As plasma fire starts to flicker around back by the 'downed bot, Masque picks up his possible prisoner and, as usual performs a swift switcheroo, swapping weapons, clips and grenades for restraints, then starts to move over to the Hellraiser, cautiously keeping his cannon levelled at the head...

 "Cease 'fire..." calls out the 'Borg with considerable volume, producing a grenade from his harness and lightly weighing it in one hand. letting what sensors are left to the crew inside get a good look at the small, vicious plasma charge.

 "Is only polite to see if crew wish to take easy way or hard. Easy way, we take prisoner - and I put smack on anyone who wishes to kill them, hard way involves carving head off and dropping little sunbombs into tin can until they are cooked, da?"

Sharp nods to Slate and stands up to make his way towards the Hellraiser to back up Silvermasque. Keying his radio he transmits over the team channel. "We have no visible targets here. The four smoking SAMS looked like they were hightailing it east out of the city. If it is all clear lets form up for a building to building search and recovery...over"

After getting a reply Sharp relays the orders just in case anyone missed them. "Were supposed to rendezvous back at the church A.S.A.P." Turning to the big cyborg next to him he says, "If we can't get the spam out of the can lets just frag these bastards and get it over with."

Mithas went looking for 'Masque after he lost sight of him.  He found a number of people from the squad begining to filter into the street.  Mithas sees the Hellraiser and jogs over.  (not too close though)  'Masque seems to be "conversing" with the sinking machine...  He grabs 'Masque by the shoulder ,or however high on the giant tiger he can reach, and tries to spin him around to face the Minotaur... This thing almost killed me and you want to make it a pet!?!
Mithas begins huffing and puffing again as the air around the two begins to warm up.  Areas of Mithas begin erupting spontaniously, first his hands, then his head, parts of his back... as he stands there facing 'Masque, in a matter of moments Mithas is a flarge burning Minotaur moments away from taking his anger out on someone, or something.

 Masque is better than two tonnes of advanced alloys, powered by the sort of super-heavy hydraulics that make him a pretty fair match for the average small robot vehicle, let alone a mere creature of flesh and blood. But on the other hand he's down on one knee, holding a plasma grenade in his hand and when one of his own team wants to talk to him, he seems pretty happy to turn around - after a fraction of a second in which it's possible to realise that, barring some /real/ effort being exerted by the Burster, he has a choice in the matter.

 "Tak tochno, da... is representing many, many millions of expensive weapon system mired in own personal little Rasputitsa. So we let have chance to give up, and if they accept, must stick with it." - he shrugs, idly measuring the temperature climb on the psychic with sophisticated visual sensors...

 "This for two reason - one, because we are not like nemtsi... second is because if you take prisoner and do not piss around with, enemy is more likely not to fight to death - which makes our job much easier, da?"

 "Oh, also is like transmitter-equipped spy in middle of our town. Now, did you want to help me get crew out of tin can so we can salvage for enough money to plate your ass in gold, or did you want to slug me some for something?"

"Both of you stop now!" Xion says sternly. "Masque get them out, Sharp help him please. Mithas head to rendezvous with the others, we will be along momentarily." Xion turns back to Masque, "You think you can drive this thing? I am sure someone here can. That is one more weapon we have against them if we need it."

 'Masque nods sharply, turning back to the suit in a businesslike fashion and exending his right hand, vibro-claws shimmering in the light. But before he can reach down to resume communication efforts with the gentlemen in the robot vehicle Xion asks /that/ question...

 And he pauses, looking up at Xion in something not entirely like disbelief as he contemplates the suit of robotic armour and then his own towering ten-foot plus cybernetic frame... Before replying slowly and patiently "With 'due respect sir, perhaps would be better to put expert, like Van in machine? - I do not think somehow it is me, da?"

"Good point...Van...can you drive this thing?"

Mithas spins to face Xion... and for a moment, but only a brief moment, one can see blood, hatred, and the taste for death in the Minotaurs eyes.  This is all quickly resolved after Xion stares the Man-cow straight in the eyes as if daring him to make a move.

