So, one new fic and a couple of scenelets. Ah well.
Have some more.
**4**
A.C. figured the Op-For had fallen back to regroup. This gave her a little time to recover.
She'd gone hunting for the fallback point instead.
Ever since Jusenkyou, she'd become far more accepting of her nature. Or, as she thought in her darker moments, she'd become less human.
She shook off those thoughts, multitasking brain or not, as they were inappropriate when running The Gauntlet. It was time to take stock.
She had an assault rifle and 115 rounds in 3 and a half clips. There was nothing special about the rounds and worst come to worst her armour could take them for a bit. It'd hurt like hell though (especially since she'd got proof positive that her body self-upgraded, something she'd suspected since the Accident anyway). Besides, juggernauting wasn't her style. Two M1911A1 pistols in .45ACP with 6 full clips, 3 in the left, 2 in the right. A.C. missed her Whistler Glock 18s, and although a part of her wanted paired .50 calibre Desert Eagles she didn't think Whistler would laugh if she asked for selective fire on them. Three red-band grenades, have to save those. Eight WMAs, although how they got a Mirage grenade in here meant she'd have to have a serious chat with Lebia later. One USAS-12 with 15 slug shells in a drum magazine, which was unexpected. Seven Ka-Bar knives (which were not very good as throwing knives, but needs must). Her monomolecular single-crystal carbon ribbon sword. About twenty shots in the reservoirs to her gauntlet wire launchers.
The map her tactical processor was building up was next to useless, given the variability of her environment (and she wasn't about to try cracking the Op-For tac-net, even if she COULD net-dive now). Her senses were muffled slightly by her helmet. No EVA pack to use for jump assist (it was too heavy. The main reason she hadn't gone to Hardsuits before now was the fact they'd slow her down. Hum, force-field actuated power suit? Tricky, have to talk to Katz. Rig it? Probably). Fatigue wasn't a problem for now (although the fact it wasn't DID worry her). No rations WERE a problem (maybe an oversight in the scenario design?).
So, incredible speed, superhuman strength, worryingly high endurance, surprising toughness, sniper-like accuracy and range with thrown weapons, a decent array of guns, and her sword.
What else? One spare wire reel. A hundred-pack of zip-ties (useless as she wasn't capturing anyone.). A couple of med-kits. A small egg in a spiral (which she recognised, but doubted she could use). A sword pendent on a necklace chain (which she didn't, and thus couldn't unless she was REALLY lucky). And something she was going to kill Lebia for.
***
One of the features of the Dungeon and Gauntlet was something Greenpeace had sweet-talked Leonard into inserting.
Called the Toy Chest, it was basically a web-board on to which anyone could post ideas and models for useful gadgets and objects to be won in either game.
When A.C. found out, the green-fingered pixy got made to take care of it.
While some of the suggestions were taken for use in other games, the vast majority were left in the 'Daydream' area. There were some notable exceptions but, like the infamous BFG-100K Gatling, the majority of these were officially rejected. (The BFG-100K-G itself actually made it back...in the animated opening titles for the Dungeon as the reason for all the monsters. A cleverly disguised but obviously parodied individual is seen working at an almost complete version when it blows up in their face. The resultant explosion on the purposely non-descript planet still gets an appreciative 'Coool' from those who see it, and is made out to be the cause of the mutations that made the monsters the Dungeon contestants face.) Given the nature of Fen, there was an awful lot of information about the objects given during discussions on the board. Eventually, after repeated requests, Greenpeace gave in and set up a wiki for the objects, which saw a lot of activity and was frequently cross-linked to Wikipedia.
Still, out of all the chaff some wheat was found, and after a second vetting by Lebia or occasionally Eddie a pool of weird but useful items based on those ideas built up.
Which just sparked more interest when the Gauntlet came around.
***
Unlike the majority of her subordinates, Utena Ten-Joh was in fact still working. Where they were pretending to work but were actually watching the video from the Gauntlet server, she was writing her latest investigation report.
