MachineSoul

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

Superbowl? Like, it's a sport where they throw over-sized bowls around? Oh my god, I should shut up before I get shot... So yeah, since no one wrote anything and the one week deadline was inching in, I posted. Kept it short.

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

The dog blinked several times as he was trying to look for Captain Sprinstream's face, soon realizing that she was fast asleep; Aidan cocked his head sideways and felt panic raise in his belly as approached the monitors, but to his relief, she wasn't crashing. She was sleeping instead, which made Aidan a bit suspicious. Edward then started talking, fumbling over his words and clenching his fists, a kind of behavior that perplexed the doctor even more; he listened carefully to his words and his intonation and by the time Ed finished delivering his decision, the dog slowly walked away from him and sat down on the stool near the drawer while looking up at him. He blinked a few more times before he burst into a low, continuous chuckle, a wide grin reaching his ears and baring his teeth, his eyebrows lifted over his eyes. Maybe he was under some funky effect from the painkiller, or maybe he found something quite hilarious to him; maybe both. When the chuckle fit had finally ended, he licked his canine tooth and closed his mouth to form an ironic smile; he shook his head a couple of times and wanted to cross his arms, but since his left one was unresponsive, he only managed to bring them together and entwine his own fingers. "Right." He started in a whisper, his voice husky with exhaustion and mucus accumulated from the good laughing fit. "Okay. It'll be done. I'll take the samples to the lab and have them analyzed, closed envelope. I don't know how long it will take them to finish, but I'll let her know when I get them back." With that, Aidan stood up, grabbed the samples and headed out the enclosed saloon, leaving Ed with a final note. "Be nice and wake sleeping beauty in two hours for debrief, in the meantime you're free to do whatever. Word got in, the op's over and Blade wants us gathered in the crew lounge." Thus, he left the two to their thoughts and dreams and headed over to the nurses to kindly ask them to deliver the samples to the lab with a single condition. Once that was done, Aidan made his way through the cruiser, avoiding bumping into people the best he could and when he finally reached his own little compartment where he would sleep or read and shut the door behind him. He leaned against it and allowed his body to slide down until he sat on the ground, sighing loudly all the way. He had to take a few minutes to regain his composure and go on with the rest of the day, making a list of things that he still had to do that day: shower, change his clothes, work out the manifestos, repack his kit, get his GEAR back in its dock, handle rations to hostages, discuss patient and casualty situation with either Blade or Irry, get a six-pack for Ken, punch Kuraiko for getting shot while he was away, call someone, unpack some books on his PADD and stand vigil for the night. The twang in his arm become more and more painful to him and he felt his patience crack and crumble under the weight of the responsibility he just took without at least questioning his true motive and the odds of his success. I've royally screwed myself he thought, a self-pitying chuckle cracked through his dark expression 'n she's too much of a coward to tell me what she wants. She leaves the responsibility to her pawn, to make the decision for her since she knew he wouldn't betray his superior. I need to be careful around her, but that poor, poor Ed... Shit, man, aren't you a bit harsh on her? He didn't quite have the time to punch himself in the face for his immense transgression, so he manned back up and went on to start ticking items off his to-do list; he gave his sweat-heavy stuff back over to the armory and took a nice, hot shower to soak his tense muscles and loosen up a little. He then retrieved the DATMK he left in the infirmary and before he handled it over to the apothecary, he subtly slid the x ray under the fresh, clean shirt he took on. He received a clipboard with a large form he had to complete in order to have his kit restocked with the necessary goodies and four other patient forms with which he had to provide with the the exact reasons why he used certain medications on them. Thus, he started to complete the form as he slowly made his back at the hangar to check if Stumpy was brought back, and to his relief, the hunk of metal was indeed back along with Kuraiko's own GEAR, which reminded him of the wolf. He sighed internally and before he would go look for him, he ran towards the mechanics and technicians working their magic on his Dartwing and politely asked them to prepare the provisions stowed in his cockpit to be distributed to the incoming hostages. He later learned that Kuraiko was already discharged, to his relief and worry and with basically nothing needing his immediate attention, he headed to the crew lounge. There, he reserved himself a seat and kept his nose affixed to the clipboard, scribbling and ticking away to make time pass. Distress was growing slowly inside him, knowing that he had to lie once more and this time to the colonel; he kept his thoughts suppressed by his current task, but there was little control over the dread gnawing at his heart and the need to scream his lungs out.

