trans_9 | Game Over, Man [Part 2]

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Game Over, Man [Part 2]

In the complex, deeper into it near the core, several of the away team were all strung up near each other, around a clutch of disgusting looking eggs. Two appeared to have already been hatched. The rest were waiting. They were bound to the walls by slime and ick, some sort of substance spit up by the creatures that may as well have been quick-dry cement.

Outside the complex, the rest of the away team had made it to the ship--only to find it damaged. Acid spit up by one of the creature had burned through part of the hull and into important inner workings. They would need someone mechanically inclined, that understood electrical work, to fix it like Jamie--uh oh.

Well, that was a problem wasn't it.

It was time for the one group to try to survive, and the other group to figure out what to do about their missing comrades.

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They were boned.

It was time to regroup. And since they were stuck on the planet until they got the engineer they needed, time to see if any assistance could be rendered.

Hiccup had the good fortune to wake up after the aliens were gone, but just in time for the initial panic.

The first thing that crossed his mind were stories that had gotten passed around, about dragons carting Vikings off to feed their young broods of dragons.

But he was a Viking, right? Calm in the face of anything. His throat was dry, and he swallowed once, calmly breathed in an out, took a moment to steady himself--

And proceeded to freak the hell out.

"Oh gods. Oh no. Oh no. This is not happening, this is not happening..."

Reimi could understand where he was coming from. At least she wasn't NAKED this time. That alone brought back bad memories of scientists and prodding and tests and the leering expressions of some of the guards--BRR.

"Calm down a little Hiccup, we'll be fine. I hope."

She glanced around the room. "Barely enough room for me to perform a killer move." And she felt behind her. No bow. "Drat."

Tobias had demorphed, and was perched on a chair-back, knowing full well Kang was probably going to let him have it. He'd acted on instinct, mostly, just like so many times back home, trying to help any way he could. He probably could have stayed airborne through the first creature, but after that, he'd had to get down there and help.

Yuunagi bounced and settled against the empty seats as Setsuna dropped it, the closest she could come to mistreating her blade. She clenched her fists and stalked to the side of the ship to stay out of everyone else's way as they entered.

"Pathetic..." she growled. It might have been hard to tell, but that fury was directed inward. She should have been able to do more. She should have been faster to react, been fiercer in the battle. But she had been completely unable to reach her teammates. Completely unable to save them.

Rose eyed the remaining eggs with apprehension.

They needed to get out of here. Now.

She struggled against the cementlike goo binding her to the wall, trying to get a hand loose. But, as with her previous attempts, she ended up with the same result: no luck.

She slumped down into the cocoon for a rest. “Well, kids, I think we’ve all learned an important lesson today: never go to an abandoned colony, because it’s probably less abandoned than you think.”

“Everyone alright? Well, considerin’…” Rose jerked her head to indicate the literally sticky situation that they found themselves in.

Stoick veritably fell into the closest seat he could find, that being next to Tobias. His arm felt strange and he could see that the shield was in pieces, the holes from the acid blood aside. He wasn't sure if he wanted to remove the shield yet or not; it would surely splinter if not dissolve if he didn't take it off soon.

And then he hung his head. He'd ignored Kang's orders in the panic of not knowing where his son was. He tried to reassure himself that Hiccup was fine--probably holed up somewhere and hiding. But it still hurt to think he'd let his son down. To top it all he'd disobeyed a direct order--his father would have had words to say. And surely, Kang would not let something like that go.

He dropped the warhammer to the floor with a solid thud, flexing his hand and letting the blood circulate once more. He hadn't realized how tightly he'd been grasping it.

"I'm in one piece." Jamie's tone was surprisingly dull, and a little faint, almost disconnected. He'd had, if just barely, enough time now to process his horrifying abduction and the subsequent indignity of being vomited upon by hideous alien bug-monsters, and had moved past his initial panic into a sort of hopeless near-torpor.

Hap Suriz was busy retrieving fresh ammunition from the rear of the passenger compartment; she'd used quite a bit giving her suppressing fire as the group retreated. Only when she was done did she come back to join them.

They'd been forced into a retreat, lost people to an unknown enemy; it wasn't surprising morale was low, but she was not the best person to try to rally a bunch of miclonians... or whatever they all were.

She looked to Kang. He was the leader here, and she would only try to take initiative if he did not.

Scarlet was doing her own thing in an attempt to loosen the goo pinning her to the wall, but when the others started talking she frowned a little, eyes moving around to make a visual assessment.

"I'm fine. We need to figure out how we're getting out of this stuff," she glanced at the unhatched eggs, an uneasy feeling settling over her before she looked around at the others again. "And we better hurry."

Yeah, the Viking that was in way, way over his head and way out of his depth was a little too busy freaking to be of any help.

Or was he? He stopped mumbling and after a few shaky breaths, he finally managed to calm himself, at least a little. A tiny bit.

"My knife!"

He managed to wiggle enough to check his belt, but it was gone. He cursed and said, "I must have dropped it."

He shrugged his head so his hand could reach his hair, and a sticky, shaking hand pushed through his hair.

"Okay. Okay. We have to think. Think. Who has--has cutting implements of some kind? Or a limb loose. We all need to--" Grunting, he tried to work his hands free. "--we need to see what we have to work with."

Kettch had been one of the last into the ship, and now he danced down the corridor to join the others in the main compartment to celebrate. He held the demon head high in victory as he sang. "Glowah! Yun yum di goot! Coatee cha tu too! Yub nub!"

But as he danced into the passenger compartment, he noticed that no one else was celebrating their great victory. In fact... where were all the craftsmen, the healer, and the pilot? He came to an awkward halt and looked around, blinking.

