Subject: 'Let's get this show on the road, then'
Author:
Posted on: 2009-04-01 23:55:00 UTC
Trojie hefted her bell, producing a discordant clang. She grinned.
The three Agents exited the RC, accompanied by Absinthe and Apple the mini-Chimera. The other minis chose to remain.
The corridor was empty, but screams and giggling could be heard in the distance.
Where are the Weeds when you need them?
It seems we have a problem....
(Just go along with it for the next 24 hours. Or so. )
What's the protocol for cleaning up RP logs and getting them into a readable form? This is currently an impenetrable mess :P
In their response Center, Naomi looks out, then groans, and grabs her partner back. “No, we first call our friends.”
She turned to the laptop, frowning as she logged on and attempted to contact Storm and Skyfire.
... both being locked in mortal combat with their clones. Skyfire was fencing her Sue counterpart, and winning now that Molly was hanging off the Sue's ear and scratching wildly at its eyes. Stormsong had discovered the hard way that his counterpart apparently had the power of invisibility, and had been dragged halfway down a convenient corridor before he managed to struggle free.
Of their RC, there is a knock, and Drake levels his railgun.
"How is it?"
"Foxglove and Laburnum." came the reply. Drake rushed to the door to open it but Naomi could even stop him, or say that there was something wrong with the voice, which had the sound of bells in it.
When Drake opened the door, he had enough time to register the impression of something pink and frilly before it hit him with an impressive amount of force. Foxglove Sue shook her pretty ringlets and giggled, kneeling on top of the stunned Drake's chest and holding a delicately wrought knife to his throat. She bent down to look him in the eye, taking care to make sure her skirt rode up as she did.
"Good morning! Awww, you're soooo cute!"
DRake glanced up, struggling not to breathe in any sue phermones.
"Errr, high?" he said, the knife at his throat warnign him this was not foxglove he knew.
"Errrr, I'm not that cute. I'm not Caffy." He admitted, hoping to confused this, wanting to tear otu the throat but the threat of death overriding his impulses, for now.
Naomi starred at this, letting Sue Laburnum to get in, stunned at drake's reaction. She looked up. "Wait, if you are here, where are we?" she asked, hoping this sue had the tendency to reveal the plans.
She picked her long black-glitter-polished nails with a knife. "I figured we'd stand a better chance if we fought someone other than our copies. Foxglove, drop him."
"Aw," Foxglove Sue said, clambering off Drake. "Can we hurry up and kill 'em, pleasepleaseplease? Trojie said I should go to her RC and I could have candy ..."
"What are we like?" She asked, her hand slowly moving for a throwing shuriken as she hoped ot distract them.
DRake growled, his own hand reaching for his sporks, hoping to catch the sue off balance and stab them.
Sue Laburnum sneered and stepped forward, complicated-looking half-sword-half-axe blade at the ready and black leather clothing gleaming. Naomi surveyed her opponent, looking for an opening. She noted the Sue's movements and reflected that it probably weighed just as much as the real Laburnum, but with the Sue the weight was concentrated in the chest area. Maybe she could use the Sue's awkward weight distribution to her advantage ...
A yell echoed down the corridor and Stormsong ran past, screaming "SKYFIRE! MOLLY! HELP!", pursued by a glimmering silver-furred weasel with a black rose in one paw and several very nasty-looking knives in his belt. Stormsong's shirt was torn, and the Stu-weasel's belt was undone. Naomi's subconscious filed this information away while the rest of her brain was occupied with fending off Laburnum Sue and started coming up with smart-aleck comments for future reference.
"Jess! Another one - oof!"
A tall, auburn-haired man with a black scarf tied over one eye had just been run into by an anthropomorphic grey weasel wearing the Bad Slash flashpatch. Steadying the terrified creature with one arm, he took aim at the silver weasel coming down the corridor with his Uzi and let rip. A few moments later, the corpse collapsed in a bloody mess.
Luke Celinus, Department of Mary Sues, took a good look at the anthro Slasher. "Uh, are you okay?"
"Stop wasting time and shift your backside to help out, Luke!" A red-headed woman wielding a handgun and with a sword in her belt dashed past them and into the RC, accidentally running into a dark-skinned girl who was kneeling over and menacing an anthro fox.
Drake epxloded into action, his sporks slahsing out to stab the sue in the arms, kicking at her crotch region as his sporks twisted insid ethe shoulder blades, crippling her. She stood p, then looked down. "now, What shoudl I do, " Backign away out of reach. "Now, if I knew where molly was, I coudl keep you to help me teach her how to kill a sue."
Naomi sighde, then dodged to the side, thorwing her shuriken, sure that they would be defelcted, then rolled in, trying to suprrise the sue, and sweep kick erh legs, although as a long ranged fighter, she was not sure if she could pull it off.
Foxglove and Laburnum - the real ones - turned the corner and saw the chaos. Laburnum ran in and helped Drake up as Foxglove leapt on her Sue self and tried to strangle it with its own pigtails.
"Hey, guys," said Laburnum, kicking at her Sue clone's legs as it stumbled from Naomi's strike. It collapsed, struggling under its own top-heaviness. "We should be running, because your clones are coming up behind us, and we need to find somewhere they can't corner us. And I think Skyfire needs help, her clone is bloody terrifying."
"Let's finish these things off first!" Foxglove yelled, wrestling with the Sue. "I do NOT want something that looks like me cosplaying as Little Miss Mary in existence any longer than necessary!"
Aiming her gun at the Sue version of the dark girl - the one being strangled by her PPC counterpart - she fired, hitting the Sue in the stomach. As it fell to the floor, crying, she looked around at the scene.
"Okay, this isn't really out of the ordinary for the PPC, war in the corridors and all, but do we have time for introductions? I'm Jessie." She stepped forwards to help the girls out, suddenly feeling a bit old as she examined them. Jeez, I'm pushing thirty and I'm helping out a bunch of teenagers.
Laburnum stomped heavily on her Sue-clone's throat, waving as she did so. "Nice t'meetcha. Hey, is it okay if I steal this one's jacket? Always wanted a black leather jacket."
"And the neurotic weasel is our old buddy Stormsong. You might have heard of him, he's one of Molly Rath's foster-parents," Foxglove added, reaching into her Sue-clone's wound and doing something unspeakably messy which resulted in a lot of screaming from the Sue. Stormsong shook himself and glared.
"'Neurotic'? Excuse me, young madam, but hast thou ever suffered the experience of being propositioned by something claiming to be a copy of thyself, however minimal the resemblance? I feel I have the right to be shaken."
"It what? Oh, that's gonna be fun to explain to the shrink," said Laburnum, bringing down her axe on her Sue clone with a loud crunch.
"Can't say I've ever heard of Molly Rath," she replied to Laburnum. "And sure, take the jacket, that looks like a nice one."
Behind Stormsong, Luke wandered into the room, looking totally unconcerned, and grinned. "Well, we've certainly got a nice party going on here." He offered his hand to the nearest person, who happened to be Foxglove, with a pleasant smile. "You'd be Foxglove? I'm Luke Celinus, nice to meet you." He winced as Jessie punched him in the arm.
"This is not the time to be flirting, you idiot."
"I wasn't flirting!" he protested, rubbing his arm. "Anyway, you people want to stick with us? Might be easier to deal with these copy-Sues or whatever they are."
Stormsong stepped outside the response centre and took the knives from the squishy pile of weasel-Stu. "Trust me, thou wilt meet her soon. Just follow the trail of carnage and ferret urine. I swear, we tried to housebreak her ..."
"Um, do you know you're robbing a corpse?" Laburnum asked, wrenching her axe free and rolling the Sue over to get the jacket. "Not that I'm objecting as such, it just seems unusual coming from you specifically."
"Aye - best time." The weasel plucked a particularly impressive barbed blade from the corpse's belt and examined it. "After what it did, I feel it owed me."
"Y'know, sometimes I forget you were raised among vermin, and then you say something like that." Laburnum tugged on the jacket and shook Luke and Jessie's hands. "Hi. Yeah, we should stick together ... we should go check and see if Skyfire's okay first, but then we've just got yours and Naomi and Drake's to deal with, and I think we can take them together."
Foxglove examined the dead Stu, took a crossbow bolt from her quiver, broke off the point, and drove it into the bullet-hole nearest to the heart. The real Stormsong gave her a very strange look.
"What? He looked kinda vampiric."
Naomi sighed
"And nice to meet you two. Although, hmm, maybe we should move?"
There was a sawing sound at the wall, And dRake leveled the rail gun as the wall crashed inward, with an URPLE anthro fox there, wielding a axe that was flashing with teeth.
"HERE"S DRAAKE!!"
Naomi sighed, as Drake leveled his railgun at his clone.
"And i'm guessing my clone is just around the corner." She said, trying to motion if anyone happened ot ahve a grenade on them.
Jessie shook her head at Stormsong's brief description of Molly. "And no, we're not new. I've been here since 2001, and Luke-"
"I joined back in 1998," Luke said with another grin. For some reason he was in a rather good mood. He watched the others going about their business. "Um, yeah, probably a good idea to go find your friend. Jessie and I haven't run into our copies yet, though we killed one that looked remarkably like a friend of ours earlier."
Heading out into the corridor, he chuckled when Foxglove stabbed the dead Stu. "Hey, trust me, he's dead. Once I kill something, it doesn't come back." He rubbed at his eyepatch absently, looking up and down the corridor for enemies.
Jessie stamped on his foot as she passed him, ignoring his yelp of pain. "Ignore him, he's just got an ego the size of HQ." She jumped as the wall of the room they'd just left crashed inwards to reveal an urple copy of the fox guy, whose name she hadn't caught. "Um... should I - oh, looks like he's dealing with it. Never mind."
There was a loud boom and most of the urple fox disappeared, along with a large chunk of the wall. Drake was propelled backwards into the opposite wall, and when the dust cleared he was sitting in the dent his back had left in it, clutching his railgun so hard his knuckles were white under the fur.
Laburnum looked at Jessie. "Yeah, so that's Drake. That little incident probably tells you everything you need to know about him."
naomi screammed, raising her backpack and heading over to the fox. "WHAT HAVE i told you about firing it indoors?"
Drake looked pleased with himself, but his ears dropped and he cowered when he saw the backpack.
"Errr, don't?"
"so, they killed my partner, maybe I should kill you?"
came a voice from jessie's right. There having obviously teleported was Naomi's double wielding a glittering sword and bedecked with all sorts of close combat weaponry.
"Hey, he just saved our asses from that guy, don't be too hard on him," the Assassin said, putting one hand on her arm. "Come on, give him a break." He offered one hand to the anthro fox to help him up.
Jessie whipped round when she heard an unfamiliar voice to face... a Sue. How lovely. The fiery-headed woman, acting on instinct, drew her sword quickly and began hacking away at the EPC Agent.
