Futuristic Unknown Crisis IC (full)

[Graystone713]

Kevin Starr​

Fuck, so fast! How the hell did they get ambushed before they were ready? Snake-dogs, everyone was fighting. Who needed help most? Cathal, Cathal was being dragged away! Gamma moved like lightning as the snakedog reached the thorny underbrush. He wanted to snag the snakedog itself, but he could still grab Cathal! Kevin jumped over the other fights, landing hard as his robotic fist grabbed Cathal's torso and pulled.He could hear Cathal's 'ow ow OW' getting louder, but he saw what he needed: A clear shot. The Tranquilizer gun on Gamma's free arm fired, hitting the snakedog dead-on. There wasn't much struggle after, and Kevin pulled Cathal free.
"Cathal, are you alright? I didn't mean to be rough, I just-Your foot! I'll get you to donny, just-... Hold on."
He said, his pistons pressurizing as they prepared for another big jump. One that, though terrifying, would get them back to Donny and the support crews.
"Okay, I'm just gonna sit you on these crates. Donny, look after him! I've gotta make sure everyone else is okay!"
He said, running back to the fight... Who would need help next?

 

[Daimao]

Miloj​

Miloj's rifle whipped to it's firing position as soon as he saw a blur of movement. "Are you for shitting me," he grumbled over his breath as he quickly assessed the situation caused by snake dogs who were flipping the fuck out, both Lefty and his helmet's HUD feeding information to him. Quickly determining that Finn was in the most need of assistance, Miloj's sights snapped to one of the creatures attacking him and his rifle kicked against his armor as it spat out a trio of bullets that punched into the snake dog's flank, the impacts splattering Finn with blood as the creature went tumbling off of him. Frowning at the still moving animal, Miloj started to line up his next shot.

 

[Faelinara]

N7KK7
​

After a few moments of clapping and giggling at Miloj's wonderful shot, Nikki went silent, her expression changing to one of focus. Standing to her full height, she resembled a tree, and extending her arm like an elegant branch, she pointed her fingers in the direction of Finn. Her critter came from around her back, onto her shoulder and down her arm it bounded, leaping from her fingertips like diving from a high board and soaring into the sky. It focused its body weight and dove for the attacker remaining on Finn, charging itself as it got closer, visible sparks igniting from various parts of its exterior. As the critter approached, it flung itself open, using its bio-mesh like wings to their fullest, and creating an electric shock throughout its body, clung onto the face of the assailant snek dog. "Yes!" Nikki whispered, her face showing a slight smirk as she loosened up her stance to face the action.

But in the blink of an eye, just as it had landed, the critter was flying again. The snek dog had sure enough been distracted, but it had also been enraged. It gripped the critter's leg within its powerful jaws, and throwing its head in a jerking motion, flung the critter through the air. It hit a solid cement block needled with long fencing prongs, and with a small *pop!* it dropped to the ground. Nikki first checked to see that Finn was able to get up and away from the attacker, then toward her critter, then squinted her face in disgust at the beast, "Well that wasn't very nice, puppy!"

 

[CelticSol]

Eppie Cross​

Eppie raises her hands just a little higher, trying not to make eye contact with it in hopes she doesn’t set it off as she tries to figure out how in the actual fuck she is going to manage to get around this thing and tranquilize it. She flexes the hand on her injured arm, wincing at the pain and the disgustingly warm feeling that accompanies bleeding through fabric. It’s definitely not arterial, nor does it seem like it’s hit a vein, but it’s painful and there is a burning sensation accompanying the bite that makes her heart sink to the pit of her stomach. She eyes the vicious fangs in the dog’s open and snarling maw, the saliva that drips from them, and tries to remember from the brochure whether or not these things are venomous.

The snake dog looks just about ready to attack her again, back legs tensed to pounce at her, when Mako appears out of nowhere and punches it in the face. For a moment, Eppie is just dumbstruck that instead of using the guns offered to them, Mako opted to just punch the damn thing in the face, but remembers this is the same woman that chooses to tango with an 180 pound insectoid for fun in her free time. The strength of the hit is enough to throw the creature back a foot or so and pisses off the snake dog enough that it’s focus is now squarely on Mako, and happens to give Eppie an opening to get her gun.

