Dawn of the Dead-RPG

@maverick_6@gale_xanders@just_an_average_man@sentinel_hawk@vitriol

Western Bangalla, South America

Alpha

"Sir, the test subjects are set in place."

A tired, half-hearted sigh escaped from Alpha. Spinning on his heels to turn, he stared from behind his sunglasses at his subordinates, intense red eyes looking at them through the shaded lenses. A run down, decrepit warehouse is where they stood, near the heart of the small town, within the small country of Bangalla.

It was miniscule in size really. While not the smallest country in the world, it was might as well have been, as it was eclipsed by its neighboring counties Venezuela and Columbia, trapped within the confines of South America. To most of the world it was unknown. Not because it was hidden. It was on every globe, map, etc. No, it was because it was so insignificant to the populace, unnoticeable. It wasn't on the news, anything that happened within the confines of its borders were never publicized. To some, this was a good thing. Isolation from the world, unbothered by its problems. Sure, conflicts with neighbors were here and there, but overall Bangalla was a peaceful land, free from burdens.

And that was exactly why Alpha saw it as the perfect target.

"Good. Are the other forms ready if need be? Inhalants, and ready to be added to the water supply?" Alpha's tone made it clear to the young henchmen that this was a serious matter. For over a decade Alpha had been perfecting this infection. Now it was time to see how far they had truly come. There were to be no mistakes. "Ye...yes director." With a sigh of relief, the man saw a grin displayed across Alpha's face, signaling his satisfaction. "Good." The last thing the underling's brain perceived were those words. Alpha lifted a golden pistol to his face, shooting him with little care, if any at all. "You can be their first meal."

"So do you just enjoy killing your subordinates, or do you have actual reason for killing them so often?" A brash, accusatory tone emanated from behind Alpha. Turning around to look at the figure, he saw that Delta stood behind him, her hand on the pommel of her sword as always.

"A little bit of both perhaps. He was both annoying, and I wanted to see the results for myself before I make my leave of this retched country." With the subtle movement of his hand, he holstered his golden pistol beneath his black trench coat.

"Look Al, I know WHY you chose this place. But if you had wanted to see this on a large scale, shouldn't you have, I don't know, gone to a larger country?"

Alpha's coy smile returned to his face, his posture turning from serious to a more relax and mundane form. "This is an isolated country. The risk of someone stopping the spread of the infection is low. Response to the incident will either be small or will take quite long...and besides, this place means something to my brother. It'll draw him out." With sweeping motion followed suit as Alpha began to take his leave, wishing to watch the incident from a safe distance. "Go, prepare the troops. Time to see what these creatures are made of."

With one last glance at the mad man, Delta removed the glasses form her face, her hand releasing its grasp on her sword. "Your the boss."

Omega

In the town square, amidst the bustling noise that came from it, there sat a man. Upon the bench he sat, his sombrero tilted down and his poncho draped on his soldiers, a Spanish guitar within his hands. With an elegance and precision that even the most skilled of musicians would be envious of, he played. Weaving the beautiful song into a tapestry of living art, he continued to keep his head low, a solemn expression masking his face.

Finally, the end of the song was reached, with the last note ringing in the air with haunting beauty, captivating those who heard it. A man walked up to the guitar player, glancing in both directions before sitting next to him.

"Hello Eric, its been awhile." A ragged, raspy voice came from the mariachi man, referring to the informant he had called. "Well, I came as quickly as I could...but I have to ask, what is with the get up?We're in South America, not Mexico. You aren't blending in very well."

A quizzical look draped over Omega, who seemed to only now realize his disguise. "Oh great now you tell me. Do you realize how much money a sombrero, a poncho, and aSpanish guitar cost? Agh, now I look like a Mariachi Ninja." Omega exhaled deeply, shaking his head. "Anyways, did you get what I asked for?"

"The info? Yes of course. From what I've gathered, Al is definitely in Bangalla." A hard crack was heard, Omega's grip on the guitar instantly crushing it as he heard his brothers name. "And?" Omega let his words hang, waiting with very little patience for wat Eric was going to say next. "Well, whatever it is, and from what you've given to me...it looks big? Maybe some backup could help." A loud cry rang throughout the village, halting the conversation to a standstill. Quickly rising, Omega's hand raced to the hilt of his blade, watching intently for any sign of oncoming danger.

A man ran from a nearby alley, tackling a civilian in blind fury. Within the blink of an eye, Omega closed the distance. Raising his foot, he decided he didn't require to actually take out his sword. With a powerful kick, he separated the man's head from his shoulders, the skull rolling across the ground with a red trail leading behind.

'What, is that it?' Omega though to himself, feeling as though this was too easy to possibly be over. Looking down at the now headless body of his victim, he noticed that it was...decaying? Suddenly, more cries of agony erupted throughout the town, and the sound of running made Omega look back.

Within his eyesight, he saw what looked like an army of the dying, several grey, decrepit humanoids charging at him. "Oh...well then." Omega looked back, seeing that Eric had followed behind him. "Eric, quick, send out a message, something, ANYTHING!"

Returning his gaze at the oncoming hoard of the dead, Omega grabbed his sword once more. his red blade, Indignation cackling with energy. "Alright, let's slay some stiffs."

@hunterzillas: @maverick_6@just_an_average_man@vitriol

Gale was in one of the local markets looking over an exotic fruit like it was a super villain. Yuck. It doesn't even smell good. Fine...fine. "I'll take..." She looked over the little stand and counted the available fruits. Oh. "All of them, apparently." While being a major figure in the staff for Jurassic World might seem like it was always super exciting...sometimes none of the interns were available and Jurassic World's head of security had to buy fruit for a staff meeting. She rummaged around in her pocket and recovered enough of the local currency to pay her bill and received a box of the fruit in exchange. "Hey boss can we have some of that super fruit that's grown here for the meeting? Why can't it just be doughnuts again?" At least those smell good. She was on her way from the street market to her parked car when she spotted a butcher. That's what I'm talking about right there.

"I'll take that." She said, pointing at entire side of cow."

"Which piece?" The butcher wondered.

"No no, the whole thing." Gale corrected. The butcher's eyes widened and he immediately went to work taking it off of the hook. She smiled, paid for it and took her new collection of food to the car. She put everything in the back and shut the door, about to go around front of the miscellaneous rental when the screaming started. Gale looked up, wondering what super villain had decided to terrorize a country her company had specifically chosen as a staff retreat while they searched for an island to buy. They needed an island, preferably around South America, to expand the genetics program and develop new dinosaurs safely away from the park. Unfortunately Venezuela had refused their business to this point so it was on to the next country. Not my fight. She determined and went to get into the vehicle. She stopped again when a shambling corpse came into view.

Oh hell.

The still basically unknown occasional hero shut her car door and stepped away from the vehicle. She glanced around and made certain no one was looking and snapped her fingers. Her highly advanced armor slipped into place over her clothing and activated its power systems. Once activated her sensor suite brought in data from her surroundings. It also picked up a broadcast message for help and provided a specific location not far from her. Maybe there's someone there and I can figure out why I'm watching corpses walk into town.I was just about to have lunch too...

Now operating as the mysterious hero Xae she un-holstered her plasma pistol and quickly cleared the market square of the first undead visitors, reducing them to molten goo. Once she saw the market was evacuated she took off for the new location, plasma pistol held tightly in one power assisted hand as she hit full stride, easily reaching sixty miles an hour.

