Sharn With Giant Robots Beta

[Nerd-o-rama]

My lawyers have advised me to avoid other Greek letters.

Previously, Breland's artificers developed frickin' sweet new magical weapons called Mobile Suits to defend the nation from hostile neighbors like Thrane and alien invasions that they probably deserve. A team of hearty and skilled adventurers was assembled to pilot these machines and protect the realm.

Then they all died horribly, except for one jackass traitor who made his escape, and one quiet dude who is now even more ridiculously traumatized than he was before.

These are their replacements.


"So to sum up," Rin says, gesturing to her impromptu chalkboard on the side of her BRE-K002S Caex, "Stage one: we use the Raptors to fan out and search the area by air. Stage 2: when we find Dove and the bad guys' hideout, we tell her to get to a high point somewhere, and make a high-speed pass over the area. Stage 3: the lead Raptor will be trailing a rope tied securely to a ten-foot pole. We'll trail the rope along at a height where Dove can grab it, effectively pulling her out of enemy territory with a high speed rescue. Stage 4: Back to the airship, and cocoa and schnapps all around. Any questions?"

[Elvith Jars]

*** Angel does a little fanservice ***

Spoiler

Show

"Hi folks, Angel here, the producers of Eberron With Giant Robots: Sharn asked me to answer some fan mail. If you have little ones in the audience, cover their ears! Ok, here goes...

Dear Angel:

As the team's medical expert, how hard is it to learn all the mobile suit jargon, and how hard is it to pilot Stomper the Bitchin Ixen?
-TechGuy

Well TechGuy, learning all the medical and Silver Flame spiritual stuff is the hard part, but I've got an expert to coach me. The mobile suit technology and piloting is easy because behind the scenes, I actually help the special effects guys design and build the mobile suits. And I get to do all my own stunt piloting! Next letter...

Hey Angel:

Think you'll get to guest star on Eberron With Giant Robots: ZERO?
-Fanboy

You know, Rin's directing that show, it's a fun one to watch. I don't know how she works a full day on the set here and still has time to direct! As for EWGR0, my schedule's pretty busy, so it's not likely to happen. But you never know. Next...

Dear Angel:

That shower scene you did when you guys camped out was so hot! Do you think you were being watched? If so, who?
-Showerguy

Actually, that shower was really cold! Somebody pulled a prank on me, I'm pretty sure it was either Liz or Rin. As to being watched, the writers haven't clued me in on that one either way. If I was being watched, I'd like to think it was Kara though, but likely it was David. And the camera crew of course. OK next one...

Dear Angel:

How come we didn't see that scene between you and the two hottie crewmembers?
-Loves2Watch

Oh we filmed that scene, and uh, rehersed it several times too... *happy sigh* but decided just saying 'Viewer's Discretion Advised' would be too tame. You might see it on the dragonshard image crystal when it's released though. OK last one...

Goddess Angel:

PLEASE LET ME BE YOUR SLAVE I WILL WORSHIP YOU ALWAYS! I HAVE SENT YOU A PICTURE OF MY <BLEEP> SO YOU CAN GET TO KNOW ME BETTER!
-slavedan

Uh, remember 'slavedan' this is all just a show. It it wasn't for the writers, I wouldn't know a cane from a cattleprod. Acting, you know? I don't actually do all that pervy kink stuff for real. Much.

OK that's all the Q & A time I have, now back to the show!"

***
"Nice," Angel notes, "Aerial extraction. Might want to tie some feathers on the end of the pole so it doesn't flop around, and be wary of hostiles that might grab it too, and might want to have part of the team ready to drop down in case Dove is incapacitated- I'm HALO qualified by the way and have a leather wingsuit and FFT- but other than that, looks good. The Twelth Strikers- er, House Lyrandar's Lightning Strike- used to fire grappling arrows into the air that levitated for awhile once they reached the apex of their flight, then a trained warforged raptor or airship flying a catcher's net would snag the grapple and away the squadie went. It was one Khyber of a ride! Dove probably doesn't have that so the pole is good improv!"

[Magnus_Samma]

"Schnapps give me gas," says Satoshi. Kara beats the hell out of him.

[Winged One]

Not wanting to be rude, Achille does not point out the fact that nothing Angel says makes any friggin' sense. "Um, what do those animals from, ah, the Talenta Plains, er, have to do with anything?"

[Nova_Eclipse]

Thrax tilts his head to one side, thinking for a moment, before looking looking down slightly.