Eppie dives for it as it knocks Mako down, taking it in her hand and aiming. She tries to run through Cathal’s instructions when he tried to teach her, and, when the snake wiggles enough that Eppie is confident she won’t hit Mako, takes the shot. The snake dog snarls at the tranquilizer, but after less than a minute, falls unconscious. Eppie scurries over to an alarmingly unafraid Mako, unwrapping Mako’s legs from the creatures grasp. At the question, Eppie blinks in astonishment, since Mako had just been knocked over by the thing and potentially eaten, but remembers, through the haze of adrenaline, that she was bit.

“Oh, um…? I’m not sure,” She says honestly, an adrenaline rush making her brain work too fast as she rolls up her sleeve to check the wound. She winces as she sees the rather nasty bite is bleeding quite a bit, “I think it looks worse than it is. I think? I might be poisoned. I don’t know,” She looks around, seeing the rest of the snake dogs are down, “Donny? I think these boys are venomous. I got bit and, just, wow, it’s sort of got a burning sensation? Did anyone else get bit?”

 

[wickedlittlecritta]

Cathal McKay​

Cathal gestured after Kevin's departing robo-form--He was happy enough to not be eaten, of course, but he had not expected to be dumped with Donny like a sack of potatoes. He looked up at Donny and said, "If you've got to amputate it, give me a shot of whiskey first."

"You're fine, you big baby," Donny said, crouching down to inspect his bootless foot.

"Don't sugar coat it none, Donny, I'm a big lad. Just tell it to me true."

"You have a sprained ankle. I've already put the brace on. Just stop," Donny said.

"Wouldja look at that," Cathal said brightly. Donny rolled his eyes.

Finn Dolan​

Despite having been startled, the team recovered, and Nikki, Miloj, and Cris all got in hits along with Finn's second attempt. He would have felt worse over the faintly doggy way one of them whimpered as it died if his shoulder hadn't been burning.

Looks like it was venomous after all.

He was very sure of that when his vision started to blur.

"Oh, shit," he said. Now that he wasn't focused on doing his job, he was also feeling a little dizzy, a little nauseous, and he thought that he ought to sit down. He could hear someone calling out somewhere on the other side of the group, and couldn't quite make out the words. He wasn't even sure who it was. Maybe Eppie?

He ought to sit down before he fell down.

The thought had just enough time to cross his mind before his legs decided to give out on their own, and Finn crumpled to the grass.

 

[theunderwolf]

"Just breathe easy , don't move your arm, up there on the shoulder is far too close to your heart for my comfort" Mako said, putting pressure on the arm to slow the blood, "Deep breaths sweet-pea, I swear running around with venom in your blood you are so reckless sometimes..." Mako said and rolled her eyes, like she didn't love how reckless her little pink human was. Adrenaline was a hell of a drug but she considered it an amateur mistake when venom was involved. Though to be fair Eppie probably couldn't control her adrenal glands like Mako could. Looking over to the rest of the team Mako noticed Miranda first, looking as cool as ever. Did anything flap her? "I smell... Cathal's blood? Not much he'll be fine and... Kevkev! Eppie got bit can you get me Donny, Antivenom or Donny with antivenom?" Mako yelled at the robot who was looking around anxiously.

 

[TrashRabbit]

Donny​

Dony was already on his feet from dealing with Cathal when he saw Finn hit the deck. He was already moving when he heard Mako use his name and the words antivennom.
"Fuck. Shit. goddamn. Sonavabitch." He said like a mantra under his breath has ran the short distance to Finn. He slid, like Finn was homebase, to his side. And pulled the med pack off.
"You still with me, big guy?" He asked getting his vitals fast. The analyzer was running while he applied pressure to his wound- he was bleeding liek a sieve. Time went sugar ozey slow/fast on him and the analyzer went beep. The chemical make up was over kill. Multiple neuro-chemicals-
"Some one get a sample of the venom. Send it up to command," He snapped.
The Med pack began printing.
Snake Venom was just as deadly for its neurotoxins as it was for its anaphylactic shock causing enzymes- and his med pack's chemical library was not comprehensive. Finn was trembling and his oxygen intake was low when he injected him with the epipen. He held a second one up to whoever was closest, not even looking, "Run this to Eppie."
The printer dinged and he grabbed the antivenom out of the dispenser. What a marvel of engineering he thought until he saw the 103s timer for the second dose.
"Shit," he said to himself as he gave Finn his dose. When he looked over though, Eppie seemed to be faring better than Finn.

