HOW TO TURN A PROFIT OUT OF CRISIS: A SF FRONTIER ADMIRAL QUEST
- Thread starter Laplace
- Start date
- Original
- Location
- boundless optimism
Update Monday at the latest. Or Tuesday. Who's keeping track?
UPDATE SIX: SPARE ME FOR ANOTHER DAY
- Location
- boundless optimism
You are eating sour grapes, sour sour lemons, and a lot of bitter shit today. Death Itself-- where did the coalition manage to find an Exalt Frame, huh? Hoh, yes, that's an E-Frame, one of your advisors nods sagely. Telltale sign of entropic distortion. It's not their training that's the issue, as you get a very nice kill feed of Tango Actual blowing out Luca's brain (why is it always Luca, you wonder) for the eightieth time, it's just that they literally physically can't win.
"Okay, so how does that help us now?" Knowing your enemy is all well and good, but you've reached the point where you'd just like to know that somewhere is a trans-dimensional citadel beaming power to this thing, and if you can run some bullshit dimension metric hack you can cut off the power and then Tango Actual will trip on its own dick and promptly explode and then die.
"Er, that was the beta version," that aide said nervously.
"The beta version?"
"Yeah, the board decided that that was too risky so they pared down some of the features and added in-field power gen slash scavenging."
You nod. You also calculate how fast you can run to the escape pods. The answer is pretty. You then proceed to say, "well, don't just stand there. Let us plan how to kill this thing."
On the screen Luca died another time.
"Pull the infantry back," Seubi suggested. "If it's getting power in field, then that means its cracking open power cores in the dead. Or siphoning power from friendly installations. We can make the fleet do the big work."
A shake of the head. "Unlikely," Technical Warrent Officer Lishin says. "It's got enough power to tough through something as imprecise as a bombardment."
"But it'll still waste power, and we were planning on turning the Rock into a pile of free floating atoms anyway."
"Capital," you break in. "Draw up an ordinance plan and make it so." Then you break for tea and watch Luca smash through eight walls, omnikiller blazing with an active plasma ram towards Tango Actual. You get a good eyeful of the chassis its packing before it hip throws Luca, steps on her, and blasts off your aide's head with a quasar-beam flash. "Colonel Luca. Stop and pull back. We're dialing heavy artillery on Tango Actual."
"Sir you know that won't work and you're just wasting munitions," Luca chatters through her teeth. "I can kill this fucker I'm immortal the fucker is not and I can touch it before it just killed me as soon as it saw me let me eat its fucking brains and crack its bones."
"Thank you for your input now fall back." Command cracks through your every syllable. You don't doubt that Luca's having an easier time now-- it's true, she can almost hit Tango Actual now. It's true that her commando shell is a bespoke affair, top of the line, that only a gens family can pay for. It might even give her a chance. But why bother with chances when you have enough ordnance to break open the gates of heaven?
She assents with ill grace. Especially since you gave up beating sense into her and ordered one of your artillery platforms to fire some bunker buster nukes danger close to Luca's squadron. Heaven and Imperium save you! It was not on purpose. You were simply so eager to see this rock cracked that you took personal attention. The death and revival of a scion to a reknowned house is happenstance, see? Heh.
Feeds feed you the audiovisual data. Kilos and kilos of rock and armor plating destroyed. Reactors bleeding radiation into the void. Ejecta geysering in sprays of debris. All this to kill one guy, you think to yourself. You're going to have fun writing the post-action report. The Budget Office is going to love this one.
The tea is hot and somewhat bitter. The sub-liutenant ballsed it, you think.
The bombardment keeps up for a full cycle-- eight hours. You give Luca the all clear to brave the rubble, floating chunks of fortress, aaaand---
Splat.
She's dead.
Again.
And she charges out once again, sniffing like hounds for Tango Actual, bounding between rubble with some sort of high energy single shot anti-vehicle/heavy borg weapon. Pirouetting in zero-g. Here one moment, gone the next.
