OZ Unlimited: A Fistful of Baylors

[Vagrant Orpheus]

As the chaos raged in the park, a figure emerged from one of the craters, a figure nobody saw. A figure nobody could see. She stalked out of the crater, her feet not breaking the delicately-glassed surface, as they floated just a millimetre above the glass.

She watched with silent interest as a man was punched in the face. As tanks showed up. As another man punched several tanks into submission before himself being reduced to a wreck of a man. As a shadowy creature appeared to toss tanks like toy cars. She walked silently over the grass, heedless of the tanks and the gunfire, stepping through the flames, patiently and silently following the others who were fleeing the area. It was hard to say whether there were actual groups as such, but her eavesdropping from when she first arrived allowed her to deduce that the military woman, gruff man and the robot monstrosity was the best cluster of people to follow.

And follow them she did. The children drove an Abrams through her, and as it passed through her, she grabbed onto the back, silently hitching a lift. Invisible, silent, curious, Phantasm watched as the rest of the group gathered within the Abram.

[Malchus]

Justinian cupped his hands over Rasa's ears as the string of expletives started. Such language wasn't for little girls. He didn't know exactly why it wasn't, but he'd heard that several times before in many different time periods. He decided to take their word for it.

OOC: This occurs during Shroom's recent post.

[Destructionator]

Some mostly naked filthy meta ape landed and said something.

With their ears still clamped shut due to war noise, they couldn't hear her, but it didn't matter - next thing they knew, they were airlifted to a broken tank before Adam could say the famous Charleston Heston character quote that came to mind.

It shouldn't take more than a couple minutes to meet up with the other force. Hopefully things would be a lot less violent then!


(quick lame post, I know)

[Heretic]

Annava and Captain Animus were squished inside the tank as the king of swearing John Baylor sped through the park.

"hell, I haven't been in a tank since the Communist crackdown on Jalpaga 6." Captain Animus shivered as he smelled man sweat, as well as other womanly scents that were more...bodily. "Forgot how cramped these things are, no matter the Era."

"Last time I have been in a tank was when I smashed into one during Dekrea." Annava pulled out her SAW, which took up quite some space.

"Watch it!" Someone in the front said as the barrel disappeared into the cramped space.

"What the heck are you wielding the huge gun for!?" Captain Animus gave a disproving look.

"Well, you know, if I get a chance to go on top of the tank, I want to have a good vantage point for gunning the enemy down." Annava changed the settings of the gun to Sniper/Grenade Launcher.

"I hope Omicron 70 is ok..." Captain Animus stopped. "Wait!" He screamed at the crowd. "Where's Omicron 70!? Where's my robot?!"

OOC: Daniel Animus is panicking over "his" robot.

[Mobius 1]

The Tyrax – Coulda, Shoulda, Woulda – 5

With nary a glance at her ultracompact carbine, the French cyborg blasted off a wave of unreality impulse, waves of countergravity distorting the space around her boots as the Tyrax bounded after her. Chevalier moved at an incredible speed, but the Tyrax’s base land speed was spectacular in and of itself, its long, bounding stride allowing tremendous stretches of ground to be covered.

The Tyrax knew this much: it was obvious they had not arrived together in this place by chance – they had been gathered. And thus, it followed that the deaths of any members of their parties would have grave consequences for the rest of them. The Tyrax, loathe to protect any human, was obligated to… rescue Jack and the droid.

They passed the thick stand of trees that separated the LZ where the Merry Band had congregated and Teague’s fresh armored column, which had just arrived from the east.

Chevalier flash-stepped to a stop in front of the nearest APC, waving to the exposed gunner.

Swearing, the commando racked the bolt on his M2 and opened fire. Without even moving, Chevalier activated her electromagnetic shield, and raised her repeater as the .50 caliber shells bent away in wild trajectories, not a single one find its mark. Sighting lazily on the soldier’s head, she double-tapped him with a penetrator moving a fraction of C. The shoulder jerked, his head popping in a fountain of blood.