 

[wickedlittlecritta]

Cathal McKay​

Cathal was not nearly as fast as Donny, with the brace on his ankle, but he wasn't going to let that stop him from running after him to Finn. He hovered around Donny, not talking this time, because it was one thing to annoy Donny when he was patching Cathal up, and something else entirely to annoy Donny when he was patching anybody else up. And when Donny passed over the epipen, Cathal grabbed it and ran it to Eppie.

She was conscious, at least, which was better than Finn was doing.

"I got you a present, love," Cathal said, holding up the epipen. "You holding up alright?"

 

[Faelinara]

N7KK7
​

The field of battle is never left unscathed, and Nikki took no time to reset. Taking a quick glance around at her teammates, she nodded with affirmation and jumped down from the light pole, backflipping and landing with a spring to her step. She ran to her critter, grabbing it and shoving it in a small pouch at her hip. Without stopping she ran toward the nearest building that looked like a ticketing or security admin. "Let the games begin" she smirked under her breath as she sprinted joyously toward her goal.

 

[TrashRabbit]

Goody

"Fuck." Said Goody in his mild electronic voice- before sprinting after her, "Nikki!"

 

[ValtheStarGal]

Miranda Menendez​

It's all over before Miranda knows it, but she remains in a heightened state of alert, watching as several of the dogs fall under the effects of sedation while their pack mates succumb to bullet wounds. Donovan and Mako are already rendering first aid to Eppie and Finn before she can jump in and help...not that she feels in any fit state to do so, still tense as she watches for more ambushers to leap out of the forest. None come, and she curses her shot nerves before taking a breath.

Instinct tells Miranda to help her comrades, but still jittery with adrenaline and not wanting to worsen the shock Eppie and Finn must be enduring, she turns her attention toward the snake-dogs. She reaches into her utility belt and draws out a multi-tool, commanding it to switch to sample mode with her inserts. Opting to let the sleeping dogs lie, she finds a deceased one to collect a genetic sample from. She finds an open wound, wishing the creature a peaceful rest as she collects blood sample for her sister to analyze.

[Altis, I'm sending you a sample,] Miranda texts as she snaps some pictures of the dead snake-dog on her entoptics to attach to the file while her multi-tool reads the sample and transmits it back to the ship. She sends the photos to Altis as it completes sequencing the genome within seconds, glancing around the clearing for any sign of predators concealed in the bush; Altis keeps the connection open to stream her work of analyzing it for Miranda.

[Well this is something,] Altis texts, beginning to highlight sequences to piece together their species of origin. The first thing Miranda notices is how clean the genome is, with very little apparent junk DNA.
[It looks like a professional job alright,] Miranda texts back; she might be a fraction of the geneticist that her sister is, but Miranda can tell the difference between a genome shaped by natural selection and one written by a geneticist.
[Not just that: the genotypes and phenotypes don't match up.]
[They aren't canid or pythonid?]
[No,] Altis texts. [A lot of this is more dromaeosaurid, if anything?]
[Wait, they used raptor genomes?]
[Its a chimera but a significant amount of this is raptor, yes. There's some kind of serpent in here too, only...]
[Only what?] Miranda texts after a few seconds' additional delay.
[Genus is Naja]
[They mixed in cobra sequences?]
[Yes. There is an impressive amount of work that went into recombining the genomes and altering the phenotype, id need more time to study the chemoelectric pathways they used to trigger the changes.]
[Was this meant to be sold to someone?]
[possibly, but I don't know if it had company approval] Altis replies, highlighting a sequence of what looks like junk DNA. [This was a personal project.]
[Marvelous,] Miranda texts. [Keep me posted if you find out more.]
[be careful out there sis,] Altis replies.

"They're not dogs, they're raptors," Miranda calls out for all to hear, sending the data on the cobra sequences to Donny via her inserts in case it could help. "Whoever made them sculpted them to look canine but their template genomes are cobra and velociraptor. A very impressive amount of work was put into making them like this, which explains how they could be such adept pack hunters as well as the venom. Madre de Cosmos..."

Putting the sample kit back in her belt, Miranda trots over to Eppie, watching as Mako and Cathal administer first aid for her bite wound. Zephyr trots up to her side, chittering with concern as she steps around Mako and Cathal to crouch by Eppie's side, slinging the tranquilizer rifle over her back. Her wound doesn't look as bad as some Miranda has seen inflicted by wildlife, but the venom still has her uneasy even as the epipen is administered. She is thankful that Mako and Cathal are here to keep her stable while the antivenom prints.