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

I'll wait for another post or two before I write down my own. From now, I'll try to cut down my post size for everybody's convenience

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

Looking at the two, Aidan sighed lowly and replied to the captain with a curt nod of his muzzle and a slow blink; he wasn't very proud of it, nor too happy, but in a corner of his mind a voice whispered that it was the right thing to do. The woman was good at her job and her whole fire team utterly loved her enough to keep her secret well hidden. It became only a matter of time for it to surface and for someone to catch it. Lucky it was me he thought with a sour taste on his tongue, feeling for some reason betrayed, even if he didn't properly knew the woman enough to consider her an acquaintance or close enough to him at all. With all this, he felt that he had a duty towards her now, or if he was cruel enough to think like so, she suddenly became dependent of his actions; he could very easily go to Blade and spill the beans like a rotten snitch, or be part of the problem to solve the problem. He perked his ear to the back, trying to catch if there was any sound behind the curtains, to make sure that he wouldn't be heard or spied on; he felt the urge to peek out, but it would have been too risky and suspicious to poke his nose out and glance over the sick bay only to draw more attention to them. Instead, the canine pulled the sheet back out of the kit and laid it beside him, then turned his gaze over the hurt woman and crossed his arms; with a sigh, an chuckling outburst and a couple of shakes from his head, Aidan prepared himself to deliver what he knew about her up to that point. "Captain, I want to make myself very clear." He started on a low pitch, the somewhat lighthearted tone vanishing completely from his voice. "You have put yourself in an unimaginable risk every time you have gone out in a mission; every second you spent without looking into your condition accumulated to this point where you can't hide it anymore and it came to it with your help. You may pull your ranks on me, but while you're in a bed with needles stuck in your arm and blood coming out of your lungs, you are my patient and I have to deliver everything I know to my patient, like it or not. After that, it's up to you to decide whether you want to get rid of the problem or die by it. If you chose to get rid of it, you'll have two more options. First, the facts." Aidan pulled the sheet and held it up for her, giving the woman and the fox a stern look. "I took a piccie of your chest. Yup, that's your lungs and heart there. See those smoky rings? I guess I don't have to insult your intelligence and tell you it's not a good sign." He raised his eyebrows and grimaced, to contrast the gravity of the situation. He then placed the sheet back in the kit, deciding not to risk handling to either of them and prefer to hide it. "Back in the cave and on the way to the bay, I prayed that you're having a chronic bronchitis; haemoptysis is not an uncommon symptom when you've got an advanced form of bronchitis. I'm afraid, though, it's not it. No, I'm sorry. I did take some blood samples from you that I'd like to have them taken to the laboratory, because I couldn't possibly come to a certain conclusion from just an x ray of your thorax. The only way to know for sure what it is is to have those samples tested- don't worry, that too can be done in full secrecy. I convinced the team here that you wish to be seen only by me due to personal issues and preferences, so remember, you trust me above everyone else to touch and see you in this state, for some undisclosed reason. We're going to use that to our advantage and demand the lab results to be delivered in a sealed envelope; yes, very suspicious, but the only people who will know about this are me, you two, the medical team that are forced through the law to keep their mouth shut and the lab technicians that won't actually get to see the results." Aidan then took a deep breath, closed his eyes so he could push them into his skull with his index and thumb, feeling the dizziness caused by the morphine shot turn into a mild headache right behind the posterior wall of the orbits; he immediately knew it was high blood pressure, most probably caused by the dim tremor of his heart as a result of his anger. "Why am I doing this? You saved my life back there, it is my turn to save yours and I am not to refuse my duty." He then started to point his index to accentuate certain syllables of his message, his frown deepening. "Do not insult me by refusing my offer." Instead of raising his tone, he lowered it to an angered whisper. "I am putting my license and freedom on the line for you because I know that I can do something about it and keep it just to ourselves; we'd might have to work ourselves to exhaustion, squeeze in the sick bay at crazy hours to give you treatment and steal stuff from the apothecary, but it can