The Tyrax soared by overhead in a twenty-foot leap, contorting one shoulder and extending a rack of mounted micromissiles – each no larger than a stubby pencil. Advanced targeting protocols laid out firing solutions on the Night Stalker soldiers shadowing the north flank of the convoy, and the Tyrax fired. The ultra-sharp missiles sped away with twinkles of blue, puncturing the throats of one soldier in every fireteam – before detonating seconds later in three-meter plasma balls. The APCs and tanks rocked with the rapid explosions, one tank flipping side over side into the stand of trees. The entire stand began to flicker with fire, giving the massacre a hellish light.

Chevalier spun as a trio of helicopters roared by overhead, separating into various attack vectors with all the deadly grace of fifty-ton wasps, all droopy noses and stubby missile pods. The chin guns of the three choppers began to roar, a continuous, shrieking monotone, and Chevalier was forced to dodge behind the nearest tank as her EM shields began to grow opaque and too dark to see through. The stream of high-caliber slugs practically tore the Abrams in half as Chevalier dialed up the elemental forge on her carbine.

With a piercing slash that rent the local fabric of spacetime, the superaccelerated rod bisected the closest helicopter, which exploded a beat later in a haze of blue non-euclidian ripples.

Holding out his hand palm up, arm extended, pointing at the closest tank, the Tyrax reached out with the gravitic manipulators of his left hand and lifted the nearest tank a meter into the air. Closing his fist forcefully, the Tyrax gazed with barely concealed excitement as the tank crumpled instantaneously into a 66-ton metal ball. Gesturing with glee, the Tyrax flung the humongous baseball into the next two tanks, crushing them and igniting their fuel reserves in twin fireballs.

Still holding the fireball that had formerly been a tank aloft, the Tyrax twitched angrily as the last remaining APC began unloading AM rounds into his joints. The bullets bounced off his armor, their pathetic HE loads barely even scuffing the overcoating of ceramic protection. Flicking his wrist with practiced nonchalance, the Tyrax extended his spiked electro-whip with all the subtlety of a cannon blast. The whip pierced the APC through its heart.

Yanking his right arm, and thus the whip, and thus the personnel carrier, up to the left, the Tyrax flung his captive prey into one of the two remaining choppers. The husk of the APC collided with the helicopter, exploding in a seismic fireball.

“Tyrax!” Chevalier shouted, her head cocked skyward. “The sat-cannon!”

The Tyrax looked wildly towards the heavens, his computers homing in on the known location of the weaponized satellite. There! It was getting reading to drop a tungsten rod….

“We hit it with everything we’ve got!” he yelled, readying a dozen firing solutions along each possible point in the rod’s trajectory. The crushed tank floated nearby, still held up by an extended arm.

Chevalier dialed up her rifle to a homing laser, her mental neural net working faster than the total computer power of the entire planet. She began to overclock her brain, and watch in slow motion as the rod dropped from the satellite directly overhead. Even watched at a millionth of normal time, the BRILLIANT PEBBLE still streaked across her field of vision.

The Tyrax fired half of an rack of missiles that was mounted near his left hip, the miniscule rockets coming directly up underneath the pebble. The impact of instantaneous, and the rod shattered into a hundred tiny pieces – at first, it seemed, only multiplying their problems.

And then the Tyrax fired rest of the rack, while Chevalier began to loose lasers at the speed of thought. To her, it was skeet shooting… of the 69th century.

Scattered shards began to vaporize, forming a blanket of tiny explosions a hundred feet above their heads, a low-lying cloud of destruction. Only a few splinters made it through, impacting the ground like artillery, throwing hundred-foot plumes of dirt into the air – but, thankfully, harming no one.

“They’re loading up a second shot!” Chevalier shouted over the chaos. “They’re aiming it at Jack!”

“We need to get them into cover!” the Tyrax shouted back. “Go, go, go!”

The pair sprinted forward as mortars directed from beyond the blast range of the rod began hammering the ground around them. Chevalier managed to weave her way through the storm of artillery, but a round impact underneath the Tyrax’s feet, lifting him up into the air and sending him hurtling forward. Managing somehow to turn his undignified spiral into a graceful flip, the Tyrax landed in front of Omnicron, who was shielding Jack’s blood-soaked form

“We’ve got incoming,” said the Tyrax smoothly. “Maybe fifteen seconds.”

