly move out of the way.

_{[OOC: Not sure if Pierson wants to try to grab onto Samuel's arm or not as Samuel is falling. It is the only body part Pierson would be able to reach due to the length of Samuel's arm compared to the length of Pierson's arms. Also Mittens if she isn't too surprised, distracted, or busy gloating about nailing 'the SWATBot' in the head, has enough time to easily jump or dive out of the path of the falling snow. At worst, Mittens could end up with a 'snow Santa Claus' moment if the snow sticks to her fur/clothing, but it isn't enough snow to hurt her other than possibly striking a blow to her ego that she just got snow dropped on her from a tree branch by what looks like a SWATBot.]}

Maverick had been completely quiet up till now (unless people tried conversing with him). "I'll take first watch. I usually stay up late anyway."

Emerald hrms, examining Maverick, then says, "We should stay up in pairs. Anyone besides me want to take first watch with him?"

Pierson didn't hold on when he saw the bot toppling as making the bot fall was the goal of his first attack. He lands on his feet and faces Sam. When Sam shows he is not a real SWAT and makes his comment about throwing one's self at Sam, Pierson calms down, cracks a smile, and straightens out. "Very convincing." Pierson comments.

Shelly pops out. "Sam?" she says quietly when the bot says how worth it spooking the group was. She smiles brightly, trots up to him, and giggles. Sam would notice the seabear is glowing, but the glow dims back to nothing as Shelly gets up to him. "Great prank! But even better craftsmanship! I was *convinced*! And from the looks of it, so was everyone else!" Yes, Shelly is an admirer of pranks, being a prankster herself. Not that she's had time to go out of her way to cause one lately.

Mai Ling quietly puts away her mini chemistry set and walks over to the bunch. "Indeed. It is very convincing." she isn't smiling though. Unlike Shelly, Mai Ling doesn't appreciate pranks. "But that was dangerous. What if we hurt you? Or if you hurt us?"

  "I gues both of us could deal with last watch for less tent shenanigans through the night Valin."  First watch seeming to be spoken for already as it was.

  "Remember, if it's the usual Swats they will loudly demand we surrender giving us time to wake up.  If it's the Genre Savvy model they will quietly kill us all in our sleep."  Fortunately, most of the NPC extras had a decent fan base so that lowered the odds of smart SWAT leaving only the player characters alive or uncaptured to escape.

OOC Style: A-Swat's latest plan.  Fly airhorns over the forest at regular intervals during the night.  Annoy the Freedom Fighters to death.

One doesn't live in Mobius for long without developing the reflex to hit the deck at the sound of laser fire.  Given the risky life Mittens has lived, all it took was for the Swatbot to begin to point it's arm in her direction for her to drop down...  and get buried in a pile of snow.  She pokes her head back up with the classic comical cartoon gag of snow sticking to her face like a beard, and blink-blinks.

"Wouldn't have figured you for a prankster, Spaceman Sam," she comments, shaking the snow off, "Nice job with the Swat Suit!"
She gets to unburying the sled.

Philip has never heard the term Genre Savvy and assumes Joe is talking about some advanced new stealthy killbot he hasn't heard of.

"I'd stay up anyway," Phillip suggests, "I tend to be a night owl."

If he gets any sleep at all now that he's thinking about some stealthy bot murdering his girl while he sleeps, it will be a miracle.

Samuel stands up and chuckles as he says, "Well it looks like this test has been a success if I was able to fool everyone into thinking I was a SWATBot and not just wearing a suit." Samuel then notices Mitten's face as she pops her head up after diving into the snow and starts laughing as he listens to Mai Ling's concerned question and laughs even harder as he can't even think of a way in which someone walking up to a group and waving ones arms around being silly can result in said group getting hurt, barring the group doing something stupid to itself like running into a tree branch, "Well it isn't like I could hurt anyone by waving my arms around when I'm out of arm's reach, and I'm not crazy enough to aim the blaster in this suit's arm directly at anyone so how could I hurt anyone. There was more of a risk of you all somehow hurting me or something going wrong with the suit. Although with this suit, I think you'd have to do more than fling snowballs at me to hurt me."

Samuel finally gets the laughter out of his system as he says, "With how much I've been keeping myself busy with repairs to the shuttle, maintaining my equipment, and making this suit... I really haven't had any time to actually do anything fun...and frankly I was starting to go a bit stir crazy. It isn't like the concept of going on a mission to pull a prank on Robotnik's goons would be productive, safe, or even satisfying. Most of them aren't even able to realize a prank has been pulled on them. All they would do is start trying to find whoever is in the area and deal with them harshly."

Valin nods to Joe and says, "Last works sounds okay with me, Joe. But wouldn't the Genre Savvy version just quietly stun us all and  then have us all restrained before dragging us off to a roboticizer. Knowing Robotnik, he'd then have them wait till we were just regaining consciousness up to roboticize us. After all Robotnik is a psycho and he'd want to watch people being roboticized. And unless they have perfected the Zombiebot, they don't really have a use for a dead Mobian." Valin grins slightly as he doesn't mind waking up early in the morning, it's the middle of the night shifts he doesn't like as much for the reason Joe pointed out as he doesn't want to have to deal with getting comfortable in the tent twice in once night.

