Gently, but with undeniable will divesting myself of the holds that would hold me. (Pt. 5: Chances)

[cityship]

The plan was...well, it wasn't simple, but it sort of was.

While the CLF attacked multiple Clone Processing centers to distract the government, the group with the CLF would target one particular one in the region that'd once been New Jersey. The group with the government would offer their services in putting down their own people.

In the center, they'd split up into several groups. One would fight a fake fight, create a massive diversion, and blow up the room where the samples their DNA were being kept in the process. Another group would secure a teleporter pad. That team would teleport out other teams to steal a ship, steal some med tech to teleport to said ship, and steal a medical database. Another team would go to the main command center and hack into the government mainframe to down the sensornet around the planet so they could escape. And Nightwing himself would accompany the clones to upload the harvested memories to the Mother Brains, left unguarded because of the diversionary fighting, and make sure that was all they did.

Meanwhile, there'd be a standing order for all teams to avoid killing other crewmates, and avoid killing guards unless absolutely necessary.

It was a complicated plan. If a single part fouled up, they might find themselves dead, trapped, or worse. But if it worked, it'd work pretty spectacularly and leave them with medtech, a medical database, the clones helped, and possibly a grateful Council depending on how the fight went, because of the ones seemingly aiding the government.

In some worlds, things that were a million-to-one-chance (exactly a million-to-one) by their nature had to work. Let's hope this world is one of them, eh, mission crew?

[ooc: Only comment to threads if it says they are open here. All threads: OPEN. Characters may get injuries up to and including 7 on the Injury Scale (scroll to the bottom). Any higher, and they must ask permission of the plot-runners, just to make sure everyone isn't immobilized without enough people to help move them.]

Comments

Subthread 10: Fight Night

[cityship]

Until the teleporter was up again, it was an all-out brawl between the crew and the metahuman Councilors and the crew's clones, made all the more difficult from the noncombatants in the group.

[ooc: Subthreaded fighting. Any character may have a clone, but you must play your character's clone. Clones can be killed or on some occasions, talked down. THIS IS A FREE FOR ALL. THREADHOP AND JUNK. GO.]

Re: Subthread 10: Fight Night

[zouichi.livejournal.com]

Zouichi looked at the white-clad man before him, a near mirror-image of himself. Though the Galileeans might have cloning technology that outstripped anything the crew currently had, what they were not in possession of was centuries of research into perfecting one of Toha Heavy Industries's most notorious product lines. The clone would not have the reinforced skeletal structure required to perform the feats of strength and speed he himself was capable of -- at least not without tearing himself bodily apart. He would not have the benefit of Zouichi's heavily integrated control, targeting, and visual tracking systems. Or the decades of training it had taken Zouichi to utilize his abilities effectively. And of course, he would not have the weapons arsenal, the one that even the R&D branch at the company had once suggested might run the slight risk of overkill.

But even without these things, a clone of himself would be dangerous. Possessed of superhuman strength and speed, heavily resistant to pain, able to recover from even massive injury in a matter of days, and requiring almost nothing in the way of food or water to stay alive. Easily programmed, easily controlled. A soldier that any government could be proud of.

Obviously, he could not be allowed to live.

Manner mode: OFF
Shot accelerator output: MAX

In less time than it took to blink, Zouichi drew his sidearm, leveled it directly at the clone, and pulled the trigger. The gravity gun went off with a muted click; a split second later, the clone's head and upper torso simply blew apart in a bright cloud of tissue and bone, as though a silent explosion had gone off in close quarters. There was not a moment's hesitation in Zouichi's actions, nor a trace of doubt on his face.

That task completed, Zouichi aimed the barrel of the 4000XL at the remains of his other self. It would not do to leave any trace genetic material available for a second attempt. The resulting coil rifle blast incinerated the clone's remains, flash-burning the ground in a wide area around the body for good measure.

"White's really not your color."

Re: Subthread 10: Fight Night

[futureisclear.livejournal.com]

"I may have to ask you to do the same to my copy," Ildraniath commented, "I have no desire for them to attempt to discover the Eldar's secrets again."

For once in all the time he's known her, Zouichi might have noticed that Ildraniath sounded absolutely livid - although it was certainly controlled anger.

