When Shelly asks to try the helmet on Samuel jokingly says, "Sure, just be careful to not break it or get it stuck on your head as that could be embarrassing."

When the group reaches Channelwood some time after Shelly has no doubt handed the helmet back to Samuel, since otherwise Katy would have noticed its presence on Shelly, Samuel looks around and notices that there is no 'big guy', and no one armed with what would obviously be a weapon that could be used to ruin the armor and hurt him in the process. Thus Samuel ponders subtly pulling the helmet out of the pouch and putting it on when no one is paying any attention to him for two reasons. First, the helmet is warmer than the hood, and second, he thinks it could be hysterical.

Mittens salutes Katy by pounding her chest with her fist.

"Greetings, mighty berserker who knocks out cyber-dragons!  It is our pleasure to bask in the glory of your awesomeness and to contribute to our mutual cause."

She gives a sweeping bow.

---

Philip of course spends his watch in silence.

Emerald is pretty groggy, but doesn't seem to question Valin waking her for any reason. "What's up?" she asks quietly, as if instinctively knowing to be quiet. Because let's face it, this is probably something any freedom fighter has adapted to doing when woken in the middle of sleep.

Meanwhile, from his vantage point, Joe can see a human female trudging along in the snow, hugging herself and looking rather chilled. And it's no wonder too. She doesn't have a coat, has exposed legs with no pants (she's wearing a skirt), has exposed shoulders, and what she does have on seems more like summer clothing, although her sleeves are long at least and her boots seem to cover most of her legs. She has silver hair and is wearing some odd little technological orbs in her impressively long hair.

(If you all hadn't figured it out yet, it's this gal: http://timothius.deviantart.co...y/?q=glados#/d2615fq )

The girl does seem to have noticed the encampment and is heading for it with no apparent ill intent. Probably just hoping for food or shelter.
This message was last edited by the player at 20:01, Tue 18 Oct 2011.

Katy blushes like Freiza. ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3v30HToswDs watch the whole thing if you want, but the blush as towards the end at 1:34) But nods to the group. "Thanks. I was lucky, you know... Let's load up the elevator."

Katy then looks at Samuel. "That is one convincing suit. VERY nice. And if it can fool the enemy, very useful. Do you know yet if it can fool the enemy?"

Shelly giggles, "It sure fooled us when Sam snuck up on us with it."

  Joe finds himself wondering where the misting breath exactly is.  Unless that's an artistic license department thing (really, how often do they bother do draw that?)

  He makes his way back to the others, "We're apparently obvious enough to make a bee-line for from a distance.  Overlanders don't tend to have two different colored eyes, silver hair, and metal plates instead of ears right?  Well, except for Julian on that last one I guess."

Valin proceeds to explain to Emerald what Joe and he had noticed while on guard duty as he continues to try to make sure everyone is awake incase whatever Joe encounters proves to be a threat.

Upon Joe's return and his description of the Overlander Valin shakes his head and says while still keeping his voice low to minimize the chances the Overlander would hear them, "While different colored eyes and silver hair is possible but unlikely, the metal plates instead of ears is disturbing. Especially since Robotnik has them."

Valin then asks, while still using the soft tone of voice, "Does the Overlander appear to be carrying weapons, or seem likely to attack? I am curious to know what this Overlander is doing out here, as the timing... is unlikely to be a coincidence."
This message was last edited by the player at 21:18, Tue 25 Oct 2011.

Samuel momentarily grins when Katy comments on his suit as he takes pride in his work.

However when asked if it will fool Robotnik's forces. Samuel shrugs as he admits,"That happens to be the next test I need to do. It should fool their sensors, but the problem is procedures and being able to act how a SWATbot is expected to act. Although to pull the test off properly I'll have to get access to the current programming for a SWATBot, since I don't want to rely on procedural data that is out of date as that could give me away. But I should be able to do that if I can find a lone SWATBot, jam it's radio to prevent it reporting anything is wrong, disable it, and then access its programming core so I can 'assume' its identity. But before I could even propose such a test, I had to make sure the suit won't fail in field conditions by simply moving around."

"If it isn't a machine it's probably not an enemy," Philip mutters.

He doesn't wait around for the others to make up their mind what to do and rushes in a wide arc to approach the human from an angle that will draw attention away from the others.

"Hey there," he says, trying his hardest not to be too threatening, "My name is Philip.  You're not dressed for this kind of weather.  Why?"

Mittens nods to what Shelly says.

"That it did!  Best disguise ever!  But I think you give those Swats way too much credit.  You might be surprised how easy it is to fool them.  But hey, can't argue with erring on the side of caution."