"Hey, hey? Where's everyone else?"

[ooc: Glory! It is very good! Celebrate the fight! Hooray!]

"Kettch, this is not the time to celebrate. The others got taken."

Kang was pissed.

He was pissed that he hadn't thought of anything coming through the ceiling or floor, he was pissed because of the kidnaps (more specifically, Hiccup's), and he was pissed that people had disobeyed his orders.

He wasn't military anymore, but by the lost gods, he had been assigned as the leader of this mission, and that meant that he was in charge. It wasn't the fact that he enjoyed having power over people; it was the fact that the only way everyone was going to survive these missions, let alone the entire bloody war, was with discipline.

Luckily, the ship was rather user-friendly, so it didn't take Kang too long to figure out how to at least get a damage report. Cursing in Nerakese, he barely held back from slamming his fist against the console, "The ship's been sabotaged. It has a repair system, but we won't have flight capabilities or communications for thirty minutes, at least. We're on a bit of a time crunch, too; we don't know how long those things are going to keep the kidnapped alive."

He saw something blinking in a rather urgent fashion, and began to fiddle with the controls, a low, continuous growl under his words, "Next time I give an order, you are to follow it. No questions asked." He glanced back at Tobias and Stoick with a pointed look. "Are we clear?"

What they had to work with. They had jack to work with, that's what they had, they were all going to die down here on this godforsaken planet, eaten by alien monsters that subdued their prey with vomit, and there was nothing that was going to forestall that. Though Jamie had no confidence whatsoever that it was going to do any good, as he'd done his share of struggling and fighting to get free already, he drew out of his stupor enough to jerk at the gunk restraining his wrists.

- and found that he actually had some give in the clot of alien mucus holding his left arm. Well now.

Holding his breath, he pulled a little more. It forced the bones of his hand to contort in uncomfortable ways and hurt quite a lot, but he could feel the limb slowly working out of its bonds, until it was freed completely.

"...hey," he announced, a little dazedly, and started pulling at the rest of the hardened slime, trying to get it off that way. It was too tough to remove bare-handed, though - if only he had something to cut through it, or chip at it -

He was surprised to find that he still had his toolbelt with him, though it was partially obscured by dried bug barf. Still, he thought he might be able to work one of the screwdrivers free...

...yes.

Twisting the tool in his shaking, slime-coated hand, praying he didn't fumble it, Jamie turned the flat head of the screwdriver on the gunk trapping his other wrist, hacking at it furiously.

"C'mon Jamie you can do it," encouraged Reimi as she tried to work something free. If only she had a little leverage. Her fingers brushed against the edge of a hanging object and she looked up.

"There's not enough room in here," complained Reimi as she started to wiggle her slimy hand through the dried gunk covering it. "And I can't risk performing a tech in here. One Seraphic Thunder and it might destroy or hatch an egg prematurely."

Stoick met the pointed look with a sincere one. "Yes chief," he replied.

And then the words sank in.

Taken. The others were taken.
But then, that meant...

"THOR ALMIGHTY!" He turned to Kang, the leader. "Hiccup? Hiccup was taken?!" And no one had said anything to him?

Rose leaned forward in an attempt to check on his progress. "Yeah, Jamie, you've almost got it."

She didn't know what a 'Seraphic Thunder' was, but destroying the eggs sounded like a great idea. "If those eggs were laid at the same time, I expect the rest'll be hatchin' soon. We should try to kill 'em before that happens."

< Yes, I suppose so. I was acting on instinct, really...I didn't grasp just how bad the attack was until I was in the middle of it. >

"You suppose so?" Kang hissed. "It's a yes or no question. And what the hell were you doing in there? You were supposed to be in the air."

He continued to mess with the controls, clearly agitated with the way his wings were rustling. "Yes, Hiccup was taken."

< All right, yes. And like I said, instinct...things got bad, and I thought I could provide some more firepower. I'll stay up this time, but I can only last so long flapping. Then I'm going to need to land. >

Setsuna frowned further and sat down next to her sword. In the confusion of the battle, she hadn't managed to process who had been captured at the time. But they had lost their medic, their pilot, and most of the engineers... Unforgivable.

But now they knew better what they were dealing with. And they could -- no, they would return for the rest of their team. Setsuna rested her chin on her hands, silently considering the aliens' capabilities and planning out counter-attacks. Lost in thought as she was, though, she still kept an ear open for Kang's next orders.

Kettch's ears flattened down against his head as he lowered the demon head and let it thump onto the ground.

Nevermind Elder Kang's snappish reprimand. They'd been Taken. Half their group had been snatched! He was supposed to protect them! That's why the Great Spirit had chosen him to go on this quest - chosen all of them. But they'd failed.

"Yud ehda..." He shook his head, and then shook himself all over for a second. Tossing down his half-melted spear with a clank, Kettch gripped the blaster rifle and hefted it up across his body. "The Great Spirit chose us to guard them! We cannot give up! We have to rescue them! The Night demons must die!"

[ooc: Yud ehda = alas]

"I agree with Rose," Scarlet replied immediately, turning her head away from Jamie to look at Reimi. "If you can destroy them, the sooner the better. Better they're dead than they break out before we all have the chance to get free." Not that running had helped so much the first time around, and now they were mostly without weapons, but Scarlet would rather have at least a semblance of a fighting chance.

"I think--I think our first priority should just be getting free," said Hiccup. "So whatever it is you want to do, it had better not be loud."

If they got loose, all they had on their side was surprise.

"Almost there, Jamie, you're doing great."

And once his hands were free, he'd find it much easier to free himself.

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Game Over, Man [Part 2]

In the nest...

In the ship...

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[ooc: Jamie's due to have a loose hand, so he should go next]

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