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

Jr. - who had had his share of bloodshed, warfare and death, couldn't help but flinch at watching Zouichi. Mainly because everybody else instantly began to attack above everything. But Jr. remembered his own experience with the standard URTVs. "Just look at them. They don’t even have wills of their own. All of them together just form one collective consciousness. Why is everyone up to 665 like that?" "The standard types have weak anti-waveforms. It’s not their fault they were born that way."

Even though the standard units had feared him, had called him a monster and sometimes even attacked him, Jr. stood up for them. And in the end, he still felt guilty over the fallout of the war. Breaking the link out of fear, leaving them all vulnerable to insanity.

But at the same time, he understood why they did what they did. Their mission was ending after this, wasn't it? Nobody would want more clones of themselves being used. Especially when they knew themselves how it felt before.

Re: Subthread 10: Fight Night

[not-edd.livejournal.com]

Oh, wasn't this just great? Not only was he stuck fighting with these good guys, but he was also stuck fighting a clone of himself. It was starting to sound like a good idea gone bad. How many times did he and/or Rita made clones of the Rangers? Too many times?

"Oh, don't you look just fabulous?" Zedd mocked his clone, the two pacing each other. "What, you think you can take me?"

"Of course." the clone replied. "I'm you. I'm better than you."

"You're nothing more than a Xerox copy!" Zedd snapped. "If you think you're better than me, then why don't you kill the Councilors and take over this planet?!"

"Because I don't want to." the clone replied, summoning his staff and charging at Zedd. At once, their staffs clashed, the two trying to push the other back.

"That's what makes me better than you! You're nothing but GOOD!" Zedd roared, delivering a mighty kick at his clone's stomach, sending him flying.

[encourage]

This was depressing. Sakura had all her clones disabled in a manner of minutes (if there was even more than one).

"Sorry," she said to the last one (or the only one), knocking her out with a well placed hit to the neck. "Guess no one saw the point in the manual where it said shinobi skills aren't at a genetic level."

On the up side, she now had more guns than she started out with!

[zouichi.livejournal.com]

Zouichi had finally gotten to see Sakura in action! Exciting! He raised an eyebrow at her new gun collection -- did ninja even use those?

"I wasn't aware shinobi came with installation guides. Clearly an oversight on their part."

He sucker punched a random clone that came up to him from behind. "I didn't know the pink hair was genetic."

[governorkang]

Kang was immensely grateful that his clones only had the potential to cast spells; he highly doubted anyone on this planet knew exactly how his kind's magic worked. He hoped they died the way they were supposed to, at least. He remembered the dunderheads back on Krynn. In this case, it wasn't souls being split, though, just straight DNA replication.

To test it, he took the stun setting off of his gun and shot one directly in the chest.

It fell, and five seconds later, all the scales and flesh disappeared and the bones exploded, catching two others nearby and causing their subsequent explosion as well.

He grinned.

[encourage]

Sakura quirked up an eyebrow, landing temporarily in Kang's general area. Her hair was black, along with her eyebrows; her voice was still readily recognizable. "That's a genetic trait?"

Goodness, this was just like being back at home fighting in the war!

[theboywhowaits]

"You explode when you die? Is that in your medical file?" Rory fired, hitting a human clone in the chest and dropping it to the ground, nearly casual despite the chaos surounding him. It was obvious that the clone was only stunned, but Rory didn't quite seem bothered, still following the no-kill order. He had his sword in one hand and one of the plasma pistols he'd lifted off a guard in his other, holstered belt that didn't quite match the rest of the uniform strapped around his waist. He was covered in a layer of white stone dust, a small cut gone pasty just above his eye. "Seems like the council can be trusted to keep its word, don't you think? I'm so glad the GIA decided that they're trustworthy." The words were dry, not heavy with sarcasm, almost ironic as he fired again, sending another soldier to the ground.

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

Jr. was backing up from another clone when the draconian exploded nearby. Far away enough to not hit him, but close enough to cause him to spin around instantaneously at the shock of it.

"Woah! What the--?!"

Re: Subthread 10: Fight Night

[futureisclear.livejournal.com]

Honestly, Ildraniath had just been irritated that they'd been discovered. Not put-out, really. They had what they wanted. Who cared what the rulers of the planet thought any longer? Well, that had been her thought process up until they'd unleashed clones on them. Her clone, in particular. Her voice, once again amplified, echoed in the chamber, "Did you really think that you could recreate my power and expertise simply by cloning me?"