Laburnum and Foxglove looked at each other and readied their weapons, but the others seemed to be handling Naomi Sue with no problems.
the Naomi Sue was lying on the floor in a pitiful-looking heap. Jessie cleaned off her sword on the remnants of the Sues's clothing and resheathed it.
Luke examined the corpse with a slightly disgusted face. "Did you have to make that much of a mess?"
"Says you," Jessie replied, indicating the Stormsong double still sprawled in the corridor with half its chest missing. "Anyway, where were we?"
"Uh... going to find these guys' friend?" Luke turned back to Stormsong and the others. "Sky-something, wasn't it? And I wouldn't mind finding out where the hell Marcus has got to, either..."
"You two act like you're joined at the hip sometimes." Jessie snorted and looked at the others. "So, shall we get moving?" With that, she set off at a jog up the corridor in the direction from which Stormsong had originally come. Luke looked at the others with a slightly amused expression and followed.
She was leaning against the wall, getting her breath back, while her clone ran around in circles screaming hysterically with Molly hanging off its face. Skyfire was trying not to smirk.
Something dropped out of the clone's pocket. Skyfire picked it up and looked at it. It appeared to be the remote control for an electric shock collar, labelled "KIERN". She swore loudly.
Stormsong slunk up and looked at the control, then at Skyfire. "Oh dear. And to think I was angry merely because mine wore a Korn belt buckle ..."
But are our doubles so ter..."
She was cut off as a loud roar sounded, like a chainsaw. From teh looks on F&L, it seemed they knew this.
"ERrr, run?"
DRake stood up, unslighing his gun.
"Ill handle hi..."
He was pulled along backwards as he was dragged by naomi.
Nat Freidar sat bolt upright in bed as a loudspeaker blared out.
All agents to report to the nearest Sueification station for reeducation. Despatch is currently readying a list of the most flagrant goodfic that needs to be flamed. All agents to report to the nearest Sueification station.
"What the gwaedlyd uffern is going on?" she grumbled, but stopped short on getting out of bed as she noticed that the room was the wrong colour. "Um, am I seein' things, or is the room..."
"Black? Yeah." Cassie turned round from the cupboard where the weapons were kept. "I thought it was some April Fool's Day joke when I went to look it up, but now it looks like there's an actual invasion or something."
"Didn't we 'ave enough o' that last year?" the lanky girl complained, sitting on the edge of her bed for a moment before what Cassie had said sank in. "What?" She jumped up and grabbed her own weapons. "Come on then!"
"Is that really such a good idea?" said the third occupant of the room, who up till then had been silent. Kelvin shifted nervously as both women glared at him. "Um, we don't know what's going on, is all..."
"Then we need to go and find out," Cassie replied. "Come on, grab your stuff." She glanced over to the minis' bed, but neither of them were in the RC. Ah, well. Guess they can take care of themselves better than we could.
A random pair of EPC Agents got the surprise of their lives - and deaths - a minute later when three PPCers burst out of the room next to them.
"That wasn't so bad," Nat said as she wiped off her sword. "More Sues. They should be easy enough ta deal with."
"Wait a moment." Kelvin was examining one of the bodies. "This looks like our flashpatch, except for the sword."
"No kidding..." Cassie looked around at the now-unfamiliar black corridors. "I really don't like this. Let's try and find someone else. Maybe they'll know what's going on."
There was total agreement from the other two, and the trio set off warily down the corridor, keeping a close lookout for more trouble.
Of course, rounding the next corner to come face to face with a large group of Sueish-looking people would probably have counted as more trouble.
"RUN!"
"Now what?" Kelvin asked as they tried to outrun the gang.
"We run an' find 'elp!"
...Agent Sedri sat bold upright.
Oh... no.
Oh, yes. Black walls, mutilated flashpatches... the EPC was back. Springing out of her chair, Sedri cursed her current lack of partner and snatched up every weapon in sight.
"Is this some kind of joke?" she demanded of the Ironic Over-Power. "Some sort of fun you have, playing April Fool's on us? Or is there some All-Hallows-Eve-like thinning of boundaries at this time of year? Hmmm? And me with my bloody door broken, too."
Kicking her way out of the shattered wood (long story - don't ask on pain of flamethrowers), Sedri carefully made her way through an eerie, quiet corridor, hoping to find a friendly face, one not warped by the EPC-
When the Narrative Laws of Comedy kicked in and she was suddenly bowled over by Agents Cassie, Nat, and Kelvin.
The four Agents went down in a pile.
"Sorry, Sedri!" Nat scrambled to her feet as quickly as she could and pulled Sedri up after her, Cassie and Kelvin doing the same next to them.
"Quit the nattering and give us a hand!" Cassie shouted, grabbing her sword and diving straight into the pack of mirror multiverse Agents charging towards them. Kelvin hesitated for a moment, then followed, ending up locked in combat with someone who looked almost identical to him, except for the arrogant sneer on his face.
"What the...?" Kelvin gaped, lowering his blade for a moment. "Who are you?"
"Celebralmir Vinyalasse Talathion, Department of Arrests," the Elf replied with contempt, lashing out again and forcing Kelvin to throw his guard up or get split in half.
"Are ya insane?" Nat yelled, staring at the battle for a moment before drawing her sword and glancing at Sedri. "Come on, they're goin' ta get killed 'ere!" She shoved into the fight, hoping to reach Cassie before the smaller woman ended up getting jumped from behind.
"All agents to report to the nearest Sueification station for reeducation. Despatch is currently readying a list of the most flagrant goodf-" Marcus, well and truly fed up with hearing that same announcement over and over, turned around and blasted the P.A. without a second thought, casually reloading his Mossberg afterwards, as if oblivious to the shower of sparks. A matter of seconds ago, they had been standing right in front of almost thirty EPCers. Now, all that was left of that group was the mass of bloody chunks that had been left by the sheer firepower he and Zodfang brought to bear and which they were now standing in.
"Haha, wuz wunderin' when ya'd shuddit up, 'Oomie." The Ork said, letting out a hearty laugh as he hefted the massive heavy bolter with ease. The weapon had laid pretty much anything Zodfang pointed it at to waste, clearing entire corridors of EPCers with ease and destroying most other things it hit as well. This served their purposes nicely, as could be expected of a machine gun that used rocket propelled grenades for ammunition.
Currently, they were on their way to DoDAEG to prevent the Enforces from cutting off power in HQ, but along the way they had been seeking out and destroying as much of the EPC's stuff as they could, especially the Sueification stations. The black of their uniforms could barely be seen for all the EPCer blood drenching them. They had been travelling with a fairly large group to head to DoDAEG, but had got separated from them in the fighting.
"What can I say, I don't like being told stuff I already know." Marcus said, shrugging as he made sure there was a shell in the chamber. "I wonder what happened to Troy's guys, we need to meet up with them again."
Before their banter could continue, they heard a great deal of commotion in a nearby corridor. Even in a situation like this, they couldn't get a break, it seemed. Nodding to each other, they walked side by side towards the source of the noise, keeping their guns at the ready. When they finally rounded the corner, they were standing behind a throng of at least twenty Enforcers, each charging towards people they couldn't see.
Marcus reacted first, depressing the Mossberg 500's trigger in a smooth motion and immediately re-cocking the weapon to bring another shell into the chamber. Not one to miss a beat, Zodfang brought his heavy bolter to bear.
"WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAGH!"
The thundering noise of the bolter drowned out even Marcus' shotgun blasts as EPC agents started to be blown apart even as they turned to face whatever was annihilating their unguarded rear flank. A couple got off some potshots, but they went wild as the Enforcers firing them got reduced to a gorey slush.
The cavalry had most certainly arrived.
"Thank you!" Kelvin ducked an attack from somebody else as his counterpart fell to the floor, then pushed Sedri out of the fighting. "You're hurt, stay back!" He plunged back in to join his partners.
Cassie had managed to get herself stuck, back to the wall, trying to fend off about four people at once. She couldn't help but notice that her partners were trying to reach her, but were being hampered by the other fourteen or so... Agents. If they even were. Why the hell would Agents be attacking each other?
Someone's boot connected with her knee and she fell. Before she could move, another person stood on her sword blade, preventing her from using it. Oh, crap. She threw her free arm up as a last-ditch defence against attacks from above.
Nat saw her friend go down and redoubled her efforts to reach her. This was made easier when Kelvin joined her, but one of the attackers still managed to get in a lucky slash at her left arm. She yelled in pain, but the sound was drowned out by a gunshot and a primal bellow she definitely recognised.
Kelvin, being the tallest, was the first to notice the massive-gun-wielding Ork coming up the passageway. His eyes widened and he dived to the floor, dragging Nat with him just in time.
Once the (metaphorical) dust had settled, everyone looked up. Cassie managed a grin at the two newcomers. "Fantastic timing, guys."
The entire corridor was cleared of Enforcers in maybe eight seconds, the bloody mess on the floor and walls again all that was left, aside from a couple of intact corpses. Some shots had missed, and the explosions of those bolter shells left sizeable holes in the walls and floor. Overall, it was a strong reminder to Marcus of why exactly he never let Zodfang bring his heavy bolter on missions, it was just plain overkill. Smirking, Marcus started to walk forward once the shooting stopped, looking around in the hopes of seeing whatever Agents had been in trouble.
I hope Zodfang didn't accidentally shoot them, he thought, kicking aside what was left of an Enforcer's torso as Cassie spoke up. Sighing in relief, he grinned back at the group of Agents on the ground, kneeling down and offering a hand to help Cassie up. It had been a little while since he'd last seen her, but these weren't the circumstances he'd had in mind of running into that little group again.
"Glad we were able to get here on time," he said. "We were just heading down to DoDAEG. Anyone severely wounded?"
"Thanks," she said, accepting his help to get to her feet and looking around at the mess. "This's pretty impressive."
Kelvin stood up himself and wiped off his sword before sheathing it. "I'm all right, thank you, but Nat and Sedri-"
"I'm fine." Nat climbed to her feet, one hand over the gash in her arm. "It's nothin' ta worry about." She eyed Zodfang's weapon with interest.
"You're hurt," Kelvin insisted, gesturing at the sizeable cut. Her t-shirt sleeve was already wet with blood, but it wasn't exactly pumping out.
"Bugger that," was the only response as the lanky girl picked up her sword and turned to Marcus. "What's DoDAEG an' ow do we get there?"
Cassie just rolled her eyes and limped over to Sedri, her knee throbbing from where it had been kicked. "How are you?"
"Shouldn't we get you down to Medical? That cut looks pretty bad." He continued, walking up to her to examine the gash. Zodfang had given her a "back off" type look when she started eyeing his gun, but was now just standing around looking rather agitated. Either that or bored, at least.
