Paradigm_Shift

Mechanomorphic and Nightshade both charged ahead of the pack, the group slaughtering everything in their way. Until they came to a fork in the hallway...

"We'll take left. Everyone else go right, stay connected through comm." Nightshade said, before he and Mechanomorphic dashed down the right passage with their minions.

Seemingly just in time to be the worst possible time-No less than three Longbow Ballista suddenly came charging from the right-hand hallway and charged the rest of the group. It therefore stood to reason that whatever they had been guarding was particularly valuable to merit three of them. And these would be much, much harder to dispatch than the previous soldiers, and to emphasize this point they all launched explosion area of effect bolts at the assembled group of masterminds and minions.

***

"And I draw the short lot and get to guard the door." Recycler-33 sighed. His zombies shifted aimlessly in undeath, and the street was quiet. All the civilians had fled. The silence broke as sirens started to approach. That was fine, Recycler-33 could handle the PPD and Longbow for all they were worth.

So he was somewhat surprised when something big and green landed in front of him, followed by a large explosion and being hurled through the air. Positron stormed through the dispersing mist of the nuetron detonation and dispatched the lich, still getting to its feet, with a solid swipe with his armored and irridated hand.

'Not good.' Recycler-33 thought. He couldn't take Positron directly, not after having all his zombies blasted. Thankfully, to him, life had four cycles, not just two. Life, undeath, unundeath, and only THEN was there actual death.

Six green wispy clouds of mist crept from the bodies of the fallen-spectrals! They immediately converged on Positron, and Recycler-33 started sprinting to the nearest truck. All of them contained heavy ordinance, some of which Recycler-33 might have been able to bring to bear on the hero...

[ QUOTE ]
As the mercenaries started to level their weapons at the restaraunters, Celes O'Bannon, commonly referred to as Doomtastic in the Rogue Isles checked her watch.

"Is it time already? I thought I was early..." She glanced at the skyline, squinting at the sun. Spending to much time in the D, is what it was, extra-dimensional travel plays hell on her Seiko.

Standing up, she activated her nano reassambler, turning her Armani knockoff suit into her combat uniform, a red leather bustier, gloves, black pants, knee high combat boots, and a long red Fortune cape.

With a toss of her hair, the blonde bombshell turned to the diners and slammed her hands together, the sonic handclap knocking them all down.

Celes turned to the mercenaries and waved at the men behind their minions her voice dripping with the worst british accent impersonation they'd likely ever heard, "'Ello! Doomtastic here, I smash for cash, if it bleeds I can kill it. Which of you blokes signs the checks?"

[/ QUOTE ]

"I'll be signin most of em." Mechanomorphic gave her a thumbs-up. "We may need to split up so switch your com unti to our channel."

[ QUOTE ]
The various henchmen aiming weapons at the building found themselves with unexpected backup in the form of a standard squad of six robots, the same drone- protector- and assault-class bots that many masterminds used for their proven reliability. The seventh figure that landed just slightly behind her minions wasn't easily recognisable despite the rather distinctive teal and black powersuit as she liked to keep a low profile when she could. It was half the reason she hadn't been caught yet, the six heavily armed bots being the other half.

Deactivating her rocket boots as she landed, she brushed a stray lock of black hair out of her face and turned to the one who appeared to be commanding this little operation. "Got room for a little extra help?", she asked. "Was planning to just cause a little mayhem but if you've got something more interesting I'm all ears."

[/ QUOTE ]

"The more the merrier the carnage!" Nightshade cackled. "Come along with us, just don't wreck anything expensive. We're looking for some fancy tech. There's a fat paycheck for anyone who comes along too!"

[ QUOTE ]
As one of the truck doors opened up, several troops came storming out. Finally, a big, imposing man stepped out, using two fingers two shake his cigar before puffing a cloud of smoke. "Sir!" one of the soldiers spoke to the man. He was tall, and had a black flak jacket with black pants, and matching combat boots. He had buzzcut hair, andone eye was a different color than the other.

"Position-Forward Fox" the man barked at his troops, and they spread out according to the order. He reached down to the holster at his hip and pulled out a pistol, a Desert Eagle to be exact. He fired randomly towards the PPD, not looking to see if it hit anyone or not. He reached into a pocket of his flak jacket and took out an ear-piece, and a targeting recticle. He put the recticle over his eye, and put the ear-piece in. "I want C-4's in this building, and the detonater in my hand, and whatever the hell the people that are paying us want in their hands, NOW!" he shouted into the ear-piece.

He walked over to the group he recognized as the people ordering the operation, and blew a puff of smoke. "Any idea where this thing is?" he asked.

[/ QUOTE ]

Recycler-33 smiled up at the large man. He was quite small in comparison, but he made up for his size with an uneasy air about him. He didn't feel RIGHT. Alien and cold.

"It's either in the basement or at the very top, guarded by Longbow and the PPD no doubt. It also belongs to D.A.T.A., so we should expect some high tech defenses. Plan is to get in, ransack the whole building, get out and retreat to Warburg. If you can get them up there, we need people on the roof to stop people from escaping-It's gonna be bloody."

As he spoke, Nightshade and Mechanomorphic both charged into the building, their henchmen following. The sounds of fighting followed, and Recycler-33 motioned for everyone to charge in.

OOC:

Whatever works for you, you could either be there by coincidence or have been hired by the trio to help them or anything else, really.

The following events take place after this three-part story.


***

“So our old robot janitor is building a Halo?”

"Bitter Heath" Nightshade said this in a deadly serious tone, despite the implications of this statement. Said ‘robot janitor’ had been a war mech that, had it ever been unleashed at full power, could have realistically overthrown the entire U.S. in a month. As it were, [censored] happened, and it wound up a crippled and slagged four foot cleaning drone. Don’t even get started on the Halo.

“More of a Dyson ring, but a Halo serves as a good comparison.” Mechanomorphic answered. “Whereas a Halo would be aboutish 10,000 km in diameter or somethin, this ring will have a diameter only a few hundred light years smaller than the diameter of the universe currently. And where a Halo only kills critters big enough to sustain the bugs, this thing will have some mighty fine power within its inner circumference. Heck, if they complete it they may even expand it into a sphere or somesuch.”

“It would be the largest structure in the known universe, even bigger than the largest super-clusters.” Recycler-33 added. “Our only advantage is that it will take time to build. Say around sixteen thousand years.”

“Wait wait.” Nightshade said, frowning. “That’s it? That means they’d have to be building the thing faster than the speed of light. How exactly are they managing it without getting ahead of themselves?”

“They are siphoning temporal energy from a stable time loop and using it to create some kind of space time tunnel that lets them isolate sections and build it before merging the tunnel with real time. Our creation has been busy, it seems.” Recycler-33 replied. “And because I’m supremely irritated we didn’t think of this first, I think we should put a stop to it.”

“Lousy machine, being cleverer than us.” Mechanomorphic said, grinning savagely. “I can magine it now: ‘Sorry there, nothing personal. You just took it too far with tha whole epic doom thing.’”

“Time out.” Nightshade said, folding his arms. “I’m all for blowin up this Halo-“

“More ofa Dy-“ Mechanomorphic began, “Whatever. And I’m all for kickin some epic levels of [censored]…” Nightshade continued, “but by now our junk sifter is going to have some heavy, HEAVY forces backing it up. You don’t try building something like that unless you can cover the whole thing until it’s finished.”

“Which is why we need to stop the ring’s construction indirectly.” Recycler-33 said. “And if we follow all the information we have so far, then the easiest way of disrupting this thing’s construction is to cut off its power. And it just so happens that the stable time loop being used to speed up its construction is right here on Earth. Nice place, actually. Backwater enough that the bigger powers out there wouldn’t ever be able to find it. Pity we happen to live here.”

“More sa pity that we found out about it.” Mechanomorphic said cheerfully. “ What are we waiting for? Let’s crash the loop!”

“Ah. Tiny problem. I don’t know all then whens and wheres of this loop.” Recycler-33 said apologetically. “It could be under a minute long for all I know. That’s what I would do, if it were me.”

“So we find the loop, wreck it, then blow up the tower?” Nightshade said. “Good times.”

“Can’t attack the tower. We’ll let the galactic empires handle that detail. Without the temporal tunnel keeping it off the map, it’ll be the largest side of a barn ever.” Mechanomorphic supplied. “We just need to get rid of the grand architect.”

“Our old creation.” Recycler-33 smiled. “Well, no time to waste. Would either of you know where we can find a temporal scanner or something? A chronal skip isn’t going to do the job here.”

