RPGWW

(OOC: Wow, second thread. Faye, looks like your little idea was a real winner. Congrats, and thanks for letting me GM this. And thanks to all the players as well for sticking with this.)

Dane discovered, to his disappointment, that the breeze had been merely blowing in the wind. There was nothing inside, save for the branches that supported the leafy structure.

Shaking off his dissapointment, Dane continued along the path he had plotted out on the map, grabbing Navin and pushing him out to lead again.

'Wait for orders to attack? We're SeeD!'

Dane was getting more and more displeased with that idea of the plan he as "lead" the way and without Stahl there he was becoming more like his old self. He clenched his fist tighter and tigher.

The blow from Ash had meerly fueuled his desire to fight.

***

Shasti wasn't happy at all. She was cured and feeling well enough to continue but the idea of Dane in charge kept causing her stomach to cramp up.

"Jei? I have a bad feeling about this... Do you think Instructor stahl knew what he was doing? I maen, my bto- Dane has never been in charge of a group before... And then theres the fact him and Instructor Ash kep coming to blows."

However, Shasti followed the orders, what little there were of them. He said move out, so she was, following the routed path. But it wasn't a direct route at all, and he was putting all of them at great risk. Did he want to get us all killed?

( OOC : Woo! Who'd have thought it last so long huh? And the story has hardly started! ^_^ eheheheheh Rar Rar RAAAR I'm getting excited! )

The squad moved forward without contact for several minutes, Dane guiding them towards the nearest artillery battery marked on the map. It was hidden in a dip in the land, to hide it's presence from advancing troops.

The detachment climbed another hill, ducking low as they neared the top...

And looked down on a scene of destruction. The small outpost was aflame, the two large guns twisted and charred by an explosion. Dead soldiers lay about the ground, their static defenses left strangely untouched. The students knew that none of their forces had come this way. Which meant that someone else had.

Ash was where Dane's group had left him, attending to the injured. He had just finished applying aide to person he had briefly left to go "attend" to some matters with Dane.

He turned to go see if anyone else in his group needed help, well the ones that were still alive as he looked back at their destroyed transport. He let out a sigh as stood there for a moment.

He then went to go check on the others who were in his squad...

Reium shrugged as the man walked away, and took a seat. He was sure that he had given him a slightly more advanced look on Gurdian. Thinking back, he never really knew why he took up an intrest when he got to the school. -Doesn't matter now, now that I'm stuck with the most annoying one in the whole hemisphere.- he thought sullenly to himself. He observed his knuckles to see if they were damaged any. They didn't hurt, but maybe thats because he hadn't taken the time to notice..
----------Meanwhile-------
The sleeping Slyph rolled over in Reiums bed and awoke. She took a curious gaze around and decided she better put some normal clothes on, seeing as reium would have a cow if he knew she was walking about. But he'd have an even BIGGER on if he found her wearing his clothes. she giggled lightly to herself and began rummaging through his clothes. Finding his usual attire. A white T-shirt with thesame Cadet pants-uniform they wear all the time. She shrugged and decided to put on the cadet uniform on anyway. Leaving the top part off of course. She quickly thanked Reium to herself for leaving her sleeping as she began to dres herself in his clothes.

(No problem Jak ^,^, I know it couldn't have gotten this far without YOU, and everyone else ..Anyone up for a group hug..no? well too bad!! *huggles all*)

"Don't know about Stahl... I think he's more impressed by sheer guts than anything else," murmured Anjelai. "Let's just hope Dane and Fanrico don't headbutt at a crucial moment..."

Navin looked at the wreckage.
"Right. Now...see, I know what you're going to say. To run in and see what the hell's going on. I, on the other hand, am completely terrified, and I think I'm going to go a lot slower than you."

"No room in SeeD for cowardice," Rudolf said sternly, absent-mindedly repeating the lessons of his instructors as he stared down at the horrific ruins below. Whoever came down on the outpost before them had done a damn fine job of wrecking the place. "Don't @#%$ this up now, Dane," he said as he cautiously rose and started down the hill.

"Like I need you two to comment on anything." The look of frustration was evident on Danes face as he looked at the carnage.