She soon arrived at Omega's location ready to murder whatever moved that shouldn't be. Her small, unimposing pistol may have looked practically worthless against the undead legions, but it was a highly advanced plasma weapon with a power output that rivaled humanity's most advanced plasma cannon weaponry. As she arrived her sensors were busy sweeping the area and painting a full three hundred and sixty degree view of the area onto her visor complete with threat identifications that immediately painted civilians as grey icons, Omega as a possible blue and all the undead as red. Her visor also granted her quick zoom access to details about each threat and ally, including life signs and possible abilities/threat levels. This whole process took less than a second.

"You rang?" She asked Omega. When operating as Xae she adjusted her voice to use her normal native accent that she always worked diligently to keep from her voice when going around as Gale Xanders. The accent was quite unusual, difficult to place but almost familiar somehow. Her visor's deep purple tinting kept her face from view.

@hunterzillas:@gale_xanders

"Begin operation."

Men emerged from rivers, armor partially cloaked from a majority of the electromagnetic spectrum, their enhanced senses and advanced equipment scanning the area once more. Immently, it is devoid of contacts, and they arise, rudging on the land's muddy ground walk on the shore, one motioning the rest to do the same. Eyes beneath helmets looking the area over, they are the first boots to touch the ground in the operation.

"Contact spotted."

From within the trees, a wandering infected makes his way towards the beach, for no particular reason than to be a stray, simply wandering aimlessly about the land. As it looks about the ground, it sees a few faint footprint, soon to be washed away by the flowing river. Approximately 20 pairs, and it sees nothing more. It lacking intelligence and pattern recognition skills, simply wanders along leaning forward, maws open. Legs ready to explode at the sight of prey. A wolf seeking sheep. The Shadow Company, Shepards. They were watching it from the tree, observing it's mannerisms, helmets taking photographs. One of them raised their weapons, and followed a subsonic round towards it. More silent than an arrow, it did not kill, but instead, lodged itself within it. So that they can track it and garner information of the once human being.

The country of Bangalla was small and seemingly insignificant. A country seemingly beneath the notice of the world, and contributing little to the world's populace. They had no interests or assets in the area, however, a mysterious distress signal, that was soon replaced with a message of reassurance and falsity of the previous message warranted their attention. Small, obscure places that were seemingly insignificant were the targets of many parties these days. From a team of "supervillains" taking Iceland, to an alien alliance trying to take Nebraska and finally, a terrorist group attacking and seeking to take over Gothic, it was a visible. There was simply no such thing as being "too paranoid" not these days, during an age of empires. Initial investigations were as simple as at first, simply using an orbital satellite to examin the area, as the multi-national corporation does many places. The results were disturbing, with them finding that much of the population already, had become afflicted with a deadly virus.

Investigation had become a full blown, covert operation. With Maverick in the midst of preparing a full quarantine of the virus. Meanwhile, squads were deployed in around an hour after the transmission, their arrival from orbit to the country taking fifteen minutes. The shadow company had taken to quickly performing recon work, mapping out the area as they investigated with their own eyes. Clearly, this was the work of someone with a large amount of resources who deliberately wanted to infect the countries populace, with them seeing high durability metahumans and strange looking vehicle-like organisms walking about. They moved around the country swiftly, garnering as much info as possible as they swept through the country, able to run at roughly 30 miles per hour with 100 pounds of gear (around 45 without) they could very easily cover vast expenses of the land. Stepping through villages unseen and adjusting cloaking devices as necessary, while seeing everything through echolocation so as to never be caught unawares. They found that among the ranks were human soldiers, advanced bio weapons, technologically augmented humans and even a bipedal vehicle of some sort. Noting the armenents and garnering a consensus of their abilities. Through tagging some enemies they were able to class the enemies as follows based on their ranking system.

Contact Profiles

@sentinel_hawk@vitriol

Briefing

While the shadow company were busy with recon work and Intel gathering, another group had been tasked with a different effort. Comprised of a small number of shadow company (Currently unnamed), numerous M.O.R.S, Dana "Didi" Kaitjima and Munoz "Sentinel Hawk" Hal. Deployed to a small base created on sight in a matter of hours via a cloaked VTOL, sound of it's approach was entirely negated until it appeared on the grounds, the engines heard for a moment as they landed in a small base already created in the short lapse of time Maverick had been here. (Approximately six hours)

It served as an area to allow the small squad group to operate as functionally a small research team as well as anti-terrorist group. Didi, being brought numerous samples of the virus for more extensive study as to it's actual properties and effects, and was being brought a live subject who was restrained with spider-silk lines, impossible for it to break, even with it's enhanced strength. The synthetically bioengineered silk at this thickness, may as well have been thicker than steel cable.

Simultaneously, they were all given profiles of present hostiles (See above) and expected to plan accordingly.

Munoz, had more freedom in what she wished to do. Guard the area, perform reconnaissance and the like. However, she was instructed to be stealthy. Allowed to engage infected but to avoid engaging or being by soldiers if possible. An alert to their presence however, was likely inevitable. Numbers were sparse, and the small number of shadow company available meant that research team could very well turn into a terrorist annihilating cell at a moment's notice. However, for now, silenced weapons and munitions only. Melee weapons of essentially any kind, was authorized.

"Stand by for further instruction."

@hunterzillas: @maverick_6: @sentinel_hawk:

Didi never shook the "special" feeling she got from her job. She couldn't have even if she wanted to, and she didn't want to. One of a kind.A vital asset. M.O.R.S. had numbers, as did Shadow Company. But as far a she knew she was the only operative of her kind along for the ride. The Bangalla job was her first real deployment with Maverick, and the way they brought the samples and live subject her way, for her to do with as she pleased, she felt like the favored child she never got to be growing up.

She would be the first to access exclusive information – later required to share with her superiors, of course, but that didn't change the root of her feeling. Her job, it was important. She could play a vital role in determining effectiveness in this operation as well as the future. The faster the better. And of course, there was the additional perk of adding to her own personal stock and arsenal.

Upon receiving her "presents" she immediately placed the test tube virus samples aside for later. First, the live one.

The subject was fastened to a gurney. It remained fixed in place by its feet (bound tightly together and to the gurney itself), neck (likewise secured to the stretcher), and at various points on its arms (affixed to the sides of the gurney), secured tightly to give it minimal mobility while also leaving Didi with the maximum body area to work with.

She went right away to work and slammed her combat knife into the center of its chestt. She braced then on the neck for stability and, with rough, jerky movements dragged the blade down the lightly crusted carcass, opening it down to the waste. The glint in her eyes and facial tension indicated a smile hidden under her face mask. A perfect incision.

Then she opened her pack and went to work.

Within seconds she lost herself and the universe lost its meaning. The rays of her mind became a laser and the living cadaver was the singular focus of her universe. Totally spaced out, nothing existed for her save for those things essential to her operation. Retractor. Scalpel. Suction. Scalpel. Hammer. Syringe.

She could lose herself for hours, forget food and water and other people, right up until there was not enough left to work with or she received the tell-tale hand on her shoulder. Whichever came first.

When her time with the subject was done, its parts were almost completely separated, save for the neck and head which remained somewhat animated. Its brain remained untouched. And when their time was done she set it aside as if it'd been a book she got bored of reading. Later she'd compare samples from the "live subject" (she smiled thinking of it that way) to those brought in from the others. And, if she could sneak it, test a few ideas on true live subjects. But first, the contact profiles.

"Human." Table, potential side subjects.

"Augmented Human." Table. Observe.

"Cyborg." Skip.

"AI." Skip.

Bioengin—"Hello gorgeous."