“Nothing in the Rogue isles, Arachnos is sensible enough to not overdo it with time tech.” Mechanomorphic said. “Unlike the idiots and simpletons of D.A.T.A. They happen to have a temporal mapping system in Steel Canyon, I think. We go in and steal it, get out of there before any heroes can interfere, run back here to Warburg where we are outside Longbow jurisdiction and we can hire mercenaries for help.”

“Crude with ultra-violence thrown in. I love both of you. When do we start?” Nightshade asked, the slightest hint of green foam forming at his lips.

***

OOC:

Hello heathens of the RP forums! Do not worry, this is not solicitation to convert you to the way of the wonderful loam and lard hammer of pink minty delights. For those of you few who wished to be saved and came here hoping for solicitation…You are already a full member of the church of Bwerp, and you shall be receiving a free jetpack and silver hammer in the mail any day now, CAD paid in peas or pie. Your call.

Obviously, the first scene of the story takes place in Steel Canyon, which makes it hard for those of villainous inclination to join in. Don’t worry, that’s what mayhem missions/random missions/generic excuse x is for! As Mechanomorphic pointed out above, they are also not above hiring outside help, and people with villainous characters may freely assume they were sent a job offer to help safe-guard their base in Warburg OR they may have been hired before-hand to help with the attack at Steel Canyon.

BIC:

It was a sunny day in Steel Canyon, not a cloud in the sky and everything was rather peaceful for a change. *At least outside.* Pedestrians and members of the PPD strolled about, talked, laughed, and did what they had always done. Little did they know that all hell was about to break loose.

Just a little ways south of Blyde Square, three trucks were circling a single block over and over again in a repeated loop. Within them was death, destroyer of worlds.

“Hmmm. Guards at the door. And this place is right next to a restaurant, we have bystanders at tables almost literally right in front of the door.” Nightshade said on his second pass by the front of the building they were planning to raid. The transceiver on the dashboard hissed Recycler-33’s words back to him.

“They are irrelevant. Only eliminate them if they get in the way, otherwise I want this job to be in-and-out.”

All three trucks suddenly shuddered to a halt right in front of the entrance to said building-a rather imposing sky scraper. It was only as mercenaries toting automatic and explosive weapons, drones with their energy armaments, and zombified summons with their odd assortment of abilities were pouring out of the trucks that Mechanomorphic suddenly thought of something rather disturbing.

“Wait. What if there are heroes in the restaurant?”

Of course, by then it was far too late to pull back. People had already started screaming at the sign of the henchmen invasion and two PPD officers had pulled their weapons and were shouting at the advancing wave of militants, machines, and rotting flesh. The three masterminds all swore simultaneously, and scrambled out of the trucks to back their troops up. That was when the carnage started, the mercenaries at the front in orderly file already bringing their weapons to bear on the PPD officers, and the unfortunate diners who happened to be in the way…

OOC:

After being shouted at by my sister, I is back. BEWARE! Sponsered by Bee-Ware Inc. Dispensing doom coated in milk and honey.

BIC:

The mask in question was a smooth ivory eye-plater, with the only decor being two large bloody eyes and tears running down the otherwise pristine surface. Such masks were often seen at Masquerades in many different flavors, and they were handy when it came to disguising yourself and fooling everyone who ever knew you...

The mask reacted to Abdul's touch. It flew out from under his hand and spun to the opposite side of the room, righting itself and staring in the dictator's direction with its bloody eyes. With a florish of light, a figure came into being head-to-toes from within said facial ornament.

Masquerade

***

'Where am I?'

'Silly me, I'm always here. So why can't I see anything? No movement either. I don't think I'm even corpreal right now. And I can't become so. I can't feel anything, so...'

'Funny. I think I'm dead. Where was I last? Oh yes. Being blown up while being worn by a physical extension. I'm sure I got away from that though...So I'm a piece of ivory somewhere right about now. Which means I need some willpower to jump-start a ressurection. I'm blind, can't move, can't speak, can't hear...This may prove difficult.'

At about this point, Abdul had touched the mask. This is where one of two things happened. The Necronomicon was a significant artifact, an extremely potent magical text. Other such artifacts were commonplace, and often detailed rituals or craft that required components/summoning trapezoids/souls. In truth, these rituals were just a focus for magical entities to effect the physical world as directed by the ritual perscribed.

Then there were people with willpower. Mages often have a little in them to fuel and activate spells, psychics tend to have a small allotment as well. Then there are the few rare individuals to do whatever they want, through nothing but sheer willpower, and make it STICK. These people often couldn't control their powers and usually needed a focus to use them, much like magical entities need specific rituals to affect our world. So either Abdul was one of those rare individuals using the Necromonicon as a focus, *making the book worthless* or the Necromonicon was rubbing off on him. A spark of willpower passed from him into the mask...

***

"Who are you?" The slithering voice of the masked man rang through the room at Abdul, question, accusation and threat all at once.

Lofty didn't know this. Different world. So he just went around looking for the largest building he could find.

"Sawwy." Lofty said to the struggling sack, stepping around it and continuing down the street. "This place has rules. Not innocent? I can't help you."

He did this with an ironic smile on his face. He was filling in the first page of his crossword book. He took little notice of the men in black-It was much more effective to just look for the biggest building there was and work from there. If he found something like a police station or something, now THAT was something he could use right about now...

The cracked portion of the wall spewing out a very thin stream of air. Not gas. Plain air.

"Well, I am sorry about your store." Lofty said apologetically to the shop keeper. "But I need to go now." He waved politely and turned to walk away down the street.

Assuming he wasn't stopped for some reason, then eventually he would encounter...

"Wha-yea-oops-" Lofty murmled in response to the lady. "Ah...dropped the book. Sorry." He said sheepishly, and for all the lady knew he had. He had stumbled when she first started pushing and from her angle it looked like he had dropped what he had been holding. It really went beneath his jacket.

Lofty took a quick look at the back of the isles as the shop owner had instructed. He couldn't help but give interest to all the various wares though, and contemplated trying to sneak some of them back. But no, that wouldn't work. Crosswords were pretty much the only thing he was allowed to get away with. So he reluctantly pried his eyes away from what he deemed to be very wonderous indeed and settled instead for a book with crossword puzzles within.

One problem at a time. Lofty mentally sighed with relief once he picked up the book. Onto the next problem. How to get out of the shop without paying...

"Uh. Shopkeep?" He asked to the owner. "You appear to have a gas leak over here..." And he spoke the truth, because along the wall cracks had suddenly formed, causing paint to crickle and fall to the ground. A tiny pin-[censored] hole in the center of the cracks unleashing a low hissing noise of rushing air and what was presumably 'gas...'

“Hello.” Lofty said pleasantly, his translator working perfectly. “Would you have any crossword puzzles?”

Lofty would have been wounded had he known someone up there thought he was the Fool on the Hill. He hated fog. It blocked everything out, you couldn't see anything. Not the land or the sky.

Lofty did notice the cameras, but he strolled right on into the street. He wasn't here to perform domestic violence, after all. Lofty was a simple man, and right now he was attending to his basic needs. It was very fortuitous for him that this street was lined with small shops. He walked casually down the street towards the nearest one and proceeded to enter via the door.

Lofty was hard pressed to answer the muggers, he had just been slugged in the chest by a freaking baseball bat. He tried to choke a response to the one with the knife, holding up an index finger indicating he needed a moment. And then the sky started falling. Just a portion of it, actually. A solitary cloud that couldn't have been there before suddenly fell to the ground incredibly fast to obscure the entire alley in soupy fog so thick the muggers would have trouble even seeing their hands in front of their faces.

Of course, the weather conditions weren't right for fog-You needed a certain level of humidity and the right amount of air pressure. Sometimes you even needed to be a certain distance above sea level. The fog dissapated mere moments after falling out of the sky.

Lo and behold, Lofty had vanished like a magic trick, going back the way he came and out the opposite side of the alley into the street beyond to find...

[u]World Three, Overwatch Central[u]

Lofty sat in his cell doing a crossword puzzle. While this may not have looked appealing to the eye of those from Earth, on World Three his shabby and inhospitable cell was comparable to a luxury suite. A crossword puzzle comparable to a TV or computer.

Long ago, World Three had been a planet not unlike Earth, until an advanced alien race calling themselves the Advent arrived. A powerful race of psions, they enslaved most of the planet mentally before moving in. They had been moving from world to world, sucking each one dry before moving on. Because of the rather impersonal nature of the Advent, the planet's name automatically defaulted to "World Three."