"What if she doesn't want to come back, Rin? I hate to ask it, but it seemed to me that she was adamant about attempting to negotiate with these people. She may not want to come back, especially not so soon."

He sighs, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Perhaps it would be better, once the hideout was found, to do as Angel mentioned earlier and drop in a covert team. We've already failed once at fighting these people on their own terms with Mobile Suits. Now we're talking about trying it again, only this time, it will be on their home turf? I made the mistake of underestimating them, I won't do it again. I think it would behoove us to consider sending in a stealthy team once we locate their base to see how good their defenses actually are, before we go risking ourselves again, especially if the person we want to rescue doesn't WANT to be rescued."

[Nerd-o-rama]

Rin makes to smack Achille over the head with her pointer, but then remembers she doesn't have one, only her borrowed chalk, so she just pegs him in the head with that. "Raptors, you clown, not velociraptors. They're a type of fast recon air unit.* Satoshi? Explanation?"

Rin then sighs, and turns to Thrax. "This plan isn't about fighting them yet. It's just a way to find their forward base and get Dove back. Recon, extraction. Intelligence-gathering was the whole reason I let Dove get herself into this mess in the first place." She sighs again, and looks downward.

"And Dove'll realize pretty quickly that negotiation isn't going to work with these guys. If I've put the pieces together right, they're the same people that were responsible for that slaughter you found us cleaning up. Anyone who can do that kind of damage has no desire and no need to negotiate anything but unconditional surrender. And if Dove's not convinced of that by the time we find her, well, at least we'll know where to find them. It's not like this rig can pull her out if she's not trying to be rescued."

*((I hope.))

[Elvith Jars]

"Having a recon team on the ground would definitely help," Angel conceeds, " since we'd get a detailed look. But who among us are skilled at stealth? I'm pretty bad at it without magical help. I'd call on the 12th Strikers but they're busy on another project. Can we get any experts out here to lend a hand? If we can't aerial recon offers the best way to check out what we're up against. Also Rin, we might need the Gar Adduran to create a diversion for the Raptor. Just something to consider."

[Nova_Eclipse]

Thrax nods, but a new thought crosses his mind.

"Do we know the raptors can outrun their flying units, though? They managed to outrun the Gar Adduran...and though we might try, there's no guarantee that they won't see us on the raptor....I want this as much as any of you, I'm just concerned we're going to wind up dead before we even accomplish our mission..."

He looks to Angel.

"I'm not very good at stealth either, but a small team on foot, even unstealthy, is going to be less noticible than a large machine flying overhead, is it not?"

[Elvith Jars]

"Well, on a ship this big, ya think somebody can cast invisibility on it? Fly high enough and they won't hear it either, unless there's magic that can help with that too. I don't know about the speed of a raptor though, so that's why we might need the Gar Adduran to help us get away."

[Magnus_Samma]

"Raptors were our first attempt at a manned magic propelled unit," explains Satoshi after Kara gets doen giving him indian burns. "They're basically aerodynamically shaped winged coffins with ludicrously powerful flight spells cast on them. They can run rings around the Adduran, not to mention the ship. The problem is if they take one good hit from any kind of big artillery and they're -literally- winged coffins. We had one test pilot wrap one of the things around a tree and when I say that I'm glossing over the three trees he passed through on his way to that last one and how completely he wrapped himself around it, I mean we found his teeth imbedded in bits of leftover metal all around the trunk... anyhow, as long as you're careful not to hit anything at top speed they're pretty safe, and the crossbolts they're loaded with could put some pretty big holes in anything not made of adamantine, but aiming the bloody things at combat speed, even with the magic enhancements we've put on them, takes a lot of practice. We could cast some invisibility spells on them but unless you're not going any faster than a mobile suit could walk anyone will hear them coming, believe me."

"Well if I'm flying the Adduran over their base like a lame duck and daring them to send a giant bronze dinosaur up my ass someone has to sit in the cockpit in their underwear with me and pour icewater down my back," says Kara, "it's only fair."

"You know, I'm, really good at-"

"Go back to your corner David."

You have never seen a gnome more visibly crushed.

[Winged One]

"Is there, um, any way a Raptor could, er, hold up a regular mobile suit? Even just a, ah, Kothar 1? Never mind, that's a stupid idea..."