be done. It's either this, you go loud with your problem, or you die from a pulmonary laceration, or a massive hemorrhage or from asphyxiation." He pushed himself up on his feet and grumbled, feeling the dizziness pull him to a side almost enough to have him topple over a mobile drawer, the instruments and contents of the drawer rattling from the sudden motion. He cursed under his heavy breath as he tried to keep himself balanced by using his good arm as a fulcrum planted into the drawer, praying that it wouldn't start moving from his weight. When the black spots and multicolored stars vanished from his vision, Aidan regained composure and took a deep breath to stabilize himself again. What a fucking day he thought in spite and it's not over yet. He took a few unsure steps towards the curtains and without bothering to look over his shoulder, he left a last note. "I am not blackmailing you. I'm giving you an extra option, take it or leave. If you refuse it, that won't mean I'll stop saving you, I'll still do my best; I am no magician though, I can't revive dead people. I'm going to take a look at my arm, that should give you enough time to think." With that he left the safety of the reserved bed and headed over to the emergency room where he suspected the doctors would be; he felt now extremely vulnerable as he started to rehearse speeches in his head to avoid any mentions about Esailia's situation. Every stutter and err had to be perfectly placed, he couldn't be too precise with his wording, but neither too sloppy, having to hit that perfect balance between them to create a believable conversation without compromising anything. It felt like the old times in his teenage years when he would lie to his mother about several situations, preferring to offer her a white lite rather than the shameful truth of whatever mishap he had made. He reached the room in time, his legs barely dragging the rest of his body there against his will, meeting with Major Dr. Reid and another two nurses. He sighed and scratched behind his right ear and started talking with an exhausted voice. "So, the patient is stable, she's never been in a critical risk it would seem. She's already conscious and talking. I took an x ray of her thorax, but I found no lesions, no fractures, no sign of blood vessel rupture or pneumothorax. EKG readings are fine, but her passing out from a shot like that is suspicious; I've took some blood samples and handle them over to the lab, in a sealed envelope." The doctor listened carefully and frowned at the last two sentences. "Lieutenant, I hope you are aware that this sounds like a very serious condition and you-" "Am supposed to turn into a snitch and notify you and the Colonel if the situation might make her field ineffective, yes, I am aware of that, sir. To this point, examinations are inconclusive and other than this incident, her medical record's a clean slate; if you ask me, the blood tests will come back as excellent, but, she already told me she wants daily checks. At the end of the day, though, everyone got scared for nothing and the prince gets to marry the princess, or whatever. But if I find anything, the smallest of things, I'll let you know. I'm not about to go to court-martial for a fucking perverted prude." The badger thinned his lips when he was interrupted again and nodded at the dog. "Alright. Now, about that arm of yours." The dog then glanced at his left bicep, to find the once-white bandage now turned into a dark red hue, a bit of the liquid extending down his sleeve. "Super." He muttered. On one hand, he wanted to sigh his lungs out for actually being able to lie to a superior, but on the other, he still had to play along and honestly, he wouldn't mind having someone else take a look at the thing. It took some time to have the wound properly examined and cleaned, but the damage done by the bullet was minimal, to his own luck. He could still feel that twang in the arm that supposed to hurt like nine hells, but his brain muffled it out as an uncomfortable sensation with the help of painkillers. With a fresh bandage, Aidan made his way back to Es's bed, meeting the ferret technician just passing by the curtains, pushing a table with wheels down the aisle; the runt nodded to the dog to greet him, he returned the favor even if he smelled trouble from the instant he saw him near the curtains. He knew he had to be on the watch for that one. Just before entering the curtains, he took a few seconds to recollect and look for some clarity in his mind, but quickly shoved it away as soon as rationality grabbed the dog by his collar and screamed in his face "What in the fuck are you thinking, you cretin mutt?! He pushed the curtains aside and took his original place. "I'm going in a vacation after this, I swear. I'll find me a beach and learn to fly planes there. Alright." He then turned his now more relaxed gaze towards Esailia, lifting his eyebrows. Aidan looked like he accepted the situation, no matter the outcome. "I'm listening."