The Advent strip-mined the planet, but then they up and left one day without explanation, never to be seen again, leaving behind all the resources they had harvested in storage bunkers all over the planet. The mental haze that had enslaved the minds of the planet's inhabitants was lifted, and chaos followed shortly. Everyone was at different odds and ends now that the Advent was gone, with two factions eventually rising and trying to seize control in the power vacuum. The Restoration Front, containing some 72% of the population, wanted to undo the damage the Advent had done to the planet and return to the old ways.

And then there was the Overwatch.

Comprised of only 11% of the total population, the Overwatch only had one advantage over its massive opponent. They had all been hand-picked by the Advent to be their enforcers. Armed with the Advent's technology they defeated the Restoration Front and made it look easy.

So now the Overwatch rules World Three, and not much has changed from when the Advent ruled. Concentration camps, core drills, orbital factories. The Overwatch itself is a para-military police force, reigning in a genocidal regime that saw large percentages of the population wiped out ceaselessly. Periodic flash cloning to keep the population at a certain minimum was performed.

And even though the resources of the planet were in their hands, the Overwatch decided the planet hadn't given enough yet. They performed dangerous experiments on the atmosphere itself, polluting and corrupting it until it rained, everywhere, all the time.

Having run out of resources to harvest, the Overwatch came up with a final solution. Strip-mine other planets. This has not yet come to pass, for the Advent never bestowed portal or space technology upon World Three. The Overwatch had to make theirs from scratch, and what they had was unstable and delicate. Even now, only two portals exist, and one is still in its testing phase.

And Lofty, property of the Overwatch Hallowed Branch, was about to be disturbed from his crossword in order to be sent o a certain blue planet that World Three had once not been too much different from. A monitor on the wall in front of his desk suddenly sparked to life to present the Overwatch Hallowed symbol, a targeting reticule bent backwards to look like an over-bearing and malevolent eye, rims and center black with the filling between sterile silver. A short fan-fare played, and a voice spoke.

"Device Lofty, heed the words of the Advent. Rise and prepare yourself for a trial of loyalty." A melodic voice sang.

Lofty rolled his eyes behind his mirrored amber glasses. He was a free agent, or a 'device' of the Overwatch. He worked for them, he used their stuff, he got the perks every member got. But he wasn't indoctrinated with what he considered to be 'over-zealous [censored].' Not that he was allowed to express this opinion. He sighed, put down his crossword puzzle, and stood to attention, awaiting the inevitable barrage of flowery religious holier-than-thou-purpose-could-be words.

"A sacred recording of the Advent has gone missing, its sanctuary defiled, and the heretic responsible has retreated to the outside." The melodic voice intoned.

Lofty raised an eyebrow behind his glasses. The 'outside' was basically the entire universe outside the small area of space surrounding World Three. So saying somebody was hiding in the outside was like saying an atom was hiding inside the sun.

"Has the grace of the Advent allowed you to divine as to where the heretic has fled in the outside?" Lofty asked. His voice had a slight accent to it that was difficult to pin down. It could have been mistaken for British, but...Yea, different world.

"The Warden's evaluations of the heretic's whereabouts are complete." The melodic voice confirmed. "It is a hospitable water planet where the super-predator is a humanoid species indistinguishable from our own. I will leave the details to your Monitor. I hereby charge you, Lofty, independent device of the Overwatch, to recover the Advent's recording from the thief who took it. You may take your leave." The screen snapped off, the Hallowed branch's emblem fading.

Lofty looked down at his crossword puzzle. He was restricted to three a moth. They were large, but even so he was almost done with his last one and he still had half a month to go.

'They'd better give me a new crossword for this. He growled inwardly. 'Probably won't, the cheap skates with their flowing white robes and their stupid bandages and their fancy hairstyles and their [censored] politics and their [censored] ideas of what motivation is...' Lofty grabbed a few dozen replacement sunglasses from his desk, (just in case) and marched out of his cell, still internally cursing his employers and groaning about the lackluster quality of his crossword puzzles. He stepped into a bleak grey corridor with cell doors at certain intervals, and he stormed down it until he picked out one of the doors by memory and stormed on in.

The room was a large gun-metallic grey metal box with four corner ledges that rose half-way to the ceiling, with various apparatus in between the gaps created b these corner blocks and a long string of desks and benches in the center floor where drones worked. These were the Monitors, the proverbial watchers. Their job was to watch the watchers, in this case the Warden branch, and they tended to do a lot of proxy work for the Hallowed branch. Lofty worked with them often in his various assignments, being property of the Hallowed branch himself.

He walked over to the nearest bench where one of the many Monitor drones was working, assembling one relic or another using instructions from a recording left behind by the Advent. He gently shoved the recording from beneath the gaze of the Monitors diodes and coughed politely.

"Device Lofty." The Monitor drone said, lifting its bulbous head to survey the man. "All recordings must be handled with care. Mishandling artifacts of the Advent is a punishable offense."

"So is a Monitor allowing itself to be distracted from its duty. Can we skip this and just get on with the proceedings?" Lofty said irritably.

"Fine." The Monitor said dryly. "I have taken note of your questionable behavior, however. I would tread lightly from now on, device Lofty." The drone met Lofty's gaze through his mirrored glasses for a moment. "Moving along..."The drone proceeded to inform Lofty of Earth. Its measurement systems, how to tell time, how many continents there were, basic geological facts and so forth. Lofty carefully processed it all.

"So I want to avoid fighting, right?" Lofty asked the Monitor.

"Correct. Our plans have not yet accommodated this world, and engaging in unnecessary hostilities could be seen as an act of war. Maximum discretion is advised" The Monitor replied.

"Got it, got it...What do I get for help?" Lofty asked expectantly. This was what he considered the fun part. The useful and whimsical gizmo part where he got things like explosive floss and knives disguised as toupees.

"You get a translator." The Monitor said flatly, pulling a rather normal Overwatch badge from beneath the bench and slapping it in front of Lofty.

He blinked.

"That's it?" He asked in disbelief.

"That will be all." The Monitor said nastily.

Lofty sighed and stuffed the translator in his pocket before heading over to the portal. One of two portals in the entire world, the one which actually worked reliably.

"Before I go, one question." Lofty asked casually as he awaited the portal to warm up. "Do they have crosswords there?"

If the Monitor drone could have narrowed its eyes, it would have. "Device Lofty, I hope you are not considering smuggling foreign luxuries back once your task is complete. Doing so is a punishable offense."

'That means yes.' Lofty thought, mentally cheering. "Absolutely. I also plan on bringing back a bunch of the natives to wreck this place."

"Excuse me?" The Monitor said his words sharp and a mechanical hand reaching beneath his bench.

Lofty waved a placating hand at the Monitor drone.

"It was a joke." He said, smiling an easy smile.

***

[u]New India[u]

In an alley behind one of the many lavish buildings in Alharzed's private nation, the air spun around as though a small dust devil were passing through. Light coalesced, and a swirling disc of golden light briefly illuminated the darkness and Lofty stepped through. The golden discus portal faded behind him.

'Hmm. This place looks posh. Fit for the [censored] Advent themselves, I'd say.' Lofty thought to himself, peering around at the relatively dirty back alley. He spotted the main street, and exited the alley to find...

OOC:

Probably not Marcus Cole...Michael Miller? No, it's Jack Miller...Is stumped.

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
OOC:

Masquerade: ...............Holding my arm in this position hurts.

[/ QUOTE ]

((Quit yer whining. In MY day we held our arms twice as long. Uphill. In the snow.))

[/ QUOTE ]

OOC:

Masquerade: Shut up vent man. I know for a FACT your bloated carcass is STUCK in there since you had to set up camp waiting for something to happen. Eating and drinking without being able to leave and get, ya know, exercise...

And the interior of my crimson cloak is begining to lose its glossy look. Happen to have any silk on you?

OOC:

Masquerade: ...............Holding my arm in this position hurts.

Masquerade wasn't one to waste words or time. He slashed at Odette the moment she materialized.

The Recycler’s Final Arc
***

[u]Reduce, Reuse, Recycle[u] (45-50)

[u]1) Unite your enemies[u]

“This is the last string of errands I will be sending you on. Then it will be over. Although I know you love working BACKWARDS through time, we need to do something a tad more realistic now. Trust me, if I could make this any harder for you, I would. I need you to go back in time and get Recycler-33, “Bitter Heath” Nightshade, and Mechanomorphic to meet up. They will all be in Talos, so finding them will be easy. The catch is, they were terrorists long before they met each other. They all planned on fleeing to the Rogue isles after raising all kinds of hell in Paragon and Texas. Longbow caught up with them, and hell hath no fury like supremely pissed off Longbow.”

