Clusterfrag

The decker’s expression darkens at the sight of the lobotomized Petunia. “SHOULD HAVE KNOWN. ANY DATA RELATED TO THIS AREA WOULD HAVE BEEN-” She flinches. She’s not about to finish that thought. Just the sight of the lost, idling drone is uncomfortably reminiscent of the meandering behavior of the thousand stranded subroutines within that broken host, awaiting a call that will never come.

Instead, Mouse draws a slow breath, as much an expression of resignation as a means of steadying herself. “SO, TO RECAP, OUR OPTIONS ARE: A) WE TAKE THE ELEVATOR STRAIGHT INTO A FIRING SQUAD, OR B) WE FIND OUT WHAT’S BEHIND THAT LAST DOOR.” Even saying these two vastly differing alternatives out loud, this decision doesn't seem to warrant any deliberation whatsoever. Her expression is instead blank, almost serenely so, as she instead returns to the elevator and her familiar position pressed against the back wall. “HIT THE FUCKING BUTTON.”

(( When everyone's out of the immediate line of fire, reboot Petunia, then herself (since Petunia's marks are the only ones left that were doing anything.)

> Hotsim + Matrix perception as soon as we start moving. ))

And so, Mick hits the fucking button.

Reiya, for once in her life, is eager to get into the elevator, in spite of the promise of several decidedly unfriendly folks waiting for them up top. Though she would have been happy to let “Petunia” do the heavy lifting, since that’s not an option, she flexes her fingers in anticipation.

“When we get up there,” she muses conversationally as they ascend, “how about I start by lobbing a Manaball at them, as soon as I have an opening? Aim for the kurokaze if I can?”

Mick nods and glances over their shoulder at the mage. "You fuckin' cooked 'em on the ship when the rest of us couldn't. Sounds like you're the best one for 'unkillable cyborg samurai' duty to me."

The elevator carriage shudders and the doors retract. The ascent is sluggish-- much slower than the descent had been in the previous elevator. Earthen walls roll by a maddening pace, accompanied by the creaking of a rusty cable.

When the elevator is approximately halfway up the shaft, the flash of daylight appears from high above for an instant. It's followed by the sound of something bouncing off the walls, traveling downwards. Whatever the object is, it's plummeting straight toward the carriage.

"Drek doc, duck, we got incoming." Yung says, as he cranes his head upward, straining his eyes in an attempt to locate the object falling down the elevator shaft.

Yung's eyes dart around the dark shaft, but he fails to spot the projectile in freefall. From the sound of the echoing clangs, he guesses he has another couple of seconds before whatever it is reaches the carriage.

Axel, Mick, and Thoryne all stare upward into the darkness, to no avail. The object is simply moving too fast and is too small to make out.

Clunk.

Even the drones are busy searching, as evidenced by their AR feeds in which their respective cameras plumb the shaft for the phantom projectile. Wind catches movement for a single frame, but it's not enough for a positive lock.

Clunk.

Taipan recalls an old trick from his youth, learned while stargazing. He allows his eyes to lose their focus and the darkness to dominate his vision. Something small and cylindrical appears, little more than a silvery smudge. In the same moment, he tags the object in TacStar, which automatically classifies the approaching item as HOSTILE OBJ.

In twelve milliseconds, the trajectory is captured, plotted and predicted. Nine more and the ARO appears on the team's shared TacStar feed. The incoming projectile is now a mere six meters from the elevator carriage.

Yung performs a smooth arcing movement with his right foot, as if making the opening move of a waltz. He gauges the next ricochet of the object, placing himself in the projected path before opening his arms out wide, his left hand extended toward the floor of the elevator with his right hand reaching up toward the incoming object.

A memory flashes before his eyes, a body lying still in the darkness. Everything slows down.

(( Show me a missile parry ))

At a height of a meter above the elevator carriage, the object is revealed as a sleek canister-- likely a grenade. There's a loud pop, followed by a hissing noise. The runners can feel the soft caress of expelled gas rolling across their skin.