She glanced over the limited information, and when she finished Didi sought the highest ranking officer she could find; she held the folder out to show, her finger on the Goliath.

"I want that. Alive if possible."

@vitriol: @hunterzillas: @maverick_6:

Sentinel Hawk had traveled to one of the local villages on her scouting mission and found the village was completely empty. She crouched down in the middle of the village square and listened quietly with her hawk like hearing. No sounds, nothing at all. This is creepy, whatever is. No corpses but I've seen a lot of blood and even some body parts...it must spread through some sort of contact and either re-animate corpses or keep people animated as they die. What kind of horrible person would release this thing?

The young Hawk Lord shook her head quietly and found a dirty, somewhat worn teddy bear that some child had discarded. She sighed softly and picked it up, gently dusting it off. What I wouldn't give for a legion of Hawk Lords to keep children from having to suffer. Somewhere out there is a walking child corpse and I'm willing to bet whoever caused this doesn't care at all. They so rarely do. She sighed and stood up again, keeping the teddy bear in one hand. She activated her communication device built into her helmet and contacted her Maverick superiors.

"The area around our landing zone has already fallen. The villages are all empty, no bodies, no living people. I can only guess as to where the walking corpses have gone. I've been wondering now if my blood would do anything to slow or reverse an infection if it hit a living person, but I'd rather not have to find out. Permission to move deeper into the country?"

@hunterzillas: @sentinel_hawk: @vitriol:

"I know that she's good and everything but....I think she's enjoying this a little too much."

"She's right there, you know."

"Trust....I don't really think she can hear me."

The way Maverick functioned, often times, the commanders or overseers, were very often human. The Infantryman there were apart of some division, a new deemed "Hazard Troopers" who were simply trained well against biological warfare and had such equipment and armor. Thus, his fully concealed armor rendered him mostly immune to the effects of biological or cold warfare. His armor contain a thick archnoweave layer that could heal. Currently, a cure for the virus, or a more, a vaccine would be useful. It would allow them to make others immune to it, even if those infected couldn't be saved. More than likely, they'd be shot, left alone or blown apart, should Maverick decide to purge this area.

He'd turned to face the general direction of Didi, her being actually, rather valued for her skills. It's rather rare for one to be a scientist who simultaneously skilled. Unlike something like a M.O.R.S she could not be easily replaced. She presented a rather unique skillset, as she was able to gather data and intel from the creatures personally about how they functioned and how best to attack them. To find weaknesses. Not only this, but the virus could be used for other things as well, having, future potential applications. They'd often not wish to risk such a thing as having her travel here. However, it'd seem that slowly, but most assuredly, enemies were nearing their base. As if, they'd located it through some means currently unknown, perhaps via satellite or even by noticing it.

The commander of the group pulled out something that looked like a flexible, rollable iPad. Rolled up more like a scroll, rather than the typical flat, stiff and fragile device most of the public used. His eyes hidden beneath a soulless, dully colored visor. He flipped through, looking for where the nearest one was already.

"The area around our landing zone has already fallen. The villages are all empty, no bodies, no living people. I can only guess as to where the walking corpses have gone. I've been wondering now if my blood would do anything to slow or reverse an infection if it hit a living person, but I'd rather not have to find out. Permission to move deeper into the country?"

"Wait one."

His command was silent to those next to him, as all he had to do was think for him to send the message and his helmet simply replied to his command.

A red blip appeared on the small map of the flexible pad. He thought about whether or not she should actually go with them to retrieve the monster. Was it really best to bring her with them? She could defend herself, yes, but they were limited on transportation. Not only this, but it would require that they sacrafice their current only gunship just to transport a dangerius behemoth.

"You want it? Well then, go get it. I'll get a small squad for you..."

"Gaz" as he is called, deemed it would be most economic to simply have her goto the beast, which was miled away, and relay data back to them, rather than carry the creatures from there and back. For all they know, the thing could very well have a tracking device in it.

"Sentinel Hawk, I'm sending you a location to a near by entity your squadmate, Didi, would like to study. If you'd like, you both can find out the effects. But keep in mind, it's unsure of whether or not they can be considered "Dead" and not simply altered. Even our gene-Augs are only altered by what can be considered a synthetic retro-virus. The same kind, could theoretically be used to change these things into what they are. But, testing it could prove useful. For now, Rendez-vous with Didi and the Squad to approach and subdue the creature."

Vehicles available were all mostly lightweight and engineered to be silent so as to not attract attention. Motorbikes, ATVs and a noise dampened Humvee were the things she could choose to transport herself. Or, if she had previously requested, she could have brought her own method of silent transport. The squad accompanying her would consist of numerous M.O.R.S, 2 hazard troopers and 2 shadow company.

"Well?" Gaz says.

"What are you waiting here for?"

Starving.

"MUST KEEP GOING!" Ravager Could hold himself no longer Holding his Stomach, He fell to the ground his knees trembling "I have nothing Left.. No Food.. No water..No..One" He turned his head slightly to the left, with his body on it's side *Hack* His body kept trying to throw up but his stomach was so empty The pain of his stomach acid eating nothing but the natural calcium on the inside. He Tried to Get up struggling to stay alive, He tried and got into a Half upright position with his head down and one leg bent like the letter L and the other with the knee cap rubbing up against the floor, he put his right hand on the ground and his left on his other knee with effort lifted himself in an upright standing pose, A hunched back and a hand on his stomach he limped his way onto a General store welcome mat he lifted his hand in hope that the door would be unlocked or broken. A couple Candy bars on the other side of the glass made Him crave for it. He pulled his Hand gun from its holster He lifted his arm then shot the glass. It was not shattered but in pieces still stuck together, he shoved threw it knocking it all over making a sot of loud noise. Ravager lifted his arms and walked towards the candy looking almost like a zombie He grabbed the candy and set it on the ground while lazily sitting against the shopping car against the wall He grabbed the first candy bar on the ground and it was a struggle to open it grabbed the second and opened it finding two round peanut butter and chocolate wonder. He took a bite and smiled ear to ear "Oh.. I regret what I said before I don't have no one I have you, You sweet... Thing" He talked to the candy with a mouth full of chocolate and peanut butter sticking to his mouth "Mmm" in excitement he grabbed the second candy bar then shoved it half way in his mouth chomping it down as if he were a Lion on the move He started choking on the candy He put a hand on his throat and the other on the ground he looked around and found a half drank Water bottle and quickly chugged it down leaning his head back. He stopped and looked at the water bottle "Gha...What a life saver, I coulda' died there" He Yawned on a full stomach, he leaned sideways then quickly crawled toward a bunch of news papers then grabbed them all and covered himself in them like a blanket. He slowly closed his eyes and fell into a deep sleep.

The Dream.

He woke on a luxurious bed in the middle of the desert He lean forward and turned with his legs over the bed "Wha." A guitar sound started plucking in the background *down down down* He pushed himself off of the bed with both of his hands then Walked slowly forward on a sand dune that was eroding faster than normal He stopped moving and looked at the sky as the sun was going down and the moon was coming up At an extreme rate. He turned around and looked at the bed quickly aging and the wood rotting. The bed fell into the ground not soon after the ground around it starting to disappear into a whole bunch of squares and diamond shaped falling into the ground. Ravager walked backwards watching in amazement Then slowly turned around and started running turning his head constantly looking back at the ground as the sun rose and settled and the moon rose within ten seconds of each other. The abis was getting closer and close by the second, In panic he looked back than tripped over a cactus that grew straight out of the ground. He face planted into the ground and the abis surrounded him in the darkness he felt himself being torn to pieces by a bunch of the undead humans. He started to scream as loud as he could but nothing came of his mouth. Non dream: His eyes opens quick as the light of the sun hugged his warm body.