[Nerd-o-rama]

Rin shakes her head. "Doubt it. They're way too small. Now, putting a Raptor in a mobile suit, that's a story for another time and an engineering conference...but anyway, thanks Satoshi," she says, grinning at the engineer. "They'll be perfect for this mission. We're goin' with the recon and high-speed extraction plan, no more complaining. Now, how many Raptors have we got, and who wants to fly?"

[Elvith Jars]

"I'm pretty dextrous so I can fly. If not I can ride crossbow."

{{Hello from Dallas Fort Worth airport. Gotta go!}}

[Nova_Eclipse]

Thrax tilts his head slightly towards Angel as Kara makes her comment about needing someone to sit in the cockpit in their underwear with her and pour icewater down her back. One eye seems to grow larger than the other, as though he's raising an eyebrow...though whether it's in amusement or confusion is anyone's guess, since he keeps the rest of his face relatively the same. He flexes a hand slightly.

"I'm fairly dexterous...and some of my talents make it easier to maneuver at high speed. I've never flown before, but before I met all of you, I'd never piloted a mobile suit before, either. First time for everything, right?"

[Winged One]

"Um, didn't Commander Morodoc say we could have some backup if we, er, find out which way they went?" Achille asks.

[Lucid_Archon]

Liz raises a hand. "Satoshi, what would happen if we stuffed a Raptor full of Alchemist's Fire and oil and rammed it into something? Just as an academic question."

[Magnus_Samma]

"Well, Liz, have you ever seen a wizard cast fireball on something? Okay, now imagine that, but instead of one fireball there'd be about two dozen, and for a brief instant before impact there'd be the most horrific screeching noise you've ever heard followed by said fireballs along with a concussion wave that would break or knock over everything nearby. and after that you have to understand the fire won't stop so the fairly huge crater that's been left behind will continue to burn for several hours at the least and anything that was even remotely close to the point of impact will not only be dead but so incinerated beyond recognition that we'll never really know if we did actually get them or not because all we'd have to identify them with would be some very small puddles of molten tooth enamel Kara why are you staring straight ahead like that and being very quiet?"

"...gotta try that..."

"Oh gods, we're doomed. Run for your lives."

[Nerd-o-rama]

"Yeah, uh...fun, but not really in the mission profile this time. Maybe after we get Dove out," Rin says. "Anyway, let's mount up."

Seems like a waste of a perfectly good mechanoid to me.

Rin leads the way, unless there's anything stopping her, to wherever the Raptors are.

[Elvith Jars]

"You know? That might not be a bad idea. Once we get Dove out, ram a Raptor fire-ship into their compound. They've demonstrated we can be hurt, maybe we should return the favor."

[Winged One]

"Um, shouldn't someone ask the, ah, crew which way they went?" Achille asks, following Rin just because that's the sort of person he is.

[The_Snark]

"War seems to be the only thing people in this era really understand," says Anavel, glancing behind him to see the DM headdesking because he completely forgot to reply to Dove's question last time he posted, "but I do not think it will come to that. We need merely impress upon your people the pointlessness of retalation with a sufficiently impressive deisplay of power. Once Leonidas is completed, I will possess one of the most powerful mecha ever constructed. Your governments will have no choice but to capitulate at that point."

He pauses, seeming to will himself to relax a little and seem a bit less insane, "but of course we would not object to acquiring allies. We have already met at least one like-minded individual who intends to assist us, and any who wished to offer their services or moral support will be eagerly welcomed into the fold."

"Oh," Dove says, considering this. From a military standpoint, it is hard to find much fault with this. "Are you sure it will work? A lot of people can be really stubborn or stupid, especially if they haven't seen the enemy themselves. It took them two years to stop fighting after Cyre, after all. What kind of power are we talking about here?"

[Nerd-o-rama]

"Oh right. Kara, which way did the dinorobot with the crazy lady in it fly off?" And if she doesn't know, Rin tracks down any crew members who might have been looking in the right direction and asks them the same.

"We still might have to fan out if they didn't take a straight shot back to base," she observes.

[Magnus_Samma]

"Well," says Anavel, "If the documents of the magecrafter Abel which detail the full potential of Leonidas Gigas have been translated properly... and I translated them myself... then it will be able to summon stars to the earth, crush them, and use that energy to reduce other mechanoids into particles of light."

Keras whistles.

"I figure I won't have to do that more than maybe, ten, twenty times before even the most thick-headed of your soldiers starts to get the message."