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

@Cartwright I almost laughed my tits off at that, it made my day xD @Es I'll be on it only tonight, I've been dragged by my girlfriend at her place to play videogames

MachineSoul

Atleast you got a girlfriend to drag you to a place to play video games

Cartwright

Yeah, well, not that I'm complaining... I just wish I had more time to play and spend time with her too, this month has been a nightmare. I also wish that I didn't have to rely on unholy hours to finish my posts

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

@Cartwright I almost laughed my tits off at that, it made my day xD @Es I'll be on it only tonight, I've been dragged by my girlfriend at her place to play videogames

Thunderbolt Black (Fighter Pilot Mercenaries)

Mmmso, I posted. I hope it is alright that I've hit two targets, I left it open for Blade to decide if incapacitated=destroyed/nonfunctional.

Thunderbolt Black (Fighter Pilot Mercenaries)

"This is Heartbreak. Black Knight squadron, form up on my aircraft. Apologies we didn't get a chance to meet and greet on the ground first, but it looks like the day has other things planned for us. We've been directed to intercept an inbound surface force, closing on the island."

Scott Valentine

"Copy, Heartbreak, this is Stalin. I'm shadowing a couple of bandits over the gulf in a Flanker, eastward of the island. Give me a few secs." The reply came from a friendly contact indeed flying over the ocean in a frantic chase; the voice was calm, rough, nasal, heavy with a slavonic accent, but otherwise, he knew his grammar and pronunciation. Indeed, there was a Flanker coming around two enemy gunships, trying its best to ward them off the coast and away from the base. It didn't manage to score any incapacitating hits yet, but it managed to land a few 30 mm rounds on one of the bandits, although it wasn't enough; Dmitry's jet, however, remained unscathed for now, since there was no real threat for him to fear. His eyes were running all over the place, from the displays of his cockpit up to the outside world, back down to his buttons, reticles and navigational instruments and then to the skies, catching the wingtip of one of his targets. With all the G's pushing him around his seat, the adrenaline filling his chest with goo compressing his heart and lungs, his guts pulling up against the diaphragm and the constant, dynamic fight for dominance, the man found a small window to yawn wide enough that made him force his own eyes from closing. To think, he only woke up half an hour ago.

