Red Building
"FOR MOTHER... M Othe Rr Rr... RUS Sss SII Aa Aa A..."
The robot collapsed in a heap. There was a bullet to the left, a hunk of robot scrap to the right and a blast of electricity in the middle. It warbled and screeched, flailing around like a headless chicken, crashing down as its body crumbled. A fate not so different from its forebears.
The rest of the robots followed suit. Many were already turned to scrap, but Gilgamesh cleaned up the rest. As everyone dealt with the leader, she'd been on pest control. It wasn't glorious, but someone had to do it.
Yellow Building
The yellow building's leader was faring little better. They struggled and winced, wriggled and writhed, but there was little they could do to break free. They bubbled and babbled, their accent becoming even more atrocious.
"B-BUT I AM NOT A MAN-A! IMMA' JUST A POOR SERVANT-A! WHAT-A DO YOU WANNTA' ME TO DO-A?!""
Suddenly something beeped. It was low and soft, slow and steady, but Tasha could hear it. It came from the leader's chest, picking up speed. What it was wasn't clear, but it wasn't anything good.
Over in the corner, the remaining robots were on their last legs. Between wind and flame they were destined to be little more than molten slag. The thieves were rounded up, their painfully loud words falling on deaf ears.
"PLEASE HOLD! IS AN ACT OF MERCY NOT IN THE TRUTH OF THE EYE OF THE BEHOLDER?"
"I AM NOT CERTAIN THAT IS HOW THAT GOES..."
But the artifact was in danger. The large tarp covering it caught flame, spreading fast. There was room to save it, but they had to act now.
Unfortunately, not all the robots were so passive. Something struck him Ryan on the back, slamming him on the ground. In reality it was a robot, but this one was stronger the others. He wasn't seriously hurt, but perhaps it was enough to rethink his opinions.
Blue Building
"NEIN! NOW IS NOT THE WINTER OF OUR DISCONTENT! NOW IS THE MOMENT FOR GLORY! IN THE NAME OUR BELOVED FUHRER—"
Those were its last words. A second later it was shot in the face, clattering to the ground, their endless sound and fury signifying nothing. The rest were crushed, buried under another broken bot, hurled from Seymour's hands.
The remaining robots weren't sure what to do. Avenging their leader was now a core directive, but claiming the artifact was even more important. They stood in place, aiming their guns at the gunslinger, waiting for someone to make a move.
Edited by kkhohoho on Jan 29th 2024 at 11:12:43 AM
CG for short
Jay Beggs Fitzgerald - Escorting the Artifact
After making her entrance and attacking some robots, Jay spotted the tarp covering the artifiact being set ablaze.
"I don't know what that thing is, but I have a gut feeling that it's priceless, so it would be unfortunate if it was burned to ashes like Zelda! I'll go get it!"
Jay uttered a chant to boost herself further, increasing her speed and dashing towards it. She aimed magical blasts at any robot that'd gotten near as she rushed towards the artifact. Eventually, she reached it and hastily grabbed it, getting herself burned in the process as the tarp was on fire. She threw the tarp away and made a small barrier around it so the fire doesn't spread.
"There we go, safe and sound," Jay muttered as she cradled the artifact like it was her child. Her left hand was aching in pain from the burns it received, but she's trying to not let that deter her. She then turned her attention to the rest of the heroes in the building.
"Y'all, if I get tackled by any of these machines here, I'll throw this thing to whoever's the nearest in a rather intense take of Hot Potato! Got it, everyone?" She shouted towards them.
Edited by Cutegirl920fire on Jan 29th 2024 at 9:45:12 AM
Victor of HGS S320 | "There's rosemary, that's for remembrance. Pray you, love, remember."
AKA Nixer
Shao Fei: Yellow Building
There was a whooshing sound from behind Ryan, and just after he had been struck by the robot, something else struck the robot in retaliation. A large metal rod, which slammed into it from the side; barely missing Ryan's back in the process. A familiar furred figure zipped into the building, tackling Ryan out of the reach of the machine before rolling to their feet with their now shrunken pole clutched tightly in their hand.