Black sodding damn. Artillery didn't work, Tango Actual had enough sheilding to survive incidentals. Okay, you need to come up with
PLAN B
[]- GLORIOUS DEATH: Fuck it, let Luca do it. Let her have her fun. Give her complete command over the infantry divisions and tell her to give you the head of Tango Actual, and damn the costs. You can trade time, and you'd rather have this probability altering demigod dead than proceed with the risk.
[]- BALLS TO IT: You know what Tango Actual, at the end of the day, is? An infantry platform. Continue your assault and accept losses. What the fuck is it going to do with cold, impersonal bombardment and waves upon waves of room clearers that all respawn anyway? Some of you may die, you tell your troops, but that is a risk I am willing to take.
[]- BULLSHIT DIMENSIONAL METRIC HACK: Look, it's a probability field. MARATHON is a cousin to it. Crack open MARATHON and make Tango Actual trip on its own dick and die. Pros: You can get the Exalt Form after it's got no more power. Cons: May blow up MARATHON and make your guys trip over themselves and then die.
And of course, the Rock Defiant (kinda looks like a half cooked egg now). It's got another thing up it's sleeves, while you were pounding away at it like a mason. Well, it's got
A BARBARIAN TRICK
[]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
[]- UPSET VICTORY: Bases are loaded, it's the ninth inning, and the other team has suddenly started playing well. They're pushing you back, lead by Tango Actual.
[]- WARP CANNON: They've found the biggest power core that draws power from a leashed singularity and they've cracked open the shielding and pointed it at you. (May interfere with MARATHON)
"Okay, so how does that help us now?" Knowing your enemy is all well and good, but you've reached the point where you'd just like to know that somewhere is a trans-dimensional citadel beaming power to this thing, and if you can run some bullshit dimension metric hack you can cut off the power and then Tango Actual will trip on its own dick and promptly explode and then die.
"Er, that was the beta version," that aide said nervously.
"The beta version?"
"Yeah, the board decided that that was too risky so they pared down some of the features and added in-field power gen slash scavenging."
You nod. You also calculate how fast you can run to the escape pods. The answer is pretty. You then proceed to say, "well, don't just stand there. Let us plan how to kill this thing."
On the screen Luca died another time.
"Pull the infantry back," Seubi suggested. "If it's getting power in field, then that means its cracking open power cores in the dead. Or siphoning power from friendly installations. We can make the fleet do the big work."
A shake of the head. "Unlikely," Technical Warrent Officer Lishin says. "It's got enough power to tough through something as imprecise as a bombardment."
"But it'll still waste power, and we were planning on turning the Rock into a pile of free floating atoms anyway."
"Capital," you break in. "Draw up an ordinance plan and make it so." Then you break for tea and watch Luca smash through eight walls, omnikiller blazing with an active plasma ram towards Tango Actual. You get a good eyeful of the chassis its packing before it hip throws Luca, steps on her, and blasts off your aide's head with a quasar-beam flash. "Colonel Luca. Stop and pull back. We're dialing heavy artillery on Tango Actual."
"Sir you know that won't work and you're just wasting munitions," Luca chatters through her teeth. "I can kill this fucker I'm immortal the fucker is not and I can touch it before it just killed me as soon as it saw me let me eat its fucking brains and crack its bones."
"Thank you for your input now fall back." Command cracks through your every syllable. You don't doubt that Luca's having an easier time now-- it's true, she can almost hit Tango Actual now. It's true that her commando shell is a bespoke affair, top of the line, that only a gens family can pay for. It might even give her a chance. But why bother with chances when you have enough ordnance to break open the gates of heaven?
She assents with ill grace. Especially since you gave up beating sense into her and ordered one of your artillery platforms to fire some bunker buster nukes danger close to Luca's squadron. Heaven and Imperium save you! It was not on purpose. You were simply so eager to see this rock cracked that you took personal attention. The death and revival of a scion to a reknowned house is happenstance, see? Heh.