[u]Accept Mission[u]

Mission Acceptance:

“I have configured the Destiny portal to send you to the right place once again. You will need to rescue those three from Longbow forces, avoid Arachnos, and get them to safety. Longbow is especially pissed off now, they brought their heaviest weapons and best troops. It will be rough.”

Clue: Recycler-33

You don’t recall meeting anybody by that name yet…Probably because you stopped working backwards.

1) Unite your enemies
a. Rescue your enemies (Outdoor Talos map)
i. Rescue Mechanomorphic
ii. Rescue “Bitter Heath” Nightshade
iii. Rescue Recycler-33
iv. Escort your enemies to safety

Notable NPCs:

Mechanomorphic (Civilian NPC)
"Bitter Heath" Nightshade (Civilian NPC)
Recycler-33 (Civilian NPC)
Longbow Ballista (Longbow Ballista) <Longbow> Elite Boss
Longbow Ballista (Longbow Ballista) <Longbow> Elite Boss
Longbow Ballista (Longbow Ballista) <Longbow> Elite Boss
Longbow Psi Warden (Psi Warden) <Longbow> Boss
Longbow Psi Warden (Psi Warden) <Longbow> Boss
Longbow Psi Warden (Psi Warden) <Longbow> Boss
Longbow Psi Warden (Psi Warden) <Longbow> Boss
Longbow Sonic Warden (Psi Warden) <Longbow> Boss
Longbow Sonic Warden (Psi Warden) <Longbow> Boss

Notes:

Your ‘enemies’ are all civilian NPCs with no hitpoints or endurance, with the grey reticule around them. They can’t be damaged, they can’t die. Each of them will be shadow fighting with Longbow, with a Ballista and two Psi Wardens apiece with Recycler-33 getting the sonic wardens. *Bonus points to whoever gets that reference*. Every time you rescue one of them, you’ll trigger a never-ending series of ambushes that will not stop until the end of the mission. This includes while rescuing the other two and while escorting them, and the ambushes stack. Bring lots of friends.

Quotes:

Longbow Ballista: “You’ve got no more gun, Mechanomorphic. What happens now?”
Mechanomorphic: “You’re ridiculous. There’s ALWAYS more gun…”
(on aggro)
Longbow Ballista: “A villain? But during outdoor missions the streets are supposed to be clear of everything but one faction! Get em!”
Mechanomorphic: “Aha! More gun!”
(rescued)
Mechanomorphic: “Thanks for the assist. If you can get me to my waiting sub, I’d appreciate it.”

Longbow Ballista: “Even cornered this guy is nasty…”
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “Gonna [censored] rip your heads off. Shrink em and put em in little jars.”
(on aggro)
Longbow Ballista: “Drop this one quickly, I want everything to be smooth sailing from here.”
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “Drop dead. Kill them slowly!”
(rescued)
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “You’re fine in my book, friend. What do ya want?”

Longbow Ballista: “This freak isn’t human.”
Recycler-33: “All I ever wanted was to slaughter your kind en mass. Is that too much to ask for on this planet?”
(on aggro)
Longbow Ballista: “Nothing can be worse than this guy, we’re gonna put you down.”
Recycler-33: “I see not all of your kind gets along, kekeke…”
(rescued)
Recycler-33: “Thank you there…person…You have something you want me to do?”

Debriefing:

“Good work there. Although this means we will have to work in a more linear fashion now. It upsets me. I am upset.”

[u]2) Plant A.I. in bunker[u]

“So, our three little friends have met up and formed a club. How sweet…All we need to do now is toss them some lemons so they can make lemonade. Take that A.I. you salvaged from that ship and put it somewhere they will find it in their clubhouse in Warburg. I have adjusted the Destiny portal accordingly.”

Clue: Alien A.I.

You still don’t see how this thing could be an A.I. It’s just a crystal ball with some flashing buzz inside it.

2) Plant A.I. in bunker
a. Plant the A.I. (Longbow Bunker)
i. 1 storage container to access
ii. 1 key to find

Notable NPCs:

Defense System (Energy Blast) <Unknown> Elite Boss
Monstrosity (Dark Blast/Energy Blast/Poison/Foot Stomp/Big Meaty Arm Crush) <Unknown> Monster
Buzzers (Devouring Swarm) <Scrin> Minion
Ion Wisp (Squall Elemental) <Lanaruu> Minion
Ion Cloud (Tempest Elemental) <Lanaruu> Lieutenant
Ion Thunderhead (Cyclone Elemental) <Lanaruu> Boss
Sucker Punch Surprise Supreme Turret (Pop-Up Turret) <Turrets> Boss
Meet-Your-Maker Pest Extermination Turret (Gas Missile Turret) <Turrets> Boss
Noxious Gas Emitter (Noxious Gas) <Traps> Medium Object *Lieutenant*
Containment Shield Device (Special) <Objects> Large Object *Boss*
Ionizing Tiberium Deposit (Thunderhead Generator/Spawns Lanaruu) <Turrets> Boss
Buzzer Hive (Spawns Buzzers) <Objects> Large Object *Boss*
Vaporized Tiberium Emitter (Darkest Night and Chill of the Night PBAoE) <Objects> Medium Object *Lieutenant*

Unique Factions:

Robotics:

Assault Bot (Assault Bot) <Robotics> Boss
Protector Bot (Protector Bot) <Robotics> Lieutenant
Battle Drone (Battle Drone) <Robotics> Minion

Mercenaries:

Commando (Commando) <Mercenaries> Boss
Spec. Ops. (Spec. Ops.) <Mercenaries> Lieutenant
Soldier (Soldier) <Mercenaries> Minion

Necromancy:

Lich (Lich) <Necromancy> Boss
Grave Knight (Grave Knight) <Necromancy> Lieutenant
Zombie (Zombie) <Necromancy> Minion

Notes:

Consider this mission ‘practice.’ Hahahahahaha! Anyway, you caught the three when they were out of the house, so it’s just you and their demonic little children and toys to take care of. Henchmen mobs cover the map, each one with a randomly chosen extra in their midst: Landmine, Poison Trap, other Poison Trap, Triage Beacon, Caltrops, Noxious Gas Emitter, Tar Patch, Vaporized Tiberium Emitter, mob-round perma antidotes. There will also be turrets scattered everywhere. We also see the return of the case of the green murk-filled rooms and containment shields.

The final room will have a door that is locked, and a large stationary enemy a bit like the thorn tree blocking it called the ‘Defense System.’ You’ll have to break it to get access to the door itself. As its HP goes down, it will summon reinforcements. The Monstrosity will be in the same room, guarding said door. It looks a lot like Adamastor with the Assault Bot’s arms tacked on and lots of mech stuff nailed into its limbs. It will also summon reinforcements as its hp goes down, and of course, there will be a never ending stream of ambushes until both the Monster and the Defense System are destroyed. The Monstrosity drops a key on defeat, and beyond the locked door is a simple storage room filled with crates and the glowie.

Quotes:

Monstrosity: “Grugh.”
(on aggro)
Defense System: “Defense system online. Engaging intruders.”
Monstrosity: “GRAAAARRRRRGH!”
(at 75% health)
Defense System: “Reinforcements en route.” *Random henchmen summon*
Monstrosity: “GONNE!” *Random henchmen summon*
(at 50% health)
Defense System: “Heavy damage sustained. Additional reinforcements en route.” *Random henchmen summon*
Monstrosity: “MOOOOOAARRRRR GONNE!” *Random henchmen summon*
(at 25% health)
Defense System: “Critical damage sustained. Additional reinforcements en route, activating exhaust system.” *Random henchmen summon, uses nova*
Monstrosity: “MOOOOAARMOOOOAAR GONNE!” *random henchmen summon, uses black star*

Debriefing:

“Mecha-Bio-Zombie troubles? That was their first super-weapon project. Such a pity it got the crap beaten out of it before it could even be deployed. I think their next project will be much more successful.

Oh yes. Very successful indeed.”

[u]3) Sabotage the project[u]

“This is the penultimate of your tasks. Using the Destiny portal once more, you will travel into the past, slightly ahead of when you last went back in time. By then, our three friends will have discovered the A.I. and put it to use. They are getting together the components required to build their next little project, and so I am sending you to sabotage their efforts. Take this virus, and download it into the terminal of the storage facility said components are being kept in. I will warn you that the facility will be heavily defended. More so than any of the other places you have raided thus far. Bring some help, it will be fun.”

[u]Accept Mission[u]

Mission Acceptance

“The target of the virus will not, in fact, be utterly crippled. It will be more of a temporary inconvenience that you will exploit in the near future.”