"C'mon, 'Oomie! We'z gonna miss da fightin'! Dis is a propa WAAAGH! in 'ere!" He said, continually looking around as if hoping some Enforcer would pop their head out for him to shoot. Sighing, Marcus shook his head.
"The fighting's still going to be there if you wait, I want to make sure they're not too hurt." Marcus explained, trying to take another look at the wound. "Anyway, DoDAEG is the Department of Dead Author Electricity Generation. I was thinking they might try to cut off HQ's power to hamstring our defenses, so we were heading there to make sure they didn't try it."
"I told you you shouldn't be out," one said, sounding somewhat exasperated and female. "If that last one hadn't falling for the old 'behind you!' trick-"
"Yes, and what if Nick got hurt? Or worse, her?" the second person asked, apparently male and trying for patience. "You never know-"
At this point, they came into view, and stopped dead on seeing the other Agents. "Ah," said Leas, the guy, and held out his hands. "We're here, in, um…"
"Are you on our side or the other?" Deryn said, rather more bluntly and earning herself an elbow in the side for it. The knife in her hand wasn't really helping either, though she'd wiped most of the last victim's blood off.
Nat moved towards them a bit belligerently, ignoring Marcus' comment about her arm. It still worked, so she wasn't going to make a fuss.
Kelvin moved up beside her, one hand on his sword hilt. "We're PPC," he explained to the newcomers, glancing over to Marcus and Zodfang for backup just in case these people were the enemy.
"Oh, for heavens' sake," Cassie interrupted, coming over to join the others as Sedri headed off to get herself seen to. "They're on our side, Nat, we met them a few months back. Now what did I hear about needing to stop people cutting off HQ's power?"
"Sorry, it's a bit hard not to be jumpy when we're fighting people who look almost exactly like us." Marcus said, nodding apologetically to the newcomers. Zodfang merely grunted, keeping a distrustful eye on them as Marcus brought his attention to Cass.
"Ya shuldn't sneek up'n us like dat, 'oomies," Zodfang said to the newcomers. "Coulda shot ya."
"Yeah, he's right. Anyway, Cass, I figured that with this invasion going on, the first thing the enemy would do to try to weaken HQ's defenses is turn off the power. We can't fight if we can't see, right? If they disabled the power, it'd give them a big advantage, so I figured they'd go for Upstairs and DoDAEG first. We were coming back from some fighting in Operations when we passed through here."
"We didn't have a good time getting here," he said apologetically. "It's good to meet up with fellow PPC Agents, though, given the circumstances."
"Didn't sneak up," Deryn muttered, sheathing her knife now that she was sure there wasn't about to be a sudden attack. "And- people exactly alike, you say?" She glanced at Leas, expression almost afraid.
Leas patted her on the shoulder, then focused his attention on Marcus. "We might be able to help if the lights go out," he said, "but you're right, it'd be best if we didn't need to. Which way do we go?"
"Right. Maybe we'd better get moving, then." She patted her sword and looked around at everyone. "I have no idea where this DoDayGlow place is, so I'll just follow you, Marcus."
Nat nodded, batting Kelvin away as he tried to have a look at her arm. "I'm up for that."
Kelvin just shrugged when Deryn asked about lookaike people. "Im not sure what's going on," he said apologetically. "I just know that I was fighting someone who was... me. Except I'd never have behaved like that."
((Apologies for short post, am in rush and will be away for a few hours now. Seeyou all when I get back!))
"We've had trouble like that too. I've heard talk of them being...alternate versions of us? I don't know, I've never seen Sues do anything like this."
Zodfang didn't seem like he had any ideas, either, instead shrugging. "Duzit matta? We'z got Sues ta kill, so letz KILL 'em!"
"I never thought I'd admit it, but the Ork has a point. Follow me, guys, and someone wrap up Nat's arm." Marcus said, hefting his shotgun again. Once everyone was ready, he started heading down the corridors.
...but she allowed Kelvin to cobble together a makeshift bandage before setting off after Marcus with an attitude that let everyone know she wasn't to be messed with.
Kelvin shook his head at his partner's wilfulness - She's so stubborn sometimes - before going over to offer Cassie a hand. She waved him off with a smile and limped on behind Marcus, somehow managing to keep up with the group.
It was the Elf, naturally, who first heard the shouting from up ahead. He'd taken the lead, mostly in an effort to stay as far away from Zodfang as possible, but slowed down and turned to Marcus, who seemed to have unofficially taken charge. Not that Kelvin was complaining, Eru knew he'd be doing a lousy job. "Um... I think there's some kind of fight going on."
""No, really, I thought it would 'ave been a picnic," was Nat's heavily sarcastic reply.
"Oh, stop having a dig at him and let's just get down there." Cassie sped up a little. "I want to see what the hell's going on and what these identical twin people are doing here."
That didn't sound good. It should probably have sounded more improbable than it did, but the patches on the ones who'd attacked them earlier…
"Well, I'm sure they won't be a problem if we all work together, right?" Leas said, trying for optimistic and mostly getting there.
"Unless they outnumber us," Deryn muttered, trailing along and trying not to eye Nat's arm too much. She was almost regretting not having studied healing magic back when, but it didn't look like the other girl was in the mood to accept it anyway.
Leas sighed, but went along. Best to not say something that might attract the Overpower's attention, he thought. With the mention of a fight ahead, though, it wasn't looking too good. "Do you think we'll get much explanation of that, if they're busy fighting?" he asked.
((I'm happy however we decide to post.))
((*feeling a bit more unsure than usual*))
...just not Good good. They obviously knew what they were doing, and Sedri had two long, bloody gashes in her arm before Kelvin's double was finished. Kelvin had, by then, joined Nat in trying to keep Cassie alive, and somebody had resorted to pulling hair.
"Ow!"
"Very mature," grumbled Sedri, who was next to useless now, and just watched as the three other agents dispatched their opponants.
Adder practically broke down the door of her RC, grabbing her wooden cricket bat. "Deuce, we've got a problem.
Her partner was already sharpening his daggers "You don't think I didn't realize that already? What the hell's going on?"
"The PPC's been compromised," Adder replied. "Some kinda mirror multiverse thing... I don't know! All I know is that we gotta kill these farkin EPC agents, and I don't intend to cower in the RC and wait it out! But don't set anything on fire. We don't know how flammable the mirror verse is."
"Damn. Oh, well." The diminutive Agent bared his jagged teeth in a feral grin. He bounded toward the open door.
"Deuce!"
He paused, looking back. "Yeah?"
"You're fly's down.
Deuce yelped, glanced down, and-- "No it's not."
"April Fools!" Laughing maniacally, with a cricket bat and one hand and a razor-sharp reed knife in the other, Adder shot out into the hallway and brained the first EPC Agent she saw.
Question; is this like, a canon invasion like the 2008 Sue attack or just a one off thing that doesn't canonically happen?
Don't expect the plotline to have any more consistency than, say, the DC Universe.
-re. That's why I asked if this is actually something that happens, or non-canon.
Well, admittedly, also because I'm a bit confused and just want to have my ideas straight, but still.
What would your agents do in this situation? Just participate. Whether or not it becomes a Thing like the Invasion/Macroviruses will probably depend on the enthusiasm of the participation :D
So, was naturally curious about if it was supposed to be canon or not. I could give it a shot, though.
Just go along with it and sort out later :D
It's alright that I jumped in, right? For RP I don't require permission if I read the wiki right.
The Wiki speaks the truth.
at least with the Cal group.
I think my post can happen after yours, considering Cal was dragging you back away, after which Chase bumps into him because she was running from a patrol she caught. Which is heading towards the group...
That work?
Time for things to Get Worse. Alex never did learn not to taunt the Overpower, even if he now believes in it.
I should let Gabe go next, yeah?
Agent Cal came running at the noise, almost tripping in his overly large trenchcoat. It took him a minute to understand the situation.
"Ellen! To me!" he barked. "The headquarters are under att--"
"YAAAAAY!"
The robot girl shoved him aside with a maniacal grin on her face, forcing the young agent to throw himself to the ground to avoid the huge spiked head of her flail.
"I will not tolerate more of this unprofessional behavior," he said weakly as Ellen ran past him. But he strongly doubted she would pay him any heed. Sighing, he got back to his feet with as much dignity as he could muster and followed his partner.
Agent Warren strode down the hallway, whistling "In the Hall of the Mountain King" at the top of his lungs.
Considering the current state of HQ and the fact that his partner was still in their TARDIS, this was a remarkably stupid thing to do. He got bonus points for dragging his lightsaber through the walls at waist height, leaving a glowing line of molten Suefic Surface behind, and for forgetting not to look where he was going.
"All Agents...bzzzt..." The loudspeaker fell silent as the lightsaber bisected it, then fell in two pieces on the glittery ground.
"Bugger you," Alex muttered, then continued humming, confident that nothing too bad would happen. It was therefore inevitable that he bumped into not one but three EPC patrols at the same time.
"Die, Agent dog, di-"
The ridiculously muscular young man's voice abruptly cut off as Drental grabbed him by the throat and closed her crushgaunt-covered fist. His neck gave way with a loud crunch, and he fell limp. That left the other two EPC patrollers, both of whom had instantly moved to attack the Agent. One appeared to be a cyborg wearing some kind of gold body armour and the other was a pointy-eared elf holding a glowing sword.
Drental sighed and dropped to one knee as the elf swung her sword in an arc towards the Mandalorian Agent's head. The blade hissed through the air inches above her helmet, clipping its antenna as it passed above it. Drental brought her blaster pistol up to waist height, aimed, and squeezed the trigger...
only to see her shot go wild and then herself fly into a wall as the elf made a subtle hand gesture.
Fierfek, not a Jedi Elf. Drental thought.
Drental suddenly found herself being bodily lifted off the ground and shoved into the wall. A loudspeaker cracked under the pressure as the gold SPARTAN held the struggling Agent against the wall. He then began tightening his grip and Drental started to choke.
SPARTAN Shadow-118 looked at the struggling PPC Agent and grinned under his golden helmet.
Once Master Chief's older brother and commander,he'd been recruited to serve a higher purpose by the EPC: the destruction of all who opposed their inspired vision. A vision of unity, of peace under the banner of the Emperor. Their Lord and Master had commanded them to cross the void between the worlds and bring down the butchers of the PPC. This mockery of their holy work would fall: the Emperor of All Universes had decreed it, and so it would be.
Suddenly feeling euphoric at the thought of victory, Shade looked at his partner, Jedi Knight Celeboraian Moonsong. An elf from Middle-Earth, she'd been trained in the ways of the Force and had a knack for taking down Forceless warriors who specialized in hunting Jedi. She laughed, her voice tinkling and sweet even as the tone turned malicious.
"That tin can didn't do you much good, did it, butcher?"
Shade chuckled.
"Do you want it or should I?" he asked. The Mandalorian struggled for a moment, then stopped when Shadow tightened his grip. In a few seconds, he'd finish the PPCer off, but for now, he'd enjoy the feeling of power he had over the murderess.