Feeds feed you the audiovisual data. Kilos and kilos of rock and armor plating destroyed. Reactors bleeding radiation into the void. Ejecta geysering in sprays of debris. All this to kill one guy, you think to yourself. You're going to have fun writing the post-action report. The Budget Office is going to love this one.
The tea is hot and somewhat bitter. The sub-liutenant ballsed it, you think.
The bombardment keeps up for a full cycle-- eight hours. You give Luca the all clear to brave the rubble, floating chunks of fortress, aaaand---
Splat.
She's dead.
Again.
And she charges out once again, sniffing like hounds for Tango Actual, bounding between rubble with some sort of high energy single shot anti-vehicle/heavy borg weapon. Pirouetting in zero-g. Here one moment, gone the next.
Black sodding damn. Artillery didn't work, Tango Actual had enough sheilding to survive incidentals. Okay, you need to come up with
PLAN B
[]- GLORIOUS DEATH: Fuck it, let Luca do it. Let her have her fun. Give her complete command over the infantry divisions and tell her to give you the head of Tango Actual, and damn the costs. You can trade time, and you'd rather have this probability altering demigod dead than proceed with the risk.
[]- BALLS TO IT: You know what Tango Actual, at the end of the day, is? An infantry platform. Continue your assault and accept losses. What the fuck is it going to do with cold, impersonal bombardment and waves upon waves of room clearers that all respawn anyway? Some of you may die, you tell your troops, but that is a risk I am willing to take.
[]- BULLSHIT DIMENSIONAL METRIC HACK: Look, it's a probability field. MARATHON is a cousin to it. Crack open MARATHON and make Tango Actual trip on its own dick and die. Pros: You can get the Exalt Form after it's got no more power. Cons: May blow up MARATHON and make your guys trip over themselves and then die.
And of course, the Rock Defiant (kinda looks like a half cooked egg now). It's got another thing up it's sleeves, while you were pounding away at it like a mason. Well, it's got
A BARBARIAN TRICK
[]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
[]- UPSET VICTORY: Bases are loaded, it's the ninth inning, and the other team has suddenly started playing well. They're pushing you back, lead by Tango Actual.
[]- WARP CANNON: They've found the biggest power core that draws power from a leashed singularity and they've cracked open the shielding and pointed it at you. (May interfere with MARATHON)
- Location
- Phoenix, Arizona
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[X]- GLORIOUS DEATH: Fuck it, let Luca do it. Let her have her fun. Give her complete command over the infantry divisions and tell her to give you the head of Tango Actual, and damn the costs. You can trade time, and you'd rather have this probability altering demigod dead than proceed with the risk.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
GLORIOUS DEATH BATTLE BETWEEN TWO GODS OF WAR (directly on the bridge of our command ship as we cower behind a monitor bank)
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
GLORIOUS DEATH BATTLE BETWEEN TWO GODS OF WAR (directly on the bridge of our command ship as we cower behind a monitor bank)
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X]- BALLS TO IT: You know what Tango Actual, at the end of the day, is? An infantry platform. Continue your assault and accept losses. What the fuck is it going to do with cold, impersonal bombardment and waves upon waves of room clearers that all respawn anyway? Some of you may die, you tell your troops, but that is a risk I am willing to take.
MAXIM 37: There is no "overkill." There is only "open fire" and "reload."
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
MAXIM 37: There is no "overkill." There is only "open fire" and "reload."
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
- Location
- New York
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X]- GLORIOUS DEATH: Fuck it, let Luca do it. Let her have her fun. Give her complete command over the infantry divisions and tell her to give you the head of Tango Actual, and damn the costs. You can trade time, and you'd rather have this probability altering demigod dead than proceed with the risk.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
L U C A ! ! !
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
L U C A ! ! !