Hey, crime didn't stop just to watch someone put their computerised ass on the line in a game.
A knock on the door got an idle look up to see Sergeant Walters pop his head in.
"Ma'am? I've got the forensics back on the Greenline sabotage."
"Thank you Sergeant." The Chief Inspector smiled wanly. "It's nice to know some people can ignore distractions in this station. Anything interesting?"
"It looks like someone put oak-flour in the transmission fluid. When the fluid heated up under motion it reacted and froze the entire system solid. Of course as soon as it stopped it began to re-liquefy..."
"And suddenly restarted." Utena finished. "Well, at least it gives us some new suspects."
"That it does Ma'am." Walters agreed. "I'd get right on it, but everyone seems to be busy."
The pink-hared woman rolled her eyes.
"Why they don't just wait until after work tomorrow when it'll be free I don't know."
Whatever the sergeant would have said in reply was cut off when someone else knocked on the door.
"Come in." The senior officer called, admitting a slightly nervous uniformed officer. "What is it Officer Nakajima?"
"Ma'am, I was wondering, can we use the projector in the briefing room to watch?"
Utena Ten-Joh hadn't gotten to her position by being dumb, so the sudden dread that settled into her stomach at that request was well earned.
"No, I'm afraid you can't." The Chief Inspector said in a much put-upon voice. "That equipment is for official use only. So are your desk computers technically." She raised her voice for the last sentence, causing people to duck back down.
"But-"
"Please don't make me call I.T. and have certain servers barred from access. Now, I believe we all have work to do?"
"Yes Ma'am." The disappointed officer saluted, and closed the door.
Sergeant Walters watched his superior let her face sink into her hands.
"There's not going to be a lick of work being done virtually anywhere right now." The woman groaned. "For Serenity's Sake, why my shift Rei?"
The sergeant couldn't help but agree with the sentiment.
**5**
At the fallback point, the five teams (Red, Blue, Green, Purple, and Grey) tried to work out strategy. The catacombs complex would normally be their bread-and-butter environment, only the target was too fast and too skilled. Their best chance had come when she'd been put into the open. The auditorium complex might be a good place to set up, but it didn't have enough cover. Forcing her through the underground industrial complex up to the wrecked town/village would be better. Sure it gave cover equally, but right now they couldn't muster enough force quickly enough to pin her down. The keep on top of the tunnels was too confined. While they'd be able to thoroughly sweep it, the advantage would be with her. They needed reach on this target. Plus it was right by the magma pit. The garden with ruins they were currently in would only serve as a quick hiding spot.
The first indication that their time was up was the Mirage grenade going off in the middle of them, providing them with HUNDREDS of targets. Fortunately only fifteen went down to friendly fire. Unfortunately it led to people bunching up.
The Scarlet Angel took ruthless advantage of this to drop some of the grenades she'd purloined during the confusion (and adding another eight kills to that tally) into the two largest groups, before raising both her rifle and one of the few .50 calibre machine guns they had and laying down a brief blizzard of fire to cause the rest to duck and cover.
Then there was silence, before a scream and a crunch brought their heads up. One of the Purples had popped up to try and surprise her, and had gotten the barrel of a red hot .50 calibre machine gun thrown through the face for their trouble.
Of their opponent, there was no sign.
Not until a well placed sniper shot hit an exposed grenade at least.
***
"Yeah, she's scary." Katz commented, as though this was a fact along the lines of water being all wet, Space having no atmosphere to speak of, and gravity being slightly sucky.
"BWAHAHAHA! Glorious! Such deviousness! Such vicious brutality!" Trigon sighed lustily. "What an Empress she would make! I was particularly impressed with her last move. Crushing their hope and filling them with fear with such effortless bloodshed!"
Across the bottom of the screen a banner was scrolling.
***ALERT*** - New Record!: Most Kills in a Re-spawn period at 52. New Record!: Most Kills in a single attack at 45. - ***ALERT***
Have some more.