Moonsong shrugged, then blinked her sliver eyelashes.
"What's that beeping noise?"
Shadow frowned and looked down in time to see a humming, perfectly spherical ball slip from the Mandalorian's fingers. The thermal detonator flared and vanished in a ball of flame.
Drental and Shadow, despite being at the blast's epicenter, were more or less unharmed due to the low-power setting of the explosive and their own armour. Moonsong, who was wearing only a revealing variant of a Jedi tunic, was less lucky. Her smoldering corpse slumped against a wall, scattering ash as it fell.
Shadow looked up from where the explosion had thrown him to see the Mandalorian looming over him, a strange gun held in its right hand. There was a click, and the world turned white for the EPCer as the Verpine slugs penetrated his helmet.
Drental dropped the empty slugthrower, struggling to stay upright as she fought the combined effects of dizziness and lack of breath from her near-fatal choking. She'd staggered two corridors away when she ran into a face she'd never expected to see.
At the sight of Agent Warren, one of the Enforcers slowly drew his violet laser whip, a weapon so indescribably awesome that it could only come from a Sueniverse. Before he could make use of it, his head was brutally smashed against the nearest wall in an explosion of bone splinters and bits of brain. The other Enforcers turned toward the attacker in surprise, only to find an innocent-looking little girl with a sweet dimpled smile, huge amber eyes and a bloodied flail larger than her. Behind her came a grim-faced young man with trenchcoat, fedora and eyepatch, who seemed to come straight out of a cheap mystery novel of the fifties.
"Come ooooon, ya can fight better than that, I trust," said the girl to the Enforcers with a creepy grin. She rose her flail again and nonchalantly swung it above her head, prompting her companion to prudently draw back a few steps.
Chase reached her hand to stop the Agent taking backward steps closer to her, as another patrol had nearly caught her from the opposite direction. She looked behind her and listened for any approaching footsteps, clutching the only "weapon" she had on her at the moment: a Intar pistol.
"I'd hate to give the impression that I'm a coward, but there are more heading this way and I've got a weapon that on it's highest setting stuns for five minutes or so."
Catching a glimpse of the lead patrol member rounding the corner, Chase mutters, "Screw it."
She takes cover behind a close by corridor and opens fire on the other patrol with her Intar.
With the EPC closing in on either side of the four PPC Agents, things were looking grim.
At least, they would have been looking grim if the first, larger group hadn't been decimated by a certain malfunctioning android. A pink haired "gothic" girl wailed as she ran away from the carnage, only to be stopped by the application of a spiked ball to the back of her head. Smiling slightly, Ellen continued to efficiently slaughter the remaining EPCers.
The other three Agents were having less luck. Cat's trenchcoat was now sporting several charred holes, Chase was running low on ammunition, and Alex...Alex knew better than to even try firing a ranged weapon. Slowly but surely, the two patrols of EPC newcomers were forcing the Agents back.
"What else can go wrong?" Alex shouted in despair, completely forgetting the PPCs resident Law in the process. The Overpower never could resist a statement like that.
Ellen cheerfully brought down her flail on one of the Enforcers, an emo vampire, but in his dying breath the target just found the strength to drive his mithril spear into the android's exposed throat. Ellen drew back, multicolored sparks flying in all directions from her wound, and her smile died on her lips. She remained catatonic for a moment, her head tilted to one side in confusion. Then she abruptly came back to life.
And started to breakdance while singing the Llama Song, under the stupefied gaze of the Enforcers.
"Argh, she's broken again," Cal complained. "Took me hours to repair her." He should have shut his mouth: immediately the Enforcers ignored Ellen and turned their attention back to the other agents. "Oh crap."
Chase ordered as she reached for the android's other arm, tensing herself to run. She wanted to make it to a RC and find something to fight the EPC agents with, preferably something that would cause some decent damage.
"Name's Chase by the way," she said in mid-sprint, nearly falling over herself as she threw her now empty Intar at the following attackers, "Don't suppose you know the way to safety, eh?"
Ellen, still thrashing wildly in an attempt to get back on the floor and resume her dance, took the voice of Bill Clinton to recite a few beautiful haiku about the superb efficiency of Warsaw's sewer system.
"Ignore her," Agent Cal advised, running alongside Chase with a firm grip on Ellen's other hand. "When she's like that, there's no point talking to her." He looked around. "I don't know the place much better than you do. But the best is just to run at random. If we have a specific destination, we'll never find it."
He ducked in the nick of time as a shuriken whistled mere inches above his head. His fists tightened in anger; the bastards had almost damaged his fedora.
Chase held tighter to the twitchy android and tried to follow Cal's advice. After a few twists and turns she could hear the voices sound farther and farther away, but what really made her sigh in relief was the presence of RC 25.
"Come on in," she practically shoved the two Agents in, "It's a mess, don't mind the Sue, she's reformed."
"I found chocolate cookies!" Akemi squealed, painfully oblivious to the hostile takeover.
"At least that's what they're telling me."
"Reformed, eh?"
Alex lowered the lightsaber to the floor but kept it activated. Giving the Sue a distrustful look, the Agent glanced at the now-closed RC door before looking back at the other three Agents.
"Now what? Are we just going to cower in here and hope those imposters go away?" he demanded, conveniently forgetting his own flight moment earlier.
Chase had just opened her mouth to reply when footsteps began echoing off the Suevian Surface corridor outside. All of the Agents froze as the footsteps came closer and closer.
"Clear." a high-pitched, irritatingly sweet voice called, its owner moving closer as it did so. There was the creak of an RC door opening.
"Clear."
The EPCer was only one door away now.
"Clea-what's this?" the Suevian Agent cried, triumph in her voice.
"Please...don't hurt me. Please!"
There was a blaster shot and a cut-off, agonized scream.
"What's going on, honey?" a deeper voice asked.
"Nothing, lovemuffin. Just one of those PPC murderers. She's in the great RC in the sky now."
The two Suevians laughed. Cal clenched his fists, shaking with anger, a reaction shared by the other Agents.
The Sue walked over to RC 25.
"It's locked," she called to her partner. "Alohomor-"
She was cut off when Alex pressed his lightsaber against the door up to its hilt. There was a gurgle, followed by a wet smack.
"Honey?" the Stu called, then gasped. "Backup!"
Chase jumped over some furniture on the way to the weapons locker she kept and opened the doors. The collection was small, but she managed to have secured a Zat from the SG continuum, which she placed in a holster. She threw an old and unpolished keyblade to Akemi.
"I thought we would have had more time before it went all FUBAR. At least enough time to get a jump on some of the patrols. So do we portal out or try to fight our way out the door?"
She offered a katana to Cal and rummaged through the rest of the weapons to find something that she could use as backup to the Zat, when she heard the footsteps of the backup the Stu had called. Settling for one of the two Reaver axes in the locker, Chase shuts and locks it.
"Make your choice, we don't have time!"
Adder swallowed hard, gripping her cricket bat. "I don't like the sound of those footsteps. I vote portal out."
"Seconded," Deuce agreed, picking up his daggers again. "I might could blast 'em with fire, but I don't wanna take that sort of chance. And Cthulhu's bleeding."
Adder glanced worriedly at the ferret. "Doesn't look too bad; you should've seen the other one. Still, though, you're right." She placed the injured white ferret in her backpack and shouldered it. "Though, with Thu in my pack, no more action rolls for me."
Agent Cal hefted the katana Chase had lent him and put on a grim face that was perhaps a trifle overdone.
"Flee by the portal," he advised the others. "I Can Hold Them Off TM." He tried a cool-looking combat pose, stumbled and almost fell.
"That's not necessary, you know," said Adder. "We can close the portal behind us."
"Oh, yeah, guess you're right." Cal looked very disappointed. "Ah well, there's no point staying here then. Let's portal out." He took Ellen's inert body under his arm and stepped aside for the girls. "Ladies first," he said in a suave, manly voice that just dripped with cheese.
(I suppose that "Cal hefted his katana" happened before "Escape". I should learn to write faster...)
The door caved in, sending metal shrads flying in all directions, and a trio of Gary Stus stormed in. Their leader lowered his shotgun and looked around. The Response Centre was empty, its console locked down and floor covered with items the Agents had left behind. The lead Stu sniffed disdainfully.
"Cowards. Come on, we have... an undetermined number of RCs left to check." With that, the group turned around and left the RC, returning to their designated posts. Their Lords and Masters had decreed it, and their will would be done.
At the same time, six Agents tumbled through a glowing portal one after the other. As was usual in such scenarios, Alex was the first one through and was subsequently crushed by the other five.
"Ow..."
"Ack."
"Ow."
"Well," Cal commented when everyone had gotten untangled and more or less recovered. "We seem to have escaped."
With perfect timing, a Stu ran towards the group, activating a lightsaber and shouting a warcry as he did so. He took an energy bolt to the face and promptly fell with a loud thump.
Chase looked from side to side, eyes widenning.
"Hang on...we're in the Cafeteria!"
"Oh... my God..." she breathed. "WANT." The young Agent dove at the dead EPC agent, grabbing the lightsaber. "Mine. I claim. I saw it first. I grabbed it first. Mine mine mine mine mine--"
"Okay, we get it!" Deuce snarled. "You can have the thing; hell, I don't want it. I hate swords."
"You just don't like them because you can't use them worth beans," Adder taunted.
Her partner stared at her oddly. "Neither can you."
Adder sniffed. "Fine, be that way. We both know you're just jealous." She stared around. "Cafeteria, eh? Anyone ever read Captain Underpants? 'Cause if there's any creamed chipped beef... well." Her Cheshire smile flashed briefly.
Akemi skipped over to the dry goods area and pulled out a box of ginger snaps, oblivious as always to the glare her partner was shooting at her.
"Hey, you wouldn't know why the portal decided to send us here, did you?"
Hugging the box of cookies upon the sudden realization of Chase's irritation, Akemi tried to think of the correct words to save her hide.
"The EPC invaded, and they were blocking the door out there at the time, plus you can't ever find the right place when you're searching for it, so I..."
"You reprogrammed the portal for cookies."
"I reprogrammed the portal for cookies and milk."
"Right."
"Uh huh."
Chase had moved closer to Akemi's retreating figure, arms reached out, when the door opened once again. More EPC agents. She pulled the zat from the holster and kept the axe in the other hand if any of the Suvians came close.
Three squads of Suevians marched in perfect formation through the cafeteria doors and towards the group, stepping over bodies from earlier conflicts inside the cafeteria. True to EPC form, not a single one was blemished; they were all exactly the same height and had the same mocking smile.
Their leader, a grey and gold armoured stormtrooper holding a glowing sword, gestured at the group, then spoke.
"Weapons."
Each of the Sues raised a gun of some kind, aiming at the six Agents.