- Location
- the Republic
- Pronouns
- He/They
[X]- GLORIOUS DEATH: Fuck it, let Luca do it. Let her have her fun. Give her complete command over the infantry divisions and tell her to give you the head of Tango Actual, and damn the costs. You can trade time, and you'd rather have this probability altering demigod dead than proceed with the risk.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X]- GLORIOUS DEATH: Fuck it, let Luca do it. Let her have her fun. Give her complete command over the infantry divisions and tell her to give you the head of Tango Actual, and damn the costs. You can trade time, and you'd rather have this probability altering demigod dead than proceed with the risk.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
- Location
- USA
[x]- BALLS TO IT
[x]- WARP CANNON
[x]- WARP CANNON
- Location
- Great Khanate of Scotland
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[X]- GLORIOUS DEATH: Fuck it, let Luca do it. Let her have her fun. Give her complete command over the infantry divisions and tell her to give you the head of Tango Actual, and damn the costs. You can trade time, and you'd rather have this probability altering demigod dead than proceed with the risk.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
- Pronouns
- He/Him/His
[X]- BULLSHIT DIMENSIONAL METRIC HACK
[X]- SUICIDE RUN
[X]- SUICIDE RUN
grimely
Twink Death Sufferer
[X]- GLORIOUS DEATH: Fuck it, let Luca do it. Let her have her fun. Give her complete command over the infantry divisions and tell her to give you the head of Tango Actual, and damn the costs. You can trade time, and you'd rather have this probability altering demigod dead than proceed with the risk.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
- Location
- in the trash
[X]- BULLSHIT DIMENSIONAL METRIC HACK: Look, it's a probability field. MARATHON is a cousin to it. Crack open MARATHON and make Tango Actual trip on its own dick and die. Pros: You can get the Exalt Form after it's got no more power. Cons: May blow up MARATHON and make your guys trip over themselves and then die.
Obviously we go for the looting option.
And then cover up the problem that we just broke an irreplaceable piece of equipment and hope that Central doesn't find out.
Obviously we go for the looting option.
And then cover up the problem that we just broke an irreplaceable piece of equipment and hope that Central doesn't find out.
silverpower
Communism is yuri and nothing else!
- Location
- Portland
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[X]- GLORIOUS DEATH: Fuck it, let Luca do it. Let her have her fun. Give her complete command over the infantry divisions and tell her to give you the head of Tango Actual, and damn the costs. You can trade time, and you'd rather have this probability altering demigod dead than proceed with the risk.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
tankdrop24
Tread First into Hell
- Location
- The Center of the Universe: Toronto, Canada
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[x]- BALLS TO IT: You know what Tango Actual, at the end of the day, is? An infantry platform. Continue your assault and accept losses. What the fuck is it going to do with cold, impersonal bombardment and waves upon waves of room clearers that all respawn anyway? Some of you may die, you tell your troops, but that is a risk I am willing to take.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
I love irony.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
I love irony.
[x]- BALLS TO IT: You know what Tango Actual, at the end of the day, is? An infantry platform. Continue your assault and accept losses. What the fuck is it going to do with cold, impersonal bombardment and waves upon waves of room clearers that all respawn anyway? Some of you may die, you tell your troops, but that is a risk I am willing to take.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
[X]- SUICIDE RUN: Tango Actual has hijacked a fighter and is gunning directly for your command ship. Shiiiiiiiiiit.
- Location
- boundless optimism
Update up Sunday.
UPDATE SEVEN: RULES OF WARFARE
- Location
- boundless optimism
Point: The most beautiful strike you can make in war is decapitation.
Counterpoint: So plan for it, dummy.
Point: If you mass a strong enough force you can push through basically anything.
Counterpoint: Defenses, static, layered, and active will denude any real attempt into nothing.
Conclusion: Tango Actual's suicide run isn't actually effective but holy shit are you crapping your pants right now.
You've tracked Tango Actual's progress with clenched fingers. "Corporal gens Abunco," you told her, "you've got full command. Bring me their head."