Awake.

He woke to a slow Walking rotting puss filled corpse slowly in the store it was twitching and moving unaware of Ravager being feet away. " There could be more, or it could just be him" He whispered to himself this is a gamble he was willing to take. He grabbed the knife from his right pocket making a bit of noise crinkling the news papers on top of him. He put his right hand on the ground with his knife in hand then pushed off the ground with his left Almost tripping, He ran quickly towards the Undead then stabbed it in the ear. The undead fell to the ground like a rock "Good" He looked around for some more food before leaving into the town.

(I had stuff to do so I know I was Lazy with my last one)

@hunterzillas @whoeverreally

Elliot's eyes peer out the window of a safe house scanning the area as he looks around. Seeing infected, and soldiers outside.

"They gone yet?" He hears another male voice in the background of another behind him, low tone.

"Nah..." He cooly and lowly replies.

"Elliot..." He begins. "I'm....sorry for getting you mixed up in this. If I'd known this was what was gonna happen, I wouldn't have called you down here. I wouldn't want to force you live this nightmare."

"Now, that's crazy talk. To be pretty truthful, not sure how far you'da made it if I didn't come along. Now, I'm gonna go look for some gas. Something tells me those soldiers don't have our best interests in mind..."

"Alright. Take as my 9 mils as you need. I don't really need that much. Most cases of what I see going down, I'll only need one."

Armory, lets his hand fall by his side, realizing the meaning behind this. He turns around unmasked, and gives him the most serious expression he's given in quite a while

"I am gonna come back for you."

He received no reply aside from a reassuring smirk. "I know you will."

Armory tendency to protect those who weren't so good at protecting themselves, lead to him eventually protecting a small group of hackers, rebelling against Gothic's criminals and upper class. And now, that has lead to him to affiliating with an enigmatic group known as "The Enclave." They can defend themselves pretty well, a lot better than what most people would give them credit for. Sometimes, they even have sparring sessions and most all of them know how to use a gun. But, most of them didn't have the years of experience Elliot had, let alone the "abilities" he had. Of course, Elliot was human and he didn't exactly know magic, but his skills came across as something supernatural. To some anyway. He never truly sees himself as much more than a regular person who just focused on what he wanted to do.

Elliot appeared on from the building's unbarricaded rooftop, climbing down a ladder. Of the rather difficult to reach shanty house. Surprisingly sturdy, but is only just below something of the sort of a drywall house. It's greatest protection was being mostly unreachable on the slippery rock it resided. He set the ladder down, hiding it in the brush of the jungle as he turned. His helmet on and body near completely sealed.

He took out a silenced CZ75 as he moved forward, discreetly pressing on. A few moments later, he'd disappeared into the brush.

@just_an_average_man: @hunterzillas@vitriol@maverick_6

"Uhhh...ok." She replied over her com system. Sentinel Hawk shrugged and left the teddy bear in the middle of the town square where others would find it as something of a small memorial. She brought a GPS navigation system up in her HUD and followed it to the coordinates sent to her. She waited once there, hiding quietly in the brush to avoid detection from the....thing...they were after. She waited for the other squad to arrive and held her mace tightly in both hands. Sentinel Hawk tucked her wings close to her back to make as small of a profile as possible.

What's worse? This thing or the monster that made it and let it loose? Probably whoever made it because they did so with intent and decision where as this thing just does what it does because it was made to do it. The creature is thoughtless, it has no mind...the person that did this needs to pay. These creations haven't killed thousands of innocents, the person that made it did. If they can figure out how to stop this virus, I want to find that jerk and break his face in.

@hunterzillas: @maverick_6: @sentinel_hawk:

"Uhh...my squad...sir. Unless they somehow already know who they are or I'm not supposed to know or...

"...I'll get going."

She started to give a salute, but caught herself midway through and stopped. Do we...do that, here? But as she stood with her hand hanging half-heartedly in the air she felt silly and finished it. Might as well. She was all too happy to get out of there.

People interactions were never really her forte anyway.

Transportation? Not even a question. It was always the motorbike. Fast, lean, maneuverable, dead sexy. And she wouldn't have to worry about other people.

Guided by voice navigation it wasn't long before Didi and her squad hit the rendezvous point. She put the bike in park and stepped off, a ways from her teammate. Her eyes widened when she first laid eyes on the winged agent. Didi leaned over to the hazard trooper beside her.

"Wow. When they said 'Hawk' I thought it was just the usual badass codename thing, but I'm looking at a real live furry for protection. Nice," she said unironically.

"So let's get on it shall we?"

@vitriol: @hunterzillas: @maverick_6

"Furry?" Sentinel Hawk asked, turning her head to look at the new arrivals. "I'm not a furry." Though Didi had been whispering Sentinel Hawk's sense of hearing was far too sharp to miss her words. Sentinel Hawk approached the woman and nodded her head in agreement. "The proper term is Hawk Lord, or Lady, if you prefer to be gender specific. If you're ready to start then so am I, I don't suppose you know anything of the target's abilities yet?"

Munoz cast a glance in the direction of the Goliath. Her helmet head recorded it while she waited but it didn't match up to anything in her database. I have a feeling it's going to be an issue capturing one of these things 'alive' but orders are orders. Either way it needs to be taken out before it hurts more innocent people.

"I'd just hit it with my mace, but I have a feeling I might regret that without knowing what it can do."

@maverick_6@gale_xanders@just_an_average_man@sentinel_hawk@vitriol

Alpha

Staring at the monitor before him, Alpha watched as his plan's came to fruition. High above, orbiting the Earth, a satellite sent detailed imagery to him of the transpiring events, allowing him to know the situation. As expected, the virus had quickly made its way around, spreading at an incredibly fast rate. Faster than expected actually, much to his amusement. His brother, Omega, had arrived on the scene immediately. In fact, he was already there beforehand. 'Always one step behind me dear brother,' The Director thought to himself, the success getting the best of him in the form of a grin. He was aware that at every waking moment, Omega gathered information about him and his whereabouts, attempting to find him. Also as foreseen, there was a response in the form of Maverick, who had arrived on the scene. They had even brought in one of the hawk's Alpha had heard so much about. Within time they had already gotten set up, ready to isolate the threat as soon as possible.

No doubt, a cure for the virus was already being worked on. Now that was a problem that Alpha had deemed would be very hard to deal with...but he still had his methods. Red eyes moved towards his transmitter, grabbing it and beginning the next phase of the plan. "Division C and Meta, there's a small base gathered...how about you give them something to deal with?" A, continue to hold the line. Delta shall be arriving on your location soon. B, how about you take care of my brother" He then turned his attention to the Goliath, who currently stood motionless, waiting for some form of order. "Goliath, target MAVERICK."Ending the transmission, Alpha continued to overlook the progress. Once again he looked towards Omega. "Oh my dear brother, you're as predictable as the sunrise."Squinting, he tipped his glasses down, looking at the female fighter who had come to his aid. "And you've brought a friend."Leaning forward, his gaze intensified. "And unfortunately for you, your friends tend to die."

Alpha closed his transmitter, rising from his chair in the process. Glancing one more time at the monitor, he walked off, approaching an elevator. Once there, he called for it, where it promptly arrived. Entering, he reached over, pressing his thumb against a scanner. "Finger Prints match that of the Director of Ascension, Alpha." A plain look spread across his face, he pressed another button, this one to bring him to the lowest levels of the facility he was at.