Mithas salutes, leaving a feeling of sarcasm with the gesture and marches off to the rendezvous point.

A partially muffled voice from the Hellraisers' barried loud speaker replies

"Go piss on yourself mutant!"

Mithas pauses in mid-step... but continues towards the rendezvous point.  Revenge already formulating in his mind.

Van gets up off his knees and begins walking back toward the wall where Saila was left. He is passing by when Xion asks him about his piloting abilities. In response Van simply looks at him...perhaps it's because Van has some amount of psychic ability, perhaps it's because he's a moody youth, but the look he gives Xion speaks volumes about how uninterested he is the salvage of this war machine right now. It is obvious that his priorities are different.

He goes to Saila's dead body and pauses for a moment before gently collecting her body with his temporarily enhanced strength. He carries her off in the direction that Deadbolt ran.

 'Masque seats himself comfortably in front of the buried power armour, brushing dirt away from the visual sensors with one hand. He pointedly lays the plasma cannon down, then puts the grenade beside it. "Is like this..." he states, amiably - determined it seems, not to take offence.

 "We can cut hole in top of armour... drop things in to make life difficult for you, and take suit. We can have earth-things bury you deep, bring you to surface in couple of weeks. Or you can open robot, come out with hands up. We take you prisoner - is all your choice end of day, da?"

 He shrugs, as though indicating a relative lack of concern about how this is going to go. "Either way, I get paid... but I am honest sort of man, underneath all this metal. Decision is yours - live, die or rot."

Seeing the end of combat nearing.  Saul ponders his own fate.  Will the group except him?

"Hey Ren, if your finished dancing, I'm going to need your help to explaining myself to the group"

Yeah - don't forget about the Coalition dude on the roof. His posts say he is pondering, but to all of you he is wearing a CS helmet, he is just standing there.

It defenitely appears as though he threw the sniper off the roof, and likely caused the explosion.

But some of you may be angry... angry that Saila and Dead Bolt were just killed by these guys...

Sharp not being an angry kind of guy in general really doesn't give a shit about the traitorous scumbucket on the roof. Instead he slides the runesword out of it's scabbard on his back and leaps up on top of the Hellraiser. Tapping on the metallic hull loudly the mystic weapon no doubt scratches the paintjob. He ain't a mutie you bloody morons he's a cyborg. Now if your finished sulking in there come on out and I promise I won't kill or torture you. Of course somebody probably will. He says that last part with a little guffaw giving the first indication that his M.O.M. implants have at least affected his mind in some manner. Poking around with his sword he looks for a hatch to try and pry open.

The three black spikes sticking out of the ground are completly revealed as the magic net is pulled quickly into the sand.

All three launch into the air...

To those who don't know anything about this - all you see is three large rockets launch straight up into the air, higher and higher out of site.
This message was last edited by the GM at 07:38, Tue 14 Feb 2006.

 Missiles... three big missiles - specifically three big missiles launching more or less directly into the air within a few inches of the back of 'Masque's pack, as he's kneeling right beside the suit's head.

 "Incoming!" he calls out, snapping his hands up and tracking the hurtling projectiles, snapping off one-two particle beams, apparently from some small and compact internal weapon system, rather than wasting the time necessary to draw a weapon.

 Damn, he should have done this a moment ago.

"Damn" Sharp exclaims and he jumps away from the sinking monstrsoity tucking into a front flip and landing beyond the perimeter of the quicksand. Not slowing a bit runs for cover behind the earthen barriers Slate erected just minutes ago.

Seeing the hellraiser fire off it's missle rounds, Saul quickly turns to Ren and says "Ren I think we had better take cover in the building".

Saul quickly lowers himself down in to the building and errects a Telekinetic Force Field (and Ren if he follows), to prepare for the impact of the missles.
This message was last edited by the player at 02:59, Wed 15 Feb 2006.