Clue: Computer Virus

A simple flash drive that is going to cripple a super-weapon while it’s still being built. Lovely.

3) Sabotage the project
a. Plant the virus (Abandoned Derelict Warehouse/Longbow Bunker)
i. 1 terminal to access
ii. destroy the Solid Shadow Generator

Notable NPCs:

Defense System (Energy Blast) <Unknown> Elite Boss
Defense System (Energy Blast) <Unknown> Elite Boss
Defense System (Energy Blast) <Unknown> Elite Boss
Sucker Punch Surprise Supreme Turret (Pop-Up Turret) <Turrets> Boss
Solid Shadow Generator (Fear PBAoE/Black Star) <Objects> Extremely Fortified Equipment *100,000 HP. No regen.*
Minor Shadow (Minor Shadow) <Praetorians> Minion
Shadow (Shadow) <Praetorians> Lieutenant
Master Shadow (Master Shadow) <Praetorians> Boss
Unseelie (Unseelie) <Unseelie Court> Minion
Horde (Horde) <Unseelie Court> Lieutenant
Hell Rider (Hell Rider) <Unseelie Court> Boss
Dark Terror (Dark Servant) <Dark Miasma> Lieutenant
Spectral Terror (Spectral Terror) <Illusions> Untouchable

Unique Factions:

Robotics:

Assault Bot (Assault Bot) <Robotics> Boss
Protector Bot (Protector Bot) <Robotics> Lieutenant
Battle Drone (Battle Drone) <Robotics> Minion

Mercenaries:

Commando (Commando) <Mercenaries> Boss
Spec. Ops. (Spec. Ops.) <Mercenaries> Lieutenant
Soldier (Soldier) <Mercenaries> Minion

Necromancy:

Lich (Lich) <Necromancy> Boss
Grave Knight (Grave Knight) <Necromancy> Lieutenant
Zombie (Zombie) <Necromancy> Minion

Notes:

Big empty spooky warehouse. No enemies anywhere. Take one step past the entrance area and suddenly you will start being ambushed. No set mobs, pure ambush mission. Larslarslars. Anyway, the ambushes will randomly consist of the Praetorian Shadows and the Unseelie Court. Dark Servants and Spectral Terrors will randomly spawn by you from time to time. The Solid Shadow Generator all the way in the back of the mission also has a gigantic PBAoE that covers the entire mission map that induces a Mag 2 fear effect once every fifteen seconds that lasts for ten. So you need to get to the Solid Shadow Generator and wear through its hp. As its hp goes down, it will summon massive amounts of reinforcements. On defeat, all ambushes and random spawns will stop. The room with the generator in it shifts from a Warehouse to a Longbow Bunker, and the room after that has a single locked door. Get to the middle of the room and 3 Defense Systems like the one from the last mission rise up over the door and on the walls to the side along with several pop-up turrets, and start blasting you. They will summon random henchmen as their hp is depleted. Destroy all 3 to get the key to the door and the last room.

Last room has a large pit in it that contains a four-legged battle mech, slightly taller than the Mega-Mech and surrounded by the blue force fields seen in outdoor missions. Best comparison I could find is this.. The glowie terminal is right in front of this pit, no extra complications tacked on.

Quotes:

(at 75% health)
Solid Shadow Generator: “Minor exterior damage received, increasing output.” *Summons multiple mobs of Praetorian Shadows and Unseelie Court*
(at 50% damage)
Solid Shadow Generator: “Moderate exterior damage received, increasing output.” *Summons multiple mobs of Praetorian Shadows and Unseelie Court*
(at 25% health)
Solid Shadow Generator: “Heavy exterior damage received, increasing output, activating exhaust system.” *Summons multiple mobs of Praetorian Shadows and Unseelie Court, uses black star*

(on aggro)
Defense System: “Defense system online. Engaging intruders.”
(at 75% health)
Defense System: “Reinforcements en route.” *Random henchmen summon*
(at 50% health)
Defense System: “Heavy damage sustained. Additional reinforcements en route.” *Random henchmen summon*
(at 25% health)
Defense System: “Critical damage sustained. Additional reinforcements en route, activating exhaust system.” *Random henchmen summon, uses nova*

Debriefing:

“I assume you saw the huge machine they have hiding in there? Well, it is finally time to tell you…”

[u]4) Stop the War Machine[u]

“The large construct you saw in your last mission is the main body for the war machine currently being constructed by the delightful terror trio. The virus you planted in its construction terminal made several modifications to it that will render all of it completely useless upon deployment. However! The head and arms failed to malfunction, so they will still work. Our three friends will be able to fix it in time, but until then, we will have what could accurately be described as the destroyer of nations stuck in a bunker because it cannot move its legs. During this time, you will go and defeat our three friends, destroy the active parts of the war machine, and destroy the inactive parts using these bombs. I warn you-even the head of the machine is bristling with high-end weapons. It will probably be harder to defeat than the Monstrosity they built. And of course, there is the terrifying trio themselves. Mechanomorphic, “Bitter Heath” Nightshade and Recycler 33.”

[u]Accept Mission[u]

Mission Acceptance

“I am afraid to wish you good luck. It implies there is a chance of you failing.”

Clue: Very small canister bomb

This thing creeps you out. It has too many warning labels to count, (including radiation and bio-hazard and a bunch of others you don’t even recognize) and you swear it stings just to hold the thing. You’d hate to be around when this goes off-The Recycler pulled it out of a cavity in his chest. Perhaps he made it?

4) Stop the War Machine
a. Defeat all enemies in mission (Longbow Bunker)
i. 1 bomb to plant

Notable NPCs:

Defense System (Energy Blast) <Unknown> Elite Boss
Buzzers (Devouring Swarm) <Scrin> Minion
Ion Wisp (Squall Elemental) <Lanaruu> Minion
Ion Cloud (Tempest Elemental) <Lanaruu> Lieutenant
Ion Thunderhead (Cyclone Elemental) <Lanaruu> Boss
Sucker Punch Surprise Supreme Turret (Pop-Up Turret) <Turrets> Boss
Meet-Your-Maker Pest Extermination Turret (Gas Missile Turret) <Turrets> Boss
Noxious Gas Emitter (Noxious Gas) <Traps> Medium Object *Lieutenant*
Containment Shield Device (Special) <Objects> Large Object *Boss*
Ionizing Tiberium Deposit (Thunderhead Generator/Spawns Lanaruu) <Turrets> Boss
Buzzer Hive (Spawns Buzzers) <Objects> Large Object *Boss*
Vaporized Tiberium Emitter (Darkest Night and Chill of the Night PBAoE) <Objects> Medium Object *Lieutenant*
Assault Drone Mk. 1 (Battle Drone) <Robotics> Boss
Assault Drone Mk. 2 (Protector Bot) <Robotics> Boss
Assault Drone Mk. 3 (Assault Bot) <Robotics> Boss
Assault Drone Mk. 4 (PPD Enforcer) <Robotics> Elite Boss
Mechanomorphic (Robotics/Traps Mastermind) <Unknown> Arch-villain
Bio-Militant (Soldier) <Mercenaries> Boss
Bio-Ghost (Spec. Ops.) <Mercenaries> Boss
Bio-Tank (Commando) <Mercenaries> Boss
Bio-Giant (Smaller Adamastor) <Mercenaries> Elite Boss
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade (Mercenaries/Poison Mastermind) <Unknown> Arch-villain
Awakened (Zombies) <Necromancy> Boss
Enlightened (Grave Knight) <Necromancy> Boss
Cultist (Lich) <Necromancy> Boss
Tiberium Titan (Smaller Crystal Titan) <Scrin> Elite Boss
Recycler-33 (Necromancy/Dark Miasma Mastermind) <Unknown> Arch-villain
Right Shoulder Pod (High Explosive Missile Turret/Incendiary Missile Turret/Toxic Gas Missile Turret) <Recycler> Elite Boss
Left Shoulder Pod (High Explosive Missile Turret/Incendiary Missile Turret/Toxic Gas Missile Turret) <Recycler> Elite Boss
Head of the Recycler (M30 Grenade/Flamethrower/Ignite/Ball Lightning/Thunderous Blast/Lightning Rod no teleport/Energy Torrent/Explosive Blast/Nova/Electron Haze/Neutron Bomb/Atomic Blast/Swarm Missiles/Incendiary Missiles/High Explosive Missiles) <Recycler> Giant Monster

Unique Factions:

Robotics:

Assault Bot (Assault Bot) <Robotics> Boss
Protector Bot (Protector Bot) <Robotics> Lieutenant
Battle Drone (Battle Drone) <Robotics> Minion

Mercenaries:

Commando (Commando) <Mercenaries> Boss
Spec. Ops. (Spec. Ops.) <Mercenaries> Lieutenant
Soldier (Soldier) <Mercenaries> Minion

Necromancy:

Lich (Lich) <Necromancy> Boss
Grave Knight (Grave Knight) <Necromancy> Lieutenant
Zombie (Zombie) <Necromancy> Minion

Notes:

The return of the green poisonous murk and all the turrets and the randomly scattered mob-aiding traps and powers. The door leading to the final room will be blocked by the Defense System, once again. Defeat it to proceed through the door it blocks and into the final room, where a nice cutscene will play. The room looks a lot like, what I can describe best as, “The Longbow Bunker version of the mega-mek cavern.” Lots of catwalks filled with enemies and special EBs mixed in that you’ll have to fight your way up until you reach the AVs at the top. In the center of all the catwalks is the War Machine. The final enemy does not appear until you have defeated the three AVs, Mechanomorphic, “Bitter Heath” Nightshade and Recycler-33. Each of them will spawn with a minimum of 1 henchmen, the number of which will increase depending on difficulty and team size. No ambushes this time around, but they can resummon their henchmen. And yes, you have to fight all three at once. When they have all fallen, another cutscene plays and you get to fight the GM.

The GM is the giant machine’s head, and because of its position on its chest rather than atop it, you can only attack it from the front. This is why it has so many AoE attacks, kekeke. Its shoulder pods will back it up, and can be destroyed. But they will respawn after being destroyed, so you’ll just have to put up with them. The glowie is at the base of the machine, in between its four legs.

Quotes:

(on aggro)
Defense System: “Defense system online. Engaging intruders.”
(at 75% health)
Defense System: “Reinforcements en route.” *Random henchmen summon*
(at 50% health)
Defense System: “Heavy damage sustained. Additional reinforcements en route.” *Random henchmen summon*
(at 25% health)
Defense System: “Critical damage sustained. Additional reinforcements en route, activating exhaust system.” *Random henchmen summon, uses nova*

Cutscene

“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “The Defense System stopped responding, we will have company very shortly.”
Recycler-33: “Too bad for them…and everyone else…that our masterpiece is already complete. We just need to turn it on. Do it!”
Mechanomorphic: “If I did that, it wouldn’t be able to launch. I performed a just-in-case scan, the torso and legs are entirely dead. Something got screwed up in their construction. I already have nanites fixin the problem, but it will take a while.”
Recycler-33: “Who could have done that? No matter. We just have to hold our ground until repairs are done.”
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “Alright boys, you heard them! Battle stations, now!”

Cutscene End

(on aggro)

Mechanomorphic: “Can’t get much more gun than this. You can’t win.”
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “Get comfortable while I warm up my neurotoxin emitters…Oh wait, they’re already warmed up. Ok then. DIE PAINFULLY [censored]!”
Recycler-33: “…! It’s you!”
(at 75% health)
Mechanomorphic: “Awww, darnit. You’re not an easy problem to solve…”
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “Cough…Gack…Neurotoxin…So deadly…BWAHAHAHAHAHA JUST KIDDING! Honestly it’s not deadly at all…To me…”
Recycler-33: “Crash my ship and strand me, will you? Time to return the favor…”
(at 25% health)
Mechanomorphic: “I can’t lose…I have far too much gun to be losing…”
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “[censored] it all, this is [censored]. Just Die. DIE. DIEDIEDIEDIE!”
Recycler-33: “Not again. Not again.”
(defeated)
Mechanomorphic: “So much gun…Just proves…Needed more…”
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “Gonna [censored] hunt you down…Gonna [censored] KILL you.”
Recycler-33: “It doesn’t matter! It might not be able to move, but it can still KILL YOU!”

Cutscene

Head of the Recycler: “Recycler online. Structural flaws detected, running scan. Completed, rerouting power supply. Targeting hostiles…”

Cutscene End

(at 75% health)
“Moderate damage sustained, threat calculation complete. Preparing for escape launch.”
(at 50% health)
“Heavy damage sustained, launch sequence preparations complete. Beginning final cycle.”
(at 25% damage)
“Critical damage sustained, initiating launch sequence.”
(defeat)
“Extreme damage sustained, launching…” *Head detaches from the body and launches into the darkness above*

Clue: War Machine’s Name

The name of the War Machine was printed on one of its legs, impossible to miss. “The Recycler.”

Debriefing:

“Your victory was superb. You may be interested to hear that Recycler-33 survived the explosion. I do not know how, he was at ground zero when it occurred. It hardly matters though, because he was buried under a few thousand tons of rock and metal. He is still waiting to be dug out. Nightshade already had an emergency teleport ready, as did Mechanomorphic. They went-Well, I think you probably already know. Here, take this little time-line. I made it just for you, keep it as a memento if you like.

This is goodbye, villainname. Goodbye. Thank you for all the help.

Now go die in a fire.”

Souvenir:

This is a time-line listing the chronological order of the tasks you performed for the Recycler, along with the actions performed by certain others. It is enlightening, to say the least. It also bears some semblance to a ‘To Do’ list. It serves as a memento to a series of ordeals you call:

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

1833-Send villainname to crash Recycler-33’s ship in Texas, Beetle Cave. Mud slide completely covers ship, is not dug up until 1970. Ship A.I. stolen, not seen again until 2001.

1955-Arrive in the past, begin finding a way to destroy Grandville.

1956-Decided to use Warburg nuke, get defeated by villainname. Travel to 2005 to be repaired by Nightshade.

1970-Mechanomorphic digs up crashed Scrin scouting vessel, Recycler-33 escapes. Neither notices the other. Mechanomorphic gets private government funding for research on the vessel.

1977-Mechanomorphic goes rogue with government finances and alien technology.

1985-Heath’s advances in the fields of toxins catches Arachnos’ attention, lab gets raided. Gains toxic powers and warped biology during the accident.

1996-Arrive in past after discovering Mechanomorphic’s defeat, try looking into the Lee Towers for an answer. Get defeated for the last time by villainname, memory core left behind. Taken by inhabitants of Lee Towers? Blank memory spot until 2015.

2000-Villainname introduces Mechanomorphic, Nightshade, Recycler-33 to each other.

2001-Villainname leaves alien A.I. to be found by Mechanomorphic, trio begins my construction.

2003-Come to life, promptly get the crap kicked out of my chassis for the first time by villainname. Escape by jettisoning from original body, gets blown up. Recycler-33 buried, remains so until at least 2015.

2004-Travel back to 1955, find a way to avert defeat by villainname by destroying Grandville.

2005-Sent word ahead, travel back into the future to be repaired by Nightshade. Warehouse completely destroyed upon arrival, get infected and become fully sentient by sentience virus. Decide to travel as far as possible into the future.

2006-Sent word back through time, travel there to be repaired by Mechanomorphic. Warehouse leveled upon arrival. Go back to 1996 to find means of repair.

2008-Meets villainname, cunning plan developed. Remind self to draw up time-line. Receive time-line from the future and hand it off to villainname.

2009-Business with villainname finished, had good laugh. Learned definition of IRONY. Travel to 42615 to begin construction of new threshold tower.

2015-Memory core recovered from Lee Towers by Manticore. Stolen by villainname, turned over to Arachnos. Gets body, escapes Arachnos, travels back to 2008 to sort the whole mess out from the beginning.

41563-Life is good. Get together plans for ‘Threshold Tower.’ Sounds promising. Leave to check on drone reinforcements from Mechanomorphic, leave sentience virus to guard the plans.

41562-Threshold Tower in the Shadow Shard plan did not take. Third defeat by villainname, Threshold Tower foundation blown up. Travel back to 2006 to be repaired by Mechanomorphic.

42615-Construction of Threshold Tower going well. Villainname has not yet arrived to slag me. Feeling optimistic. Decided to balance bending of time along the edge of the universe using temporal energy generated from stable time loop created by villainname and me. Laughed after coming up with plan. Sent finished time-line to myself in 2008.

Additionally, this forum is VERY small. You have a higher chance of winning the powerball than running into one of us in-game. That and we don't really tend to 'in-game' RP.

Unless they've been doing it behind my back.

OOC:

Masquerade cast TP foe on Odette, still waiting on that.

Returning to the Recycler as a Contact

***
[u]A.I. is a Crapshoot[u] (45-50)

[u]1) Switch the Construction Plans[u]

“Have you freshened up since our last encounter? Excellent. I have some good news and some bad news for you. The bad news is, if you do not do what I say, I will cease to exist and all the resources I have expended on you will also cease to exist, which makes one wonder what, exactly, would happen to YOU.