"Are you alright, cariña?" Miranda asks in a soft voice, her tail twisting around behind her with the worry she tries not to feel, Zephyr leaning into her and cooing at Eppie with the same worry.

 

[CelticSol]

Elias and Eppie Cross​

As Mako instructed, Eppie breathes deeply and evenly, ignoring the anxiety voice in her head slamming their hands on the table and chanting ‘death is coming!’ repeatedly because Finn was downed, and slowly slides to the ground to sit down just in case, pulling Mako to sit with her. Eppie drags in a sharp breath through her teeth as Mako puts pressure on the wound, her eyes watering a bit at the burning pain of the bite. She scoots a little closer to Mako to rest her head on the other woman’s shoulder to let the contact calm her racing heart, which smooshes her cheek.

Mako’s comment makes her shift her head so she can look at the other woman, expression incredulous, “I’m reckless? You punched it in the face with your bare fist despite the fact we were given tranquilizer darts,” Sighing despite herself, she resigns herself to the fact that, yes, she should’ve read the brochure more carefully to see which boys were venomous, “Sweet-pea is new, though, kitten.”

When Cathal arrives, epipen in hand, she smiles up at him, “Doing okay, all things considered. I guess enough venomous boys have made me a chew toy in the past that it’s not hurting me that bad,” When offered, she takes the epipen, briefly reading the instructions so she doesn’t fuck it up like a dumbass, then mumbles to herself, “Orange to the thigh, blue to the sky,” and injects the epipen into her outer thigh. She rubs the secondary ouchie, as instructed, but as a firm hater of needles, Eppie can’t keep the frown off her face.

As Zephyr comes over and all but crawls into her lap, Eppie pats the back of their neck and smooches the crown of their head, “I’m okay, bug, I’m tough,” As Miranda and her worried expression also comes over, Eppie laughs a bit, “Wow, I sure am popular,” Taking Miranda’s hand and pulling it to try and encourage her to sit down, Eppie tries to smile reassuringly, “I’m fine, but you look one genetically modified animal away from having a nervous breakdown, chèr. Do you want to sit down with me for a minute?”

Meanwhile, separate from the crowd around Eppie, Elias goes over to the totally down and out Finn, where Donny is working on him. Kneeling on the ground, Elias rolls up his sleeves, “What do you need me to do, doc? I might not be a doctor, but my mother was and I’ve got some field training.”

 

[TrashRabbit]

Donny​

"Finn's gonna be alright-" He said, "The wound itself isn't awful- Finish this dressing for me- he's gonna need an evac." He left Elias to finish the field dressing while he checked the genetic profile Altis had sent him to the genus's the antivenom he was printing worked for. He breathed out the tension in his chest, the scanner had correctly picked out the right markers- unless there was something vastly clever he hadn't picked up on the anti venom he printed would do.

His med pack dinged he grabbed injection. "Stay with him Elias- I'll get Eppie," he said before he ran it to Eppie- she was still conscious which was a a good sign.

"Coming in hot," He said, tugging Eppie by her good foot and sliding her from out between her two admires. The antivenom had to go into a real vein with acuracy, and Donny made that happen with syrgical efficiency- ignoring his usual concern for Eppie's needle squick. "I think you got lucky. I don't think you got a full venom load-" He said taking her vitals. Her ppm for the venom was about a quarter than what finn's was. Her wound was nothing to write off but, it was nothing a little superglue, gauze and tramadol couldn't handle for a couple of hours. "You're gonna feel like shit probably but, you've had worse, I wont send you back to UC9 less you want to."

 

[Faelinara]

N7KK7
​

One would never be able to tell whether Nikki hadn't heard Goody, or was just blatantly ignoring him, but she didn't break pace as she headed toward a generic looking building. She ducked inside and sat right in the single big chair behind a desk covered in scattered computer ware and paperwork.

As she held up one hand, palm up, the other swiped from left to right in the air above it and mini holo-screens popped up. With only a few seconds, and a twitch of a few fingers on her holo-keyboard, Nikki was in the system. She glanced at the limited information she could recover, letting out a small sigh, and then "Hmmm." Her gaze intensified on a few coded parts, and with her fingers, like magic, she brought up a few heavily coded windows.

"Peekaboo," Nikki grinned, "I see you."