Emerald not only doesn't have the chance to argue with Philip, she doesn't have much reason to. Though she looks at Valin. "Guess Philip's got the stranger covered. Now it's up to the rest of us to have Philip covered."

Speaking of Philip, the overlander girl looks at Philip, still shivering. She reaches up, pulls off one of the black things to reveal an ear. That's right, those are not in place of ears. Those are resting on them. Kinda like Vector's headphones. She seems ecstatic. "A person! An actual person! I'm Glados! I was kicked out and have not had much chance to find extra c-clothing. Can you help me?"

 "Not unless she's hiding a machine gun under a skirt barely long enough to cover her undergarments, no. I do agree with the fact she was walking directly towards out silent and out of site location makes even my arrivals look plausible."  After all,  Joe stumbled across an entire town by a stable water source.  This is the middle of nowhere.

  Then again, you can search a lot of forest in almost three years RL.  Glados's departure post was back in December 2008.
This message was last edited by the player at 04:18, Wed 26 Oct 2011.

Katy guides the group into the elevator, helps load, and goes up. In the elevator, she looks at Sam. Then the others. She says, "Sam, Mei-Ling and I will take the stairs. I don't wanna risk overloading the elevator cables." She heads for the spiral staircase with Sam. "Besides, it's an excuse to test how well your suit handles stairs. With people like you on our side, Sam, Robotnik could very well be beaten by his own devices. What poetic justice that would be..."

Meanwhile, in the elevator, Shelly turns to Pierson. "I love this part!" and she then peeks out the window to watch their ascent. "The elevator in Aquarius should have windows... I'll ask Sam or Milloni to install windows."

Samuel looks to Mittens and says, "It's not the SWATBots that I am worried about, but field commanders and other more intelligent beings that I am concerned about, like a certain robot dragon."

Samuel nods when Katy points out the stairs and follows her as he Samuel explains, "I know the suit can handle stairs as that was easy to test without leaving Aquarius. But the stairs are the better option as I wouldn't want to risk overloading the elevator anyways." Samuel then pauses for a moment and says in a distinctly dark tone of voice, "Poetic justice would be Robotnik being slowly roboticized and force to clean up the mess he has made," as it sounds like Samuel would have no hesitation in pushing the button to roboticize Robotnik, if Samuel ever had the option to do so.
This message had punctuation tweaked by the player at 21:07, Sat 29 Oct 2011.

Valin nods as he says softly, "That is true. But right now we just have to make sure we don't walk into a trap. We don't know anything about this person, and in these days blinding trusting strangers is risky."

Then again if Valin knew that Glados was apparently responding to quiet comments Joe had made when she should have been too far to hear said comments, Valin would be far more suspicious since as far as Valin knows Overlanders don't have 'super hearing', but robots can very sensitive sensors.

  Joe, and plenty of other characters aren't without their own cyborg bits, but the 'looks just like what Robotnic has' angle isn't quite so common.  Surprise offscreen to Joe revelation cold metal is put to use as earmuff choice isn't cybernetics aside... Though you might end up needing cyborg ears from frostbite with that fashion sense.

  "Less than hostile overlanders have been popping out of the woodwork lately, but yeah that doesn't mean drop all paranoia." Okay, one violent child, one 'special needs' child, and one Guy supposedly willing to glass the planet if it meant killing Julian.  Okay, so maybe only one of those was actually less than hostile.

  OOC Style: Outtakes Reel:  ""A person! An actual person! I'm Glados! I was kicke-"  "HOLY CRAP!" "What?"  "You just tore your frostbitten ear off!"  "Oh, that?  That's just my novelty prop ears.  That I wear under my not really attached metal ears. Honest."  "I'm still not finding this believab-" "When Robotnic killed my family and town like everyone else's family and town ever, he stole my ears." "Oh, then it must be true, so sorry."

  Eslewhere:  Robotnic says "I turned her ears into stereo speakers! Muhahahaha!"
This message was last edited by the player at 02:51, Sun 30 Oct 2011.

Philip lets his guard down and nods.

"Yes, I can help," he answers, "From the looks of you, you'll be fine as soon as we get you a wrap.  Follow me, but keep your distance.  My daughter gets nervous if there's a stranger close to my back."

He tosses Glados his jacket, then turns to lead the way to Raichel's tent, making sure Glados stays back enough to keep the others from panicking.