"Damn, watch yo'ass fellas. Run for cover!!" Ren and his duplicates head after Saul to seek protection from the missle blast.

Silvermasque is pretty sure he hit one of them before they disappear into the clouds...

Ren and Saul lower back into the warehouse, and Saul creates a forcefield around them, incase the missiles hit the warehouse, and the building collapses...

Sharp runs to the Earthen wall, Slate is at the church now... looking for Seidon in the rubble, with his returned Earth Elemental (yes Zephram, still the mud mound)

Van is in the far field. He finds dozens of pieces of Dead Bolt, and volunteers to put him to rest with Saila. Van collects the bits, an arm, a foot, an ear... the rest is unmanageable. He barries the pieces of Dead Bolt with his rifle in a hole, beside a larger one, one he digs for Saila.

He considers to himself both of their lives... Saila joined the army to defend her home with her powers. Dead Bolt had dedicated his life to murdering the Coalition. They both seem like victims of war, but at the same time, they died doing exactly what they were willing to risk their lives for. Both of their lives were ended rather violently, but when is murder not violent, which is what war is all about, on a mass level...

The two warriors are put to rest... one, a mercenary, fighting for money, and revenge - who will never get paid a dime... and the other a brave young mystic, who died instead of whoever else was about to go over that wall...

Van barely realises the missiles are launched...

Xion and Mithas take cover in a close building, and wait for where the missiles are gonna drop.

Silvermasque starts to get worried that he should have run sooner, and these missiles are about to come back down on top of him. But it is worse...

All three missiles land on the army gathering to the south. The explosions are huge, it is no doubt that alot of people were just killed...

Just as the anger swells... for the cheap shot the Hellraiser just took on the soldiers... it fights to the end, as most hardened special forces soldiers do...

The Hellraiser explodes.
This message was last edited by the GM at 08:56, Wed 15 Feb 2006.

 'I hate fanatics' goes the thought through 'Masque's mind as he's pitched through the air by the blast, having failed to knock down any of the projectiles in the few fractions of a second they were in range - and having had the opportunity to witness the fundamental weakness to missile bombardment of a force that eschews technolog in favour of magic...

 The two-tonne Borg slams through a wall nearby, picking himself up essentially unharmed a few moments later to advance on the smouldering wreckage, making quite certain that nothing survived the suicidal self-destruct. "Bojmoi, I hate when they do this." he grumbles, joining the search effort to ensure that nothing is missed in the investigation (enemy troops or salvage) - and most definitely picking up the corpse of the 'Borg with whom he exchanged so much fire, mentally adding zeros to the profit of this little run, given that standard mercenary contracts include the repair of survivors equipment. Well, if they started with it.

 One of the Terror-troopers P-beams would have been nice, or a mini-missile rifle, but those are up on the north side of town, and likely in the hands of someone else by now, so it's light scavenging time - grenades and E-clips, robot nano-medical kits... and most especially - patting down the 'Borg, any of those sophisticated new Coalition nanotech repair units for cybernetics and bionics.

[ Important question : I'm quartering the west side of town with team one... do I at any point run into a figure in coalition armour that is (i) obviously not one of us or (ii) obviously a zombie. I'm looking at you here, Necro-boy. ^_^ ]

Hearing an explosion in the distance, Saul drops his sheilds.  "I think the missles have hit lets get out of here."

Saul walks out of the building and sees smoke emerging from the south, and the remains of the Hellraiser in front of him with a what appears to be a giant(tiger) borg around it.  Saul, wonders whether he will be able to reason with him or if he should wait for Ren to explain the situation.
This message was last edited by the player at 01:54, Fri 17 Feb 2006.

Sharp crawls out from behind the earthen barricade and looks at the damage caused by the self-destructing war machine. "You don't suppose they were off put by my torture and killing comments do you?" He asks as he sheathes his sword. Wiping the dirt off of his C-14 he makes his way towards the ruins of the church.