Nerrone's Rangers IC

Grecsh was in his compartment, suiting up for their upcoming mission. He opened up a box that he had carried with him from the Ponderra, lifting out a shielding device that he had never used before. It was supposed to hook onto his current armor setup, but on his back. After fiddling with it for a few minutes, he managed to get it hooked up to a socket under an unhinging plate on his back. Flicking a switch on his wrist, he heard a slow whirring noise that turned into a peaceful humming, emanating from his new equipment.

It was a low-power, form-fitting shield generator, designed to protect the user from light gunfire. It could protect him from two or three heavy explosions, but it would short out after too many hits. He had heard that some higher end dealers could modify the setup to give it a longer life and more protection.

I just had to remember this after we were at the market in Santa Frerraro...

((Edit: If anyone is wondering, I did mention this shield generator in my character profile for Grecsh, I just hadn't mentioned in IC.))

Back in Quark's quarters, Quark found himself stirring and when he woke up to see the shredded hole in his roof. He also noticed a bit of a commotion aboard, so he put on his lab coat and got his tools. He seemed a bit mad due to the fact that he had just gotten a nap, and that he may have even morerepairing to do. Also his ship improvement plan would once again need to be postponed. Aside from his annoyance, he decided to first contact Kwa through his com. saying: "Kwa, it's Quark, I'm sorry for any inconveniences I may have cause on the last mission, including 'Cuna, but I noticed a bit off commotion, and I was wondering if everything's OK."

((Sorry for my absence and sorry if this post is a bit weird, but I needed a quick jump-start back into the story))

Zeriax threw his pistol in the air and caught it again in a gesture of 'I only wanted to go home, not be a part of a garage band'. He set his gaze toward Kwa.

"I knew you would try to keep me here, babe." Zeriax grinned. Zeriax suddenly became serious as he looked at the team. "What now? Do we have an actual plan or are we just going to rush in like idiots? Because that's what I hear you merc types do." Zeriax said, mocking all mercenaries in general.

Zeriax never really liked mercenaries. From his experience mercenaries had no skill, no precision, always risking the lives of the innocent just for money. He hoped that they weren't the same. That's why he had quit being a hired gun and decided to be a rouge assassin in the first place.

Flank sighed. "Not that this isn't exciting, but I'm stagnating." With that he walked away from the cockpit and headed toward the aft bathroom. Shutting himself inside, he began to pull his armour off in pieces, some taking longer than others after being glued to his skin with dried blood. Then, he shoved a cork from his backpack into the barrel of his cannon and got into the shower.

The hot water almost sent him to sleep, but the constant RAP of it against the metal parts of his body kept him awake. To his relief, the accumulated filth washed off his body easily, turning the water a dark red brown.

When he was clean and dry, he took a worn-out cloth from his backpack and a tub of metal polish, and dipped the former into the latter. Using said cloth, he rubbed down his cannon barrel, protective shield plate, scope, tail, chest lens and back plate, leaving the gun metal grey surface shiny and pristine.

By the time he stepped out of the bathroom, he could have passed for a different Ravis.

Celdryc wasn't too concerned with going on another mission so soon, seeing as he hadn't been injured much during the previous one, and this mission was neccesary for them to recieve payment. He did feel a bit bad for those badly wounded though. He turned to Zeriax. "Well, I've been a mercenary for a long time, probably longer than you've been alive, and I've never rushed into something unprepared. I believe Kwa just explained our plan of getting where we need to be anyway, we just need to dea with whatever may be inside"
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IO switched his AA gun out for his rocket launcher, seeing that the ships seemed to be completely leaving them alone for now. Using the rocket launcher, he would still be able to deal some damage to ships if they suddenly decided that the rangers were a threat. He winced in pain a bit as he used his arm, as he had gotten a nasty burn from the Aegraa in the previous mission. He also adressed Zeriax. "Well to be honest, as long as we know where we need to go, charging in like idiots isn't that bad of an idea in this situation. But we had a plan last time, and all thats left to plan for is any security there is in there."