Yung deftly plucks the active grenade from the air, pivots, and deposits it over the side of the moving carriage. It can be heard bouncing and hissing as it drops into the shaft.

Though this all transpires in less than a second, the air is saturated with a foul, caustic aroma. Exposed skin begins to tingle, then burn.

Mick coughs and waves at the air in front of their face, but it's not enough. The ork unslings their pack from their shoulders, allowing it to thump to the floor of the elevator carriage, then quickly whips off their coat and uses it to begin fanning the atmosphere. The black synthetic fabric produces a heavy 'WHOOMPSH, WHOOMPSH' sound as the ork attempts to disperse the toxin, angling their motions so that the coat pushes air from the center of the carriage toward the edges. Batting at the the darkness, Mick turns their face away from the motion and makes eye contact with Yung, and comments, "Some fast hands you got there." The comment hangs in the air for only a heartbeat before the whoosh of the coat pushes it away, but for that moment, the ork's sincere appreciation hangs palpably around them.

After a few seconds have elapsed, the burning sensation becomes excruciating. Mucus and tears begin to run, and breathing is difficult. Every member of the team is affected to some degree, with the exception of Thoryne who seems totally impervious to the chemical agent.

The elevator continues its climb, now having passed the halfway mark. The carriage is a chorus of hacking coughs and labored groans.

Mick relents their action to the necessity of the cough, the rhythm of their hacking coming to replace the rhythm of their attempts to fan the poison away. Doubling over, the ork falls to one knee beside their pack, gagging, their eyes watering. But then, an idea. A recollection. Frantically, the adept unfastens the pack and rummages through, spilling a utility knife and their autopicker to the carriage floor. After what feels like an eternity of choking and burning, Mick finally yanks free a SLAPPIT™ brand stim patch. Ripping it free of the wrapper with their teeth, the ork slaps it on their neck.

Mick feels the jolt of bioelectric heavy metal coursing through their veins. Their pulse pounds in their vision-- a phenomena made manifest by engorged blood vessels. The burning sensation fades to a distant stinging and the world around them seems to sharpen. For the time being, the intense discomfort is a distant memory. Their hands close into fists reflexively. Something awakens in the hidden reaches of the adept's mind, thrashing in distilled rage.

"Aw, fuck," Reiya swears, wincing. At least she had the forethought to pull her hands in and turn her face partially into her shoulder as the projectile hit, so she's not badly hurt. She shakes her head to clear it and assesses the situation. "Ok, let's see if I can heal this. Who's worst off? "

The shaman automatically looks at Mouse, purely because of her size. Compounded by the stress the decker has been through bearing the brunt of their workload thus far, Reiya's own fondness for her, and the undeniable fact that they need her skills badly, it's an easy choice. "May I?" she asks, assuming her healer's voice.

There's just no fight left.

Yes, her fragile body has its own fail-safes, echoes of some single-celled ancestor capable of no motivation above ensuring its own survival. That, on top of Yung’s honed reflexes, is the only reason why she's still conscious right now. But the will to fight back, to spit in the face of the Saito regime, or really do more than just keep breathing, may as well have been left behind in that fragmented host.

That is, after all, the reason she went back into the elevator in the first place. She was as much of a coward as that researcher, more willing to face a hail of bullets than to find out what lurks in this basement.

And her team followed after her, didn't they? After she all but called the elevator out as a death trap. She said to push the fucking button, and lo, they did. What does that make them? Poor judges of character?

Or was it because she begged them not to leave her alone?

Reiya’s voice cuts through Mouse’s angst-drenched ruminations, the healer’s voice rendered tinny from the local feeds, but no less gentle and concerned.

“I’VE FELT WORSE.” Lacking control over the normal social mechanics she’d rely on to reassure (and as some might argue- mislead) others about her current condition, she has to fall back on the limitations of her software-produced speech. “SAVE YOUR POWERS FOR A REAL EMERGENCY.” This is probably less than convincing, given the state of her limp form, breath ragged, face covered in tears and snot, but in truth, it’s sincere. What she’s feeling now is just… pain. A weakness of her meat-shell- a distraction.