Swiping downward right and squishing her fingertips she moved and resized the coded windows. Another swipe and she brought up three others. Each showed multiple camera feeds in live time. Scanning them intently for a moment she tapped each one with her middle finger, a rainbow of colors momentarily flashing on her gloved finger in response. Nikki waved her hand to the top corner area of her 'screen', and all windows moved over and shrank in size. Tapping with her fingers to bring up a coding window, her fast fingers led her gaze to the list of controls for the entire facility. All were in bold red font, and all read OPEN under the category status. Three windows heavily coded popped up one after the other after, and without hesitation Nikki's palm was open toward the screen, and she quickly brought her fingers from open to a closed position, all windows closing at once. Gazing down and slightly right of herself, she bit her lower lip and let out one more "Hmm." Then, opening two more windows, she quickly typed a few things, swiped right, and closed her holo-screens.

Nikki twirled the chair around and stood up emphatically. Bringing her hand up to her ear, she sent out a mass comm to her new friends. It was an image of a very ornate membership card reading their respective name, and the words "Multiverse Menageries, Class S" in calligraphic lettering. Under it is a small caption, "Field trips! ; )"

 

[ValtheStarGal]

Miranda Menendez​

"Whoa hey-!" Miranda calls as she is pulled off balance, Donny dragging the wounded Eppie who holds her hand. She topples over and lands on her side, laughing the whole way down and looking up at the canopy. She turns her attention to Eppie, and smiles to see Donny taking good care of her. Zephyr trots to Miranda's side, pushing her up to sitting before Miranda collects herself and rises to her feet.

Miranda's inserts ping her to let her know she has been given a VIP membership to the Multigalactic Menagerie, and she smiles again at Nikki's signature. [Well done, gremlin] she texts the precocious hacker.

"Right, once we're all back on our feet, we should get moving," Miranda suggests to the group. "Other creatures will likely have heard the commotion and I doubt we'll want to be around for if or when they arrive. It seems we can follow the paths designated for tourists to find our way down to the lower levels?"

 

[TrashRabbit]

Goody

[Go back go back,] Goody signs but the gremlin was moving too fast, didn't know sign and wasn't looking. "Go back to the cameras, I want to look. And what about the locks for the pens, can you get them back on?"

 

[wickedlittlecritta]

Cathal McKay

Cathal's phone beeped, and he pulled the display up on his palm to check the text from Nikki.

"Hey. Hey Miranda," he said, not looking up from the display. "You don't have a phone, do you? You need a phone. Remind me to get you one. You need one so you'll know when Nikki steals us zoo memberships. Eppie, does Elias have a phone? I can get him one too. But the real takeaway here is that we can go to any zoo we want now. I'm gonna ask Elias and put Finn to bed, poor lad," he said, and motormouthed away to join Elias and Finn, still looking at his texts.

 

[Faelinara]

N7KK7
​

Nikki flicked a few fingers and swiped toward Goody. A folder with the live camera feeds popped up on his inserts, small and in the corner. She grinned at her guardian, "that's not how you win Hide-and-Seek! We haven't reached base yet, and he'll find us if I dig any deeper."

 

[TrashRabbit]

Goody​

"Who? Are there people in here still?" He asked looking through the feeds for survivors or perpetrators. he stops at the strange tableaux of several velocioraptors eating an elk. "There doesn't look like there is anyone else in the facility to play hide and seek with sugar duck."

 

[Faelinara]

N7KK7
​

Nikki giggled and crawled onto the comfy desk chair, pulling herself up to her feet. Putting a closed hand (configured much like a duck if it were a shadow puppet) in front of Goody's face softly, smirked and quickly opened her fingers to show an open palm. A giant window came across Goody's feeds, full of very dense and intense looking code. "Our new friend! He's very good at playing the searcher."

 

[TrashRabbit]

Goody​

For a moment code was all he could see and he stepped back- he made a frustrated noise in his throat and minimized it. He stepped forward and pluck her up under the armpits and set her on the floor. "You mean an Ai? Use your words." He said neutrally as he said all things. "You can't convince him to go home can you?"

 

[ValtheStarGal]

Miranda Menendez
​

[Thank you for the offer Cathal, but that won't be necessary ; )] Miranda texts him via her inserts, smiling as she slings the tranquilizer rifle over her back.