There was a harsh, cold anger in her words.

"The skills of a Farseer are more than just genetic - they are honed. They are learned. And they are not for your pitiful people to discover."

It was a simple matter after that, really. Her clone had nothing - and she had everything. She simply reached out and snuffed it's empty mind. The husk that merely resembled her crumpled to the ground, blood running from ears, nose and mouth.

"You will die for that. All of you."

And now her attention was on the Councillors.

Re: Subthread 10: Fight Night

[zouichi.livejournal.com]

Suspicions: confirmed. Cynical world outlook: vindicated. Zouichi hadn't thought a complex operation like that could have gone off without a hitch, and here they were, facing off a bunch of hastily assembled evil twins. At least no one had a goatee. So far.

Zouichi observed Ildraniath's handiwork with interest. Though the mechanisms behind her abilities and those of Earth's espers were obviously quite different, the end result was much the same. Well. He supposed there were a limited number of ways for a humanoid body to react physically to a sudden, lethal mental assault.

He wasn't particularly angry himself at this point, mostly because he'd been bracing himself for this possibility since the 'clone' crew members were kidnapped. And since then, he'd been afforded the opportunity to vent a little of the murderous rage that had gripped him earlier.

Which wasn't to say he wasn't sympathetic. Far from it.

He set the coil rifle against one shoulder, gravity gun in the other hand, saying nothing. It was only polite to let Ildraniath have the first shot.

Re: Subthread 10: Fight Night

[so-pregnable.livejournal.com]

They were killing them. Some of them were, anyway. Left and right, like they weren't people. Like they weren't the same exact flesh and blood. Without even trying to see if there was another way.

Superboy could only look on in abject horror as blood ran from the ears, nose and mouth of Ildy's clone.

Then he locked eyes with his own clone. He was older than him, nearly Superman's age, clearly in his prime. He ought to just fight him, he ought to just put a teke bubble in his brain, he ought to not even give him a chance, Kon knew, because he knew in a straight fight with a fully-developed version of himself, he was the one in trouble.

There were a lot of things he ought to do.

He didn't do any of them.

"You don't have to do this. You don't have to be what they want you to be--you don't have to be what anyone wants you to b--"

He was cut off as he was punched in the face, the punch teke-reinforced, sending him crashing through multiple metal bulkheads.

Re: Subthread 10: Fight Night

[so-pregnable.livejournal.com]

The clone, assuming Superboy was dead as he'd been left in a crumpled heap several chambers away, turned to kill someone else.

Re: Subthread 10: Fight Night

[iselldrugstothecommunity]

As hard as Superboy's been punched, Howard's surprised the path through the metal bulkheads isn't Kon-shaped. Either way, the trajectory seems to have taken Kon out of the most immediate section of the battle, so Howard decides that he's actually going to do his job and pretend he's a medic.

Also, getting as quickly away from the Superboy clone as possible seems like an excellent idea.

Howard emerges from under the collapsed piece of door he's been using for cover, casting one last look at his clone - who, cowering under the wreckage as well, seems to be the only one with any common sense. Common sense that says 'a skinny teenager with no exceptional fighting skills is going to get turned into ground hash out here'.

"Not that I blame you," he tells his clone, "but even I want to beat you up right now."

And with that, he slings his shiny new med kit over his shoulder and, nearly tripping on the mangled metal on the floor, rushes over to Kon to make sure he's still alive.

[brustriese.livejournal.com]

"Didn't we already do this bit?" the Signum in pink asks. "Or perhaps this is what Eins's world was like."

The Signum in white does not answer, simply draws her sword. Signum doesn't notice any armor, but then again, maybe the white uniform was serving as her armor. She let her Master determine its design after all.

"We don't have to do this. There's nothing to prove, nothing to be gained. The Council is just using you the same as all our Masters once used us," Signum explains, more serious now.

The doppelganger in white still ignores her, taking a defensive stance.

Signum sighs. "Very well. Can we at least keep this one on one? I hope I know myself that well."

At this, the cloned Signum nods and flies upward to a clear space for a duel. Signum herself suppresses a smirk. The Galileeans may have cobbled together a magitech sword for her, but there's no way they'd figured out a Cartridge system, and Signum was packing plenty.

Signum flies up to take care of her opposite number, perhaps inevitably to be interrupted, perhaps not.