**4**
A.C. figured the Op-For had fallen back to regroup. This gave her a little time to recover.
She'd gone hunting for the fallback point instead.
Ever since Jusenkyou, she'd become far more accepting of her nature. Or, as she thought in her darker moments, she'd become less human.
She shook off those thoughts, multitasking brain or not, as they were inappropriate when running The Gauntlet. It was time to take stock.
She had an assault rifle and 115 rounds in 3 and a half clips. There was nothing special about the rounds and worst come to worst her armour could take them for a bit. It'd hurt like hell though (especially since she'd got proof positive that her body self-upgraded, something she'd suspected since the Accident anyway). Besides, juggernauting wasn't her style. Two M1911A1 pistols in .45ACP with 6 full clips, 3 in the left, 2 in the right. A.C. missed her Whistler Glock 18s, and although a part of her wanted paired .50 calibre Desert Eagles she didn't think Whistler would laugh if she asked for selective fire on them. Three red-band grenades, have to save those. Eight WMAs, although how they got a Mirage grenade in here meant she'd have to have a serious chat with Lebia later. One USAS-12 with 15 slug shells in a drum magazine, which was unexpected. Seven Ka-Bar knives (which were not very good as throwing knives, but needs must). Her monomolecular single-crystal carbon ribbon sword. About twenty shots in the reservoirs to her gauntlet wire launchers.
The map her tactical processor was building up was next to useless, given the variability of her environment (and she wasn't about to try cracking the Op-For tac-net, even if she COULD net-dive now). Her senses were muffled slightly by her helmet. No EVA pack to use for jump assist (it was too heavy. The main reason she hadn't gone to Hardsuits before now was the fact they'd slow her down. Hum, force-field actuated power suit? Tricky, have to talk to Katz. Rig it? Probably). Fatigue wasn't a problem for now (although the fact it wasn't DID worry her). No rations WERE a problem (maybe an oversight in the scenario design?).
So, incredible speed, superhuman strength, worryingly high endurance, surprising toughness, sniper-like accuracy and range with thrown weapons, a decent array of guns, and her sword.
What else? One spare wire reel. A hundred-pack of zip-ties (useless as she wasn't capturing anyone.). A couple of med-kits. A small egg in a spiral (which she recognised, but doubted she could use). A sword pendent on a necklace chain (which she didn't, and thus couldn't unless she was REALLY lucky). And something she was going to kill Lebia for.
***
One of the features of the Dungeon and Gauntlet was something Greenpeace had sweet-talked Leonard into inserting.
Called the Toy Chest, it was basically a web-board on to which anyone could post ideas and models for useful gadgets and objects to be won in either game.
When A.C. found out, the green-fingered pixy got made to take care of it.
While some of the suggestions were taken for use in other games, the vast majority were left in the 'Daydream' area. There were some notable exceptions but, like the infamous BFG-100K Gatling, the majority of these were officially rejected. (The BFG-100K-G itself actually made it back...in the animated opening titles for the Dungeon as the reason for all the monsters. A cleverly disguised but obviously parodied individual is seen working at an almost complete version when it blows up in their face. The resultant explosion on the purposely non-descript planet still gets an appreciative 'Coool' from those who see it, and is made out to be the cause of the mutations that made the monsters the Dungeon contestants face.) Given the nature of Fen, there was an awful lot of information about the objects given during discussions on the board. Eventually, after repeated requests, Greenpeace gave in and set up a wiki for the objects, which saw a lot of activity and was frequently cross-linked to Wikipedia.
Still, out of all the chaff some wheat was found, and after a second vetting by Lebia or occasionally Eddie a pool of weird but useful items based on those ideas built up.
Which just sparked more interest when the Gauntlet came around.
***
Unlike the majority of her subordinates, Utena Ten-Joh was in fact still working. Where they were pretending to work but were actually watching the video from the Gauntlet server, she was writing her latest investigation report.