Forces-

Division C enacted on the orders immediately, bringing what was essentially a truck load, as they were being moved via large crates. The reanimated dead had been bound and subdued, ready for immediate transportation. Flanked on either side by Juggernauts with 360 degree sonar location, they approached from a distance. By the time they were within 100 yards, each crate was quickly unloaded, letting the undead horde loose, directed towards the camp. The soldiers, meanwhile, stood at a distance, ready to open fire as soon as opposition arrived, with Meta watching the perimeter, a 360 view finder and satellite scanner giving him layout of the area.

With a loud groan, the large figure of Goliath awoke, making a jerking motion as its head rose. A towering figure standing at nine feet, stood straight as a pillar, his back unbent, and his eyes unblinking. There was no emotion, no reason or conscious, simply a behemoth, waiting for orders to attack. And so those orders were made. Turning around towards the Maverick soldiers, it heaved up the modified mini-gun in his grip. "MAVERICK!"the beast bellowed, before letting loose a hail of bullets aimed at the soldiers, looking to tear them apart. Lumbering towards them, it would continue its mission to annihilate the soldiers, no matter the cost.

Division A, meanwhile, surrounded the zone where the infection had grown the most numerous. Along the rooftops, Juggernauts, Newts, standard troops, and a soon arriving Delta prepared to prolong the infection as much as they could. As soon as they arrived on location.

"Alright. Arriving on location." A light, zooming along the roof tops of Bangalla signaled the arrival of Delta, her blade gleaming in the sunlight as she began approaching the coordinates. A sigh escaped her as she ended the transmission. She hated Alpha. She really did. He was an obnoxious, overconfident asshat...for lack of a better term. "And yet, I continue to work with him." She knew why she continued to work with him, she didn't question that. Delta simply couldn't decide whether or not she wanted to continue.

And each time, her answer was, 'Eh, it's worth it.'

Leaping from the roof she stood on, she looked down, her perception of time slowing as well as her senses sped up. As of now, the hero Xae stood, shooting through undead hordes. Meanwhile her friend, Omega, was nearby."An issue for another time. Division A and B, take care of him." So, the only thing to occupy her at the moment was the feline armored hero. "Hey sweetheart!" she yelled, hoping to draw her attention. Delta's perception of time returned to a standard, as she swung her sword, aiming to blindside Xae with a blow to the head. Her high frequency blade cackled with power, waiting to cut through her opponent.

Omega

It pained Omega, each time his blade lashed out, severing the heads and limbs of the dead around him. Why? These people...what had they done to deserve this? It was a fate worse than death, to be turned into these creatures. Each of them; average, ordinary people, caught in the line of fire between his and Alpha's war with one another. 'So much innocent bloodshed, and it's all my fault.' "God damn it Alpha," he spoke, his tone permanently cold and filled with impatience. He said this to himself more than anyone else. Finally, he registered the existence of the other heroine, Xae, who stood beside him, weapon in hand, blowing apart the hordes of the dead. She had called out to him, over the noise of the the dead dying once more. "Yeah," he replied, not fully there, part of him still thinking of the consequences of his vendetta. "Thanks for responding so quickly."

Glancing at the surrounding area, Omega saw people understandably scared, running away in a panic. With a burst of speed, he ran over to them, shielding them from the oncoming undead. These were his people, he would not let them suffer the same fate as those before them. Turning his head back towards his new found ally, he shouted over the cries of the damned. "We need to make a safe zone of some sort; a quarantine." Looking down towards his wrist, he quickly established a connection to The Ascensions's satellite. A little something he had worked on, hacking into the device. Whether or not they knew he was using it didn't matter, because right now, time was of the essence.

According to the data, Maverick had arrived. "Good, they'll know what to do. Pretty sure they're trained to handle this crap.' Once more, he looked towards Xae, urgency in his voice. "I've sent a signal to Maverick! Maybe we can get that whole quarantine zone idea into motion. Then..." Omega was cut off as a powerful anti-tank round fired at him, to which he swiftly spun around, Indignation flashing through the air and slicing through the bullet. Whirling back into position, Omega saw the rooftops lined with Alpha's forces. ready and armed to the teeth. Omega sneered at the opposition, readying himself to cut these men to pieces. Taking up his stance, waves of currents traveled along his sword, giving it a blood red glow. Grunting, Omega leaped forward, spinning through the air with acrobatic ability unmatched, swerving through gunfire before reaching his destination. Impaling a Newt through the head, liquid seeping through the wound.

Tumbling over like a domino, the Newt fell, crashing to the ground below. Landing back onto the building, he once again raised his sword, hatred in his eyes. "Then I am going to gut you all." His words were not threats. They were a promise.

@hunterzillas:

Trying to blindside Xae was risky business and very difficult. Her sensors picked up the approach of Delta long before her own senses did and she continued to act as if she were unaware of this new arrival. She wanted to see what they would do, how they would approach and if they would attack. When the attack was launched she moved with surprising grace and speed that gave away to anyone with a basic understanding of human anatomy that she was not human. She ducked beneath the approaching blade and lunged forward, aiming to drive into her opponent and send her backwards. She didn't maintain contact long, just a second or two, long enough to transfer momentum and mass. Xae was not light, especially with her armor on, coming in at over five hundred pounds. The moment she broke contact she pivoted to the side and brought her nano-molecular sharp claws around in viscous slashing motion intent to spill kidneys.

Her plasma pistol was still in play but Xae had no intention of firing at this close of a range. Firing the weapon here at point blank range would destroy the end of the weapon and damage her armor, but if her opponent made the mistake of opening distance between herself and Xae then she would fire. IF her opponent decided to keep things close she would learn that Xae was more than heroine in some armor, she was a living predator, an apex hunter from an era full of apex hunters. Every moment of Xae's previous life had been dangerous and to top it off, she had thousands of years of experience in the military and millions of years of fighting, killing instinct to fall back on. At a distance Xae was dangerous, up close she was a swift lethal killing machine and not one that just claimed it because of some mutation but because that's exactly what she was, it was what nature had bred her to be.

Xae deposited her allies comments in the back of her mind and would re-examine them the moment she was free from combat. For now, she had some fighting to do.

@hunterzillas:

Sentinel Hawk acted the moment the Goliath turned to fire its weapon on her little squad. Ever the defender she put herself directly in the line of the bullets to buy her team time to re-organize and move to defensive positions. Bullets meant to tear apart light vehicles and mist people impacted all over her body at a high rate of speed. Her seemingly leather clothing though was much more than that. The Nth Metal Weave had a new companion suggested by Nemaz and the two worked wondrously together. The bullets smashed against her Weave armor and flattened against the superior Nth Metal while the liquid beneath her weave absorbed the kinetic impacts and prevented any major damage. No armor was perfect though and a few stray bullets here or there slipped through to pierce her skin. After taking the first full volley Sentinel Hawk was lifted off her feet and thrown back wards. By the time she landed on her back the bullet wounds had healed and the bullets were ejected from her body where they fell useless on the ground.

Munoz shook off the disorientation from the experience and stood up. She pulled her mace from her belt and charged it with fifty thousand volts of electricity. Anticipating a possible melee attack her armor also began to crackle with voltage. She looked around her to make sure the squad was ok and then readied for the beast to move into striking distance, aware that for some reason it approached despite its obvious tactical advantage. Must be mindless. Strong though I'd be, very strong.