In a fleeting moment of recognized absurdity, a small breath of laughter manages to escape her still lips, as she adds: “IT'S LIKE PAIN GATING- THE BURN’S NOT REALLY SO BAD.”

In the virtual space in which she’s parked herself, her form cranes its head to the drone feeds, squinting at the view around the crowded elevator, particularly those occasional glimpses up. “JUST… PLEASE TELL ME WE’RE ALMOST THERE?”

Her matrix form flickers, the stealthed form increasingly difficult to maintain while her body is physically wracked. Almost absentmindedly, she flicks a hand, opening her wrapper program for its familiar disguise as an Erica Elite, if only so she can focus the remainder of her attention on her search. If there’s anything broadcasting up top, anything she can twist to her team’s advantage, she will find it. But if not, then she’s as good as dead weight in this state.

(( How close to the top are they? Essentially, once they’re reasonably high up, she’s going to attempt one last roll to find icons/hidden icons. Mostly, she’s just trying to determine whether there’s anything running online to find. If it doesn’t seem like there’s anything online she can work with, she’ll pop back into AR so as not to be a potato-sack when shit hits the fan.

Also, if anything triggers a defense roll before she gets an answer, interrupt for an ‘I Am The Firewall’ to get that bonus in, just because I don't want to TPK today. ))

Yung rolls onto his back, madly grasping at the bottom lip of his mask before ripping it off in one swift motion. Tears stream down his face, which he fruitlessly attempts to wipe away with the sleeve of his jacket. He curls into the fetal position, returning the arm sleeve to his face in to cover his mouth as he begins coughing uncontrollably. Despite the pain, he does everything in his power to keep his physical reaction as muted as possible.

After a few moments of muffled coughing he sits up, surveying the rest of the crew to assess the damage. As the others begin talking his bloodshot eyes widen, first training on Mick, then Reiya, and finally Mouse. As Mouse finishes talking he emphatically starts waving his hands trying to get everyone's attention before placing a single finger in front of his lips, pantomiming silence.

Axel doesn't remember how he ended up on his knees, and yet here he is, coughing up a lung. Through squinted eyes he views the figures around him. Still moving, good.

He lumbers up, placing a hand on his knee to aid his shaky legs. He holds his hand out, fingers pointed upward, and says, "Wind." The drone descends the half meter onto his hand. His fingers spread out to cup the chassis as it settles into the bowl of his fingers. On his AR display, the motors spin down to 10% and the drone becomes much heavier, the fans still kicking up a torrent of wind, but not enough to loft the machine into the air. Axel reaches his other hand over, flipping the drone up on its side, and holding it out in front of him like a riot shield. He waves the drone around in a circle, chasing the remaining gasses back up and down the elevator shaft. As the coughing subsides, he holds the drone back out in its proper orientation, and tosses it lightly into the air. The dog brain spins the motors back up, the drone catching itself and returning to its position right above the team.

He catches the tail end of the conversation between Reiya and Mouse, and turns toward the two. He reaches out a hand, but thinks better of it when he sees Mouse's feral look and wild eyes. His hand hovers awkwardly in mid air, before some atrophied sense of decorum and social shame combines with a need to do something to produce... He lightly taps Mouse's shoulder with his fingertips in the world's most half-assed "there, there" motion. "Hey," he says, "it's okay. Take the help."

He cranes his neck to look up the elevator shaft. "And yeah," he says, swallowing hard, "I think we're almost there."

As the runners recover from their brush with neurostun, the elevator continues its ascent. At somewhere near the three quarters mark, the top of the shaft illuminates as the doors open once again.

As light trickles into the shaft once again, Yung briefly glances up toward the doors through bleary eyes. His instinctual reaction lingers for half a heartbeat, the briefest recognition of mortal helplessness before he allows himself to collapse to the floor of the elevator. With no time to explain his reasoning, the only thing he can do is hope. Unfortunately, not everyone in the group is on comms, so the only option is to convey the idea verbally, as quietly as possible. "Play dead." He says aloud, barely a whisper as he lies motionless on the floor of the carriage.