Earlier that day

7:01 AM The alarm tone on his cell refused to switch into snooze mode, its small loudspeaker blared with the default ringtone, forcing the man awake. Dmitry woke up to his own bed, laying in his bed on his belly with his laptop at an arm's reach, half-covered and half-naked; he lifted his head, barely cracking his eyelids to locate the small annoyance and shut its mouth. He battled to keep his heavy eyes open, but his sleepy mind allowed for four more minutes of laying in his bed; with that in mind, he checked the screen of his laptop, which was in standby, and lazily wiggled the mouse with his wrist, only to find that the server had kicked his character out of the world for being AFK for over one hour. He sighed into the pillow, closed the game's screen and powered off the laptop. He rolled off his bed and planted his feet into the ground, having to push really hard against his sleepiness in order to get up and going, but when he did succeed, he went over to the shower. The stream of lukewarm water splashing his face and body woke his senses a little, but when he turned the faucet to cold, he woke up properly. Minutes later, Dmitry was all dry and walking down from his apartment, wearing light clothes to survive the incoming heat of the day, as he never really got used to the warm weather of the tropical island. He remembered he had the briefing at 10:00, but if he would have allowed himself to let himself sleep some more, he would be dead and dizzy; instead, he took a trip at the bistro at the corner of the block, where he ordered a coffee, a soft drink and breakfast with bacon, eggs, a sweet bagel, two crispy sausages and some beans. Reclining in his seat, Dmitry took a moment to enjoy the cool morning breeze, the calm sounds of the morning and the sip of his coffee. The rest of his was rushed, the man being able to eat whole meals in roughly five minutes, so fast that the information from this stomach didn't quite reach his brain in time to tell him that he had satiated his hunger; he was already jogging his way over to his workplace, thinking that he'd might spend some time there before the briefing time arrives, but his own arrival was one of the best timings he had in his life. He just passed the checkpoint when he heard some passing jets, a very odd thing indeed, but then the rumbling and the boom came, which quickly drew Dmitry's attention towards a cliff only to see a SAM site being blasted off into oblivion by what seemed to be a bombing run. He found that ridiculously ironic to the point he snickered, shook his head and rested his palms on his shoulders. "Good job, you dirty motherfuckers." He replied to the attack Air raid sirens started to wail, the pilot was dashing to get his G suit on and reach the hangar to get his fighter up in the sky. He didn't really have time to think about anything, about who were the attackers, how come they were so quick to disable a SAM site and what was their beef with this base. He changed into his suit and equipped a vest he didn't count on saving him, but he heard enough scoldings to convince himself to strap it on. It took him roughly a minute or so to get himself fully equipped, he only needed to retrieve the helmet from the hangar where his beauty was about to be woken up. He didn't lose any time chatting with the technicians finishing up the arming process, he only nodded to them as they yelled over the siren. "You've got four missiles, four rockets and two bombs on ya, all laser-guided. Canon's loaded, you're good to go!" He took a final moment to perform his good luck ritual of drawing a cross over his body with two fingers, snort his nose and spit out the phlegm and finally mutter to himself nekhaĭ shchastīt' before he'd climb into his baby: a fresh Sukhoi-35, bought with his own blood money. She had its maiden flight a few months back, but this was the first time he would lift the girl for a rough flight. The AL-41F1 twin turbofan engines came to life, but they were only a rumble in the background as Dmitry still had to taxi the aircraft to the strip; he shut the cockpit around him after he strapped himself in his seat and powered on the plane's navigation and armament instruments. He then made contact with the tower to announce his liftoff. "Tower, this is Stalin, preparing to take off and engage, over." "Copy that, Stalin. Be advised, you've been attached to the 101st Black Knights, you are under the command of Knight One, Scott Valentine. He's flying an A-6F Intruder, hard to miss. Scramble and ward off anything you can find, further orders will come from him. You're clear to take off on runway 3. Over." "Rog'." Dmitry approached the runway, rolling his fighter on the taxiyway until he found a clear high-speed twy to access the runway designated for him. Once on the center line, he waited for a couple of fighters to take off first before he would; finally, he increased the thrust in the engines, feeling himself being pushed back into the seat as the craft's speed was growing rapidly and as soon as he saw on the altimeter that he was climbing steadily, stream of air pushing the 30 ton beast, he retracted the gears and leveled the flaps. After he cleared the runway and made sure that there weren't any other aircrafts near him, he pitched the nose of the jet up and ascended vertically for a few seconds until he reached a desirable altitude, then pitched the nose some more until he was once again parallel to the ground, but upside-down; to correct that, he completed a half roll and darted off over the land below. The ground seemed to move relatively slow underneath him even if he was moving at a considerable speed; from up there, he saw some bogeys both through the panes and on the radar, immediately identifying them as the enemy threat and the first targets he considered to take out were a couple of gunship helicopters. As there were no enemy fast movers in the area just yet, he pitched down and approach the helos with a dramatic, shock drop. As soon as he was in gun range, he struggled to get a fix on the choppers that were now doing their best to avoid getting hit by the jet; once he got a one second lock, he first noted on the radio to make sure there would be no friendlies interfering. "Guns, guns, guns." He released a few bursts from the GSh-30 internal cannon without confirming a clean hit or kill. He pulled back up before it would have been too late to save himself from crashing into the sea and began to maneuver around the targets and approach from their six. By then, the leader of the squadron he's been attached to called out, getting a reply both from him and two more pilots. Catching up on the choppers, Dmitry first banked slightly to the left to align himself to the target and unleash more 30 mmm bursts, then banked on the right to catch the other helo and fire at it. "Guns, guns, guns." He pulled away from the engagement, having the visual confirmation of incapacitating both of the targets; he was very tempted to unleash his rockets on them, but he thought against it as the SAM site must have been destroyed by an enemy bomber, of not a fighter. Taking down enemy helicopters is a cakewalk, as they are pretty limited in their maneuverability and evasion due to the fixed rotor lifting the vehicle. Static targets, training dummies. A dogfight with an equally able pilot and a good jet, on the oter hand, was a completely different story.

"We have twelve surface targets closing. Looks to be approx six assault landing hovercraft, with the same number of amphibious APC's riding outboard. Air cover looks to be gunship helos, and expected fast-movers in the area too. The surface targets and helo's are the priority; I'm loaded for air-to-surface. Any of you loaded for air-to-air, keep 'em off our backs. Remember, watch your six on approach and climbout after releasing weapons - the triple-a is gonna be thick over that landing force".

St. Helen Carter

"Two helos incapacitated on Eastern shore. I've got combined munitions, mostly air-to-air. Continue engagement on other tangos, or maybe you need a wingman?"

GEARS - Mecha Sci-fi with Anthro characters. RP in a detailed, story-driven world.

Also, the game is now officially 1 year old, and we haven't rebooted, collapsed, or stopped for once. Well done to us!

Silverwind Blade

Thunderbolt Black (Fighter Pilot Mercenaries)

Same here! Always a pleasure, Blade :3