“Thankfully, the good news is that I still plan on hiring your services rather than trying to force you to help me. Just think of it as a coincidence that you now have a potentially lethal time paradox hanging over your head. It will go away if you help me, which is what I am hiring you to do. So no worries. First, we need to make sure that the Shadow Shard Threshold Tower’s construction was planned so you could show up and wreck it.”

[u][censored] Time Travel[u]

Mission Acceptance:

“Ok, the plans for the tower originally had it placed near the edge of the universe. The plan was to construct it so that once it looped and re-joined with itself, the tower would actually be a gigantic ring. Coincidentally, it would also be the largest structure in this universe and quite a few others I believe. However, the Shadow Shard is most notably, NOT at the edge of this Universe. It is, in fact, its own universe entirely. Not only would this have made the ring structure smaller than planned, but nobody ever got that far because you showed up. I have adjusted the Destiny portal to send you to the right place. It will be unusual, as it is quite a bit ‘out there…’ but you have probably seen weirder by now.”

Clue: Time Paradox?

Something the Recycler said to you a while ago before this whole time paradox business bothers you…He had implied that a time paradox would be impossible when he said time is linear. What is he trying to pull?

1) Switch the Construction Plans
a. Switch the plans (Indoor Rikti Map)
i. 1 Terminal to access
ii. Defeat the Sentience Virus Perfect Manifest

Notable NPCs:

Sentience Virus Perfect Physical Manifest (Deathsurge) <Cap Au Diable Demons> Elite Boss
Cosmic Entity (Cyclone Elemental) <Lanaruu> Boss
Star Denizen (Tempest Elemental) <Lanaruu> Lieutenant
Otherworldly Being (Squall Elemental) <Lanaruu> Minion
Sentience Virus Imperfect Physical Manifest (Gremlin) <Cap Au Diable Demons> Minion

Notes:

The entire map is scattered with Gremlin and Lanaruu mobs, with Deathsurge in the final room and the glowie behind it. Just slaughter the mobs, kill Deathsurge, click the glowie.

Quotes:

Sentience Virus Perfect Physical Manifest: “Objective: Defend terminal.”
(on aggro)
Sentience Virus Perfect Physical Manifest: “Engaging hostile.”
(player defeat)
Sentience Virus Perfect Physical Manifest: “Hostile eliminated.”

Debriefing”

“Good job there. Working backwards chronologically is not so hard, no?”

[u]2) Plant Sentience Virus[u]

“So, remember the big bad electro baddies from your last jaunt? We need to make sure they existed. Which means you just need to plant this virus I had concocted in the right place. This is much easier said than done, and I would strongly encourage you to bring help on this mission.”

[u]If they never existed I never got infamy for defeating them. Let’s do this.[u]

Mission Acceptance:

“This is an underground bunker in Warburg this time around. I am not quite clear of what was inside of it. Fuzzy memory, in no small part thanks to you. Do not worry, it is a good thing. Could be Arachnoids for all I know. The only thing I do remember is that there is something truly horrific and pestilent within. As long as you are there, wreck everything. Any equipment you find, anybody you see, and so forth.”

Clue: Memory

This sounds an awful lot like the last mission you had from the Recycler that was in Warburg.

2) Plant Sentience Virus
a. Plant Sentience Virus (Longbow Lab Map)
i. Defeat all enemies in mission
ii. 1 terminal to access
iii. 1 supply cache to destroy *glowie*
iv. 1 nano-assembler to destroy
v. 1 key to find

Notable NPCs:

"Bitter Heath" Nightshade (Mercenaries/Poison Mastermind) <Unknown> Elite Boss
Bio-Tank (Commando) <Unknown> Boss
Bio-Ghost (Spec. Ops.) <Unknown> Boss
Bio-Militant (Soldier) <Unknown> Lieutenant
Bio-Ghost Squad Leader (Spec. Ops.) <Unknown> Elite Boss
Noxious Gas Emitter (Noxious Gas) <Traps> Medium Object *Lieutenant*
Containment Shield Device (Special) <Objects> Large Object *Boss*

Unique Faction:

Mercenaries:

Commando (Commando) <Mercenaries> Boss
Spec. Ops. (Spec. Ops.) <Mercenaries> Lieutenant
Soldier (Soldier) <Mercenaries> Minion

Notes:

First thing that should be mentioned: After the first door, there is a visible green murk in the air that acts a lot like the radiation in the Terra Volta trial. You will constantly take damage and take a hefty regeneration penalty while you are in an area with this murk. This can be avoided using the Containment Shield Device. This handy object will, you guessed it, grant you a containment shield whenever you step inside it. Just like the one from the TV trial! The containment field will protect you from the effects of the murk and has a duration of five minutes. This should be just enough time to reach one of the many checkpoints in the mission, a room with no murk in it as well as another Containment Shield Device. There is also a jail in the map where you will respawn as opposed to the hospital or base, which you will have to break your way out of.

Every mob except the special situational mobs near the end of the map will spawn with either a poison trap in their midst, with every member of the mob buffed with a permanent antidote, or a Noxious Gas Emitter that emits Noxious Gas in a moderate PBAoE. Yea.

About halfway through the mission, you’ll come across a very wide and empty room with several balconies higher up on every wall, and the terminal in the center of the room and a locked door on the other side. Clicking on the glowie results in a cut-scene, followed by the insta-spawn of a varying number of Bio-Ops and the Bio-Ops Squad Leader on the balconies above, who will all start sniping away your pretty health bar, and your little debt bar too! To make things even more game-breaking, four Noxious Gas Emitters will spawn in a square around the terminal you just clicked on. Defeating the Bio-Ops and the Squad Leader earns you the key to unlock the door to the next room. The Bio-Ops Squad Leader has permanent applications of antidote and Noxious Gas.

Nightshade spawns in the last room with the rest of the glowies and with a decreasing or increasing number of his special henchmen around him depending on the difficulty level and the size of your team. He will not resummon defeated henchmen, but will instead summon more as his HP drops. There will be a continuous stream of mercenary ambushes starting the moment you aggro him. The battle starts with him having three Noxious Gas Emitters surrounding him, but these, like the others, may be destroyed.

Quotes:

Commando: “So. Been quiet today. No Arachnoids stumbling in by accident or nothing.”
Spec. Ops. “Yep.”
Soldier: “This really sucks…”
(on aggro)
Commander: “INTRUDER! BLASTIN TIME!”
Spec. Ops.: “That’s what we’re here for: Activating the alarms!”
Soldier: “Ok, I take that back…”

Cutscene

Bio-Ops Squad Leader: “Did you really think we were just going to sit around while the alarms were blaring and with you trashing everybody? Start prayin, PAL. You don’t have [censored] for time to do anything else.”
*Camera pan out to reveal varying number of Bio-Ops depending on difficulty and team size flip off their cloaking devices and aim their rifles at you. They will all re-cloak once you have damaged or destroyed any of them or the Noxious Gas Emitters*

“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “An intruder in the base. And that damned machine still hasn’t arrived yet.”
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “And to top it all off, now there’s a virus in the failsafe terminal. That’s gonna take HOURS to purge once this is all over.”
(on aggro)
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “Villainname! You [censored] [censored] [censored] piece of [censored] [censored]! Gonna [censored] kill you!”
(at 75% health)
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “Once you’re dead, I’ll revive you as my Bio-slave. I’ll tie you to a rack and do nasty things to you. Nasty things involving knives and bolts with a side-order of neurotoxins. Super-sized, [censored].” *summons an additional number of Bio-Militants depending on the difficulty and team size*
(at 50% health)
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “I’ll stick a needle in your head and rewrite your entire [censored] life. It’ll be a living hell, and then I’ll ramp it up with experimental chemical weapons, keeping you alive the whole time…I’ll even put a mirror in front of ya.” *summons an additional number of Bio-Tanks depending on the difficulty and team size*
(at 25% health)
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “Gragh…you will PAY…You’ll pay over and over again…Forever…” *summons an additional number of Bio-Ops depending on the difficulty and team size*
(defeated)
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “…..[censored] it all…..”
(player defeat)
“Bitter Heath” Nightshade: “Now you just wait in one of my charming little cells for a while. I’ll be coming for you soon, villainname.”