@hunterzillas:

Beneath Gaz's seemingly cold, faceless mask, he smirked. Had she been in the armed forces, more than likely, any officer would have instructed her on how exactly one salutes. Gaz wasn't even an officer when he was a marine. He hated saluting officers.

"Sir we're picking a transmission via satellite."

"That so?" Gaz says, from the base, as the corporation takes to listening to the communications of the area once more. Having well enough experience in simple infantry to lead the operation, as well as knowledge of biochem and nuclear warfare. He orders them to track all transmissions in the area, as with the entire country being in essence, gone, it should lead them to the enemy's forces. Not only this, but information concerning their communications is valuable for intel about the enemy and their activities.

"Large number of confirmed hostile contacts en route to our A.O."

"Well, looks like they've found us." He says, giving out his next order with a smirk. "Alright everyone, pack it up! We're leaving."

Without question, everyone began doing just that, loading weapons and gear into vehicles as they began to clean housing, ripping apart the makeshift base they built. If the Satellite had particularly keen eyesight, they would be able to spot Gaz looking towards the sky, his middle finger extended, as he gives the satellite the bird. Those who remained were the M.O.R.S, who seemed to quickly be overwhelmed by the swarming undead, killing them before being swarmed in piles and overwhelmed, releasing a particularly attractive scent before...

Blast waves riddled the area, the noise of the exploision audible for miles as the ground itself seem to tremble. Dirt flied into the air and obscured the area, shrapnel tossed kilometers away. Most any human sized object vaporized and anything near by getting killed by sheer shock of being near the area.

One of the shards of shrapnel seemed to halt in midair and then it revealed itself, able to now be seen and heard. The armored dropship revealed it's weapons, electro-thermal 20 mm autocannons.

"Fire. Let's keep an eye out for anti aircraft." Gaz orders above the ship.

The rounds then tore through the air at railgun like velocities. Tearing the air asunder as they vaporized most what ever it hit. Tearing through steel and concrete like paper. The rounds were steered towards the army as the VTOL made sweeping motions through them.

The Olympus, Earth's Orbit

Maverick's Olympus, floating over the Mexico area received an order of a particular satellite the enemy possesses and is using to monitor them. After some time, they were able to acquire "what" kind of satellite it was, and awaited permission from the U.N. Security council to shoot it down. With the already substantial amount of evidence existing of the incident, Maverick was able to take immediate action. Men were deployed to the small country and would reach their drop point in roughly 30 minutes. As soon as the authorization was given, the satellite was targeted.

Outside the station, a man stood on a platform the satellite acquired with an NSO Launcher.

"Alright you ready?"

"Ready."

"Go ahead and shoot'er down."

The round was let lose from the MANPADS based weapon, the target some 200 miles away, the round gradually accelerated, going from just above the speed of sound. However, over simple seconds, it went up to going to speeds of mach 20. half it's top speed in moments. And with that, the rocket steered itself and headed right for the satellite Alpha used and would detonate near it, the explosion equal to something of a .5 Kiloton nuclear bomb, explosive aurora of gamma rays bathing the area able to be seen briefly by the observant eye.

Meanwhile, the quarantine was already in the midst of being form, local forces being the first to act, with the help of ensuing Maverick personal for particularly "unrulely" infected and otherwise.

The ground

@sentinel_hawk@vitriol

"Get down!"

The two hazard troopers drop and if Didi does not go down, they would yank her down.

The thing now given their location and firing on. However, not being too keen on being close or even clustered together the group seems to move on it's own, fluently. Nobody actually said to split up, but the M.O.R.S seemed to quickly move about, as if either they had already been instructed or simply already knew what to do. The shadow company troops were gone before the thing had even started firing

"Can I get a round please?"

One of the shadow company draws the thing's fire for a moment, before with one swifted moition with a combat knife, he smacks one stray bullet aside and barely ducks, managing to not get clipped as he immediately drops back down amidst the hail of of bullets. The round gets deflected into the dirt right in front of the hazard trooper, as per request.

"Thank you." He reaches into the hole as bullets flyby. "Sentinel! I need you to-" She's gone, off the stand in front of a hail of gunfire. As the man looks over his head, he shakes his head and continues to calmly sit back down as the rounds continue to whir by overhead as he sits crouched. Looking the remains of the round over. "Judging by the looks of the gun, probably a M134 Minigun strapped to his, firing seven point sixty two millimeter NATO rounds. Muzzle velocity of around twenty eight hundred feet per second and having a muzzle energy of around three thousand four hundred and four joules. So, around....two thousand four hundrd and thirty seven pounds of force force every shot it fires. A bit over a ton in every bullet it fires, around three thousand to six hundred rounds per minutes. At least 50 every second."

He flicks the round off.

"Well Didi, might make you a bit sad to say this but I'm afraid we won't be able to take this thing whole. We've been compromised and are the midst of engaging the enemy likely responsible for this. Needless to say this thing has spotted us and is attracting god knows how many of those infected. So, needless to say we're going to have to make bring back a few pieces of what's left for study. Hope that's alright with you."

The soldier pops up with a his AK-337 rifle, a rifle mounted Grenade launcher in hand as he fires onto the thing after popping up. Should the round hit, the enormous explosion would hit with tremendous amounts of force as it causes a catastrophic explosion as it'd set the thing ablaze and flipped around cars. Any luck it would splash all over at least leave a crater and melt the thing's gun.

@hunterzillas: @sentinel_hawk: @maverick_6:

Didi faced the admonishing with light confusion. Where Hal nodded, Kitajima stared blankly into her mask, not entirely sure of her point. "Hawk Lord" or lady, she didn't really understand, or care. It seemed a matter of personal desire. People weren't really her "thing," except for when they were infected with some toxin or disease or when they were the subject of some experimental curiosity. She never really tried to understand beyond the initial moment.

Questions. That, she understood, though receiving the inquiry with some annoyance, for some information had already been provided. "What, she didn't get a dossier?" she asked, turning to the trooper beside her, pointing with her thumb.

"They're calling it Goliath, class 3. I call it Christmas in October. It—"

"Maverick!"

"—can speak!" She looked up and, then presumably under cover of the Hawk as a meatshield, started after her—before being jerked down to the ground by the leg.

She looked at the trooper and, for the first time since the mission started, she was on the same level as everyone else...more or less.

"Wait, what?" She shook her head, half disbelieving, half blatant no. "No no, I won't allow it. I need this, all of it—it won't be the same without the whole thing and you haven't even attempted it!" She squeezed the pistol down at her waist, cringed as if he'd fired the launcher directly at her.

"This is not alright with me. You have to try at least, or..." She trailed off and just glared, withholding her hand for a time. "You have to try. You have to," she practically ordered through gritted teeth.

@hunterzillas: @gale_xanders:

Maybe I should be stayin' away from the gunfire. Stead of goin' to it....

But Elliot felt something guide him here, tell him otherwise. His gut, intuition, conscious? Whatever you wanna call it. Besides, not like there was much else to follow. He'd managed peer over to the border and there was already a quarantine in place. Pretty much anything that ran too close to the gates and barricades they were building got shot. Soldiers in here? They all seemed to be even worse. Not containing the infection or trying to cure it. They made it longer. This might actually lead him to some survivors or more likely, the things or people that caused this. He found a bunch of soldiers lingering around, mechs or whatever you call 'em just walking around patrolling. They seemed like they were moving somewhere. Elliot kept his head down when necessary but this seemed a time to.