“With the elevators offline, it makes sense to me that we get moving toward the nearest access point and head on down while the gremlin works on wrestling back control of the facility. The emergency stairwell seems our best bet, but we’ve got some ground to cover, so Zephyr and I will go ahead and scout it: anyone who cares to is welcome to accompany us, or hang back until we know what’s what.”

With that, Miranda turns and heads into the jungle, Zephyr darting off into the canopy ahead of her and clicking in ultrasonic notes that Miranda’s enhanced hearing can pick out from the din. She finds the nearest tree amenable to climbing, then sets her boots to prehensile mode, their structure adjusting to allow her maximum grip. With a single bound, she finds purchase on the trunk, then starts climbing.

Zephyr goes ahead, clicking in codes that inform Miranda of what lies ahead - a riverbank here, a colony of harmless creatures there, a piece of technology over here, something abandoned over there - as she climbs higher into the canopy. Despite her nerves, Miranda feels a surge of confidence, back in her element after the ambush and watching her comrades get hurt. She leaps from her tree to seize hold of a vine and swing to the next one, timing her jump carefully to grab hold of the next vine, smiling with the thrill of it. The jungle streaks by her in a blur as she leaps from vine to vine, Zephyr guiding her toward the otter pens and the stairway down to the next level-

An infrasonic rumbling cuts through the din, and Miranda times her next jump to catch a tree branch and swing up and over to stop herself of a wide stretch of river, landing with her feet on the branch and her tail wrapping securely around it. She signals to Zephyr with the same clicking to stop and hide, and she hears the cricket confirm her command before vanishing from her hearing. The rumbling continues, a sound like grinding metal, maintaining the same tempo...Miranda is reminded of creatures that see by echolocation, and thinks she hears menace in those notes.

Miranda draws out her Official Funtime Zoo! Map and Guide, orienting herself to this bend of the river - and finding she is not far from the otter pens and the access way she needs to find. She skims through the descriptions of the organisms on this level of the arcology and searching for any references to echolocation, careful to mind the rumbling - which seems to be holding steady and suggesting that her presence is unknown.

Puzzled to find nothing about it in this section, Miranda has to look further ahead in the guide - considerably further, having to look several levels down - before she finds a description that best matches it. The closest match is described as a Poena, a specimen of xenolife from a marsh-like biome: a red exclamation mark is put next to the name Poena, warning safari guests away from close contact with these dangerous organisms. Miranda frowns at the description of the more distinctly non-terrestrial biome this creature is meant to inhabit, noting that the composition of atmosphere and local biochemistry ought to be inhospitable conditions to such a creature.

[Team, we’ve got something between us and the otter pens, something aggressive and territorial. It’s listed as ‘Poena’ in the guide, and it’s described as amphibious, omnivorous and something that shouldn’t be in this biome, leading me to believe it or they must have gotten up here from another level of the facility. Zephyr and I are fine for now, but we’re going to need help finding and neutralizing them if we want to get to the otter pens and the emergency stairwell. Who's with me?]
Enclosed with the text is an image, snapped from the guide with Miranda's entoptics as best as she can get with the jungle lighting.

Spoiler: Poena

 

[Graystone713]

Kevin Starr​

Kevin took a moment to collect himself. He then took a minute to scan the limited perimeter they'd established. Okay, everything looked normal. He had a second.

“Tina, how’s the soundboard coming?”
“Complete, give Sonar access.”
“Sonar access?... Sure, okay. What for?”

Then came Miranda’s transmission about the Poenas. Huge territorial land porpoises? Sure.

“Infrasound, Ultrasound, Poena calls.”
“Nice. You’re a lifesaver, Tina.”
“Still useful.”

Okay, Kevin couldn’t be sure what that last bit was about, but he had the soundboard! He started walking to the main plaza, and spoke on the main team comms.

“Miranda, you should have vantage on some of the plaza. I’m gonna head there, and call him out. If he really is territorial, he’ll fight me. I’m gonna try to hit him with a dart before he’s close, but if I don’t make the shot, you take it.”

When he was done, he was in the spot, and ready to go. He took a cursory look around, trying to see if it was already there, but no sighting. So he hit the button, releasing a horrible metallic sound, a lot like what Miranda already heard, but somehow even angrier. When he heard the responding cry, he thought he was ready. He was not ready to look at it. June, June was in the way! He started a dead sprint right towards her. She was too far to grab, he had to take the shot now! His tranquilizer guns fired, but the hits bounced off the blubber. He couldn’t get a solid hit! He became aware that he was screaming on the comms.