Chevalier slid in on her knees, drawing a gun-like injector from her low-slung utility belt. “This,” she said, racking the slide on the futuristic medipac. “is meant to stabilize those who have been exposed to massive trauma. I figure it’s the only way Jack will survive the upcoming trauma.”

Placing the gun near Jack’s neck, she depressed the trigger. Particles of advanced medicine were teleported into Jack’s bloodstream, the potent cocktail of nanomachines and bioagents beginning their work on the spot.

“Seven seconds!” shouted the Tyrax, firing his rockets at mortar teams, forcing them to turtle behind cover. “Ma’am, can you shunt the rod aside with your EM shield?”

“It’d be a bit much, but I can try,” said Chevalier, throwing her arms skyward and beginning to weave a bubble of protective energy.

And then the second BRILLIANT PEBBLE fired.

Results: Take Covers!

[Heretic]

Omicron 70 saw the Tyrax and the French cyborg women fight off choppers and tanks before firing at the air. Sensors showed that a satellite based orbital weapon was fired and destroyed, but a second one was coming. The Tyrax did a flip and landed in front of Omicron 70.


“We’ve got incoming,” said the Tyrax smoothly. “Maybe fifteen seconds.” The Tyrax calmly stated.


“This is meant to stabilize those who have been exposed to massive trauma. I figure it’s the only way Jack will survive the upcoming trauma.” The French woman came and shot a what seemed to be like a medical gun into Jack's neck.

As the Tyrax asked her to veer the tungsten projectile aside, Omicron 70 placed Jack on the ground and used the operating table as a shield from incoming debris, calculating from the possible trajectory during impact.

[Vagrant Orpheus]

And Jack groaned incoherently.

OOC: Hey guys, I'm still here, kay?

[Magister Militum]

“Seven seconds!” shouted the Tyrax, firing his rockets at mortar teams, forcing them to turtle behind cover. “Ma’am, can you shunt the rod aside with your EM shield?”

“It’d be a bit much, but I can try,” said Chevalier, throwing her arms skyward and beginning to weave a bubble of protective energy.

And then the second BRILLIANT PEBBLE fired.

The rod of tungsten descended through the atmosphere with fantastic speed as the Tyrax, Omicron, and the unconscious Fantastic Jack huddled around Chevalier. Extending infantry-level battlescreens over a distance isn't new; a common trick among infantry squads (including her own) was to link their screens together in a 'phalanx' of sorts, amplifying the power and range of their shields. She, however, was relying purely on her own battlescreen and power plant in creating the battlescreen dome, something that is much harder to do with only one person.

Transferring virtually the entire output of her battle armor's conversion furnace into the shield, Chevalier braced herself for the kinetic fury as she eyed the rod that was only seconds away from impact. The hypervelocity projectile covered the distance near-instantly as it slammed right into the battlescreen like the hammer of some demented war god, creating an eye-searingly bright flash from the interaction. Chevalier grunted as the kinetic energy that surged into the battlescreen generator in her armor rippled throughout her body. She was successful, though, as the battlescreen held its own against the onslaught.

“I can't take repeated hits like that,” said Chevalier as she lowered her arms. “I'm wearing light armor, not a Juggernaut-pattern battlesuit.”

Before the Tyrax could respond, the mortar bombardment commenced once more. Chevalier threw up her battlescreen, shielding the group from the bombardment.

“I can easily handle this, but were sitting ducks if those mortars prevent us from taking out that satellite. Can you distract the mortar teams long enough for me to deal with that sat?” asked Chevalier over the roar of explosions.

“That's no problem, but we need to get Jack out of here now,” responded the Tyrax.

“Agreed.” Chevalier glanced over to Omicron. “The second he manages to stop the mortar teams from their bombardment, I'm going to drop the screen and take out the satellite. The instant I do, you grab Jack and run as fast as you can and met up with Baylor. Well catch up with you as soon as were done. Got it?”