"Whew. Sorry I'm late, guys..." Fei apologised, standing up and twirling her staff nonchalantly as she regarded the others present. She nodded in response to Jay, suddenly thrusting her staff backwards and extending it in order to strike a robot that had been sneaking up on her behind. There were only a handful of them left, but they were still dangerous, so she had to keep her ear out for any particularly stealthy machines. "Is there a... noise? Sounds like a... what is that?"
She glanced over at the leader, giving a side-eye to Tasha before zipping over to Jay's side with a short burst of speed, intending to cover her position.
"Maybe we should just get out of here...! I don't like the sound of that...!"
bork
Seymour Greene, Blue Building
"All right, the leader's down, time to take down the herd!"
Seymour noticed that the robots were all focused on the gunslinger, and decided to use this as an opportunity to catch the group off-guard. The humanoid plant-dinosaur-man jumped high in the air, and then attempted to perform a body splash into the crowd of robots, hoping to crash into as many robots as he could.
"Verdant.... SLAM!!!
The Light That Blinds
Windwing (Yellow Building)
"Ha! Take that, bad gu— oh crap!" Any pride Windwing felt was immediately evaporated in the wake of panic that holy smokes we might destroy the artifact! They had to do something, had to— oh, wait, no, Jay had handled that. Windwing allowed himself to relax a little.
And then Fei mentioned hearing something. And now that she had mentioned it, Windwing could faintly hear it too. It sounded like...beeping.
Windwing's eyes popped open. He'd read enough comics to know what that meant! "IT'S A BOMB!" he yelled. "IT'S GONNA BLOW UP!"
In what was probably a monumentally stupid decision fueled solely on adrenaline, a burst of air sent Windwing rocketing towards the robot, trying to shoulder-check it out of the building before it could explode.
"Kept me waiting, haven’t you? Tch. No matter. Dawdle all you’d like. In the end, your defeat remains inevitable."
Overtaker - Red Building
"Woo! All right!" Overtaker cheered as she watched the robot commander fall to the group's combined attacks. Then she turned to the others. "Great job team! Now, anyone know what this thing is? Or at least where we should put it?"
Overtaker took the artifact the robots had been trying to steal out from under her arm and held it in front of her with both hands to get a better look at it.
Breath of the Sun
Tasha, Yellow Building
Oh, it was a robot. That made things simpler.
As her ice crept up, Tasha cocked one axe back, readying a throw to split the bastard in half, but her keen ears caught the ticking noise. Because of course the annoying thing had a bomb in it.
Dropping her axes, she clasped her hands so she could focus all her power on freezing the thing completely solid, hoping that would be enough to keep whatever explosive compound it used inert.
Then the stupid idiot child flew towards it for some ungodly reason, and she was forced to quickly raise up a wall of ice to intercept him, lest he trigger the explosive preemptively.
"I'm freezing the bomb, you damn fool!" She all but roared at him. "If you set it off and kill us all, I'll drag you to hell myself!"
What is so amusing about this? Why do you take lives? How can you forget?
CG for short
Jay Beggs Fitzgerald - Yellow Building - Running Off with The Maltese Falcon
"Fair enough, old sport!" Jay responded to Fei after she noticed that she'd caught up with her. "Let's dash out with this little Maltese and play Hot Potato if needed!"
Jay began dashing towards the exit and along the way, she saw Windwing flying towards the bomb and Tasha grabbing him before he could hit it. She giggled at the sight, finding Tasha's comment of dragging Windwing to hell amusing.
"Say, old sport, if that bomb exploded and we all get killed from it, do you want me to guild you through hell a la Virgil just to find the right ring to put Windwing in?" Jay paused abruptly just to utter that joke to Tasha. She almost dropped the artifact but grabbed it in the nick of time. "But in all seriousness, we should really get out of here like what Fei suggested."