Hey, crime didn't stop just to watch someone put their computerised ass on the line in a game.
A knock on the door got an idle look up to see Sergeant Walters pop his head in.
"Ma'am? I've got the forensics back on the Greenline sabotage."
"Thank you Sergeant." The Chief Inspector smiled wanly. "It's nice to know some people can ignore distractions in this station. Anything interesting?"
"It looks like someone put oak-flour in the transmission fluid. When the fluid heated up under motion it reacted and froze the entire system solid. Of course as soon as it stopped it began to re-liquefy..."
"And suddenly restarted." Utena finished. "Well, at least it gives us some new suspects."
"That it does Ma'am." Walters agreed. "I'd get right on it, but everyone seems to be busy."
The pink-hared woman rolled her eyes.
"Why they don't just wait until after work tomorrow when it'll be free I don't know."
Whatever the sergeant would have said in reply was cut off when someone else knocked on the door.
"Come in." The senior officer called, admitting a slightly nervous uniformed officer. "What is it Officer Nakajima?"
"Ma'am, I was wondering, can we use the projector in the briefing room to watch?"
Utena Ten-Joh hadn't gotten to her position by being dumb, so the sudden dread that settled into her stomach at that request was well earned.
"No, I'm afraid you can't." The Chief Inspector said in a much put-upon voice. "That equipment is for official use only. So are your desk computers technically." She raised her voice for the last sentence, causing people to duck back down.
"But-"
"Please don't make me call I.T. and have certain servers barred from access. Now, I believe we all have work to do?"
"Yes Ma'am." The disappointed officer saluted, and closed the door.
Sergeant Walters watched his superior let her face sink into her hands.
"There's not going to be a lick of work being done virtually anywhere right now." The woman groaned. "For Serenity's Sake, why my shift Rei?"
The sergeant couldn't help but agree with the sentiment.
**5**
At the fallback point, the five teams (Red, Blue, Green, Purple, and Grey) tried to work out strategy. The catacombs complex would normally be their bread-and-butter environment, only the target was too fast and too skilled. Their best chance had come when she'd been put into the open. The auditorium complex might be a good place to set up, but it didn't have enough cover. Forcing her through the underground industrial complex up to the wrecked town/village would be better. Sure it gave cover equally, but right now they couldn't muster enough force quickly enough to pin her down. The keep on top of the tunnels was too confined. While they'd be able to thoroughly sweep it, the advantage would be with her. They needed reach on this target. Plus it was right by the magma pit. The garden with ruins they were currently in would only serve as a quick hiding spot.
The first indication that their time was up was the Mirage grenade going off in the middle of them, providing them with HUNDREDS of targets. Fortunately only fifteen went down to friendly fire. Unfortunately it led to people bunching up.
The Scarlet Angel took ruthless advantage of this to drop some of the grenades she'd purloined during the confusion (and adding another eight kills to that tally) into the two largest groups, before raising both her rifle and one of the few .50 calibre machine guns they had and laying down a brief blizzard of fire to cause the rest to duck and cover.
Then there was silence, before a scream and a crunch brought their heads up. One of the Purples had popped up to try and surprise her, and had gotten the barrel of a red hot .50 calibre machine gun thrown through the face for their trouble.
Of their opponent, there was no sign.
Not until a well placed sniper shot hit an exposed grenade at least.
***
"Yeah, she's scary." Katz commented, as though this was a fact along the lines of water being all wet, Space having no atmosphere to speak of, and gravity being slightly sucky.
"BWAHAHAHA! Glorious! Such deviousness! Such vicious brutality!" Trigon sighed lustily. "What an Empress she would make! I was particularly impressed with her last move. Crushing their hope and filling them with fear with such effortless bloodshed!"
Across the bottom of the screen a banner was scrolling.
***ALERT*** - New Record!: Most Kills in a Re-spawn period at 52. New Record!: Most Kills in a single attack at 45. - ***ALERT***