"Aim."
The Sues lifted their weapons to shoulder height and deactivated the safeties.
"Fi-" The stormtrooper stopped midword, reaching for the side of his helmet with the hand not holding a blaster. He seemed to slump slightly, then gestured. Unbelievably, the other EPCers lowered their weapons and stepped aside. Another group of Agents entered, each of them familiar but twisted. It seemed the Suevians had a sense of irony.
A trenchcoat-wearing Stu-Cal led the six newcomers as they charged towards the PPCers. Looking at his counterpart as it screamed obscenities at him, Alex thought, quite randomly, Thank God for mook chivalry.
Weapons clashed and the battle was joined.
Adder roared, recognizing her and Deuce's own counterparts, who (to her grim triumph) still looked a bit beaten up from their last encounter. Stu-Deuce's face was burned, but somehow this failed to detract from his good looks.
At the sight of the Suevians, who had been murdering unarmed Agents unprovoked and for no apparent reason, coupled with the hum of her lightsaber in her ears, pure exhilarating anger swelled within Adder. Deep in her brain, something snapped.
With a harsh scream of rage, Adder activated her lightsaber. "Time to test out my new toy, pitiful fools!" She swung it at her counterpart, only managing to slice off a lock of flowing brown hair. Her face was twisted in fury as she let out a wild howl. "FASCISTS!! WHO WANTS SOME?!"
Deuce merely gripped a dagger in one hand and ignited a flame in the other, snarling viciously. He glanced at his partner, and in his surprise he nearly tripped over his own feet. Adder, it seemed, had been pushed too far. (Though, the fact that she now had a lightsaber in her possession had most likely contributed.)
The whites of his partner's eyes were now suffused with blood. Adder was in the grip of the Bloodwrath.
Sue!Chase stepped out from the group of six wielding a ga'ould hand-device on one arm and grasping tight to an unusually shiny metal whip.
Of course, Chase rolled her eyes, she'd have the one weapon that could shield a zat blast.
Which meant Chase had to disable the device with her reaver axe; easier said than done. As she moved closer to her Suvian counterpart, she could see the pearly white teeth from the maniacal yet still mind-numbingly beautiful smile. It made Chase want to retch. With an almost unnoticed flick of Sue!Chase's wrist, the whip had cracked dangerously close, and Chase had to side-step to dodge the recoil. Sue!Chase aimed once more, but was concentrated on the recruit when she felt an object collide with the side of her head.
Akemi stood triumphant as the box of ginger snaps made their mark, and a dumbfounded gaze turned to the keyblade wielding recruit. Chase seized the opportunity and made a running start to slide straight towards Sue!Chase, ending in a power slide as she swung the axe.
The amputated arm fell to the floor, a clean cut, but Chase was unable to counter as the whip lashed around her neck, held by the remaining hand of her doppleganger.
"Hkkk!"
Engaged in battle with her own Sue (which was odd, considering the difference between the two was perhaps longer hair, and well, the Sue did smell better), Akemi could see her partner struggling to gain an upper hand. Unfortunately, Sue!Akemi was a step ahead of Akemi with two keyblades. Every swing she could dodge was quickly followed by another and poor Akemi was being beaten back. It was when the Sue got cocky; she was trying to cast a spell, and Akemi swung with full force across the girl's neck. The lopped off head make a dull thud on the tile.
"Hold on, Chase, I'm almost there!"
But there was no need, Chase had fortunately gotten hold of her zat and shot her Sue once. The shot had affected her as well because of the whip and close proximity, but she managed to stay conscious enough to move farther away as she fired the fatal shot.
Trying to steady her breathing, Chase closed her eyes for a moment until she felt her partner's hand trying to pull her up.
"Focus! The other's might need help," Akemi shouted to drag Chase out of her dazed state.
"If they need help they'll ask," she replied, standing.
She aimed for the battalion of Sues and began to open fire. Akemi ran back towards the kitchen area to find something she could assault the group with.
Deuce was in difficulties. His Stu counterpart was just as short and scrawny as he was, but (being a Stu) possessed unnatural strength and a katana. Deuce cursed both inwardly and out loud. He was skilled in hand-to-hand combat, having lived on the streets for a good three years of his life, but one of the skills he'd never gotten the hang of was sword fighting.
Stu!Deuce whirled the katana in a flashing figure-8, for the sake of showing off his skill, before swinging it downward at Deuce's head. The PPC Agent managed to catch the katana strike with the crossed blades of his daggers, and kicked the Stu hard in the lower stomach for good measure. Before he could recover his balance fully, the Stu brought the katana down and around, slashing at Deuce's abdomen. Only his swiftness saved his life, but the blade still caught him in the side. Gritting his teeth against the pain, Deuce switched his grip on one of his daggers and flung it. Stu!Deuce dodged it gracefully.
Snarling, Deuce ducked the flashing katana blade and maneuvered through the fighting to the dagger he'd thrown. Summoning up his nerve, he stooped to retrieve it.
He was too slow. Stu!Deuce made his move and cannoned into him, knocking him to the ground and jarring the remaining dagger out of his hand.
Deuce found himself flat on his back, with the dagger he'd attempted to pick up just within his reach. He stretched out his hand to grab it when the Stu drove the blade of the katana through the downed agent's shoulder. Deuce could not hold back a cry of pain, and he felt the sword's tip scrape the ground beneath his bleeding shoulder.
"Oh, no you don't!" the Stu hissed. "How dare you, you evil, murdering PPC agent! Suevians are superior! We will cleanse the Multiverse of your fil-"
Deuce grabbed his opponent's uniform front with the hand connected to his uninjured shoulder, dragging him down. When the surprised Stu was within reach, Deuce raised his head and sank his jagged teeth into the side of the Suevian's neck. With a savage jerk of his head, Deuce tore out the Stu's jugular before shoving the twitching body to the side. A strangled "urrrgghhnnn..." escaped from the dying EPC agent's mouth.
I hope he regenerates like me, please let him regenerate like me, Deuce thought frantically. The Stu, however, stayed dead, and Deuce inwardly rejoiced having thwarted the Ironic Overpower.
Suddenly, Sue!Adder was looming over him, pointing an M-16 in his direction with a twistedly beautiful smile on her face. Deuce nearly panicked right then and there, but--
"HEY! YOUR FIGHT'S WITH ME, BOYO!" Eyes still suffused with blood, Adder advanced on her counterpart, her lightsaber held at the ready.
"Relinquish your weapon or your partner dies." Sue!Adder said flatly, only to be beheaded two seconds later.
With the atrocity dead, the Bloodwrath faded. "Deuce! You okay?" she asked her partner worriedly.
"Oh, I'm fine," Deuce replied dryly. "I'm just lying here relaxing, pinned to the floor by a sword through my shoulder. Be a dear and get it out, will you?"
Adder complied as carefully as she could. Deuce bit back a scream of agony, his blue eyes closed, and he passed out from the pain.
Taking up her lightsaber, Adder stood over her partner and lashed out furiously at any Suevian foolish enough to get too close.
Alex stared at himself. He stared back. As was usual with AU doppelgangers, the two were almost identical, down to the same light grey jacket and slightly pop-eyed stare. There were some subtle differences, such as the Stu's slightly longer hair and the lightsabers of canons replacing those of Sues on his belt, but they were hard to tell apart at a glance.
There were shouts from nearby and the clanging of weapons as the Agents clashed with the their EPC counterparts, but Stu-Alex continued to casually stroll towards his canon opponent. Alex knew he was taunting him, but couldn't help rising to the challenge.
"For canon!" he shouted, slashing at the doppelganger. Said Stu calmly sidestepped as Alex ran at him, then gave him a hard shove in the back. Alex stumbled, tripped over a piece of debris, and landed heavily on one of the tables. Stu-Alex chuckled deeply, pacing back and forth a meter away.
"Pathetic. I'd expect my counterpart among these vermin to have a modicum of skill, but it seems I expected too much."
Pushing himself off the table with a grunt, Alex turned and looked at his counterpart.
"Die."
Reaching into his pocket, Alex pulled out a small, blue sphere and pressed a red button mounted into its middle. As the plasma grenade began to hiss and glow, he threw it at the Stu.
His eyes widening, Stu-Alex leaped to the side, spitting curses at Alex as he did so. The plasma grenade went off with a buzz, sending arcs of electricity in all directions and leaving a smoldering crater where a set of chairs, a Sue, and a teapot had been moments earlier. The fate of the teapot, while important in the larger scheme of things, does not factor into this discussion and will not be mentioned again.
Stu-Alex staggered to his feet, eyes literally blazing due to his usage of Enraged Glare #6. A smirking Alex walked up to him casually in an almost exact reenactment of the scene from moments earlier.
"You were saying?"
The Stu pulled out a curved, engraved lightsaber hilt, fingers tightening around the handle. Alex noted that it appeared to be identical to that of Asajji Ventress, and the knowledge of what had likely occurred added to his rage.
The Stu pressed his saber's activation stud and a blood-red blade hummed into existence from the handle. His face and jacket blackened and scorched from the grenade, Alex-Stu struck Dramatic Pose #4, then lunged for the canon Alex. He parried, and the duel began in earnest.
Much to Cal's dismay, Stu!Cal was closely followed by Sue!Ellen, who was just like Ellen except that she was fully operational and wielded a... lightflail. Of a beautiful urple color. Panicked, Cal put his android partner back on the ground and re-activated her, hoping she would act more or less normally now.
Instead, Ellen resumed what she had been doing when Cal had switched her off, namely the Joker's amazing pencil trick. But Sue!Ellen made the grievous mistake of running straight at her at this very moment, her deadly weapon swinging high above her head.
It turned out that pencil beats lightflail.
Cal did not prove as efficient against his own evil counterpart. He rose his katana, expecting his enemy to do the same, but Stu!Cal, being a Stu, had of course not forgotten the Indiana Jones approach to such a situation: drawing his revolver, he casually shot the PPC agent in the chest. Cal collapsed, a red stain widening on his trenchcoat.
(Amazingly, the lightflail does exist in Star Wars fanon. Since it's not canon though, it's the kind of thing a Sue would have.)
Adder shrieked. Distracted by the downed agent, she failed to notice that, contrary to Deuce's assumption, his Stu counterpart was not dead. The regenerative abilities were shared.
Urple fire blossomed from Stu!Deuce's hands, and the injured EPC agent flung himself at Adder's unprotected back.
The lightsaber was knocked from Adder's grasp, and she collapsed beside her partner. She rolled onto her back just in time to see the Stu, blazing with urple fire, advancing on her. He leaped, just as Adder's searching fingertip found the handle of her lightsaber. But she could never get it up in time...
Right as the Stu leaped, Deuce's bright blue eyes snapped open. Convulsively he grabbed for one of his dropped daggers and stood to meet his counterpart. Unfortunately, not even Stu!Deuce could fight gravity. The dagger was driven straight into his heart, killing him for good.