Jay continued her march towards the exit, holding the artifact as tightly as possible and ready to fight back.
Victor of HGS S320 | "There's rosemary, that's for remembrance. Pray you, love, remember."
The Light That Blinds
Windwing (Yellow Building)
Windwing had enough time to see the wall of ice that sprung up in front of him—but not enough to change course or slow down, and he let out an undignified shriek as he hit the wall full-force with a CRASH!
He didn't punch through it. It wasn't that flimsy. But it was still ice, and it was ice being rammed into by the full weight of a (admittedly rather small) nineteen-year old, meaning the front of it broke and collapsed on top of the poor hero, who fell to the floor and lay there, all the wind (ha) knocked out of his sails.
It hurt. His whole body hurt, especially his shoulder, and the ceiling was spinning. Or maybe that was just dizziness; it was hard to tell. He vaguely registered shouting, realized with perhaps not as much urgency as he should've that he should probably get out of there, and made to get up.
Very slowly.
Not helped by the aforementioned dizziness.
Woah, now the whole room was spinning...
"Kept me waiting, haven’t you? Tch. No matter. Dawdle all you’d like. In the end, your defeat remains inevitable."
AKA Nixer
Shao Fei: (Very Quickly Fleeing From The) Yellow Building
"I've got him, I've got! him!" Fei called out upon realising Windwing's plight, dashing in and scooping him up into a bridal carry before grabbing her staff with her tail and all but sprinting out of the building. She essentially jumped through the front window rather than use the door, shielding Windwing with her body from the glass shards before landing outside and running what she assumed to be a safe distance away before gently depositing him on the ground.
"Hey! You okay...? How many fingers am I holding up...?" she asked, holding up three fingers in front of his face to see if he had a concussion or not. "You hit that ice fast. Think you need a doctor...?"
bork
Fwomph
The Blue Building
"Bravo, bravo, gunslinger!"
Al had been getting people out of there while everyone else had been trashing the scrap. It wasn't glorious, but in a situation like this where certain insufficiencies would be easy to notice otherwise it was the best Al could really do. But now things were clearly winding down and he could safely approach his teammates.
It's clearly a case of backroom political albumizing.
Samus wasn't the first.
Maxx - Yellow Building
Maxx grunted through his teeth as the tarp covering the artifact caught fire and he found himself focusing as hard as before to keep that fire off of the artifact itself. Such was his concentration that he didn't notice Jay enter the room at all, at least until she rushed in and saved the artifact by getting rid of the burning tarp.
"I had that covered!" Maxx scoffed through heavy breaths as he relaxed his arms, which felt like they'd been tensed for the last hour. He wasn't actually sure if he did have it under control, though, and was secretly very relieved Jay stepped into help - though he wouldn't admit that to anyone, not even himself.
It took Maxx a few precious moments to process Windwing's announcement, but once he did it snapped him fully back into the present moment. Bomb disposal was not Maxx's strong suit, to say the least, so instead he began moving towards the exit. The sound of a flying superhero going 0-1 against a wall of ice stopped him in his tracks briefly, and after turning to see the aforementioned hero being carried out of the building by Shao Fei, he cursed under his breath while running for the museum's exit door.
Outside of the building, Maxx silently watched Windwing and Fei from near the door. He wanted the former to be okay, but the only thing he knew about medical situations was that they were very easy to make worse if you didn't know what you were doing. Maybe he should have studied up on that stuff before becoming a superhero.
Ay, you! It's Gold, and I'm noble!
The Light That Blinds
Windwing (Having Just Exited the Yellow Building)
"Ooooooh..." Windwing frowned and squinted at Fei's hand, trying to make her stop spinning. "Uh—three? Three, I think it's three— ow, my shoulder." The pain was starting to ebb away, but the major ache there hadn't gone down. "Did we— did we get 'em?"
"Kept me waiting, haven’t you? Tch. No matter. Dawdle all you’d like. In the end, your defeat remains inevitable."