"Everyone! Get ya ass down there and search round for whoever did this!" Looks of it, they're probably some tough group of shits

Shasti walked a little forward and pipped something out that couldn't really be caught.

"What!? Shasti?" Dane snapped, with a growl.

"Shouldn't.. we look for survivors too?"

Dane looked almost puzzeled. "We were going to kill them all ourselves... why bother? Unless it was to take em out of course."

Shasti kept her face calm but inwardly she thought about it. were they really going to kill them all or were they just going to imprision them somewhere and sucure control. Either way doesn't matter now but...

"Brot- Dane. A survivor might know who did this and give us more information. Also, shouldn't you report this to Stahl?" She asked, looking down at Danes "radio".

Dane looked at his sister, then shook his head.

"Look, you go down there and search for ya @#%$ survivors okay? If you find out anything wrothwhile then by all means tell us... But remember we ARE taking this post!" As for Stahl, he's not going to call him just over every little thing. They had the post, or will do damned soon, so everything was going to the plan.

As the student SeeD's entered the base, Dane looked at it. "Some damned bastards in this battle taking my fights." Maybe some other group sent in to squash these guys... naw.. they used SeeD cause we're meant to be the best...

Growling in frustration, Dane headed down.

Shasti also had headed down and began looking for survivors or a computer turminal. If it still worked she might find some decent information for the mission.

Navin gripped his trident in fear, as he slowly looked around the post.
This...this is ridiculous. This place looks like it was hit with a bloody missile!

Nale was on the biggest combat high of his life so in his mind nothing could "fu<king" stop him. Still he approached the ruined outpost slowly sniffing the air for any sign of trouble.

Ash looked over his remaining men. Three students, all male, armed with a variety of hand to hand weaponry. Delta team, which had been twice the size of any other squad, had been created as an assault squad. But after the casualties, Fanrico wasn't sure if they could cut it.

"Ash, you should head to staging area B."

Ash looked over his shoulder, towards Stahl who was walking off in the direction Dane and the others had gone.

"I have some students to evaluate."

---

Slyph quickly got into the spare set of clothes, now looking respectable and far less conspicuous.

---

A few minutes later, the chef walked out of the kitchen again, carrying a plate of soup with a half loaf of brown bread on the side.

"Here," he said as he placed it down on the table, "it's all I could get you due to the other cooking. Anyway, have a nice meal."

And with that, he turned around and headed back towards the kitchen, probably with work to do.

---

Upon inspection of the dead, Navin realised that it hadn't been a missile that had got this place. The bodies were riddled with bullet wounds, most in the upper body and head area. One corpse had it's entire body above it's shoulders blown away, most likely the result of a shotgun blast. The remains were splattered over the ground behind the corpse. The others with him were greeted with the same sight, and noticed the lack of any corpses that weren't of rebel soldiers.

---

Nale also knew what had killed these men, but not due to his eyes. He could smell the gunpowder in the air, as well as a faint whiff of something... plastic explosives. That's what had destroyed the gun emplacements. Besides the familiar smells of his squadmates, he couldn't smell the scent of anyone else who was still in the land of the living. Whoever had hit this place had done so at least an hour ago.

---

Shasti soon found what she was looking for. At the rear of the gun emplacements was a small bunker, probably housing the trajectory correction systems. She peeked inside, and was greeted with a sickening sight. The area near the door was coated in gore, scorch marks outlining the red mess. Someone had popped a grenade inside, and splattered the poor sods all over the walls. It didn't look like there'd be any survivors.

Still, the computer seemed to be intact, albeit with a smear of blood on the monitor. She could see it was also booted up and working, recognising the program on the screen as the Mhern ABC (Artillery Barrage Coordinator).

Edited by: Jak Snide&nbsp; at: 9/5/02 4:50:45 pm

"Dane!", Nale grunted, "the emplacement has been empty for at least an hour, there is no one around that I can smell."

As Ash watched Stahl walk off, he couldn't get this feeling of suspicion out of his brain. Like something was going on... that he didn't know about... or realize. What it all meant was...

His trust of Stahl was fading.

But, he would look into this later, he had a mission on his hands right now. He turned back to his troops in his squad.