Omicron nodded as he carried Jack on the operating table and waited for the signal. Nodding to Chevalier, the Tyrax dashed from the battlescreen and unleashed his remaining micromissiles. The missiles darted through the skies before descending upon the mortar teams and unleashing their warheads, bathing them in plasma and killing/maiming many of the soldiers. Lowering the battlescreen and grabbing her repeater, Gabrielle shouted to Omircon, “Now!”. Omicron immediately ran into the trees with Jack, while Chevalier aimed at the satellite.

Not wanting to take any chances, Chevalier set the elemental forge on her repeater to create but one round, a hyperkinetic penetrator. Taking aim, Chevalier squeezed the trigger, sending the round out of the barrel at hypervelocity. Unlike traditional ammo types, though, the hyperkinetic penetrator used its reactionless drive to accelerate itself to a significant fraction of light speed. Hurtling toward the satellite at incomprehensible speeds, the hyperkinetic penetrator slammed into the BRILLIANT PEBBLE satellite, reducing it into a rapidly expanding cloud of vaporized metal.

“More are on their way,” responded the Tyrax as he returned to Chevalier after dealing with the mortars.

“Then it's time we do like Omicron and get the hell out of here,” responded Chevalier as they both raced to catch up with Omicron 70 and the rest of their party.

[Vagrant Orpheus]

Jack groaned again, not feeling the jostling of the cart he was riding on.

Meanwhile, on a partially destroyed Abrams...

Phantasm solidified into existence, both becoming corporeal and visible at the same moment, sitting at the back of the tank.

She was clad in a black and gray sneaking suit, made of masking materials and similar in design to the military infiltrator suits used by certain SpecOps forces. She had a variety of gadgets slung on a utility belt, the belt being covered in pouches of all different kinds.

Over her face, Phastasm wore dark facepaint, and her long blonde hair was tightly done up in a bun. She'd been in the process of an infiltration when she had been plucked out of her world and deposited here, with the ragtag group she now shared a tank with.

"What's going on? How long until we get to this Baylor?" she asked nonchalantly.

[Siege]

Thaddeus Gray Teague – 160th SOAR

Colonel Teague had – with some bewilderment – been following the goings-on in Jefferson Memorial Park. First they had taken out the column of armour and some of the helicopters he had sent out, not all of which had been under his command but still. Now they had graduated however, to a level he was wholly unfamiliar with; a level where they could – apparently – intercept hypersonic tungsten rods dropped from orbit. Teague was unsure just what the presidentialists had come up with to make that possible. Presumably, however, it involved beam weaponry, probably of some design they'd received from the Soviets. That only made them more guilty of high treason in the colonel's mind. Consequently, it didn't exactly so much as give him pause.

He grunted in annoyance as he saw another spear of energy bloom up on the display and the second kinetic penetrator was taken out just like the second was. Teague keyed in the code sequence that activated the special code-link. “This is KEY STROKE” he said, his tone of voice matter-of-factly. “to HIGH TOWER. PEBBLE is a no go, I repeat, PEBBLE is a no go. Situation critical. Request instructions.”

The voice that replied was full of static, as if it came from very far away and had to be run through several satellites and advanced digital filters just to be understood. “This is HIGH TOWER. We copy your previous message KEY STROKE; PEBBLE is a no go. In the light of the extreme threat to national security we authorize the deployment of extreme measures. You are hereby cleared for the deployment of excessive force to terminate the threat with extreme prejudice. HIGH TOWER out.”

“Copy that HIGH TOWER,” Teague said to no-one in particular, his face a mask of grim determination. He keyed in the appropriate channel into his command set, the one that linked him up with the USAF. As a proper GroPo Teague detested having to call in favours with the other service branches, but he liked losing even less, so he did it all the same.

“This is KEY STROKE calling for ULTIMA AURORA. Do you copy?”

“This is ULTIMA AURORA” a voice came back, sounding almost as remote as his superiors had sounded. Teague leered, knowing at least why this threat sounded so distant, soaring as it was in the upper reaches of the planet's atmosphere. “We are stand-by for your instructions.”