He peered through his scope, overlooking the battlefield from inside a moderately tall tower, his helmet set aside for peripheral vision. A charge set to watch his rear that he can set off if he knows anyone's coming. His helmet is set down next to him, as aims around, trying to get a good view of the place and of whats going on. He spots a group of soldiers through his sniper scope, fighting off some infected and apparently some giant hulking thing before shooting it with an exploding incendiary grenade.

His keen eye had caught vision of something else. Some thing hacking up some of the mechs. He seems pretty well off, and so do the soldiers. His eyes move as he catches something else in his view. His keen eyes catching something of particular interest.

Catfight.

He noticed something, familiar about one fighter, at first, unsure of who exactly to root for. But one felt more familiar to him. He aimed forward and fired a .50 cal MK211 Raufauss, sending the round downrange that'd whir right by Gale at thrice the speed of sound, aiming to clip Delta in the Abdomen with a round that impacts with enough force to shred through a 1 inch sheet of steel. Well enough to down an armor personal carrier or down a helicopter in one well placed hit. What would be worse is that after the round burns into it's target, it promptly explodes, it often being used to detonate car engines. The intention of this was to either wound the girl or simply give Gale support for a moment. He lowered his rifle as he put his helmet back on. Not inclined to stay any one place for long. A wolfish grin crawling across his face.

I'd recognize that ass anywhere, Xae.

As he moved he saw railgun rounds tear through the walls effortlessly, and heard a meta super soldier kick the wall down. All of them breaching the building effortlessly and locating Elliot in quick time, forcing him to retreat somewhat. They had guns, and were stronger and faster than he was. Not only this, but the weapons the were carrying were well capable of just going right through his bulletproof armor. As they pretty much instantly locate the Average Man, the also locate the grenade he throws at one. Instinctively, the meta catches it in his hand and then rears his hand back to return it back it's sender.

Gotcha.

He appears, whipping out nothing more than a CZ75 handgun in one hand as he shoots the grenade out of the air, causing it to go off in their faces. Staggering and disrupting them, a moment was all he needed to send 3 rounds from the .600 Nitro express, designed to punch through armor and considered overkill for an elephant, to punch through their visors in three consecutive shots. Panting heavily, spreading dripping behind his own visor, he couldn't even believe he pulled that off. But he didn't pause. Seeing a crowd of infected gather and spot him, he lobs a White Phosphorus grenade, into it as he books it. They run after him, and would bave easily caught up to him had the grenade not gone off and sprayed the incendiary everywhere for 75 feet, igniting any flesh ablaze a 5,000 degrees F. One by one, they started to fall apart as the flames burned through them, the chemical able to burn them to the bone. Those who ran at him, he dealt with hand to hand. Immune to the flames, combined with their fragility, he could just rip them apart and cave their skulls in with his punches.

He ran off then to find Xae and her opponent moving closer towards her. His .50 cal swapped out for a Panzerfaust.

"Fancy meetin' you here. In the mood to tag team this? You handle close up and I'll play the range game?"

@vitriol: @hunterzillas:@maverick_6:

Sentinel Hawk moved behind cover now that the danger to Didi had passed. She listened quietly to their little conversation and the description of the Golliath. "How do you suppose it would respond to an electrical charge?" She asked the talkative MORS. "Maybe we can incapacitate it that way. Scientist lady, how do you feel about it if maybe we just tore the gun off? Can you still do all your picking around in it if its minus one really problematic gun?"

Sentinel Hawk watched the grenade fire and explode and was grateful for the audio dampener installed in her helmet. Don't need my ears ringing. "What do you need me to do?" She asked the MORS, trying to remind herself to act better as part of a team, she still struggled with that from time to time. Being a Hawk Lord she was used to mostly fighting alone or with others of her kind where team work was less of a focus than it was with Maverick. In a lot of ways Munoz would always be a work in progress, but she was still quite skilled and the only healer their little group had available.

"I think the problem with taking it intact is that we don't think it can exactly be...knocked unconscious." Munoz explained to Didi. "It may not be possible to render it unable to fight us without destroying it but we'll try and do what we can. If you can see any possible weaknesses to exploit that would be a big help."

@maverick_6: @sentinel_hawk:

"Whatever it is, the subject is humanoid and appears to function like any other animal. We'd be fools to rule out concussion right away," she shouted above the racket, and then she sighed. I know I'm "the scientist" but I shouldn't be the only one who understands empiricism in the slightest."Target the head. If there's a brain – and we can be sure there is some center for cognitive function somewhere – causing it to shake inside the skull would do it." That was assuming the null that its processing center was made of soft tissue, located in the head, and worked at all like most animals. But they'd all be damned for throwing their hands up over nothing, and she'd be damned if she was going to let them.

"The gun is superficial, unimportant. An unnecessary danger, I'd say." She shrugged. Whatever it took to salvage the important parts. Although in truth, the more Goliath presented itself as a dangerous theoretical conundrum, the more fascinating – and desirable – it became. "Regardless of other means of threat reduction it would be advantageous to get rid of the ranged capability."

"This is not alright with me. You have to try at least, or..." She trailed off and just glared, withholding her hand for a time. "You have to try. You have to," she practically ordered through gritted teeth.

"I don't have to try Jack sh**. I do what is best for the mission, team and the whole. So it talks. So f***ing what? So do you and I. Meager intelligence and strength."

The M.O.R.S did not give her (@sentinel_hawk) a response, as it wasn't programmed to. Indeed, it lacked the mental capacity to indeed offer any kind of response. It more or less ignored her, not acting towards her because it did not see Sentinel Hawk as "Munoz." It saw Sentinel Hawk as "Non-Hostile entity." As it continued to fire in the general direction of approaching infected, not yet sure if the thing had even survived the explosion. The rest of them turn their attention towards the groups of infected, explosions littering the air, thermobaric bombs going off with radius of nearly a hundred feet, from quite the distance. The type of grenades and yields that flung bodies a dozens of meters away as opposed to a few feet in bloody heaps. Individual limbs sent some hundreds of feet away. Those infected, durable enough to survive, crawled along the ground coated in flames from the nanothermite fueled incendiaries that lacked shrapnel. Others were far too charred, turned into bones if not dust from the heat of the explosion.

In the midst of the bickering, the figure made itself known. Third degree burns all about it's body and it's arm, practically melted off. But, it seemed to essentially regenerate from the damage as from before. It's movements, more slow and lethargic trhan before. However, it's wounds sooned warped on the spot. Black flesh melding and returning to it's former state, albeit slowly. It's arm, not regenerating but seemingly spawning something from within stored mass. The display warranting a few replies from the Hazard Troopers. Thermite was more ideal against metals, than flesh. Even if flesh had little tolerance towards heat, the heat does not travel as fast.

"Might be some serious bionanotech." "Or a metagene."

He looks towards it, more or less in some attempt to decide what to do with it while he had the time. Maverick had soldiers genetically engineered such as the shadow company, who did defend them from oncoming infected. The same troops who swatted a bullet with enough precision to smack it into the dirt in front of them and who moved efficiently about the environment. Ones currently engaged now, in picking off stragglers. Throwing punches that could crack brick and concrete, dent steel as the fought off the infected forces in mostly hand to hand, their armor protecting them from bites due to not exposing any skin or even their eyes. They were good, but there is almost always room for development, for diversity and potential improvement. There is little belief in perfection, but perhaps the thing had something to offer them. Even the virus itself had...potential.

"I'm sure it can take a few shots to the head. Aim for the eyes. Open fire."