The effort exhausted the half-conscious and injured agent, and he collapsed to the floor again. Without wasting her breath on thank yous (she could hug him later), Adder grabbed her lightsaber and resumed fighting. She glanced over at Cal, her eyes worried.
Risa watched as the group of PPC and EPC Agents fought, looking for an opening to move in and assist her Protector comrades.
On seeing several of the fighters fall Risa moved, crossing the cafeteria in the blink of an eye. The generic Suvians in her path stood no chance, as Risa struck them down with her zanpakuto as she passed.
Now that she was closer, Risa could see that not all of the ones she'd seen fall had been the invaders. Sheathing her zanpakuto, she knelt down next to a young man with a bullet wound in his chest, who didn't look anything close to being a Stu.
"Lie still, Agent," Risa whispered, hoping that no Enforcer would notice what she was going to do. "I will heal that wound as far as I am able."
Risa's hands began to glow green as she spoke a low and fast incantation under her breath. She placed her hands over the Agent's chest and the torn flesh beneath them began to knit back together, leaving it looking as if the injury had happened days or weeks before.
"I regret that I am unable to completely heal you, but that is not my area of expertise. I suggest that you visit Medical once this invasion is dealt with."
Seeing a look of alarm on her patient's face, Risa turned in time to see a katana heading for her head. There was no time for her to dodge the blade or draw her own sword to block.
Cal sat up quickly, a jolt of pain coursing through him due to the bullet still inside his chest, and deftly caught the Sue's wrist just as she was about to behead Risa with her katana. He twisted sharply, causing the attacker to drop her weapon with a most unSueish squeal.
At this moment Cal really could have looked cool, but he threw it all out the window when he apologized profusely to the Sue for hurting her and, turning to the other agent, said rather plaintively:
"Kill her, Risa. I can't hit a girl."
There was a flash of light and a shower of sparks as the two lighsaber blades struck each other and their owners pushed. Alex pulled his lightsaber free from the lock and swung again, only to miss completely as the Stu sidestepped again. Stu-Alex smirked again, and made a beckoning gesture with his hand.
"Stop doing that!" Alex shouted. The Stu's smirk widened.
"Pathetic, useless fool. How your kind came to dominate your multiverse, I'll never understand. You will fall to the might of the EPC, and we will rule all of reality."
Alex blinked, surprised that his EPC counterpart had managed to say all of that one breath. Why, why, why did my counterpart have to be the talkative type? he thought, then lunged again. Stu-Alex casually blocked it, then swung his own lightsaber an inch lower. Alex felt an intense heat on his saber hand as the sword passed centimeters above it and saw his blade vanish as the Stu cut through the top of the handle.
The Stu grinned, showing his perfectly white teeth in the process.
"Goodbye, vermin."
Smiling, Stu-Alex lifted his sword and brought it down for the kill...only to bring the blade down in front of him in a last-second parry as Alex activated the laser whip he'd salvaged earlier and sent the flexible energy beam hissing towards the Stu. The violet beam wrapped around Stu-Alex's saber blade, and Alex tried o pull it back. Unfortunately, the Stu had recovered from his momentary shock and easily, almost contemptuously, pulled his saber back, taking the vibrowhip with it. The weapon deactivated upon being pulled out of Alex's grip, skittering under a table and out of reach. The Stu was smirking again.
"As I was saying, goodbye."
Cal, it seemed, would be all right. She hoped.
The storm trooper who had led the squad of EPC agents in the first place now attacked her, swinging the glowing sword. With a yelp, Adder ducked the blade. She stood over her unconscious partner protectively, scared out of her mind but unwilling to leave him. Deuce had been right; apart from wild swinging and chopping, her sword skills were dubious at best. Gritting her teeth, she ducked another swing from the glowing blade. All the stress lately, piling on top of the trauma from the smutfic she and Deuce had been sent into, had snapped her sanity. But the Bloodwrath she had experienced refused to resurface; now she was herself again, forced to fight with nothing but what little skill she had.
There was a familiar grating roar, and a small, dark red shape shot toward the storm trooper and snatched the sword from its hand. Dashing forward, Adder ran the EPCer through and turned to her rescuer. "You took your time getting here, Zoku! What kept you?"
Zoku the Mini-Fire-Dragon merely snarled in reply, before breathing a mouthful of fire into the face of Alex's Suevian counterpart, right as the latter was about to bring down his lightsaber for a death blow.
Alex was crouched in front of a table as the Stu prepared to strike, his hands clenched into fists and held up in a futile gesture. The Stu brough the blade down...and dropped the saber as flames washed over him. The curved lightsaber rolled away from the EPC Agent as he staggered backwards ,screaming in agony and clawing at his now-burned face.
Alex picked the saber handle up and briefly contemplated making some witty remark before deciding to simply finish the imposter off. Stu-Alex's screams quickly died down as he stopped clawing at his own face, replaced by gasping. Alex looked at his counterpart and saw something that resembled a well-done steak more than a human face. Both of the imposter's eyes had been completely burned away, and blackened glitter oozed from the sockets.
"Payback time." Alex snarled. The imposter swivelled towards him, flailing wildly with his burned arms in a vain attempt to block him. Alex calmly and quickly swung the saber in a low arc. There were two buzzes in rapid succession, and Stu-Alex's torso fell one way as his legs fell another. Shrieking in pain, the imposter continued to wave his arms as he fell on his back.
"Relax." Alex said, an unpleasant smile on his face. The Stu continued to scream, so Alex turned the lightsaber over in his hands and stabbed down. The Stu clutched at his now impaled sword hand with the other, gritting his teeth in pain. Alex noted that he'd stopped screaming, then took the other hand.
To his credit, Stu-Alex was completely silent when Alex lifted the lightsaber above his head for the final time. There was a hiss as the lightsaber passed through the EPCer's neck, and Stu-Alex's head rolled off.
Alex deactivated the lightsaber, and looked at his counterpart's body.
"Hm...jacket seems to be intact."
Alex bent down and promptly relieved the imposter of the jacket. There were some burn marks, and the hood had been singed by Alex's lightsaber swipe, but it was more or less intact. Better yet, he had four lightsabers on his belt.
The battle in the Cafeteria had quickly grown into a full scale skirmish. With reinforcements from both sides pouring in through the doors, there were now several dozen Agents from both sides inside the cavernous room. Stray energy beams and projectiles flew in all directions and the clanging of swords echoed through the room.
Putting on the imposter's jacket instead of his own now-tattered one, Alex looked around. Agents of all shapes and sizes were fighting Sues, many of them their counterparts. Alex heard a hiss and turned to see a large cat jump at him, claws extended. He chuckled and ducked. A moment later, he was very surprised when it abruptly shifted into a large wolf and knocked him to the ground, claws tearing into his jacket.
He tried to gut it with his lightsaber, but the Animorph Sue saw the movement and knocked the saber from his hand with one massive paw. In a now-unpleasantly familiar situation, Alex saw the saber handle go flying off into a Suefic surface rubble pile. Jaws snapping, the morphed Sue prepared to tear the Agent's throat out.
(OOC: I know that Animorphs can't shift directly from one form to another, but the Sue doesn't.)
Akemi shrieked at her partner, and Chase was able to turn fast enough to see the fight Akemi was referring to. A wolf was pinning one of the other Agents down, preparing for the fatal strike. Chase aimed her zat and caught the animal once, but the second shot missed and hit a wall as the wind was knocked out of her.
Chase hit the ground and the zat slipped from her fingers, and she turned to face the storm trooper that had knocked her off balance.
"Isn't that a little un-sueish for you?"
She shoved the trooper away and scrambled for the zat, but her face fell as the weapon was picked up by another pair of hands. As Chase saw the Storm Trooper lift himself off the floor to pull out his blaster, she saw a blue beam pulsate towards his figure.
Akemi, shaking some from the close call, reached the zat out to Chase, who took it and stood up to get her axe.
It looked like more reinforcements for their side had drawn in, and the fight dragged on.
"Stop throwing food at people and start chopping some heads!"
Akemi nodded and made her way to the storm troopers as Chase ran towards the other Agent and the wolf.
The wolf sue had recovered sooner than she had hoped, and was moving too quickly for Chase to get a decent shot without hitting the other Agent. She tried to get closer to intercept the two, but nearly tripped on something. She looked down to see the lightsaber, shut down but still functional, and quickly tossed it towards the fighting Agent.
"Heads up!"
It's all the way across the page now, would it be considered clutter if we put our particular RP on a new one?
Ha, this wouldn't happen if we were on Invisionfree!
*I-told-you-so dance*
I used to admin for one, invisionfree rocks.
You can start the new one.
Adder's foaming at the mouth, I think Deuce is waking up, and he's pissed.
Apparently aware of her surroundings again, the android broke free from Cal's grasp, wrestled with Akemi for a moment and managed to get her hands on the cookie with the most chocolate chips per square centimeter. She greedily swallowed it in one gulp.
"You're an android, you don't even need to eat!" exclaimed Cal. "And since when do you even have a sense of taste?"
But Ellen ignored him, drifting back into her oblivious state (this time, imitating Heath Ledger's Joker with a rather creepy accuracy). With a deep sigh of resignation, Agent Cal turned to Recruit Chase.
"I think we'll have to make do without her until she's repaired."
"How about a magic trick?" asked Ellen to Akemi in a hoarse voice. She drew a pencil from her pocket and stuck it into the nearest piece of furniture. "I'll make this pencil disappear."
His face turning pale, Cal dived at Ellen and quickly switched her off before she could attempt her trick on anyone. She fell limp to the floor with a thump, still smiling. Wow, that was close, thought the young agent.
"Well," he decided aloud, "maybe we better try to contact the others to join them somewhere. We can't stay holed up in here forever, but we can't fight the Enforcers all by ourselves either, no matter how totally kick-ass that would be."
(Going to bed now.)
through the hallways, locked in combat with their respective mirror-selves. Cthulhu the ferret had emerged victorious over his own opponent, though he was limping badly, and Adder could not be sure that all of the blood staining his white fur had belonged to the EPC ferret.
Deuce was making a grave mistake; every now and then, he would look up, frantically searching for the familiar door to RC 6664. Because of this, they were nowhere near it.
Finally, Deuce decided to ignore his partner's earlier advice concerning pyrokinesis. Concentrating, he summoned a flame and sent it blasting into his opponent's face. Unfortunately, the thing refused to die.
"BLIGHT IT ALL TA HELL!" The small Agent snarled. Stooping, he scooped the injured ferret up in one hand and grabbed Adder's jacket sleeve with the other. "Come on! We have to find safety somewhere!"