"Hell yeah!" Luca cheered. "Hear that, boys? Let's go kill a motherfucker! Fireteams! Beta! Charlie! And Foxtrot! You're all on me. The rest of you, keep at it!" Cheers, again, the heat headed celebration of the adolescent immortal. They howl in joy like the dogs they are and lope after their prey. Through fronts they chase them, through palisades of lasers and through hedges of plasma fire. O'er hill and o'er bastion they chase Tango Actual, exchanging fire for bodies. Mostly theirs. All their's, in fact. But they have the Empire and MARATHON, and when one dies it is only a short sprint back to the teeming fray.
And Tango Actual is weakening. Slowly. Surely. Like carving canyons by erosion. When once it used its entropic alteration cloak now it relies on redundant construction and multilayer shield-fields.
They engage in flickers of violence measured in milliseconds. Beamers flash and munitions turn walls into rubble. It is one man, quick and strong and with probability (or fate, or destiny) on its side, against a cold, unfeeling machine composed of the best and the bravest and the Empire, frothing over with mad battle-lust and virile heroism. It is winning, though. Or at least not dying. Which, hey, means you're up on points!
It drags its way to the hangars. Small fighter-craft explode as Luca and her braves search for Tango Actual. Except it's too late-- the entire hanger goes up in smoke, just as a feed from a sweeper-fighter catches a single fighter leaving the terminal.
Now.
Death Itself, under the name Tango Actual, rockets towards you on wings of rippled space. It flies through webs of lasers. It slides past chasing globs of plasma. Behind its path lies the paltry amount of screeners, broken to bits. Chasing after it is Colonel Luca on similarly commandeered vessels. It flies through ships, laser carvers somehow finding the bit in the armor that's the weakest, and isn't that just the most unfair bullshit, even more than naked numerical superiority.
It is eating up the distance. You are doing your best not to worry. And the damned thing is, you've set your trap-- a corridor, of sorts, of heavy ships with the best point defense, around your citadel. It's the most come-at-me-bro formation you can think of, and Tango Actual either doesn't care or thinks it can kill you faster than you can kill it.
Fifty clicks, then twenty five, then ten, and now Tango Actual is entering its apogee of its suicide run. Behind it is Luca's squadron-- wait, it's more than a squadron now. You look back to the feed, and another aide whispers to you, "she's bullied eight regiments to go after Tango Actual."
"What the fuck?" you scowl. "That's eight regiments that could go to the front. What's she thinking?"
"She's probably thinking, if the Margrave-Admiral dies that would surely be a great slur on Empire, so let's go and preserve your life."
"Licking her ass won't get you an appointment with the gens Abunco." You give her a half hearted go-away clout and--
Where did it go? "Where's Tango Actual?" you ask a sensor tech. "I can't see it."
"Neither do we. It disappeared a couple secs ago, in that wreck over there." He points at a shattered destroyer, a small ship packed full of guns and engines. "Tango Actual engaged Destroyer 11A-Ceta, and after the reactor blew we lost it. We-"
"Get to it," you snap. "Find me the Captain of Security!"
He materializes at your elbow. "Here, sir." A thoroughly stoic man. You've met full conversion borgs with more emotional capability than him-- he's a bioaut.
"All hands on deck," you order. "Tango Actual could be here any second."
The Captain nods and leaves. You find a seat and fiddle with your fingers and wait. Progress on the Rock is proceeding apace, it's being blasted into a pebble. Tango Actual is still missing, and Luca's snarling on the lines and frightening several poor ECM captains to give it an update on Tango Actual's location.
Three minutes later, you know. This is because Tango Actual has crashed its fighter from a vertical axis on an ascending vector. It is in your base and killing your troops.
"Colonel Luca!" you roar, teeth almost chewing the mic. "You will take your detachment and return to the Master Citadel now!"
"What? Why? Tango Actual-"
"Is here! Hurry your ass back here before you get a superior officer killed in the line of duty!"
"Sir yes sir! Hey, you scum!" she shouts to her own troops. "Double time, Master Citadel! Go go go!"