Rhak put his head slowly in his hand.
He could not phantom how they would do. He himself could not come up with any thing without the maps for the facility.
Maybe the assasin was right. He was surrounded by brutes.
He took out his gun, checking the magazine and unplugged it. The compressed air would still make a loud noise.
He raised it over his head and shot.
A loud bang echoed through the cockpit.

Bor whirled around at the sound of Rhak's gunshot. What's he doing?

Kwa turned to Quark, and motioned towards the cockpit as she stepped out, leaving the schematics of Sapphire Point for everyone else to study.

"See for yourself."

Presently, the Lacuna closed in and began its final approach to Santa Frerraro: the silhouette of Sapphire Point grew rapidly, and soon they had left the worst of the chaos behind them. The landing pad within the facility's outer walls was the most elegant they had yet touched down on: not ornate, but with a kind of smoothness in its design that bespoke thought for presentation as well as functionality. Sapphire Point was more than just some military base: there were paving stones on the tower's approach in place of concrete, and in the middle of a small square in front of the main entrance stood a larger-than-life statue of some aloof military commander, wielding a stern expression and a ceremonial sword aloft in one hand.

All this could be seen from the bottom of the Lacuna's landing pad as it descended. As she stepped out onto the ground, Kwa's ears strained to try and detect the sound of running water, to betray some kind of fountain — the ugly kind, she imagined, with chubby naked bow-wielding cherubs spewing water out of their mouths for no regularly apparent reason. Thankfully she observed no such thing, and silently acknowledged that at least the architects had known when to stop.

The one inconsistency in this landscape was a mid-sized metal crate that had been laid out nearby, kept closed with a pair of clasps but apparently unlocked — roughly four feet long, two wide and two tall and picked out in white paint.

Celdryc gave Rhak a quizicle look, then followed Kwa out of the ship. "Nice place" he muttered as he looked around. His eyes fixed on the box. "Whats that for?" he said aloud and pointed to it.
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IO looked at Rhak as he fired his gun. "You know, a simple 'Hey guys, listen up' usually works." He said to him. When the ship landed, he exited into the courtyard looking area. He too soon noticed the white box. "Strange, that looks like some sort of container" he announced. "Whats in it?"

Flank left his backpack and rifle on the Lacuna, since he figured it would be easier to move without the extra weight, and that he'd just carry anything he wanted to keep, if he found anything. As he stepped out into the well decorated courtyard, he mumbled to himself: "And yet, this place is still intact..."

As the white metal crate drew his attention —which it certainly would have— a host of questioning possibilities as to its contents swarmed his mind. Weapons? Ammunition? Medical supplies? A telescope? Maybe some sort of flying machine? Whatever it was, it certainly kept him curious.

"Governor?" Dagon asked.

"Ah, yes," their benefactor's voice stammered; it had taken less than a minute to patch Dier's comm-channel into the Rangers' network. Now everyone on the team was able to hear and communicate with the hapless politician through their remote headsets.

"My associate in R&D seems to have come through for us. I have to say, I'm going to owe more than one person a really big favour for organising all this — assuming the city isn't ashes in the desert by sundown. Err. Well, help yourselves."

Grecsh spotted the crate soon after Celdryc and Flank, and he rushed out ahead of them, remembering the governor having mentioned some form of aid in the crate. He decided to wait for Kwa or Dagon to give him the "okay" to open the box, but when one of them did, we was ready to tear the thing open.

Xol shut the ship down as they landed, making a quick stop on his way out the back. He grabbed his Zeafly recon bug, its new arsenal still waiting to see a debut opportunity. His vision blurred for a minute, a clear sign that he hadn't fully recovered. He clambered back out into the hall and spotted Zeriax. Still not sure what to think of him, Xol walked over to the newcomer and said, "So I assume you're planning on coming along with us? Staying with the ship clearly isn't a possibility, in case you were considering it for some reason..."