Yung's suggestion meshes with Axel's plan, anyway. He lies on the floor, and glances up at wind. "See you soon," he says to the drone, and the world shrinks to a point.

Axel wakes a couple meters in the air, his metal carapace held aloft by a pair of turbofans. The sense of freedom is intoxicating. He shoots up the shaft, peeling away the constant tyranny of gravity and the slow decay of flesh. He reigns himself in as he approaches the top of the shaft, coming to a halt three meters below the doorway. He tucks his borrowed body as close to the wall in which the door is located, hiding as best he can in the visual shadow beneath the door. He looks up and waits.

(( Going to be watching for a grenade toss. Want to try to catch it. ))

The out-of-body submersion into Hotsim invokes an odd dissociation, in which Axel’s reassuring touch is seen, rather than felt. But his intention translates, as does the familiar tone of both comfort and warning. Hardly in any position to argue, she concedes to Reiya’s offer, her tone low. “...IF IT’LL MAKE YOU FEEL BETTER, FINE.”


Jung’s advice, while something she’s half-way following in her slumped over state, is met with more skepticism. << Play dead and then what? Hope the super engineered killing machines won’t be able to distinguish a cold corpse from a warm hostile? Or think to double-tap? >> Of course, this might come across as hypocritical from the potato-sack with her nose buried in the network, but just because she's willing to gamble taking a blade to the gut while in hotsim doesn't mean the others need be so willing. << If you’re not prepared to fight on your back, then I’d suggest you stay mobile. They don’t need any more still targets to unload into than they already have. >>

Mick ignores Yung, having seen far too many flat-vids and trids of soldiers a hail of bullets across the bodies in a mass grave. Just to make sure.

Hastily, the ork flattens themself against the carriage in a corner immediately beside the door.

(( I'm going for a stealth roll here ))

And then, pressed against the wall, Mick has an idea, "Hey, hold your breath!" The directive is a rushed whisper, high and harsh. As soon as it ends, an acrid odor creeps in around the edges of the cart, growing stronger, thickening. The atmosphere darkens, foul and smudged, insects buzzing, distant but near. From a distance, the ork reasons, it just might look like the noxious cloud of a grenade that detonated as intended.

(( Plague cloud, please, which doesn't deal any damage to anyone unless that person hits me in unarmed ))

Wind hovers a few meters below the open elevator doorway. For anyone else it would be an awkward angle. Axel, however, feels right at home gazing through the fish-eye lens that's fixed directly upwards. At this proximity, he can hear conversation through Wind's microphone.

Unfortunately for the rigger, he doesn't speak Japanese.

The elevator continues to climb. Mick huddles in the corner, covered in an aura of undulating pollutants and tiny insects. Yung, Mouse and Axel are flat on their backs.

Meanwhile, in the matrix, Mouse's latest ping returns three icons that had been running silent. Geolocation data suggests they're likely associated with the combatants at ground level.

In her hot-sim happy place, Mouse can almost forget about the chemical burn wracking her flesh. With the help of her wrapper program, she cloaks her typical outlandish persona in a guise more befitting an off-the-shelf Renraku Sensei: in this case, a buddhist monk. Eyes fixed on the icons, she draws her virtual form closer, keeping her movements staggered and jerky, akin to a device in AR.

<< Targets sighted. >> With that, the monk persona silently opens a palm, sending two will-o-the-wisps floating toward the icons.

(( Forked Hack on the Fly vs two of the icons. Hopefully should be fine on its own, especially if those are devices and running silent? But if for some reason my roll comes out comically bad, then edge to try again. ))

Unwilling to lay prone on the floor of the elevator, Reiya opts to slump down against the wall instead, where she can easily feign death or spring back up as needed. Staying close to Mouse, she holds her breath as Mick instructs, settles her mind, and casts her healing spell.