Time draws out like a knife. You wait as Tango Actual kills its way up to the HQ. You wait as Luca and her commandos land, blazing up on the ruin their prey has made. You can do nothing as death fights its way to you, so you fix yourself one last cup of tea. If it gets to you, you muse to yourself, should you try to shoot it? Or should you shoot yourself, properly demonstrate the stoic virtues that the online pundits would just love.
As a counterpoint, you'd quite like to live and only die of excessive wealth. But shit, what are you going to do? Sweet fuck all.
The sounds are closer and closer. You discover that the level of panic in your command room is inversely proportional with the distance Tango Actual has to get you. You realize Tango Actual has arrived when one of your analysts puts a service weapon between their teeth and blows their brains out.
Goddamn, you crossly think, that was my way out. Now if I did that shit I'll just be a copycat show. Damn the man.
You turn around and behold Death Itself.
…it's a letdown.
Well, actually, that's false. Its quite terrifying and it's only because you're a contrarian ass and you've seen worse that you're not pissing your pants right now. Its an average looking cybernetic death machine with perfectly average looking glowing angry red cyclops optics holding a perfectly average omnikiller with white hot barrels with perfectly average blinking bits of people's organs and perfectly ordinary stains of people's body fluids splattered all over it. All in all, a strikingly ordinary killer death cyborg.
Actually, you blink, this looks just like one of the mooks Luca and your infantry splattered in job lots. If MARATHON spat out a killer cyborg god for the other team you're going to be pretty steamed. "Do you need anything?" you ask, which is an absurd thing to do.
Tango Actual kills another aide, gibbering from fear and aiming a shot at it, and says, "I dunno. I thought a lot about what I'd say to you, you lizard scum. But now that we're face to face its--"
"It is a bit silly," you nod and scratch your nose.
"You're damn right, you fuckin' subevolved macaque!" someone shouts. "It doesn't matter what you do! Because even if you kill us the Empire is immortal! We'll crash down on your shitty Rock like waves! You--"
It absently saws off the lower half of the officer and turns back to you, leaving a noble officer of Empire in the lurch for a couple hours in reconstructive surgery and roughly the same amount of time in hideous pain. "Anyway, I guess, what I wanted to ask you is, why?"
"What, the invasion?"
"No, no, I get the uh, operational reason for it. We accepted the hand of the Hegemony, so you had to fuck us up. Reasonable enough. But I want to know why you're doing all of this. Invading, killing, warmongering. Not like you have anything to lose."
You nod, composing your thoughts. First of all, you can hear Luca storming up the walkway. At least you hope it's Luca. Second of all, you can see a trigger finger tapping on the omnikiller. Lastly, you have realized that if you want to come out of this thing alive you had better bullshit up a good enough reason so that your aides won't frag you afterwards.
YOUR GLORIOUS SERVICE TO EMPIRE
[2.0x]- "Well," you say honestly, "it's just a job, you know?"
[]- "Look, you bloody robot, you're here to kill me so bloody well do it and stop asking for quotes like a journalist."
[]- "If I tell you that I just love killing people and destroying nations for money will you make it quick?"
Counterpoint: So plan for it, dummy.
Point: If you mass a strong enough force you can push through basically anything.
Counterpoint: Defenses, static, layered, and active will denude any real attempt into nothing.
Conclusion: Tango Actual's suicide run isn't actually effective but holy shit are you crapping your pants right now.
You've tracked Tango Actual's progress with clenched fingers. "Corporal gens Abunco," you told her, "you've got full command. Bring me their head."
"Hell yeah!" Luca cheered. "Hear that, boys? Let's go kill a motherfucker! Fireteams! Beta! Charlie! And Foxtrot! You're all on me. The rest of you, keep at it!" Cheers, again, the heat headed celebration of the adolescent immortal. They howl in joy like the dogs they are and lope after their prey. Through fronts they chase them, through palisades of lasers and through hedges of plasma fire. O'er hill and o'er bastion they chase Tango Actual, exchanging fire for bodies. Mostly theirs. All their's, in fact. But they have the Empire and MARATHON, and when one dies it is only a short sprint back to the teeming fray.