[makeherblue]

The Doctor found himself face to face with himself. That exact same thought crossed both their minds.

Well. Maybe not exact the same, because it ran more like this:

I look utterly brilliant in white, don’t I?

Bowties? How come I didn’t get a bowtie?

The clone Doctor sized him up. The Doctor returned the favor, weaving to the side slightly. They both frowned. This could get awkward, fast, and he could see from the other one’s posture -- that old, familiar straightening of the shoulders, a slight hunch forward -- that he wasn’t fancying a tussle right there either. That wasn’t their style. His style. No, it was still theirs. Their style. It was then that the Doctor could feel a pressure building in the air and right between his eyes, big enough to draw that instinct to look away at the fighting around them: Other-Him was trying to worm his way into his head, get a good curious sniff and psychic feel around and the Doctor hoped the clone was just clueless, because really! It was incredibly clumsy. Embarrassingly clumsy. Like trying to kick down a door when all you had to do was ask.

Still, dangerous…intentional or not.

The Doctor easily pushed away the first probe. By now he was starting to get glimpses into his clone, all that sense of self leaking away. This incredible openness the Doctor didn't have, ever. Other-Him didn’t even know how to keep it in check. It bled everywhere: all the little regrets in his lives, the pain, everyone he should’ve saved. Everyone he secretly wished he hadn’t. They came in uncontrolled psychic bursts even as the clone Doctor smiled across at him, as if he’d found the one person who could really understand.

Goodbye, Susan. Goodbye, my dear.

The Doctor managed to keep from reeling. It hit him hard right then just how much he missed his granddaughter. A solid ache in his chest, as if one of his hearts had skipped a few vital beats on him. Had she even survived the Time War? The Ohm?

Humans have it better, don’t they?

Sometimes he entertained the thought of using the Chameleon Arch permanently. There was a part of him that hadn’t wanted Martha Jones to come to his rescue. It would’ve been so much better to be stuck in a frail, happily oblivious and Time-blind human body. Maybe he’d even been jealous. The Doctor watched as Other-Him’s smile grew more hopeful. All their dark little secrets! Why, he didn’t want to kill him! No, what he wanted was confirmation he wasn’t alone. That was all. That was all they wanted, just to know they weren’t alone in the galaxy and that finally there was someone out there who could share everything: life spans, wishes, desires, absolutely everything! Everything and anything!

The Doctor was so distracted by that feeling of agreeing with his clone that he almost let the second probe attempt slide in. He pushed it away harder this time. Somehow the other Doctor had popped up closer to him, still as nonthreatening as before. The Doctor immediately brought his own guard up. He knew that look.

Nonthreatening for him was when he was most threatening, whether Other-Him was aware of it or not.

[theboywhowaits]

The Doctor and the Doctor...it should be stranger than it was to see the Doctor face to face with himself.

But it seemed almost normal to see. He frowned, scanning the rubble around the Doctor for anything else that might become a threat.

And came face to face with himself, well, yeah. Really. Why not? The Cloned Doctor and the Cloned Him. Now that, unlike seeing the Doctor face to face with himself, was downright strange.

His clone was scowling, gun in hand, and that was an odd expression to see on his own face. "Doctor, what do we do with them? Can you undo the programing?" His clone was less of a threat than a new born Time Lord with no moral hangups about squishing the bugs of humanity surrounding him, but he was no more willing to kill his own clone than he was the Doctor's. How could he look his children in the eyes, if he was willing to do that?

[hi_there_aliens]

Daniel ran up through the chaos, and was confronted with a sight that almost made him forget the hurry he was in, which was the Doctor and....the Doctor either preening at each other or puffing their chests out (non-violently) at each other. Daniel slid to a halt, the gun he'd taken from a guard going lax in his hands. Neither seemed violent. Neither seemed inclined to say anything to each other. They were just...staring at each other. Silently. As if they could communicate with their eyes alone. A standoff with just their eyes.

It was kind of creepy.

"Doctor?" he asked hesitantly.

It didn't take much to put the pieces together. The security checkpoint they'd initially passed earlier had gotten the DNA off them. Getting cloned didn't seem too hard after that. Still, it was just odd seeing two of him in one place. Luckily he knew the one he'd come here with.

Unless the Doctors decided they'd liked each other's clothes and decided to change clothes for some reason.