"Okay guys, gangway!" Dagon pushed through the group and down the landing pad, hefting a large rusty crowbar in both hands. He approached the crate, hefting it menacingly. The container looked suitably intimidated by the display.

"Alriiight..."

"Dagon?"

"Yes Kwa?"

"Clasps."

"Ah... Right. Yeah." He deflated a little, and grumpily threw the crowbar aside with a loud clang as it became clear he would not need it. Instead he reached out and undid the clasps on the white crate, and its lid sprang open readily. He peered inside, and let out a gasp.

"What? What's inside, Dagon?"

Dagon turned his head to face Kwa, a look of singular awe and wonder on his face:

"Boxes, Kwa. This crate is full of boxes."

"..."

Audible ellipses are, of course, physically impossible to vocalise due to their very nature as a lack of sound. Kwa, however, was not one to let physics get in the way of displaying annoyance. She could engage in whole conversations with only a frown and various flavours of silence. They were long, uncomfortable conversations for the people on the receiving end.

"No really, let me just— nngh." Dagon grunted as he lifted something free from the crate. It was, perhaps unsurprisingly, another, smaller box; one of seven identical objects arranged neatly inside. Each was, on the surface, a one-foot cube made of a polymer or ceramic material of a sterile white colour that almost glowed in the morning light. On their topmost faces, each bore a smooth black pad roughly in the shape of a hand, and on another side a series of warning labels: Radioactive. Biohazard. Property of Las Thaddas Central Bureau of Medical Research and Development. Apart from these markings and a pair of indentations on opposite sides to act as handles, they were almost featureless.

And as Dagon found out lifting one out and placing it on the ground, they also felt like they were made of lead.

Rhak had simply shrugged off the comments from the other mercs. Instead he limped towards the box, and saw the smaller sterile white boxes.
"Experimental technology?" He asked and immediatly frowned for his stupid question.
"Biohazard? We're sure it won't affect us?"

Flank stepped forward and lifted one of the small boxes out of the crate. He held it up to his chest where he could see —a bizarre action as always, because he aimed his head at it as if he could see with it— and peered over its faces. He also gauged the weight.

"Well," he relayed his thoughts to the air, "it's not a snack." Turning to the others, he spoke what next came to his mind. "So... what? These are supposed to be radiation grenades? We're going to radiate some security to death?"

He decided that he wouldn't open the box to check. He hadn't had any near-death experiences with radiation that he could benefit from, and frankly was yet to have any experience with radiation. All he knew was do not touch or eat, and that served him well through his life. He continued to roll it over in his hands, staring it down with eyes he didn't have.

Once again, Governor Dier took over the explanation: "Ahah, no, not as such. What you are looking at is, I am assured, the very cutting edge of medical technology! You have seen the Electromagnetic Tissue Regeneration treatments used commonly in this sector of the galaxy, yes? Big, clunky machines — an energy management nightmare I'm told, but they get the job done rapidly. One ETR device soaks up enough power to keep the average village running for a week in a single treatment, give or take, and they're pretty much built into whatever hospital they're installed into. But hook a wounded man up to one and he'll be back on his feet in the space of a minute — this is all fairly widely used technology.

"Now, what you're looking at here are proof-of-concept models for the next generation of field medicine! Isn't that exciting!"

Xol nodded his head excitedly while Grecsh was nearly lulled to sleep by Dier's speech. The O'onthos heaved one of the boxes out of the crate and set it down by the Selthem. Xol had walked to Dagon and said, "If it would be of any use, I would gladly offer myself as a test subject for one of these devices." He was certainly one of the more injured rangers around, though the small creature that had introduced herself as 'Bianca' seemed fairly hurt as well.

Bor examined the boxes silently. After a moment, he said, "Well, if these things work that takes care of one problem. I still think this is too risky, though."

"Duly noted," Kwa said, "If you have a better course of action in mind, now is the time to air it. I, for one, believe this is our best chance to come away from this situation smelling of the proverbial roses in both the short and long term."