And Tango Actual is weakening. Slowly. Surely. Like carving canyons by erosion. When once it used its entropic alteration cloak now it relies on redundant construction and multilayer shield-fields.
They engage in flickers of violence measured in milliseconds. Beamers flash and munitions turn walls into rubble. It is one man, quick and strong and with probability (or fate, or destiny) on its side, against a cold, unfeeling machine composed of the best and the bravest and the Empire, frothing over with mad battle-lust and virile heroism. It is winning, though. Or at least not dying. Which, hey, means you're up on points!
It drags its way to the hangars. Small fighter-craft explode as Luca and her braves search for Tango Actual. Except it's too late-- the entire hanger goes up in smoke, just as a feed from a sweeper-fighter catches a single fighter leaving the terminal.
Now.
Death Itself, under the name Tango Actual, rockets towards you on wings of rippled space. It flies through webs of lasers. It slides past chasing globs of plasma. Behind its path lies the paltry amount of screeners, broken to bits. Chasing after it is Colonel Luca on similarly commandeered vessels. It flies through ships, laser carvers somehow finding the bit in the armor that's the weakest, and isn't that just the most unfair bullshit, even more than naked numerical superiority.
It is eating up the distance. You are doing your best not to worry. And the damned thing is, you've set your trap-- a corridor, of sorts, of heavy ships with the best point defense, around your citadel. It's the most come-at-me-bro formation you can think of, and Tango Actual either doesn't care or thinks it can kill you faster than you can kill it.
Fifty clicks, then twenty five, then ten, and now Tango Actual is entering its apogee of its suicide run. Behind it is Luca's squadron-- wait, it's more than a squadron now. You look back to the feed, and another aide whispers to you, "she's bullied eight regiments to go after Tango Actual."
"What the fuck?" you scowl. "That's eight regiments that could go to the front. What's she thinking?"
"She's probably thinking, if the Margrave-Admiral dies that would surely be a great slur on Empire, so let's go and preserve your life."
"Licking her ass won't get you an appointment with the gens Abunco." You give her a half hearted go-away clout and--
Where did it go? "Where's Tango Actual?" you ask a sensor tech. "I can't see it."
"Neither do we. It disappeared a couple secs ago, in that wreck over there." He points at a shattered destroyer, a small ship packed full of guns and engines. "Tango Actual engaged Destroyer 11A-Ceta, and after the reactor blew we lost it. We-"
"Get to it," you snap. "Find me the Captain of Security!"
He materializes at your elbow. "Here, sir." A thoroughly stoic man. You've met full conversion borgs with more emotional capability than him-- he's a bioaut.
"All hands on deck," you order. "Tango Actual could be here any second."
The Captain nods and leaves. You find a seat and fiddle with your fingers and wait. Progress on the Rock is proceeding apace, it's being blasted into a pebble. Tango Actual is still missing, and Luca's snarling on the lines and frightening several poor ECM captains to give it an update on Tango Actual's location.
Three minutes later, you know. This is because Tango Actual has crashed its fighter from a vertical axis on an ascending vector. It is in your base and killing your troops.
"Colonel Luca!" you roar, teeth almost chewing the mic. "You will take your detachment and return to the Master Citadel now!"
"What? Why? Tango Actual-"
"Is here! Hurry your ass back here before you get a superior officer killed in the line of duty!"
"Sir yes sir! Hey, you scum!" she shouts to her own troops. "Double time, Master Citadel! Go go go!"
Time draws out like a knife. You wait as Tango Actual kills its way up to the HQ. You wait as Luca and her commandos land, blazing up on the ruin their prey has made. You can do nothing as death fights its way to you, so you fix yourself one last cup of tea. If it gets to you, you muse to yourself, should you try to shoot it? Or should you shoot yourself, properly demonstrate the stoic virtues that the online pundits would just love.
