trans_9 | System Shock - Fight the Power!

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System Shock - Fight the Power!

Gods could be too arrogant. Such was the case of SHODAN, who had turned the Pods into a nightmarish zone where she could freely amuse herself and torture those that had come here.

But arrogance breeds pride which breeds mistakes. Instead of killing everyone off, she had decided to do this more slowly – watch them suffer in a slow agony, and, therefore had not expected them to fight back.

It had been a lucky shot, really, one in a million, But one of the people present that day had accidentally shot a tiny, insignificant object. A tiny little drone, that, once it had been the source of the power damper, had fallen. The tables were turned, and the goddess had been forced to retreat from the pods.

Now she was on a panicked mode, not only because some of the other people on the ship had managed to work their way into her system files, using another AI to send pointless images and sounds to her, distracting her from her task, but they knew how they could defeat her and gain their powers back.

It didn't take long for the message to be sent out, as the word quickly spread. Find the tiny little creatures, and shoot them down. SHODAN couldn't work their shields properly and once they were found, it was only a short matter of time before the powers returned to an area.

It would take time, but, finally, the tide of the battle was turning on the side of the crewmen and women. In vain, she was throwing her all; even more strange robot creatures, attacking in packs, but with hope on their side, they could win this...

[OOC - OKay go for it! NPC players, feel free to NPC as many robots as you like. Players, once your powers return, feel free to make as much scrap metal as you like, no need to have people NPC for you if you just want to write tags of them kicking ass.]

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The moment he heard the news, Mar knew what he had to do: SMASH A THING.

Fortunately, this was one of his strengths.

UNfortunately, he didn't have any good ranged attacks without his magic.

The unlucky soul who comes to join him will find themselves about an inch from being hit in the face by a table, as Mar hefts it from the long end with a manic look of determination.

As if she weren't already irritable enough about the clusterfuck happening aboard their surrogate mother, it seemed she also had to deal with tables to the face...which she just barely managed to avoid with a reactive dive to the floor.

With a huff, Mindfuck pushed herself off the ground, reattached the clipboard that had been hanging on her waist, and retrieved her scattered pistol. It was a shame that there were only so many emotions one could convey without words and actual eyes, but she was still trying her hardest to give Mar a look that said 'what in the actual fuck?'.

"Sorry -- MINDFUCK!" Mar said, shooting from apologetic to absolutely delighted in the space of half a second. "You're all right! Thank the Light! Shoot that thing that I'm trying to swat with the table!"

Despite the close call, he didn't seem at ALL inclined to stop attempting to smash the power dampener with furniture. With another grunt of effort and some serious strength behind it, he hefted the table again. He WAS, however, much more mindful of her presence now.

Oh, right. That was what she was here for, wasn't it? She wasn't exactly looking forward to the psychic backlash that would occur when she suddenly gained back her psionic abilities, but what had to be done had to be done.

Mindfuck raised a thumb as a silent reply to Mar, then turned to take a look at the 'thing' he'd been after before her arrival. With a grimace, she took aim at the power dampener and fired.

Then missed. Twice.

The third, however, hit home and she seemed relieved. She wasn't going to bother mentioning how many bullets were wasted trying to bring down the other dampener she'd passed by.

But still better than he could have done, so don't think he was about to complain. Quite the contrary, in fact!

"YES!" he said, hurling the table aside violently as the Light surged back into him. He drew his mace, then spun lightly on his heels. "FOR THE GLORY OF AZEROTH AND THE SIN'DOREI!"

...oh right. There weren't any robots at just this moment. With a self-conscious chuckle, he hung his mace from his belt as he turned back to Mindfuck.

Oh, how she would have loved to laugh at him for that outburst (followed by relentless teasing, no doubt), but the sudden return of her abilities had her staggering, then dropping to the floor, cradling her head.

It wasn't just that she'd been assaulted with the collective thoughts of the crew that had been out and about, attempting to fight off this threat. It was also the rush of their emotions that came with the jolt of thoughts.

Plenty of worry, a good dose of determination, crippling despair and the raw agony of the injured. Her face was red with the effort of simply staying conscious.

Mar didn't know specifics about psychic anything, but he had a pretty good guess of what was happening to her based on the fact that she hadn't said a psychic word to him. And at least every time he'd ever been slammed by a mental assault, it had hurt like hell but healing magic had helped.

With his own powers restored, then, he gathered the Light into his hands, shaped it with a second and a half's worth of gesture and thought, then invoked a flash of restorative light over the poor girl. If that didn't help... well, he'd do it again, damn it. He didn't have a ton of options here.

Maybe it would help, though, that amidst all the other feelings she was getting, right here there was one mind that, aside from some understandable worry and dismay over her pain, was simply and purely quite happy to see her.

If anything, the healing light served to soothe the pain accompanied with her psionics and turned brain-melting misery into the easier to handle, excruciating, throbbing that still managed to muddle her mind.

She audibly exhaled and, after a moment of confusion, brought a trembling hand to stem the blood that trickled from her nose. A jumble of unintelligible thoughts flashed in his mind for just a moment before being replaced by only one clear, but strained thought.

"Thanks."

He took a moment to gather energy for a more powerful spell, then brought that, too, down on her in a wash of light. Naturally, his mind offered no resistance to hers.

"You're welcome. Requesting permission to violate personal space, ma'am!" he said, with a mock salute. He intended to hug her. Hug her a lot. Actually if he was given his choice, he'd take her in his arms and give her a proper, 'hello, I missed you, I worried about you, I'm glad you're safe' kiss, but he figured that might be a bit much in ideal circumstances, let alone these.

Yeah, in his excitement he was letting just a bit more slip out than usual, can she tell?