“ULTIMA AURORA, intercept targets at coordinates nought-zero-five. Weapons are free, say again, weapons are free. Good hunting, ULTIMATE AURORA.”

High above the planet, the four B-101 Aurora hypersonic suborbital bombers accelerated to insertion speed. The contact was a series of unmoving coordinates on the eastern seaboard. Perhaps one day that would have inspired doubt in the pilots flying the planes, but this was the Secret War, and Colonel Teague knew who he was calling upon; the flight of super bombers on patrol today was completely loyal to the Cause, and would attempt complete any order given to them without question. Within seconds, their bomb bay doors opened and a series of sleek projectiles were released, each of which soon began to power its own way toward the distant surface at increasing speed.

Tiffany Jones

“Uh guys” huffed Tiffany Jones, her red hair moving fiercely from one side to the next in the chaotic breeze. “We've got a problem...”

“You don't say” murmured Lt Col Starr.

“No I mean a real serious problem,” said Jones. “You know that woman over there just intercepted two hypersonic tungsten projectiles? Well whoever has it out for us just retaliated by releasing a flurry of twelve... Well to be honest I'm not sure what they are” she was looking at the weird device she'd produced earlier even as she was running. “I do know though that my scanner here classifies them as Mark 53 murder-death-kill-devices.”

“Did you just say Mark 53?” Starr sounded faintly incredulous.

“Yeah, I guess I kinda did.”

“Those are nuclear sub-munitions,” Alexis Starr's voice sounded distinctly desperate.

“What does that even mean?”

“Your world knows cluster bombs, yeah? Well it's kinda like those... Except each bomblet is an individual 50 kiloton nuclear weapon. Eac missile contains eight of them. Twelve Mk 53's means they are prepared to level everything from here to Alexandria...” Starr threw a glance at Tiffany. “I think your interdimensional buddies just right properly fucked us.”

[Destructionator]

“I think your interdimensional buddies just right properly fucked us.”

Adam and Leila exchanged a look, almost wishing they hadn't opened their ears.

After a beat, Adam said aloud: "Computer, end program."

Leila nodded slightly. She knew where he was going: if you are falling off a cliff, might as well flap your arms, right? You've got nothing to lose.

Well, actually no: terminal velocity meant that if you played your cards right and had enough luck, you'd have a chance of surviving that. A slim chance, but a non-zero one.

But they weren't falling off of any cliff.

She followed suit, flipping open her communicator: "To any starship in range, two to beam up."

Nothing happened. Pity; Adam had always wondered what it would feel like. Probably nothing at all, just somewhere one instant, elsewhere the next instant.

Oh well, he'd try something else: "Q! End this!"

Leila looked at him again and switched to speaking A'millian: "We're pathetic," she said with a bit of a laugh.

After a second, he barely whispered a response: "This is really it, isn't it?"

She glanced at the others in the tank. "Looks like it."

"Yup." he subconsciously took her hand. "...Good bye, old friend."

She silently nodded then put her head on his shoulder, balled up, and went to sleep.

[Vagrant Orpheus]

"Hrm... bad time to manifest, huh?" asked Phantasm nonchalantly. She wasn't worried, her cross-phasing would render her non-corporeal and allow her to survive the bombs without a hitch. The others would probably die, which would be a shame, but Phantasm would live. And adapt to this new world.

Hell, she could try to phase the tank out of line with existence, but that was just more risk to herself, since she'd never phased more than two others besides herself. Hardly worth the risk to her own body. She waved at the others, grinned, and vanished once more.

[Malchus]

“Those are nuclear sub-munitions,” Tribonian heard one of the empowered human females say, her voice sounding dismayed.

“What does that even mean?” the one Justinian had first greeted asked.

“Your world knows cluster bombs, yeah? Well it's kinda like those... Except each bomblet is an individual 50 kiloton nuclear weapon. Eac missile contains eight of them. Twelve Mk 53's means they are prepared to level everything from here to Alexandria...” the first trailed off, shooting a glance at the second. “I think your interdimensional buddies just right properly fucked us.”