As a counterpoint, you'd quite like to live and only die of excessive wealth. But shit, what are you going to do? Sweet fuck all.
The sounds are closer and closer. You discover that the level of panic in your command room is inversely proportional with the distance Tango Actual has to get you. You realize Tango Actual has arrived when one of your analysts puts a service weapon between their teeth and blows their brains out.
Goddamn, you crossly think, that was my way out. Now if I did that shit I'll just be a copycat show. Damn the man.
You turn around and behold Death Itself.
…it's a letdown.
Well, actually, that's false. Its quite terrifying and it's only because you're a contrarian ass and you've seen worse that you're not pissing your pants right now. Its an average looking cybernetic death machine with perfectly average looking glowing angry red cyclops optics holding a perfectly average omnikiller with white hot barrels with perfectly average blinking bits of people's organs and perfectly ordinary stains of people's body fluids splattered all over it. All in all, a strikingly ordinary killer death cyborg.
Actually, you blink, this looks just like one of the mooks Luca and your infantry splattered in job lots. If MARATHON spat out a killer cyborg god for the other team you're going to be pretty steamed. "Do you need anything?" you ask, which is an absurd thing to do.
Tango Actual kills another aide, gibbering from fear and aiming a shot at it, and says, "I dunno. I thought a lot about what I'd say to you, you lizard scum. But now that we're face to face its--"
"It is a bit silly," you nod and scratch your nose.
"You're damn right, you fuckin' subevolved macaque!" someone shouts. "It doesn't matter what you do! Because even if you kill us the Empire is immortal! We'll crash down on your shitty Rock like waves! You--"
It absently saws off the lower half of the officer and turns back to you, leaving a noble officer of Empire in the lurch for a couple hours in reconstructive surgery and roughly the same amount of time in hideous pain. "Anyway, I guess, what I wanted to ask you is, why?"
"What, the invasion?"
"No, no, I get the uh, operational reason for it. We accepted the hand of the Hegemony, so you had to fuck us up. Reasonable enough. But I want to know why you're doing all of this. Invading, killing, warmongering. Not like you have anything to lose."
You nod, composing your thoughts. First of all, you can hear Luca storming up the walkway. At least you hope it's Luca. Second of all, you can see a trigger finger tapping on the omnikiller. Lastly, you have realized that if you want to come out of this thing alive you had better bullshit up a good enough reason so that your aides won't frag you afterwards.
YOUR GLORIOUS SERVICE TO EMPIRE
[2.0x]- "Well," you say honestly, "it's just a job, you know?"
[]- "Look, you bloody robot, you're here to kill me so bloody well do it and stop asking for quotes like a journalist."
[]- "If I tell you that I just love killing people and destroying nations for money will you make it quick?"
- Location
- New York
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Ahh, I can't decide what's the funniest thing to say.
That's a lie, I think the first one is funniest but it's got 2X advantage so I automatically want it to lose on principle!
That's a lie, I think the first one is funniest but it's got 2X advantage so I automatically want it to lose on principle!
- Location
- Great Khanate of Scotland
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[X]- "Look, you bloody robot, you're here to kill me so bloody well do it and stop asking for quotes like a journalist."
tankdrop24
Tread First into Hell
- Location
- The Center of the Universe: Toronto, Canada
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[x]- "Look, you bloody robot, you're here to kill me so bloody well do it and stop asking for quotes like a journalist."
Voting for this for the 'what are you going to do stab me?' vibes.
Voting for this for the 'what are you going to do stab me?' vibes.
Lookashiny
First and Only
- Location
- Tanith
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[X]- "If I tell you that I just love killing people and destroying nations for money will you make it quick?"
- Location
- United States
[X]- "If I tell you that I just love killing people and destroying nations for money will you make it quick?"
- Location
- Phoenix, Arizona
- Pronouns
- She/Her
[X]- "Well," you say honestly, "it's just a job, you know?"
This is the funniest option, so I gotta go for it.
This is the funniest option, so I gotta go for it.