Re: Subthread 10: Fight Night

[badassfreakingoverlord]

Zetta... had no clone.

This was perhaps unsurprising, as cloning technology worked relatively poorly on books.

Which meant that a horde of minions, swords and axes and pies and chainsaws and power drills held high, crashed to the ground only to charge the Councilors with manic, unfettered bloodlust. From his vantage point held high in his leader-minion's arms, the book just fired low-power Zetta Beams left and right indiscriminately, laughing maniacally. "Mess with me, will you?! You should've spent a little more time playing Makai Kingdom! And the many other fine Nippon Ichi releases in which I appear!

Open to anyone to join her

[thewunderkind]

She knew this was going to happen. Dreaded it, even. When the inevitable came to pass, Lash flinched and pondered at her possibilities.

The people of her world had been cloned before. What beautiful irony that it was her, who had been part of the original team responsible for cloning members of the other nations, was now stuck with an army of doppelgangers. But Zetta was right. She was smarter than they could ever hope to me. They might have the genetics and the potential to become COs, but they were nothing like her.

And to prove that point, she was going to make herself stand out. Lash looked around to see what could be useful to make a stand, maybe take a jeep from one of the soldiers....but then she spotted the all too familiar floating fountain from her first day here. As the others were distracted, she ran towards it, getting under the mechanism. Time to take over and claim it as her own. It couldn't be any harder than that dumb computer in the army...yeap. There it was, the power control. One wrong move and she could accidentally shut down the gravity field, crushing her like a bug. Lash worked quickly, moving a few wires until she had it switched to manual. Seeing the light again never felt so good as she rolled out from under, standing on the edge as she tested out the manual control panel to see how it could move.

...Pretty fast for a hovering piece of architecture. She nearly crashed it into a nearby building. Okay. This would do.

Transforming into her sentai form - possibly the easiest way for her to differ herself from the others, she took off her helmet so her clones would know who was going to end them. Rangers killed bad guys, right? These were bad guys. Kind of. Right. With those thoughts swimming in her head, she fountain hovered into battle.

Forget not killing anything, the wunderkind already had out two guns out as the hovering water wonder advanced, bowling over some of the normal soldiers like pins. She was hoping to kill her own clones straight between their eyes with a single shot before they could even attempt to unlock their CO power potential.

That could turn pretty ugly really fast if it did.

Re: Open to anyone to join her

[zouichi.livejournal.com]

Oh, hi, Lash -- hope you don't mind a Synthetic Human hitching a ride on your magnificent fountainous chariot.

Zouichi glanced up at her, pistol in hand. "You need some help picking them off? I assume there's a reason you're shooting to kill rather than to disable."

Re: Subthread 10: Fight Night

[ruffntumblenut.livejournal.com]

Ruffnut could hardly believe her eyes. A team of two were staring her down, one her partner and best friend Mindy...

...and the other was a spitting image of her.

"Dude...this is so freaky..." She muttered rubbing her eyes, still sore from the fight that she had fought to help take the teleporter. "I mean I know I have a twin...but this is ridiculous."

The next thing she knew as she opened her eyes she saw the bottom of a shoe and then darkness an stars.

[carrieswar.livejournal.com]

Jr. did not looked pleased at all. Angry was one way to describe it, but that wasn't the most telling expression that he had on his face. He looked a mix of upset and pained when he saw them. Dressed in white instead of the blue and white uniforms he had always seen them in -- somewhere he might have even wondered if these had numbers like the ones he and his brothers and sisters possessed, five of Jr.'s own clones had joined the fray. But they didn't look exactly like he did. Jr.'s red hair and blue eyes were a result of special mutation that he went through to give him a will of his own, as well as his own special powers. They looked like the rest of the standard U.R.T.V. units - blond haired, blue eyed and still too undeveloped to have wills of their own.

This was one thing he didn't want to deal with. Not again. He already had to kill the rest of the standard units - or rather, he had cut their mental link, causing them to fall victim to U-DO's waves and the Song of Nephilim, allowing them to be driven to insanity. None of them survived the war. So he might as well have killed them with his cowardice - even though it was always conflicting to him. He knew if they had went through with their mission and held their mental connection, they all would have died, and the planet would have been destroyed. It was a no-win situation.

Now there he stood, facing a small group much like the ones he had failed. He kept his hands tightly over the handles of his guns, but didn't make a move.