Debriefing:

“Hey, you look like you went through hell. Or a septic tank. A purple guy in green-grey armor? Violent personality? Toxic murk and bio-soldiers? That would be “Bitter Heath” Nightshade you fought there. Another terrorist, worked with Mechanomorphic. Used to be two separate names, both derived from the rumors that he only killed using poisons you needed to consume or come into contact with your tongue. Both just merged together after a while. Utter rubbish, but it certainly makes for a catchy alias. You will be seeing him again later.”

[u]3) Prevent the Warburg Rocket from launching[u]

“So a long long time ago, during what you called the Cold War, the U.S. and theSoviet Union were not the only ones with nuclear power. Lord Recluse was here, still reveling in his recent military coup of the Rogue Isles. And stoked hot with his own armament of nuclear weapons. He was smart enough to continue with the Rogue Isles’ neutrality. Some genius got it into their mind to launch a nuke anyway, and this is WAY before Marshall Blitz. Do you recall any non-test atomic detonations that may have been highly publicized during the Cold War?”

[u]I see where this is heading[u]

Mission Acceptance:

“Good. This one should be simple. Just go in and stop the missile from launching. Arachnos does not know about it, so they will attack you, but they will not be too persistent about it. Warburg was still part of the Rogue Isles back then.”

Clue: Funny thought

You have to wonder what Arachnos looked like that long ago...

3) Prevent the Warburg rocket from launching
a. Stop the missile launch (outdoor, non-wrecked Warburg)
i. Defeat the Humongous War Machine

Notable NPCs:

Humongous War Machine (PPD Enforcer/Energy Blast/Electrical Assault/Assault Rifle/Assault Bot) <Unknown> Arch-villain

Unique Faction:

Robotics:

Assault Bot (Assault Bot) <Robotics> Boss
Protector Bot (Protector Bot) <Robotics> Lieutenant
Battle Drone (Battle Drone) <Robotics> Minion

Retro Arachnos:

Wolf Spider Huntsman (Wolf Spider Huntsman) <Arachnos> Boss
Wolf Spider Tac Ops (Wolf Spider Tac Ops) <Arachnos> Lieutenant
Wolf Spider Assault (Wolf Spider Assault) <Arachnos> Minion
Wolf Spider Enforcer (Wolf Spider Enforcer) <Arachnos> Minion

Notes:

Outdoor Warburg map, minus bunkers and debris and randomly placed Arachnos outposts. Looks like a regular Rogue Isle city…With a nuclear missile launching facility. At the start of the mission, you’ll see some Retro Arachnos fighting some drones, but they’ll both team up to beat you. After that, it’s all drones until you reach the base of the missile launcher, where you’ll find the Humongous War Machine. It looks like a fully upgraded Assault Bot with black and white body paint. Oh, and it’s only a few feet smaller than Kronos. The moment it’s aggroed, there will be a continuous stream of drone ambushes that will stack over time. Just defeat the Humongous War Machine to end the mission.

Quotes:

Arachnos Tac Ops: “Man, this Arachnos thing was cool at first…but all the fighting sucks.”
Arachnos Enforcer: “And these suits…Ugh…”
Assault Bot: “Eliminate Hostiles.”
(on aggro)
Arachnos Tac Ops: “Look, it’s a PC!”
Arachnos Enforcer: “What?”
Arachnos Tac Ops: “Just shoot!”

Humongous War Machine: “Launch codes confirmed. Initiating launch sequence.”
(on aggro)
Humongous War Machine: “Launch sequence aborted. Engaging hostile.”
(on defeat)
Humongous War Machine: “Retreating for repairs.” *teleports upon defeat*

Debriefing:

“Great work. To be honest with you, preventing the missile from launching was only half the reason I sent you. You will see why later.”

[u]4) Attack the alien dropship[u]

“Today you will be going further back in time than you have ever gone for me before. Back in 1833, an alien scouting vessel-Not of Rikti or Nictus origin-was passing by Earth. They would have ignored us, had you not shown up mysteriously and caused it to crash land. If the sole surviving member of the ship is anything to go by, fighting the ship’s crew is going to be pure hell. I would bring help on this one.”

[u]Accept Mission. That’s right, no fancy dialogue. I ran out of clever ideas, sue me.[u]

Mission Acceptance:

“Take this bomb and plant it next to the engine. How you find it is up to you, I am as lost as you on this point. Also, there should be an A.I. piloting the ship. You will need to deactivate and steal this before leaving.”

Clue: Bomb

Another Arachnos omega bomb. You know from personal experience that it’ll get the job done.

4) Attack the alien dropship
a. Cause the dropship to crash (indoor Rikti map)
i. Defeat all enemies in mission
ii. 1 bomb to plant
iii. 1 Terminal to access

Notable NPCs:

Animated Tiberium Shard (Geode Shard) <Scrin> Underling
Animated Tiberium Crystal (Geode) <Scrin> Minion
Buzzers (Devouring Swarm) <Scrin> Minion
Prodigy Spawn (Fungoid) <Scrin> Lieutenant
Tiberium Deposit (Will of the Earth) <Scrin> Lieutenant
Reaper-17 Warrior (Greater Devoured) <Scrin> Boss
Deployment Node (Spawn Chamber) <Scrin> Boss
Tiberium Titan (Crystal Titan) <Scrin> Elite Boss
Supervisor Recycler-33 (Mitochondria Electrolytes) <Scrin> Arch-villain

Notes:

Crossovers, anyone? Devouring Earth mobs with different names, with Will of the Earth randomly scattered around which will spawn more enemies. You’ll find the engine room around half-way through. There will be a wall of crystal blocking the entrance, attack it and it will unfold into the Tiberium Titan and try to smash you. Beyond is the bomb point. In the final room, there will be four Deployment Nodes surrounding the mit-sorry, Supervisor Recycler-33. The moment you aggro it, there will be a continuous stream of ambushes that will stack until it is defeated.

Quotes:

They are aliens. They don’t speak English. I was going to put something in anyway, but it felt fairly ridiculous. I guess in this situation they would all be given their Dev-given dia-wait, no that wouldn’t work either. Sigh.

Clue: Crystalline Orb

As far as you can figure it, this is the A.I. the Recycler told to steal. There’s no way to be positive, but the sudden lurch you felt when you removed it from its place and sudden increase of temperature from entering Earth’s atmosphere was a bit of a dead give-away.

Debriefing

“You will be pleased to know that the dropship crash landed at Beetle Cave, Texas. The wreckage will be covered by a mud-slide, of all things, and the sole survivor will not be dug out for a good hundred and forty seven years. It is important. I will have to tell you about it someday. Keep a hold of that A.I. for the time being, you will have need of it soon.”

Souvenir: Crystalline Orb

This orb is an A.I. that you stole from an alien dropship in an adventure you like to refer to as-

A.I. is a Crapshoot.

The Recycler sent you into the past to destroy the original plans for the Threshold Tower so that it would be built in the Shadow Shard instead of at the edge of the universe. The mission went fine, and you came back to have the whole thing made more complicated than necessary when you were told you had to go back in time again and make sure the guards you had fought ever existed, and thought that planting a virus somewhere in Warburg would do the trick. You didn’t see the connection, but you went there anyway to discover the hideout of “Bitter Heath” Nightshade, an extremely violent and toxic specimen who seemed to know you. You defeated him along with his soldiers, and planted the virus as you were instructed. The bunker this was in bore a striking resemblance to the one from your previous mission in Warburg involving Mechanomorphic, in that it looked to be custom built to service one machine.

You were then sent into the past to stop a large war mech from launching a Warburg missile during the cold war, and although the historical importance is justification enough, it’s just plain wierd. This was about when you started to wonder just how all these events were connected, considering how random they all seemed. Your wonder turned into disbelief when the Recycler sent you to sabotage an alien dropship that had been passing by Earth in 1833 and cause it to crash, not of Rikti or Nictus origin but something else entirely. After that, the Recycler told you to take a break, mentioning that he’ll have to tell you about it all someday.

We peoples of the RP forum do not condone LARPing in any mannerism.

I suspect Banes receive no special training whatsoever. They are are conditioned to lack free will and act as a 'hive mind.' Just one Bane knowing something means all other banes will also know it. Aside from some basic physical conditioning with a side-order of cybernetic implants, training to be a Bane just involves being a good listener.

Widows, on the other hand, would have a rigerous extensive training program that would hone their physical prowess as well as focus their pyschic abilities. I suspect that Widows don't receive much cybernetic augmentations unless they decide to become spider queens, so boot camp for a widow would be kinda like hell cubed on steroids and crack. With a survival rate of only 28%. Ish. Training would probably last for years, since most widows are indoctrinated at an early age and probably spend most of their teens doing nothing but training.

No.