Adder aimed one final blow at her opponent with her cricket bat before joining her partner in a full-out sprint down the hallway. An RC door was ajar; without thinking, Adder grabbed her partner and flung him through it. Then, diving into a shoulder roll that would have made her sifu proud, she made it into the open RC. Flipping over onto her back, she shoved the door closed with her foot, causing the pursuing EPC agents to smack into it in a rather un-Sueish way.
Deuce lay on his side, breathing hard with both fatigue and relief, and Adder looked up to see whose RC they'd charged into. To her immense relief, she recognized one of them.
"Why, hello, Cal," she greeted, somehow managing her braces-studded Cheshire Cat smile. "How's the coffee maker? Doing well, I hope?"
Read the post by Ugo and me.
Upon seeing the writing on the wall, as it were, Alex promptly did the second stupidest thing of the day. He charged towards the eight remaining Agents, yelling something about honour about the Plot Continuum as he did so. This would have been all very well and good if Ellen hadn't been doing the same thing at the time.
Cal dragged Alex back as his android partner charged into the group of EPC Agents. There were screams, screams which were abruptly cut off by wet thwacks and splashing noises.
Looking at his savior, Alex said the first thing that came to mind.
"Nice coat."
Agent Mulhoon looked out the door. Gone was the grey Generic Surface, to be replaced by chic black. Loudspeakers dtted the wall at intervals, blaring out PSAs.
All agents to report to the nearest Sueification station for reeducation. Despatch is currently readying a list of the most flagrant goodfic that needs to be flamed. All agents to report to the nearest Sueification station.
"Oh, good," he grunted. "The EPC are back. Had enough of those last year."
He walked acros the response centre to the weapons cabinet, drawing out a revolver and a set of brass knuckles.
"Grab your toys, newbie. HQ's been invaded, we need to go find some more agents to help chuck the jokers out. Help me find the way to RC 45?"
"But I've got no idea where that is."
"Good. I do know where it is, which means I'll never find it. You'll likely go straight there. One of the oddities of HQ. It's Trojie and Pads' Response Centre, if I know them at all they'll be spoiling for a fight."
'Just let me tie up the animals and you can come right in. There we are. Now, what the hell are we going to DO about this? Anyone got any ideas?'
"they are Sues after all. It's not like they'll show us any mercy if they catch us resisting like this."
Ansela tried to stand up and failed, Absinthe's giant paw and head across her chest, pinning her down. "Tro, could you please call Absinthe off? And get me a towel? I didn't know one animal could produce so much slobber."
Trojie pointed out, handing the Floater a towel anyway and hauling the dog away. 'I'm down with the killing thing, anyway. It's been a year or so since we got bloodthirsty, right, Pads?'
Pads was having a smoke in the corner, watching the Console as if she expected it to beep any minute. 'Speak for yourself. I for one spent nearly six months killing replacement characters by jugularectomy.'
'Fair point. Fancy doing it again?'
Pads stubbed out the cigarette. 'If I had a dentist, it'd probably kill me for what I'm about to do to my teeth, but okay, let's eat some glitter.' She transformed, and bared her teeth.
Ansela said, "and could you please give me some warning before you do that? You know how I react to dogs."
She dropped the towel onto a random pile of dirty washing and strode towards the door, hand twitching towards Pads' back. Producing a throwing knife from somewhere on her person, Ansela grinned. "It's clobbering time."
Trojie hefted her bell, producing a discordant clang. She grinned.
The three Agents exited the RC, accompanied by Absinthe and Apple the mini-Chimera. The other minis chose to remain.
The corridor was empty, but screams and giggling could be heard in the distance.
... followed quickly by four agents, two of whom were equally fuzzy, and all of whom had various types of weapons at the ready.
"MOLLY!" shouted Skyfire. "I told you not to leave the response centre!"
Laburnum twirled her axe. "Sky, that kid's worth any two agents in a fight. And if the EPC adopted her equivalent in their universe and it survived more than a few minutes, I will personally eat my axeblade, so they probably won't be expecting her ... okay, do we have a plan?"
Foxglove checked her crossbow and sighted along the arrow. "How about 'fight your way through the place, find your bizarro twin and beat the hell out of them'?"
said Trojie to Ansela as the Yiff agents barrelled past them. 'What do you think?'
Ansela replied with a manic. "No one walks around with my face and gets away with it."
'She's got a scent,' said Trojie. 'Come on, let's see what's down there.'
Molly changed direction abruptly, zoomed back down the corridor, and scurried in circles around Pads, squeaking "Super fun happy kill time yay!"
'I know she's a little killing machine and all, but I gotta admit, I'm kinda worried she's going to get lost and outnumbered. Don't you guys at least have a leash for her?' the Bad Slasher asked Skyfire.
Before Skyfire could reply, however, the group rounded the corner ... and ran into a group of EPC agents.
'Oh. Shit.'
Ansela Jonla, Princess of Thieves and Senior EPC Agent ran a delicate yet strong hand through her shoulder length auburn hair as she strode through the captured corridors of this PPC. She shed a single crystal tear for every sign she saw of her murdered sisters from this multiverse, for every shred of perfection destroyed before its time.
Her head held high, Ansela brushed a piece of dust from her tight gold leather catsuit with manicured fingers, as she led her assault group around yet another corner. There was resistance in this sector, their telepath said, and they were to stamp it out before it could become organised, not that these mundane murderers could ever be a true threat. It was with great shock then, that Ansela came face to face with a group of these incredibly dull, unglamorous looking 'PPC Agents'.
Pulling a perfectly formed bejewelled dagger, with a hilt of pure gold and a blade of silver and steel, from her belt, Ansela's whiskey-coloured eyes locked onto one of the resistance in particular. This woman bore some superficial resemblance to the EPC Agent, close enough in fact, that they might even have been twins if the PPC one carried the glow of a Sue and a true woman within her.
Trojie didn't have time to say much else as battle commenced. But she soon found herself exchanging blows with a woman almost identical to herself, save that the band t-shirt the other wore advertised the Pussycat Dolls rather than Nirvana, and that she lacked the air of having been dragged backwards through a hedge.
'Paaads!' Trojie wailed, losing ground against the more skilled EPC agent. But the Animagus was fighting an adorable fluffy black labrador with purple eyes, and couldn't seem to get the upper hand either.
All around the corridor, it seemed the fight was even ...
The scream went up as Agent Adder hurled herself headlong into the fray. An EPC Agent exactly identical to herself (but with finer features, large brown eyes, and long, flowing brown hair) attacked with a bejeweled short sword. With a squeal, Adder leapt back...
There was a shrill, angry chattering, followed by a fuzzy white blur, as Cthulhu the ferret pounced onto Adder's mirror self and sank his teeth into her face. Adder barely had enough time to recover before Cthulhu's opposite, a ferret with blinding white fur and blazing red eyes, leapt out to attack its counterpart. Snow-white fur ran red with blood.
"Thu!" Adder roared, bringing her meticulously sharpened reed knife around in a sideways slash. Her own counterpart leapt back before returning to the offensive.
Deuce's eyes were narrow with fury when he found his own mirror self. Without wasting his breath on battle cries, he sank his dagger into the thing's shoulder. Sharp pain lanced through his side when it retaliated.
The two nearly identical opposites lashed out at each other, and blood (both realistically dark red and oddly pinkish) spattered the ground.
said Trojie, landing a lucky blow and knocking out her counterpart before moving in to help her canine partners in crime against their adversaries. 'We're just ... fighting ourselves? Shit, this was the worst tactical idea any PPC Enemy's ever had, isn't it?'
'Seems to be working!' someone yelped from the melee. 'Or at least, no-one's losing yet!'
Ansela yelled back, parrying a jab from her counterpart's impossibly constructed dagger. "Uh, a little help here would be appreciated, preferably from someone with a weapon a bit longer than a throwing knife that isn't really meant to be used for hand to hand combat."
Gripping her bell handle between her teeth, Trojie grabbed the ends of her chain in both hands and proceeded to attempt to garrotte Ansela's EPC twin. 'Bitch is freaking strong!' she gasped as she tried not to lose her grip.
Ansela said, grabbing onto the Enforcer's knife hand with her empty one. "No one walks around with a Sueish version of my face, bitch!"
Ansela drove her knife into her twin's throat and sliced, severing the EPC Agent's windpipe and blood vessels on the right side of her neck. Ansela and Trojie were drenched in glittery blood as the Sue's heart continued to try and pump blood to her brain for those last few seconds before she died.
"Thanks for the help, Tro."
'... couldn't this have been less messy?'
It was at that moment that the Enforcer Trojie decided to shake off her mild concussion and leap back into the fray.
'Whoa, shit, a little help here!' cried Trojie, clawing wildly at her doppelganger's face.
Ansela snarled, "but if you want less messy..." Ansela waited until the two Trojies' struggle left the evil one's back to her and then lunged. Her knife flashed upwards, severing the spinal cord and entering the Sue's brain. "How's that?"
said Troie, dropping the twitching corpse. 'Looks like we might have a chance after all.'
After the disasterous attempt to take over this multiverse's Department of Operations, the unexpected level of PPC resistance forcing them back, he had been charged with taking DoDAEG with the taste of defeat still in his mouth. Thanks to these worthless canon-lovers, he had lost a lot of his friends on the way here, but they'd managed to escape the slaughter, and now they were here in this hall. Putting a hand to the still-bleeding cut on his face, he couldn't believe the PPCers had marred his once nearly-perfect visage.
"Heh. Are you sure you know where you're going, Marcus?" Zodfang asked, standing to his left. Zodfang was about as handsome as an Orc got, with ornately designed battle armour modified to fit EPC uniform regulations, the mithril axe in his hand dripping with PPCer blood. A rare Orc!Stu from the Elder Scrolls 'verse, Zodfang had been his partner for a long time, the fact that they were friends the only reason Marcus tolerated the huge Orc second-guessing him.
"Of course I am, we're getting closer every minute," he said, giving Zodfang a sharp look before glancing behind them to Cassie and Nat. "You guys ready? It shouldn't be much further."
Once he had got a response from the two, he checked his revolver and pistol to make sure both were loaded. Satisfied that they were, he started to head down the corridor. It wasn't a long walk before they came out into another corridor, only to find the corpses of a group of their own Agents, being stood over by PPCers who looked almost identical to them. It didn't take a genius to figure out just what happened, and the Enforcer couldn't contain his anger, raising his weapons into a firing position...
Only for a bullet to go straight past his head, causing him to yell in surprise and duck back around the corner.
***
Marcus and company had been walking for a while before they found much worth noticing, the few Enforcer groups they ran into easily dispatched, much to Zodfang's disappointment. They didn't seem to be any closer to learning the truth behind this random attack, and any attempt to take EPC members prisoner didn't amount to anything, but at the least he knew he still had to lead the group to DoDAEG, and they were getting closer. It was only a matter of time before they rounded a corner and say Trojie, Pads, and Ansela standing over the corpses of their doubles.