Though the resulting laugh was pained, it was a laugh nonetheless. With a final sigh, Mindfuck pushed herself from the ground (twice in the span of five minutes, now) and offered a shaky smile.

"How disappointed would you be if I said no? Terribly so, considering how brightly your cognisphere lit up (like fireworks, almost). But I don't think I'm currently in any mood (or desire) to deny that particular (generally egregious) violation of said space."

"A lot, but that doesn't matter," he said, kneeling to offer her a hand up. "My disappointment is far, far inferior to your comfort and desires."

Then, when she was up... yes, violation of personal space. Seriously so. But, despite the fact that he was wearing heavy plate armor, Mar could, and did, hug surprisingly gently. A lot of strength was being restrained, as well as a strong desire to hug very hard indeed, but really... he was so happy she was all right.

She took the hand offered and straightened herself, eyebrows furrowing when she was embraced. It wasn't that it was bad, it just seemed...foreign, considering how long it had been since she was the one being embraced in such a manner. Slowly, she raised her arms and returned the gesture, her head nodding forward to rest against the cool metal of his chestplate. It almost had a soothing effect for her still-throbbing head.

Well. That only made sense, since she'd been all alone up in space for however long. But it was still kind of sad. He leaned his cheek against her head, exhaling. Yes, this was definitely nice. Now if only he could do something to help her mental problems, too, then he'd consider this the perfect day!

Her reaction to the sudden return of her abilities made her wonder exactly how the other telepaths and psionic-users on the ship were fairing. Hopefully better than she, though there was cause for concern for certain individuals who'd gone bat-shit crazy during this entire scenario. Linking with that particular mind only brought silence, however.

There was no rest for the weary though, and still so many things to get done. She wasn't looking forward to all the extra work that was going to need to be done as far as security was concerned. With a short breath, Mindfuck let her hands drop to the side and lifted her head, a wry smile gracing her face.

"As much as I would love to hide out in a dark room and sleep all day (or forever), I'm certain there's much more pressing matters currently at hand that require our attention, Maridian."

"You know, from my perspective I'm not entirely sure I agree," he said, but he released her. Honestly, he was a little embarrassed. Sure, he took a very strong interest in ensuring that his friends and allies remained whole and healthy, but never quite such a personal interest. Frankly, it surprised him a great deal. "But I suppose if a bunch of robots suddenly burst in to start slaying us, they would probably not respect a sentimental moment quite as much as we'd prefer."

"Really, now? Don't you have a certain 'duty' to uphold, good sir? Ah, the downfalls of the morally righteous."

It surprised her as well, given her background, but she was beginning to think that elves (which, in itself wasn't difficult to get accustomed to, considering some of the suprahumans from earth) were either a trusting bunch, understanding, or plain weird on some account. The primordial ooze-man who received his powers via stds didn't even bother speaking with her, given the chance, and that was as low as you could go on the totem pole of Superhomeys. Next to Elyssa, that is.

"Hmm, in my (expert) opinion, I'd say that you're correct on that. There's also their inorganic state to consider; there isn't much (at all) I can do to fight them off, save ineptly firing a gun in their general direction and relying on (my terrible) luck to strike true."

Naw, that was pretty much Mar. But why shouldn't he trust her? She'd been nothing but forthright, responsible, honest, and friendly with him all the time he'd known her, when with her power what she COULD do was surely much worse, probably without even any consequence to her. Even the most uncharitable person had to respect that.

Then again, he valued those qualities.

"Are you capable of reading them at all, or do mechanical minds not count as minds to you?"

"Unfortunately not," she replied, crossing her arms over her chest. "I'm afraid my (mind) hands are tied when it comes to that. Artificial Intelligence, kludge minds, (blah, blah, blah), etcetera aren't actually affected by my telepathy the same way a normal mind is. As in, I could (quote, unquote) 'read' the mind of advanced AI, but due to their nature there's no guarantee that what I 'read' would be accurate."

"But you can sense them?" Mar said, perking up. Just knowing numbers would be helpful, and if she could do direction and distance as well, score!

"Yes, my telepathic reach can extend many hundreds of miles (fortunately, or unfortunately), though considering our current location, it's just a matter of separating their minds from the (collective cacophony) of the babbleroar (which shouldn't be too difficult considering their thoughts most certainly consist of 'maim' and 'kill')."

Edited 2012-01-05 13:03 (UTC)

"Perfect!" He threw up a fist triumphantly. "You can be my eyes and ears! Knowing what's coming and how many will make it a lot easier to prepare and assault them. And not attacking other crew members would also be helpful," he added as a distant afterthought.

"In that case, I probably should leave you to the grunt work and keep my lamentable accuracy to myself, lest a stray bullet makes its way into a hapless crew member (gun-wielding is not one of my skill-sets)."

With that said, Mindfuck let her arms drop to her side and inclined her head slightly. "Let's start, shall we?"

"More like you assign ME to do the grunt work while you sit back in the seat of power and information," he said, even as he swapped out his mace and shield for his trusted two-handed sword. "Be my eyes and ears, my lady, and I shall be your hands and sword!"

"Oh now, don't act as if you're not going to enjoy it. Isn't protecting the (not-so-innocent) what you're all about?" she teased, then fell silent, though his last comment almost received a laugh.

It was a headache and a half hopping from congisphere signature to signature in such a small vicinity, but it did help that the robots in question possessed AI that didn't quite mimic the minds of the other hundreds of voices aboard Stacy.

"Three within a 15 yard radius, with an additional two, 7 yards beyond that."

"Clustered or separated, can you tell?" Light swirled up and around him as he invoked a blessing on them both -- congratulations, Mindfuck, you've just been Kingsed. Then his seal, then Righteous Fury, then Retribution Aura.

Special Weapons: OPEN

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