Gunslinger shrugged. "I'm a fighter not a historian, most of the history I know is of the weird backstories of a few heroes, and the various Gunslinger Vees."
Surrounded by weirdoes
Yellow
Night Chaser knew he had to move once he saw the bomb, he ran to it, intent on grabbing it and throw it as high up as he could. He needed to move fast as he could to do so.
The roof Gotta get there.
Wake me up at your own risk.
Revolver Revenant - Blue Building
"...yeah, sure. Bravo. me."
As droll as she might sound, Giorgia is being as sincere as she gets. Truth be told, she's not used to being complimented, even after doing her job. She reckons Revolver Revenant's a little bit too unsettling to win most people's hearts.
With Al handling evacuation and Seymour providing a distraction sufficient to keep the remaining Mecha-Mooks at bay, Giorgia decides the only thing to do now is make a dash for the exit. Get whatever the Nazi-bots were so keen on appropriating for themselves out of here and into the hands of people who might know what it is and what to do with it, stat.
be nice to benjamin it's not his fault he got beat up by a microbe
Yellow Building
As soon as the frozen bomb reached it cracked open, splitting into a dozen pieces. The frigid shards of metal and plastic rained down, hurtling towards the floor below. The threat of explosion was non-existent, but any stray civilians or uncovered artifacts were still in danger.
But the most important artifact was in plain view. It was a golden scepter, glittering gems and ancient engravings carefully carved. They were hard to read, worn and archaic as the scepter itself. It was worth a fortune, but the other artifacts were as well. It was hard to tell what made this one special.
Blue Building
The robots weren't so easily fooled. Even as Seymour smashed them apart, their attention was focused squarely on the artifact. A lone bot raced for the gunslinger, a metal cheetah on tank treads, large cannon sticking out of its chest. It aimed for the Gunslinger's heels, fixing to make it trip. Either its programming was faulty or whatever was in their hands was sturdy enough to take a fall, but it wasn't letting up.
Red Building
Over in the red building, things seemed to be over. Gilgamesh thrust their spear into the last robot, streams of black oil leaking out as it gurgled. She couldn't care less. She pulled it out, squashing its head with her foot.
"Another mechanical monstrosity dealt with. Let us pray that was last of these foul beasts..."
She marched towards the others, surveying the room now that the coast was clear. She rested her spear on the ground, taking a closer look at the artifact. It was a gold bracelet, radiant as the sun. It was fitted with gems and engravings, same as the scepter. Gilgamesh blinked. She wasn't sure, but it seemed familiar somehow.
"...i am afraid I know not. My apologies. Perhaps there is someone within these halls who knows more about the subject..."
Her hand shook, golden spear rattling in her grasp. She glanced away, pinching her nervous brow. She was always so strong, but there was something she wasn't telling.
Overtaker - Red Building
Overtaker could tell Gilgamesh wasn't being entirely forthcoming about the bracelet, but she decided not to press the issue. After all, she knew all about having information that she'd prefer not just anyone knew.
"Maybe you could go outside and see if anyone who works at the museum is nearby?" Overtaker suggested to Gilgamesh. "I don't want anyone to get the wrong idea if I take this thing outside, so maybe me and Gunslinger here could try and see if there's anyone still inside that could tell us something about this." As she said this, Overtaker gestured towards the unconscious people in the red building to emphasize her point.
"That's actually a really good idea," Gunslinger pointed out. "Somebody ought to be more knowledgeable if they actually work here, and this is clearly important if someone sent communist robots out to grab it."
He leaned over to Overtaker and whispered. "Remind me to tell you of the Gunslinger of the first world war, crazy stuff during that time."
Overtaker - Red Building
"I'll take you up on that when we finish this up," Overtaker told him, then turned to the civilians.
"Excuse me. Do any of you work at this museum?" she asked. "We were wondering if you could tell us about one of the artifacts here."