"...Plus we get to do something for the good people of Santa Frerraro, which is an... interesting thought," she shrugged lightly.

"Maybe you can ask them to put up a statue or something, eh?" Dagon interjected, his voice strained as he lifted out another of Governor Dier's portable ETR's onto the landing pad, "Like that guy over there. Swinging a sword about and all that. Heh."

"We should really be moving things along," Dier's voice piped up over the comms, "Each of those devices is a single-use Tissue Regenerator. They're prototypes, so I'm afraid their controls are rather simple: one use on one person each. There should be eight in there, enough to—"

"Seven," Dagon interrupted.

"Really? Oh, well then enough to put seven of you back on top form, no scarring guaranteed!"


"...Right, who's first then?" Dagon said, slightly breathless after lifting a third device out onto the ground, "Hand-print on the top seems self-explanatory enough to me."

Xol was first to surrender his hand to one of the devices, eager to see what its effects would be. Grecsh, on the other hand, assisted Dagon in lifting the rest of the devices out of the crate.

Xol's hand rested lightly on the cube's surface for a few moments, and nothing happened. Somewhere in the distance, the muted sound of an explosion reached them, as the cruiser hovering menacingly above let loose another bomb on a helpless Santa Frerraro.

Then, as if taking some unseen cue from programming embedded in its core, the device began to vibrate. The curious sensation traveled up Xol's arm from the box, as something inside began to work furiously. A continuous, high-pitched note of sound began, descending from the ultra-sonic and steadying itself at some point just within the human range of hearing, a sort of continuous keening that drilled into the skull. The vibration continued, the device now warm to the touch. Beneath his hand, the contact-pad blinked green, and without warning the cube shed its outer layer, splitting into four separate pieces with a hiss of compressed air. The pad beneath Xol's fingers fell away, and it was at this point that anyone observing was forced to shield their eyes, from the sphere of intense green light that had been left behind: a glaring ball of insubstantial energy, ten inches in diameter, apparently held suspended in a slender metal ring left upright in the aftermath of the device's shell-shedding.

To anyone who had not averted their gaze completely, it seemed that this curious green werelight then reached out, sacrificing some of its brilliance as it did so, and enveloped Xol head-first. By the time it reached his toes, it was nothing more than a dim green corona about his form and a scorched after-image on the eyes of those watching. This too faded away silently a moment later.

The ETR left behind its four pieces of casing, its elegant metal containment ring and the dried blood and scabs from Xol's wounds, which sat exactly where they had been before — but now on top of fresh, seamlessly re-knotted flesh and skin.

Xol, for his part, had spent fully ten seconds hearing nothing but the high-pitched note emanating from the core, feeling nothing but the vibration that had spread from his arm to his entire body, and seeing only the blinding green light. When the display was at an end, so too did these sensations fade.

The whole process had taken no more than half a minute.

Bor cursed. "Well, if they didn't know we were here a minute ago, they do now." He paused. "Did it work?"

Rhak had his arms crossed over his chest.
"Apparently it did."
He made a gesture towards the rest of the six ETR's as he announced to the group.
"Anyone else? If you're more hurt than me..." He patted his leg. "...I'll gladly wait on board the ship."

Xol removed his hand from the device and took a glance at his wounds. His eyes widened as he scrapped off the scabs to reveal the new flesh that had taken its place. He rolled his shoulders, took a few hops into the air, then smirked.

"Alright, lemme at 'em."

Grecsh couldn't resist a snarky comment in Bor's direction.

"Geez, you're a real 'Mr. Comforter', aren't you?"

After the intense light faded from both of his fields of view, Flank took yet another look at the ETR in his hands.
An instant fix-me-up box. He thought, looking at his left arm. I could, but... I don't need it.
He was apprehensive about using it anyway. The fact that it had electromagnetic in its name was reason enough for Flank to believe that it would cause him some sort of problem. With a shrug, he surrendered it to the collection at his feet.