"Alright... I know we're still not in the best of shape at the moment. But we got to get moving. We got to start towards our destination." he ordered as he took one last glance at the downed transport.

Ash's squad began marching off towards it's destination.

Walking through the raher messy room and fighting back the urge to puke, Shasti reached the computer console. She thanked whatever GF was looking out for her today and cracked her fingers before getting to work.

"Standard systems, standard systems... didn't they have a guy who could write his own stuff at all?..." Sighing at her oppenets lack of challenge she continued her work.

"Whats locked up here and what isn't.. and why? Weapons in this one at all?"

Also another idea popped in her head as well.

"I wonder if they're stupid enough to have all the military bunkers linked together through this thing?"

She spoke out loud to the machine. This was a calming mesure, to herself, and in some odd way, to the computer and the program she was trying to hack through. She felt better about doing something like this why explaining it to the machine... otherwise it was just... some form of rape or something...

"so how are the other buckers fairing huh? You know my cute little Mhern ABC?"

Searhing for all these things Shasti worked at something she knew.

***

A @#%$ hour!? Dane didn't acknowlage Nale as he walked past him after the news, though he was cleary displeased at what he was told.

So they hit here before we even got dropped in?! Dane went around, just searching randomally. This was the most frustrating thing ever. In that amount of time any number of buckers could have been attacked already, they may end up having nothing to do here at all...

Shasti worked her way through the system counter-hacking measures with ease, quickly gaining access to all the resources available on the computer. A quick check told her that, while the terminal was connected to a wireless network, she'd need a password to logon and access any other terminals from offsite.

Still, the resources she had weren't that bad. Daily log, lists of soldiers stationed at the outpost, surveillance camera recordings, preset coordinates for various targets in the area, and a map revealing nothing she didn't already know.

The slyph quickly stepped out and began wandering around the garden. Reium hd never let her do this herself, so this was all very new and exciting for her. A tad scary, since the place was empty. he unwittingly headed towards the cafeteria

--------Meanwhile-------

Reium looked on the plate, nearly disgusted at what he had to eat. This kinda stuff seemed to be the food of slaves. Though he knew better. Since most slaves didn't GET to eat, and since it was better then nothing he got started to eating, watching the door out of habit. -I wonder if I'm ever gonna be a SeeD. I bet Rudolfs gonna be rollin' in his hit when he finds out

Edited by: Faye Alkaline at: 9/7/02 4:51:38 pm

Deeum looked around the area with the look of horror/disgut.
This was the first time she had seen a real battle, and was sort of upsetted by the scene.
She walked over to one of the bodies, just stared.
'Man..." Deeum though, with the twing of pain coming from her sholder

((the wound is from when she was fighitng the soldiers WAY eariler on))

Reuim's brooding was interrupted as he heard the door to the cafeteria swing open. He looked up. And saw Sylph. In his clothes.

Edited by: Jak Snide&nbsp; at: 9/8/02 3:27:17 pm

Shasti checked through each targets cordinates and jotted them down, where they were and what they are, just in case. She then went into the surveillance camera recordings and looked through, searching for some explation as to what happened here.

Reium spotted slyph about the same time slyph spotted him. she blanched as he jumped up, knocking his tray up as he went. "What the hell are you doing here...IN MY CLOTHES?!" he screamed at the GF. Slyph was pretty used toReium being 'mean' to her, but he usually never yelled. she bit her lower lip and hung her head. "sorry.." she murmured.

Shasti quickly found the files, and began scanning the recent recordings. Nothing interesting seemed to pop up. Until she hit the events of about an hour ago.

The base had been orderly and unalertred one moment, then the next it was in chaos. A man dropped dead, a hole blown in the side of his head by an unseen gunman. Half the others were cut down as they went for their weapons, the remaining men running for cover and beginning to fire back. It didn't seem to help, as they quickly fell dead to whoever was firing on them. Then she saw them. Clad in black, mostly carrying silenced submachine guns and moving in carefully from the rear of, covering every angle. One moved over to the bunker where she was now, opening the door and popping a grenade inside, and slamming it shut after him. A rebel soldier appeared from nowhere, probably having been hiding out of sight of the camera and the black operators. His upper body was blown away before he could even fire a shot.