Emerald says, "Or the positive version: If it's genre savvy, it will give up, knowing we are the heroes of the story and thus we can't lose and its whole existence is to make us look good when we beat it. Besides... I have sharp ears and will be watching for movement." Emerald can not break the 4th wall, but she knows what Joe is talking about. She doesn't believe any story would revolve around herself (Maybe Joe or Katy... or Samuel), but IF a story did, they would still be the heroes of the story since everything else is the villain.

She most CERTAINLY doesn't believe this is a children's cartoon. XD

Emerald looks at Phil. "Alright then. If you would have stayed up anyway, I'll go ahead and take the mid-shift. See you in four hours." and she heads for bed.
This message was last edited by the player at 19:33, Sat 24 Sept 2011.

Raichel says, "Guess I'll be taking mid watch too then. G'night, dad. G'night everyone."

Meanwhile, Maverick takes a position and sits there, looking like a sentinel.

Shelly says, "Don't be such a worry-wart, Mai-Ling." then looks at Sam. "Don't blame *anyone* for going stir crazy. So, wanna tag along for our trip to Channelwood?"

Pierson doesn't comment, though he goes to help Mittens un-bury the sled.

Mai-Ling goes to aid in that as well, having little else to do or add.

  "Well, after you Valin.  I think I just might have an easier time closing the tent than you."  He could also be wrong there, but whatever.  At least we got a line of dialogue out of a 'So Joe went to go sleep till later' post.

OOC Style: Speaking of Genre Savvy Swats, the A-Swat 'applications' were made way back in August 2007.  And the last things ever said about it were in Feb 2008.  I've given up on them though, even if they got properly made I've lost my enthusiasm for them.
This message was last edited by the player at 22:54, Sat 24 Sept 2011.

"G'nite," Phil answers.

Great thing about having the silent types take first shift: they don't keep you awake with chatter.  He listens and watches quietly while the others turn in for the night.

OOC: Indeed.

"Good to see you're not all business and no fun, Spaceman Sam," Mittens says with a grin, "Happy to have you along.  Curious how the Channelwood folk will react.  Though you might wunna remove the helmet so they know it's a person approaching.  Don't wunna cause a panic, do we?  Remember they have a big guy of their own, and he could do you some serious harm with a thrown rock."

Valin nods to Joe and hunches over before getting into the tent, and manages to fit into the tent as he mutters, _{"Now I know how  a sardine feels,"} as he misses his larger hut and its comfortable bed already.

Samuel ponders Shelly's offer for a moment as he stands up saying, "Okay let me pick up my cloak and pouch since I left them not far from here. After all I had to wear something to not alarm people while I was coming up here."

Samuel then walks as fast as he safely can in the suit back to where he dropped the hooded cloak and pouch that he had previously worn and hidden the helmet in and retrieves them both. When Samuel returns he is now wearing the cloak with the hood over his head, and the helmet in his hands as he says, "The helmet is warmer than the hood, so I'm considering wearing it till we get near Channelwood."

The night is uneventful for the most part. Maverick is quiet, so unless Philip actually strikes a conversation with the boy, he doesn't speak. Raichel and Emerald converse quietly during the night and eventually even Philip succumbs to his mortality as he's too tired for his tenseness to keep him awake (This is why he isn't a morning person).

But during Joe and Valin's watch (the third shift), the two of them can hear the sound of crunching snow and leaves from someone walking not too far off.

Shelly grins. She nodnods to Sam's mention of the helmet being warmer. "Can't blame you there, Sam. Can I try it on, though?"

Fast forwarding a bit, though, the Aquarius group eventually arrives at Channelwood as they spot the unmistakeable windmill and it's not-frozen pond (though there are ice patches floating about in it and along the edges). The watch tower already informed Katy of the approach of the group, so Katy is there to greet them.

Katy walks up to the bunch. "Greetings. Nice of you to visit. Even nicer of you to bring surplus. We sure can use it."

Despite the fact the elevator is run by water power, the Channelwood Freedom Fighters thankfully have a way of heating water, so the water pipes don't freeze. This is evident by the fact the snow is melted around any of the pipes.

  Joe suspects the reason to be thankful for the snow, will be reason for Joe to wish he had an odd number of fingers.  Considering only Cannon Characters seem to get to completely ignore the laws of physics and sound.

  "Valin, think you could wake up the others while I try to get a look at who or whatever that is?"  The polite thing to do would be to wait for a reply, but some days having sub par manners is a great time saver.

  Let's see, how to bypass needing to explain how Joe walks silently on fresh snow when his character is a sneaky sort while his player has no clue on methods... Ah, of course.  While any Sonic plan will default to 'go fast', a Joe plan often defaults to 'vertical travel'.  Joe quietly batman's his way up to a branch without much in the way of snow for a better viewpoint.

Valin nods and replies softly, "I'll get right on it, just be careful since whatever it was isn't some small little critter and is more likely a robot patrol." As Valin knows that he and Joe wouldn't mistake the sound of footsteps on snow for some small scurrying critter, especially since said critters tend to either be hibernating this time of year, or have adapted to move very quietly to not draw the attention of predators.

Valin then proceeds to quickly and quietly wake people up in the camp without alerting whoever, or whatever is nearby so that the camp will be ready in case the person proves hostile.