Guns were raised and with Sentinel withdrawn and out of the way, bullets began roaring through the air at supersonic, nearly hypersonic speeds, lighting the air ablaze as the rounds pierced and distigrated what it hit. Molten holes forming in concrete as bullets put holes in the creature, something similiar to watching small meteorites whizz the air from the barrels of recoil dampened weaponry. The creature was pierced, something like water. It wasn't that it was resistant to being pierced, more, it had endurance. The bullets could cut clean into and higher caliber ones could go clean into it.

Subtle R-Telepathy orders were given as soldiers used common sense to dictate where best to aim. The skull was one of the thickest bones in the body and the chest was well protected, even if it housed "vital" organs, they wanted to slow the creature down and hinder it. Make it easy to take down. They aimed towards it's eyes, seeking to blind it and to hinder it's mental capacity. The next candidate was it's knees and achilles as the surrounded it. And it worked, to an extent. It wasn't dead, and it was impeded, but it seemed angry and still had strength of it's arms. It extends it's "regenerated" mutated arm, practically a mucous coated mass of tendrils, towards a vehicle as it still seems to remember enough to then pick up off the ground with that arm, and then throw it in a random direction.

The random target just happened to be Maverick's only field scientist in the area.

@maverick_6: @vitriol

Sentinel Hawk was planning what to do to help disable the beast when it sent a car flying right at the person she was here to protect. The young Hawk Lord watched the vehicle fly through the air and tried to approach it the way Nemaz would, making plans within plans. As it continued through the air she realized sometimes she had to operate on something else entirely...instinct. Casting plans aside she did take in one bit of training that proved useful in this situation...lifting and when to do it. She waited until the car was overhead and launched herself into the air just as the undercarriage of the car was directly over her head.

The moment before she took off she held her mace over her head. The mace turned into an almost liquid state and flattened out into a large disc before it hardened again. Once this was done she flapped her wings, launching into the air she was careful to control her speed. If she took off too fast she'd cut the car in half, if she took off too slow she'd miss. The Nth Metal shield served as a lifting platform as she drove it up into the under carriage of the vehicle and used her speed and momentum to deflect the vehicle, lifting it off its trajectory and sending it flying end over end away from their group and defenseless scientist.

Once the car was out of the way she was now lingering in mid air.

Her eyes locked on the beast and the shield she had forged shifted shape again, forming into a short bladed sword. She took off again, flying straight for the monster and its tentacly arms. Her Nth Metal blade charged with fifty thousand volts of electricity and she flew for it with the intention of severing its arm entirely from its body. She knew now that the tentacles could regenerate and so possibly could its other arm, so her intention was to cut the arm at the base where it connected to the body. She remembered what Nemaz had once said about causing problems for people with regenerative properties and she planned on doing the exact same to this monster. If her strike was true her blade would cut half way through its shoulder and stop. There the weapon would be lodged into the bone and tendons of the monster and then she would use her weight and momentum to twist the sword until the tip snapped off in the wound.

Taken aback by his words, Dana reeled from the verbal lashing, blinked twice in apparent stupefaction. He couldn't talk to her like that. It was her mission. She was the important one, the scientist. She called the shots. Her sample that she was told she would be allowed to see. She stared into his eyes and her face was clear, but just a bit lower her grip tightened around her pistol.

"Fine." She played the scenario in her head. "Fine. Do what you need to do." Then—boom!One in the back of the head. I can deal with the excuse later.

He got in my way, situational stress. I tried to help out, do what's best for the mission.

Dammit, no. She couldn't afford a reprimand on her first mission. Even if she got away with it she'd be judged unfit for actual field assignments until further notice, then it's back to basic training "to learn how to conduct yourself under pressure." That's why she was there.

Damn ego.

"Look you f—"

She started but was interrupted by the renewal of the threat, ducking for cover behind the man she'd just begun to berate...At least, until Hawk and her...whatever-thingy threw the projectile-vehicle off its course, completely negating the use of the (somewhat embarrassing) defensive action.

Didi cleared her throat and composed herself professionally as if it never happened. Jabbing her finger into every facet of his personal bubble that seemed like it might get his attention. "Look, you...You have to, or I'll report you're compromising my ability to gather data and jeopardizing the entire operation from this point forward. Do you want to be responsible for that—Hawk, don't do too much damage! Some is fine but we still need it in one piece!" she shouted over her shoulder.

"If you want I'll get in close myself. If that'll prove I'm serious about this and not just risking yourlives..."Even if yours are only marginally significant because of mine.

@sentinel_hawk: @vitriol:

"Look you f—"

His eyes narrow as he waits for her to complete that sentence.

"Jeapordize the entire Op? Oh really? You're really just making **** up aren't you? The thing's not that ****ing important. But. If we can take it alive. We will. If we can't. We can't. Just sit back and try not to do anything stupid."

The creature's response to the sword was sluggish, as it felt very little in concerns to actual pain, and that would serve to it's detriment. Retaliation was difficult when shadow company shot out it's eyes. It's vulnerable nature set up for more flashy moves as one of the super soldier sprinted at it, full speed in complete body armor as he jumped into the air, at the creature, brought his legs in and then, drop kicked it with extreme prejudice. The creature attempted to swat the man away, but the blade lodged within

The creature, though heavy, was sent back and off it's feet with an impact that must have been multiple tons, as if it'd been hit by a car. More bullets went into it of extreme caliber and lodged themselves in particular places, such as ravaging the knees and making it utterly unable to walk at the very least.

The creature was left wreathing on the ground in sub-par condition. It was alive but barely. Singed. Not in pain but the sensation of pain was absent to it. It was hurt. Severely.

The rest of the horde came, seemingly the enemy's forces appearing out of the wetwork as well. A show loomed over the entire group and as it turned out, it was a friendly aircraft. Autocannon fired reved and sent a spew of bullets downrange, 50 a second, intent on tearing through enemy forces. Rounds that cut men in two and reduced the things to small puddles of goop on the ground, all the while troops deciding to.

"You ladies and gents seemed like you could use a hand." Gaz said, rappling down. "And look at what at what you caught. Looks like you all got along fine!"

"Good trophy for your first mission. Alright." He looked at the shadow company. "Wrap it up, if you can." The creature was ensnared soon after in carbon nanotube cord, design to contain individuals capable of lifting thousands of tons. While this creature seemed a multi-tonner at best. They had no cage, to speak of. And instead, opted to have the creature on the outside of the craft, tethered by a cord.

Gaz exchanged glances with the man next to Didi who was to function as her "protector." Then to Didi, Sentinel and the rest.

"We're leaving. Nothing much for us here and the camp's compromised. We're taking that thing and we're getting out the red zone."

Throughout the country....

"Purge it."

With their base gone, and the country now clearly, under active attack at the hands of a bio weapon, the shadow company troop's job changed. Rapidly, along an Ipad, one such officer with nigh photogrpahic memory had decided to go about marking every single area they had been. There were two choices, areas with survivors. And areas without survivors. Most places, did not show any signs for survivors. And as such, most places were simply marked for death, and perhaps, the pieces of what was left, and some soldiers might be taken in to be interrogated. Most of them killed. Jets streaked through the air, over the country at eye blurring speed. Cloaking and uncloaking all about the country to deliver instant and unseen death. Indeed, why stop there? Orbital Satellites from the HELIOS could be very efficiently used, bringing up ambient temperatures in some areas to as such as 1500 F. Not enough to melt steel, but to burn the country. What made this country so easy to bomb was it's isolated nature.

The country was shown mercy in the sense that the company would indeed, pick up stragglers. Survivors and uninfected non-hostiles. But the rest? The PMC was quick to, with U.N. Consent even, quickly raze the rest of the country to ashes.