She watched a few more minutes, the mystery soldiers planting an explosive charge between the guns, then running out of the camera's view, both artillery cannons being destroyed in the explosion. The rest of the recording simply showed the devastated base.

Shasti was awe struck. Whoever they were, they attacked with the effiantsy of an elite SeeD group. The attack had been so skilled and pulled off with no hitch's at all.

They were pure skill.

"I wonder... what sort of GF they used to get that good..." There actions seemed so inhuman Shasti believed they had to be helped by some GF.

There was no evidence that they did however and that disturbed Shasti even more.

Making a note to report all this to Dane, Shasti started making a copy of the recordings. Others may want to exaime this later.

***

Dane grunted and hit a wall. This place was dead and there was nothing left to do. The bunker was secure alright, everyone was eliminated.

"ALRIGHT! Everyone get ready we're getting to the next place! I ain't hanging around here no more!"

Dane stomped around and searched for everyone who wasn't already nearby kicking dead bodies out of his way. He couldn't stand being in this coffin any longer.

Navin was perfectly happy to leave this place.
"Got it. Whoever did this, I don't think I want to be there if they return."

Reium seemed more then angry that slyph had came walking in with his clothes on, healso eemed angry that he had chosen THIS time to wake up and unoccuppy the bed. "Tell me what your doing here.." he said in his uual voice. Slyph kept her head hung, her hair faling in front of her face, hiding the michevious grin he had on her face. She reached into the pocket of the pants and pulled out the cleaning cloth Reium usually carried. she tore off a bit and tied her hair back. he raised her head again and begun concentrating. Reium had no real clue what was going on "are you going to answer me?" he asked, sounding irratated. She quickly looked into Reium's mind and tried to changesome parts of his personality...To something she called "Knight in shining armor" ..This is done by changing their morale and personality to something a bit more friendly and caring. More charming too.

(I don't know how you'll decide if this'll work, or if this is allowed. The change is temporary BTW, and this kinda thing can be blocked. ..Bah x.x, This kinda stuff is for the Phlyis people ^^

(OOC: Slyph can do it, and she succeeds as well. Oh, and Cho, you need to post. Shasti should tell everyone what she saw. XD)

Rudolf looked up at the sound of Dane's command, both relieved to leave the unsettling massacre and frustrated that their objective hadn't been properly reached. The absolute precision of the attack still amazed him. Warriors to top SeeD? Was that even possible?

Reium's ears twitched, and for a moment he lost all expression..then his face took on a heartwarming smile. He walked from the table, his arms wide open as if to recieve slyph. He walks over to slyph and quickly takes her left hand softly, the other going around her back and hugging her closely to him..Slyph blushed and covered her face

Shasti finally left the room and set out to lok across the base, only to find Dane and a few others waiting, ready to leave.

"Dane." She said, in her best military blank voice. "I have a report to make reguarding who did all this."

Dane looked up, mostly unintrested to begin with, however as Shasti explained what she saw Dane started to pay attention. She ran through the pression of the attack and all the sites she saw.

"... This seemed to be done by people alone then... " Dane said with a grin.

Of course Dane would like it if it was done by no GF's help but just cause they didn't use them in this attack doesn't mean that they didn't use them. No Shasti convinced herself that they had to have used a GF.

"We have no evid-" Dane waved his hand irritably. He obvously didn't want to hear it.

"Is everyone here then!?" He barked as he looked around "Then we're going!" With that Dane headed off...

"Dane? SURE you don't want to hang around a bit more?" Anjelai called dubiously. In a vague, abstract portion of her mind, she supposed she should be as wary of Dane as anybody else, but it was still hard for her to take somebody who didn't weigh even half as much as she did seroiusly, especially when she topped him by over a foot. "To make sure that whatever took care of THESE guys won't take care of US next?"

Dane shook his head. "We're going! @#%$ hanging around here! We're on a mission! What sort of stupid @#%$ would stop in a mission cause it may be a little bit tougher then it might of been orginally. I certainly ain't hanging around here and as I'm in charge you ain't either. Unless you want to leave the misson completely!"

"DANE!" Shasti shouted out. Dane glared at her, then rolled his eyes and started leaving again.