Surrounded by weirdoes
Yellow
Night Chaser saw the bomb fall apart, so his mind seemed to calm for a second, but he knew he had to keep going. His senses caught at least a few people, so he started to run to the nearest civilian in danger. And even then, there was something else bothering him. Like he got a weird vibe out of one of the things, a scepter. He hesitated in touching it, if it had some kinda power, it would end badly for him if he touched it, and depending on what, exactly, might end up really messy.
"Gonna go help the last few people" He said to the communicator he carried "There is this weird scepter, mind checking it out?" With that, he bolted out to do as he had to.
Wake me up at your own risk.
Seymour Greene, Blue Building
Seymour saw that the robots he managed to smash apart weren't too in it, as he saw the robotic cheetah of sorts rush towards the Revolver Revenant. She seemed very good with that gun, but Seymour felt a need to make things easier for his ally.
Seymour saw how fast the robotic cheetah was going, and felt like it would be too fast to hit with another thrown robot, and began to spin one of his arms around, not like a windmill motion but as though the arm was some kind of sling or whip, trying to gain momentum before throwing a punch, extending his fist towards the robotic cheetah at a fast speed.
"Look out behind ya, metal cat!"
Breath of the Sun
Tasha, Yellow Building
The blast had thankfully been contained, though there was still some shrapnel. Frozen as it was, Tasha used the ice on the metal bomb-bits to push them away from hitting anyone.
Exhaling, feeling the faint soul-ache of pushing her magic this hard, Tasha recalled her axes, strapped them to her belt, then stomped over to the artifact, gently taking the scepter in one big paw as she examined it.
"All this fuss for a fancy stick." She frowned, turning it over to see if there was anything worth noting about it. "Must be worth a fortune if they were so interested in it. Hmph. Greedy fools."
What is so amusing about this? Why do you take lives? How can you forget?Revolver Revenant - Blue Building
It was extremely fortunate that Seymour was there to literally watch her back, because Giorgia would otherwise have been caught flat-footed by the robot cheetah - not least because of the speed its form afforded it. WHAT a cheetah had to do with Nazis, Paolo would ask himself later; he could hardly ask himself now, since, like the other three souls within Revolver Revenant, his current state was one of panic. Caught between their instincts to draw a weapon and fight and to ensure they didn't let go of the artifact no matter what, Revolver Revenant would've been toast right there and then without backup, capable only of managing a sloppy quickstep back before the friendly neighbourhood plant monster saved their pallid skin.
"...thanks." It wouldn't have been clear even if Seymour was familiar with the four voices which Revenant was speaking, so indistinct was this one word. That was all Revolver Revenant gave themself time to say before resuming plan "Run Like Hell".
be nice to benjamin it's not his fault he got beat up by a microbe
Jay Beggs Fitzgerald - Flashback, before entering one of the houses
"Hey, old sport!" Jay called out towards Fei. "Wanna be my Sancho for the class' first mission? After all, by the looks of it, our classmates are parin' up and since you showed an interest in learnin' spells from me, it would make sense if we worked together. I'm thinkin' of going to that yellow house by the way."
Jay Beggs Fitzgerald - Present Day - I, not Robot
Regardless of whether or not Fei accepted her offer, Jay entered the Yellow House. She was busy escorting civilians out of harm's way this entire time once she got inside, but eventually, she figured she'll have to do something about those robots.
Muttering a spell chant under her breath, Jay swapped into her sleek dandy wear and wielded her trusty cane. She jumped into the battle, unleashing some magical blasts towards some nearby robots; they may or may not have hit them.
Sorry for the late entrance, was busy with other things, but I, MagiFlapper, have come to enforce Asimov's laws on these machines!"
If Fei did agree to team up with Jay, then by now, the flapper is expecting her monkey partner to join the fray.
Edited by Cutegirl920fire on Jan 29th 2024 at 9:34:12 AM
Victor of HGS S320 | "There's rosemary, that's for remembrance. Pray you, love, remember."