Mittens ahs, smiles, and thumbs-ups at Samuel's clarification.  She then nod-nods enthusiastically to Shelly's idea.  "Yeah yeah!  That'd be super!  I love this place.  It's the ultimate tree house!"

GLaDOS follows Philip over to the others and does so as Philip suggested; from a distance. She looks around to see if there is anybody else. If the others don't bother making themselves scarce, Glados will notice them.

Emerald is one such person and comes over to Philip. "So what's her story?" she asks of Philip.

Katy is able to overhear the excited yellings of Mittens, though she doesn't make out what Mittens is saying. She just flicks an ear in response to hearing the excited voice, then looks up at Sam and nods. When she reaches the top, Katy guides the bunch to the storage hut. The bridges creek and sway when walked on. If the suit Sam is wearing has some balance difficulties, he may find himself nervous on Channelwood's bridges. Shelly is, of course, more than happy to tell Katy of her idea about a window in the elevator back at Aquarius. Katy just nods.

While The SWATBot suit Samuel is wearing doesn't have balance issues, Samuel is nervous as he walks on the creaking boards for another reason... fear of the boards breaking under the weight of him wearing the SWATBot Suit as Samuel doesn't like the idea of falling the to forest floor.

Samuel mutters to himself as he is led to the storage hut, "If these boards break and I fall to the ground and break my neck, I'm going to come back from the dead to torment someone. Preferably Robotnik, but I'd settle for whoever build these walkways."

Valin figures that he's too big to hide, so he might as well not try. So instead he follows Emerald and upon hearing Emerald's question he mutters, "This is strange. She looks like she isn't prepared for winter, and she doesn't look like she's the type to be able to forage for herself, especially since she doesn't look like she has anything to carry supplies she foraged for on her. However she also doesn't look like she is starving." Valin realizes something isn't quite right here, and that the easiest solution is that the girl isn't alone, and that she has deliberately left herself like this to draw sympathy and get people to lower their guard, while her companions ambush whoever she comes across.

Thus Valin glances around, as if expecting an ambush at any moment.

  Joe had written off her condition partially, due to cartoon clothing rules (as in, most people go around practically naked all the time with no hassle).  Though when someone makes such a big deal about being lost in the cold, it does draw more attention to how perfectly fine they are.

  "Nobody sticking around anywhere near here that I know of to give food and shelter, so I'm more curious where she came from than where she's going."  He gets the feeling he'll be stuck keeping an eye on her while others deal with the job.  leading complete strangers to emergency food stockpiles is a nono in a post apocalyptic setting.

"She says she was exiled recently," Philip answers.

He can guess at several reasons such a strange girl would be exiled.  But to leave her without any winter coat?  Execution would be more merciful.  Unless...  Unless any number of nightmarish reasons that would mean Glados was deserving of worse than freezing to death.

"I'm surprised you're so sure there isn't a hidden town near here considering how far we've traveled and the lengths your own town goes to in order to remain hidden.  Even so, my instincts tell me that even if her story is true, she deserves to die of exposure.  But that's just instincts.  Until it is proven otherwise, I will treat her as though she deserves to live."
This message was last edited by the player at 04:40, Fri 11 Nov 2011.

The stability of the bridges aren't helped any by Mittens hopping along like a bunny.  Or her ducking, dodging, and shadow dueling imaginary ninja Kobolds.

"Considering a 500 lb gorilla lives here, I'm sure it's plenty strong enough to hold you up, Sir Haunts-alot," she says, "But coming back as a wrathful spirit of vengeance would be an awesome afterlife goal.  Or a vengeful spirit of wrath.  Either one suits you...  Stealth pun!  Suits the guy wearing a SWAT suit!"
This message was last edited by the player at 04:41, Fri 11 Nov 2011.

Katy snorts from Sam's comment and then Mittens makes her point for her. "These bridges are built to hold Valin. His dad originally built them and Valin himself has maintained them. As Mittens pointed out, if they can hold Valin's weight, they can definitely hold yours." She gets the group to the storage shed and begins filling it. "You came all this way, do you all want to stay and rest a while? I sent Emerald with some others to go grab some grain from a storage before you guys offered this surplus, so maybe we can all share a little."

Shelly says, "I don't mind staying for some fellowship and stuff. And at the very least, Sam can share his SWATsuit tinkering with your best techy so when you guys get a SWATsuit, you can do what Sam did."

Katy nods. "The more, the merrier. Daemon can receive any info concerning programming, while the more hardware part... well Joe could probably jury-rig something, but at that level, we would still need a devoted techy like you Sam. I just hate to bother you with extra work." Katy really prizes the independence she and her own have.