"What I think Dane might mean Jei... is well, the people attack here an hour ago. Honestly they probably took the rest of the bases as well. I couldn't check the other bases cause I didn't known the password...

"But we shouldn't stop yet. They did strike an hour ago, but we should " and with this she glared at Danes back as he was walking away " be extra careful. If nothing else we should find out more about this right? A group like this may be a threat to SeeD... "

The group set off again, heading towards the next "checkpoint" on Dane's route. It wasn't too far, but it was guaranteed to be guarded well. The briefing had identified it as the primary supply depot. Chances were they could procure some munitions there. If they really needed it, that was.

---

Ash and his three remaining students walked on, the instructor in the lead. One of the men was fiddling with the com link, rattling it and talking into it.

"Sir, I can't raise Lambda and Theta squads. They're not replying."

The injured SeeD spoke up. "Maybe they're jamming us?"

Slyph wa embarssed by Reium's sudden move, but after he got used to being held closely she began to like it,. though she knew that thi wouldn't lat for very long..he felt like taking a picture and holding it under Reium's noe. o he wouldn't be able to boss her around. But knowing reium he'd jut slice it in half or omething. She ighed and held her palm open. She began countering softly
5..
4..
3..
2..
1..
*she quickly pulled away and waited for the effects to wear off.

Reium began to feel the "spell" wear off slowly, his mind clouded and disordered by the transition.

Ash began muttering things under his voice. He then turned to the others as they walked. "This is strange... never had this sort of thing happen before in previous field tests." he said as he looked forward again.

IM: What does Stahl know that I don't? What's he planning?

He looked around, "It could be some sort of interference, like mountains or other terrain." he suggested.

He chuckled, "But then again, we've been surprised so much on this excercise so far... wouldn't surprise me that they have jamming capabillities as well." he said in a sarcastic chuckle.

He began to think again about what Stahl had in mind about all of this. Why did he bring such a loose cannon along?

"We might as well just try to finish our task ahead of us. Keep your eyes open and your steel drawn boys." he ordered as they moved along.

Deeum followed suit along the others in the group not realy wanting to stay in this depressing place much longer.
hearing Dane(i assume i can) and thought what an ASS he is.
sure no brother can be that horrdily mean to his sister.
it was nearly to the point she wanted to say something about it, but kept it to herself.

((blah, v_v, I don't really matter much in the story. Maybe sometime the chars'll meet again. but till then I think maybe I should drop out so I don't seem to be spamming this up.))

Reium sat back down and shook his head, not knowing what had happend but not wanting to know right now. He set his head down, leaving the tray as it is and tries to get so sleep. Slyph sits across from him and places a hand on his shoulder, knowing he was upset yet not knowing why. Reium shrugged it off, but she plced it back there. He let it stay this time..

(OOC: Faye, you're not spamming the RP at all, but I understand how you feel about being left out of the main plotline at the moment. Tell you what, if you want to keep RPing, I'll get my creative hat and give Reium and/or Sheen something to do. If you'd prefer to wait for the others to get back, that's fine as well.)

Dane and the others crouched low to the ground, looking onto the depot before them. The base consisted of a few buildings, mostly wearehouses, and was surrouned by a wire fence, with bards at the top to prevent infiltration. They could see that the base wasn't that active, with a few guards patrolling back and forth, their alertness being impossible to tell from this range.

Suddenly Dane's radio crackled to life, a garbled voice coming through.

"Dan fskk, what is you st fsskus and posit fssk"

(OOC : First.. I'm sorry for holding this up so much guys -_- Stuff happening and all but its no excuse.. I'll try better )

Dane swore under his breath and backed off a bit before answering the rather garbled transmission. Of all the times to be interupted, he couldn't believe Stahl would do this in the middle of the mission.

He then looked at the radio. He wasn't sure but he felt something was up here. He looked at the radio in his hand and scowled...

He then placed it next to his ear and waited for the repeat transmission... making very sure to try his best to catch the voice of whoever spoke.

( OOC : Bah.. Paranoid me eh? ^_^ )

Dane, not having given a reply, heard anothetr burst of static.

" frssk do you read? Answer me Dane."