“JUNE! JUNE GET OUT OF THERE! JUUUUUNE!”

 

[Nimbus]

Ji-Eun Moon, Scooter Thief​

A screen popped up just above her wrist, where the Meshhead could see a text from Miranda. Ji-eun's holographic lenses flickered blue as she read it. Having surveyed the perimeter to make sure none of the HL barriers in this sector were currently broken, she turned down lane of palm trees, then hit the accelerator on the scooter she borrowed from a zoo kiosk.

"Eumseong insig hwalseonghwa," she shouted over the high-pitched scooter motor to activate her voice to text feature. She slowed another moment to bank around a completely useless and impractical midway. This place, when not in crisis mode, seemed like a pretty luxury to June. A good place for a date? Ehhh, with less bio-weapons, maybe?

"It's cooled off where I'm at for now. So I'm with ya, Mirri! You know, Poena's kind of cute, if you ignore her claws...and teeth. Pretty speedy, to get from her home to there. Maybe not as cute as otters. We'll have to see when we meet her!"

She added a quick, warbling, "jeonsong jeonsong" at the end so the message would send.

As June drove towards the location on the Official Funtime Zoo! Map and Guide, the trees up ahead got way closer together, thicker and more...different. Like, never seen before weird different. The road proper dwindled from concrete to cubist paver mosiacs to chunked stones to gravel to nothing. That's when June realized there'd be a wall up ahead, but...was it the shadows of the trees or did they paint the wall with camouflage?

Half expecting to crash into an invisible wall, June lifted off the gas and slid on her scooter. Dirt, twigs and broken leaves sailed up over her and the scooter. She leaned so low she almost _ her head on a- wait, that looked like a piece of wall?! The fuck?!

"Hey Team," she chatted into her comms, once she righted herself, "Looks like a physical barrier is down where I'm coming from. Something really big crashed through it. Or a horde of less big things. Not sure if I'm seeing recent prints? Sending coords in 5."

There was a dull roar in the distance, followed by a louder one that sounded like it wasn't more than a block away. June was much more used to loud mechanical noises, so this caught her off guard enough to cause her bike to wobble into some critter's long-ago rut.

"Owwwiieee, maybe try inside voices please?"

She shook it off, but that delayed her. And being delayed by animals, no matter how cute, pissed June off. She revved the scooter and sped away from the cracked wall, toward the source of the offending noise. The road reappeared under her scooter, which was good news. She didn't think its little engine was gutsy enough to take much more high-speed off-roading. Plus, she handled a bit better on hard, smooth surfaces.

It wasn't until Kevin started screaming that June realized there was very bad news headed her way, in the form of a charging Poema. It looked like the picture in the guide, except that picture did not seem to scale at all.

"Oh Holy Hydrogen, that's a big one."

June did think about stopping, or maybe weaving around the amphibious mammal. But she might not make it in time, and even once she got away, what else was she gonna do? Pitch the scooter straight into the plaza fountain and try to barrel roll away to safety? That was so not her style.

Fighting fire with fire, or in this case, smashy headbutts with smashy headbutts? Very much June's style. She took the scooter up the hill, and it made her think about gravity and physics and hardlight and equal and opposite reactions. She had a plan.

"No time," She explained to Kev, "'S cool tho. I got this. Hardlight can be manipulated up to a point to match and rebound an oncoming force, like a rubberband...er, that's not the best example, more like a trampoline? Ah fuck it, material physics never gets applied in badass ways anymore. Ra-Bots, assemble!"

Shifting her knees to maintain a relatively stable steering column, she called out the flying bots. They formed a shield-wall of sorts in front of her, whirring with what June personified today as bloodrage.

"No, I'm the boss Poena," she yelled, linking the reinforced hardlight before girl on scooter and four-legged amphibi-tank collided.

 

[TrashRabbit]

The Poena crashed into the hard light wall so hard the barrier screeched as it was forced back across the cement. The barrier flickered and held. The poena crumpled with a sound like a weed whacker imitating a sad whimper. It shook its head and backed up mewling the song of its chainsaw laments. It puffed up, not as impressivly as a puffer fish but following what seemed to be the same biological principles and began to sway back and forth in some sort of display. Whether it was a sign of submission or aggression is not something that is immediately to anyone on the team. However its about 50 feet from June, 450 feet from Kevin and about 500 feet from the main group in the main entrance of the plaza. What do you do?