Satoshi, meanwhile, shows the way to the raptors. Or windriders. Hell, call 'em whatever you want. They're ****ing core fighters.

"Well, I might be a bit biased," says Kara, "but I have to admit the idea of launching a flaming ball of horrific death at my opponents holds a certain appeal. The problem lies in properly aiming such a missile without actually putting a pilot inside the thing, which leaves us with the problem of how to get the pilot out before it turns itself and a large portion of the ground into a smoking crater. So unless someone can circumvent that problem I'm going to have to nix the idea and limit the chances of horrific death we encounter to unstoppable enemy mecha from who knows where and control panels that still have yet to completely pass the "don't send clouds of burning shrapnel directly into the pilot's groin when destroyed" test. There's no telling whether it made any course changes or not, but I can show you which way our metal saurian friend whent when I shot it in the face at point blank range. Satoshi can show you how the basic controls for the fighters work, I'll see if the techs have finished cooling down the Adduran."

[Winged One]

"Um...mind control someone who you were going to kill anyway into doing it?" Achille suggests.

[The_Snark]

"Translated... um," Dove inserts a No. 2 Indicator of Uncertainty to blunt possible offense, "isn't one of your main complaints with the Five-Four Nations that we're using incredibly powerful destructive technology without knowing enough about it? It seems a little, er, hypocritical." And the No. 1 sees use, right before a direct accusation.

[Nerd-o-rama]

"I thought you said they fixed that..." Rin says, kidding herself.

"Alright. Kara, show us how it's done, and if we're done addressing feeble objections, we'll be on our way." She mentally facepalms and remembers to ask "Thrax, you fit for combat or do you still need repairs? I don't plan on stopping until we get back, but I don't want to get anyone killed because they needed healing."

[Nova_Eclipse]

Thrax shifts a bit, uncomfortably.

"I would like to lie and say I'm ready, but I don't think it would benefit anyone, least of all me. In short, yes, I could use a good deal more healing."

[Magnus_Samma]

"Leonidas was made for me," says Anavel, a touch smugly. "More to the point, it was built to protect the faithful from their enemies. I know the purpose of Leonidas' power, and I know I am capable of wielding it. The exact form it takes will become known to me in the proper time. If there is anything I can be accused of, lady machinima, it is perhaps hubris... but it is not unseemly, I think, in one destined to wield the powers of a god."

The air in the room shifts nigh imperceptibly. In one corridor leading into the hall where there was no-one a moment ago there now stand two men, both garbed in black with hidden faces; one in a suit of ghoulish gold-trimmed armor with an impractical cape, the other wearing a featureless bone-white mask and casually carrying a weapon like a shortened double-sword with curved blades in each hand. When the latter speaks, his voice sounds like the wrath of a fairly small but very angry god.

"Zerstorer's hit a snag," he rumbles, "you gonna kill her and get it over with so we can actually do some strategizing here?"

"I was going to let her live," says Anavel irritably, "but now that she knows about you two that's a little dangerous."

The armored man shrugs. His voice is disturbingly free of inflection or tone, aside from a wheezing undercurrent and an almost mechanical buzz. "Unless she knows Hadrian Skarn or Kara Ronah personally it's not going to make much of a difference."

"Eh, I'll leave it to Keras' judgement then, he's the one who wanted to bring her."

"I dunno," says Keras, "I was thinking we could avoid a lot of bloodshed if she, you know, told her people how pointless fighting us was. But I don't think you really convinced her. Seriously, 'hubris'? How many people even know what that means?"

"Oh, go slide down a barbed wire fence," grumbles Anavel as he leaves the room with the ominous guys.

Kera shrugs and turns to Dove. "Any thoughts?"

Satoshi, meanwhile, shows the pilots how to pilot a windrider. It's not difficult in principle; seems most of the work is done by manipulating a central upright control stick. Angel proves to be very good at it, for various reasons.

[Lucid_Archon]

Liz passes a tightly folded note to Rin as Satoshi prattles on. A moment later, she is back to pretending she is paying attention.

Spoiler

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The front of the piece of paper reads:

Rin,
If I am not dead, do not open this. Because if you do, I'll kill you.

[Elvith Jars]

Angel plays with the joystick, learning the proper grip and technique. Her hads unconsciously slip up and down the joystick a few times getting a feel for it. She particularly likes the button at the top but is careful not to press it just yet.

"This seems pretty straightforward," she says triumphantly, "I'm pretty good at manipulating joysticks. Good to go here."