Finally, a pleasant surprise, he thought about to call out to them when he saw himself (?!) round a corner behind them. The conclusion was an easy one to reach, and as his double started to raise his guns Marcus had already slung the shotgun onto his back and taken out the Colt, switching sheer power for precision in the hopes of picking the Stu off. Unfortunately, his shot just barely missed, but it caused his double to cry out and duck back around.
"WATCH IT! We've got hostiles," he shouted to the group ahead of him, squeezing off a few more shots at the area his double had come from to buy Trojie's lot time to get into cover. A bullet nearly clipped his ear, but the fact that it missed meant he only reacted by motioning Zodfang up. "Zodfang! Get up here and give us some suppressing fire! Maybe we can disable them, find out what's going on here!"
And to think this had been a relatively quiet 1 April.
Nat reached for her own weapon, but stopped when she realised who the PPCers further down were. "Don't shoot at 'em!" she yelled at Marcus, not having seen the mirror'verse Agent. "They're on our side!"
Cassie leaned round to see who it was Nat was talking about, but glanced back at Zodfang in alarm when Marcus called for the Ork to come and help.
"Trojie! Hide!"
***
Mirror!Nat had shrieked with surprise when Marcus had been fired at, and was now fussing over him. "Are you sure you're okay? It's not hit you?"
Meanwhile, Cassie drew her gun and flipped her long, glistening golden hair back over her shoulder. "I've had enough of this," she stated. "It's bad enough we lost all the others. Are you going to come and help?" she asked Zodfang, batting her eyelashes at him in a manner she'd found no male could resist.
"Suppressing fire, huh? Reckon I can help there," she said, moving forward.
Leas grabbed her shoulder. "Protective magic first," he told her firmly. It was good that they hadn't had to use them before, but he wouldn't like to take on someone like Marcus's double without protection, and he doubted the others would, either.
"Yeah, yeah," Deryn sighed, making sure she wasn't in the line of fire before starting on casting Protect on everyone she was sure was on their side.
alongside Trojie and Pads. She really didn't want to get killed by her own side, especially not by accident. That... creature with the BFG didn't seem to care one bit who got hit.
"Saradonim worshipping mother lovers!" She yelled at the Enforcers, following up with a rhyming suggestion of what they could do with waterfowl.
Ansela looked at the glitter covered knife in her hand and grimaced. That wouldn't help if these newcomers all had guns. Picking up a gun dropped by a dead Sue, her lip curling at the realisation that it was encrusted with diamonds of all things, she prepared to make a break for the Protector's group during the next lull in the shooting. Surely someone had to reload soon...
looked around the corner to fire a shot at where he'd seen his double, trying to yell over the incredibly loud din of Zodfang's heavy bolter as it pounded the hell out of the EPCers' cover. There were very large chunks torn out of the walls where bolts had either gone stray or hit home with the intention of forcing the EPCers to keep their heads down, allowing Marcus to move up into his position and try to get closer to the trapped Agents.
"Ansela! Trojie! Are you alright?! Listen, just make your way over here, we'll try to keep them pinned down!" Marcus screamed, trying to make himself heard over the sheer volley of fire. The bolter was deafeningly loud, but he thought he saw his words register to the people he was talking to, though he couldn't be sure as he again fired at the EPCers, this time nearly hitting one who had stuck his neck out too far.
Alright, we're doing good, now as long as Zodfang doesn't run out of-
*click*
"ARGH! ZOGGIN' 'ELL, 'OOMIE, I'M OUTTA BOLTZ! FER GORK'S SAKE, COVA ME, YA GROTS! NEED TA RELOAD!"
***
"Okay, these guys are starting to annoy me!" Mirror!Marcus snarled, slamming in another clip for his solid gold Colt .45 as the hulking beast that served as this multiverse's answer to Zodfang bellowed out to the world that he had run out of ammunition. Leaning out, he hesitated for a moment, unsure of whether to shoot at the Agents on the ground or the ones firing, but as he aimed his pistol at one of the prone female Agents, he almost lost his head again, causing him to duck back and look at the others. Somehow, aside from Zodfang's arm being grazed, none of them had been hurt, almost as if the sheer torrent of fire was more to keep their heads down than to kill them. Muttering several expletives, he fired around the corner.
They're MOCKING me!
"You lot're all right?" Marcus asked, again returning fire at his double. If they wanted to advance, fine, it would just give him the pleasure of wringing the life out of the fake Marcus with his own hands.
feeling fairly useless, as their weaponry was pretty much limited to their swords, which in this kind of situation were about as much help as wings would have been. Exchanging a glance, the pair of them watched their companions fighting and occasionally peeped out anxiously to check on the progress of Trojie, Ansela and Pads, who were crawling up towards them.
Kelvin, though unnerved by the events, was contributing as much as he could. Unlike Zodfang, who didn't even seem to grasp what the word "aim" meant, the Elf was taking his time and actually trying to hit the people firing from around the corner.
When Zodfang stopped firing, Cassie and Nat looked at each other, the same thought going through both their heads, and scrambled out to begin crawling down to help the others out.
If we can get ta the corner, we can take 'em out, Nat thought, trying to ignore the fact that her arm was protesting against being used for the current exercise.
Beside her, Cassie's thoughts were more on the line of What the HELL have I just done?! Too late to back out now, though, she added as she rolled behind an open door just in time to avoid getting her head blown apart. Why the hell anyone had left their RC door open she had no clue, but it was definitely useful. "Nat!" she yelled, an idea coming to her. "Open the doors so we can use them as cover!"
Nat gave her a blank stare for a moment, pressed up against the wall on the opposite side of the corridor, but she quickly grasped the idea and scrambled forwards to open the next door along.
A blonde girl leaned out, seemingly to get a better look at the situation, and Kelvin let fly. She screamed and ducked back, the arrow lodged in her shoulder.
***
Mirror!Nat gasped in horror as her friend fell back, an arrow in her shoulder, and rushed to help. "It's all right, you're going to be just fine," she said soothingly, trying to help the crying girl up. "We can get you sorted, just stay calm."
"They're getting closer," Cassie sobbed, crystal tears rolling down her face and splashing onto her uniform. She looked pleadingly at Marcus and Zodfang. "We've got to stop them."
"Shhh, it's okay, you just stay calm," Nat said, trying to ease the arrow out and eventually pulling it free. She examined it for a moment, then angrily snapped it and threw it across the corridor befor trying to bandage her friend up. "We'll pay them back for this."
Once she was finished, she left Cassie sitting out of the way and joined the other two, trying to return fire at the stinking PPC Agents who'd hurt her friend.
but both were determined to do what they could. They'd been here a while.
"Keeping them down rather then outright killing, huh?" Deryn murmured, her gaze distant as she considered which spell would be best. "Suppose it'll help work out what plans there are, if we can get 'em…"
Leas nodded. "I'll see if what I know can help," he said, and pushed a pack into her hands. "Remember not to push yourself too far before refreshing yourself."
"Yes, dad," Deryn groaned, inching up. She looked at the field, and thought. A bomb would be a good distraction, but with agents coming towards them and her aim not being the best with grenades and the like, a fire was probably the safer bet. Failing to char the target hadn't exactly been part of her training, though… "If I can get the gun…" she murmured, and focused on aiming at that.
Leas, meanwhile, had started singing softly- a simple chant, meant to rejuvenate the spirit.
and Agent Adder found herself spattered with glitter as her duplicate's head exploded. Agents Mulhoon and Render had come up the corridor, flanking the enforcers. Mulhoon lowered his revolver. At the same time, a crossbow bolt flew across the room, to bury itself in the adorable labrador's flank.
"Afternoon, ladies," Corporal Jake Render said, nodding at them. "Need some assistance?"
He could feel the Black Rage tickling at the edges of perception. He had been trying to find the office of the one on charge so he could receive his partner and his RC, so that he could at last fulfil his true calling to the God-Emperor, by smiting vile badfic wherever it was.
He had come across no-one, and he was fairly certain that was blood, Suvian or otherwise, on the walls that he passed. He surmised that a crisis was at hand, and as a soldier, he required orders. 'Kill the Sue wherever it is found', only worked if you could FIND the bastards.
So it was that when he came across a group of people covered in various hues of Suvian blood, he knew that the Emperor had delivered him unto the means of finding The Enemy. He decided to introduce himself.
The clone twisted, freed her beribboned rapier, and tapped Skyfire lightly on the shoulder with it. "Touche!"
"Oh, now you're just showing off ..." Skyfire grunted, kicking out at the Sue's legs and missing when the piece of fur wrapped around the copy's tail caught her eye. "Great seasons, is that Kiern's fur?!"
"It was," Skyfire Sue said, fangs glinting and eyes taking on an eerie reddish tint. "Don't look at me like that, he's still alive. We decided there was no point in fighting over him, so we kept him. He seems quite happy ... maybe that's the dope, though."
"WHAT?!"
"Oh, don't be so silly!" the Sue giggled, with a sound like silver bells in a crypt. "Pretty people can do whatever we want."
Skyfire's own eyes gleamed with hate. "MOLLY!"
Molly left off from attacking the dying dog Sue and sprang at Skyfire Sue's face.
((Joining, even though agent has not been approved or even applied yet. Is that alright? Kick me out if not.))
B&b poked her head out from her RC, where she had been patiently waiting for her new partner to show up so she could finally get the ropes of the PPC. Lime-green painted nails dug into the Generic walls as some girl (presumably an agent) launched past her and onto an unidentified, way too pretty female...thing. Presumably a Sue or agent gone crazy, B&b concluded and quietly stepped out into the hall, shutting the door behind her with a an unheard click, lost among the chaos of noise and yells.
She leaned up against the door, crossing her arms and ankles casually, watching the mayhem with an expression similar to a bored woman forced to watch a horse race. "What's going on?" She asked whoever was near her, currently fighting someone that looked like a clone, though she couldn't see all too clearly.
Are we fighting or are we hiding? I'm down with both, I'd just like to know ...
I can get another grey jacket off my counterpart after I kill him? And his lightsaber collection?
There are flowers, just like the ones in charge of us, who are evil?
I TOLD YOU SO! Battle stations!
*grabs Moonlight Sonata and pulls him under cover* Do you want those EPC patrols to catch you, moron? Yelling at the top of your lungs with Suvians around is a bad i...de...a... *trails off* There's one behind you right now...
Damn that was close. I'm headed to RC 45, if you want to come along. Try not to get killed, whatever you choose. *starts humming Over The Hills* *jogs down corridor*
Is it a parody?
Or a compitition?
They kill goodfic and and protect Sues, with the aim of destroying canon.
Which happens to be conveniently located behind a foot thick block of titanium-steel alloy.
Or find some weapons, or something.
Problem solved, right?
Not that that's a bad thing. Seems interesting.