(( Heal Mouse at Force 6. ))

A soft light extends from Reiya's fingertips, drifting like gossamer thread to seep into Mouse's skin. The burning sensation rapidly subsides, until the decker feels more or less normal. Though the spell is a strain, Reiya feels little more than a slight headache as ar result of employing the spell.

Axel splits Wind's feed off and sends it to the rest of the team, allowing the Japanese speakers to translate the captured audio.

"--just throw a fragmentation grenade?"

"Hachiman wants at least one alive to interrogate. Hand me another neurostun grenade."

"Ryōkai."

Meanwhile, in VR, Mouse's exploits award her a mark on each of the two targeted icons.

The elevator ascends another few meters.

Axel's heart beats at 3500rpm and his blood rushes at 48 volts. If the drone could hold its breath, it would. The light spilling out of the open door promises violence. He's laser-focused, watching for any object to come tumbling out of the doorway and into the elevator shaft.

As he splits off his feed, he catches the spoken Japanese. << Anyone catch what these chucklefucks just said? >>

There's no time to hesitate, in fact, it's probably already too late. Regardless, getting hit with another one of those things spells game over anyway.

Yung ends his brief cherade nearly as soon as it starts, sitting up in a swift mechanical motion. He places his hands on the bottom of the elevator, palms down, before swinging his legs around behind himself. As the nearly fluid motion briefly comes to a pause he appears to be a sprinter, ready to launch off imaginary blocks.

His left hand rises to the mask resting atop his head, once again pulling it down over his face. He launches forward, gaining a brief burst of momentum before placing a foot on the rear wall of the elevator. He manipulates his body's center of gravity, driving his legs to gain as much altitude as possible before jumping to grab one of the exposed cables lifting the carriage.

As he hovers in the air, arms outstretched reaching for his mark, he wills a single word through his wireless neural link in response to Axel.<< GRENADE! >>

(( Gonna wall run as high as I can, jump and attempt to grab the elevator cable, if successful start climbing up. If i grab the cable and can climb I do want to keep an eye on the opening if possible i.e. watch for the next grenade. ))

Axel nods in his mind, but the expression doesn't translate to his metal body.

<< Perfect. If I miss it, you catch it? >>

Just like that, the pain that had nearly crippled her moments before washes away in a sensory reformat. Sure, if the glimpses of herself she gets through the feed are any indication, she still looks like a mess, face pink and snotty as though she’d spent the last several minutes ugly-crying, but admittedly, it is easier to focus when her lungs aren’t burning from the inside out. << Thanks, Reiya. I O U 1. (TヮT) >> It’s not much for expressing gratitude, but it’s the best she can do for now.

Of course, that relief may prove short lived if the comms chatter is any indication, which she translates verbatim into the wireless. Still, she opts to trust in her teammates right now. She’s going to have to- especially with her own work to attend to right now.

(( Perception to ID both icons Mouse marked? And maybe the outstanding silent one if there’s time. ))

Yung sprints up the wall, soles slapping the earthen shaft as he goes. He manages to climb a full four meters before he slips, knocking his mask free from his face and blinding himself. His momentum stops and he hangs in free-fall for the briefest of moments.

There's a thwap as Yung kicks off from the wall and leaps up, thrashing blindly for the elevator cable he knows is somewhere nearby. Somehow-- miraculously-- his hands encounter the thick, steel cable and he secures a hold.

Meanwhile, Mouse positively identifies the icons she has marked as firearms; more specifically: Ingram Smartguns.

The elevator rises another three meters.

"Back up," says one of the Japanese voices over Wind's feed. "Or you'll get caught in the blast."

The decker translates again absentmindedly, her focus on the two new devices than the threat above. << So far, they’re packing: neurostun, frag grenades, a cyber-sam and now three Ingram Smartguns. >> She peers into the matching icons for vulnerabilities as she rattles through this list.<< But we have one advantage they don’t: D.E.E.Z. >>

(( Hack on the fly, please! (Forked) Take a -4 penalty to put two marks at once on the devices I already have. Can always edge if I roll terribad or they roll uncomfortably well.
> If that works, then G.I.G.O. : Fire command -> Eject clip. ))