Tribonian jerked suddenly on his perch, the most obviously he had reacted so far. Not that anyone really noticed.

Justinian, have you detected any exit tesseracts? the faux quail demanded. His mind voice, though still overtly calm, had a slight edge of panic to it.

"No, no I haven't." Justinian answered. The boy's usual smile was gone now, replaced by a rarely seen sober expression.

"Huh, say something kid?" the one known as Animus asked. Justinian ignored him.

Then we are in grave trouble. Tribonian stated flatly.

Justinian shot a look around quickly. It was still dark, shadows everywhere. He then turned to regard Rasa, who looked up at him. The boy smile returned, as he aimed it at her. He placed a hand on her head and ruffled it gently.

"I'm sorry, Rasa," the boy said soothingly, "We need a bit more from you."

Rasa's eyes widened in understanding, and her usually blank expression became more apprehensive. However, she still nodded.

"...okay." she said in Chinese.

"I promise, it won't take too long."

After saying the last reassurance, the boy's hand moved at blinding speed. He quickly struck the bells hanging from the girl's neck and hair, seemingly wildly. However, anyone listening carefully enough would've noted that there was a definite, but not sensical or musically pleasant, sequence to the ringing. A few of the other riders in the tank did turn, eyebrows up questioningly. Some even asked. Justinian, however, ignored them all. He was focused solely on the sequence of bell tones.

Suddenly, he stopped. He looked at Rasa, who was now quivering in fear but made no move to stop the boy. He brushed a strand of her hair from her face gently, his smile still comforting. One must always comfort one's pet, after all. Especially if you were about to have them do something unpleasant.

"It'll be alright, my Little Shadow. I promise."

Her lips quivered, but she nodded. With that, Justinian reached to give the bell on her neck one final, resounding tap...


OOC: Well, I await what happens next. But, I assure you, I am NOT unleashing some uber-shadow to swat away or devour the incoming nukes. I've something else planned, and the hint is in Rasa's character profile.

EDIT: Retconning in light of recent developments.

[Mobius 1]

The Tyrax - Coulda, Shoulda, Woulda - 6

Chevalier's head whipped around, face white. "Tell me you heard that."

The Tyrax nodded gravely. "Teague is someone I can respect."

Chevalier threw her hands up into the air. "You don't drop nukes on oyur own capital!"

The Tyrax made a cutting motion. "You misunderstand. I still intend to rip Teague's spine from his body when I eventually catch up with him. You don't suppose you could shoot down the plane?"

"It'd be a tad out of my league," said Chevalier as she ran. "The target's moving too fast, too high, at such an oblique angle..."

"It wouldn't be out of our collective league," motioned the Tyrax. "If we could blind the pilot with combined ECM, you could guide that one female metahuman into chasing down the craft and downing it in the ocean - perhaps through the black psion's help."

That's ridiculous!" shouted Chevalier. "You don't even known if the metas could operate at those ranges or levels!"

"You don't understand," said the Tyrax as he leapt over a burning jeep (his crumpled tank still floating along behind him). "Where I come from, you can do anything if you try hard enough."

"Does that include stopping nuclear strikes?!"

"I highly doubt the a nuclear strike is anywhere within the grand cosmic plot of this dimension. Let's get a move on."

After a moment of silence, the Tyrax added, "And do you honestly think Baylor's helicopter could outrun a nuclear fireball?"

[Booted Vulture]

"So your plan", said Rivers, jumping down from the tank to face the Tyrax, "is to try and blind them while sending someone up there to punch them out of the skies? Do I really have to mention that that is a bad plan? People maybe be able to do anything they want if they try hard enough where you come from. Where I come from we have a few little things we like to call; stealth, guile and misdirection."

He looked between the Tyrax and the Tech girl.

"Now I assume at least one of you has been monitoring the comm channels. What freqs and encryptions is he using?"

[Heretic]

“I think your interdimensional buddies just right properly fucked us.” The costumed people, one a knight and the other some scientist dude, said.


"What's going on? How long until we get to this Baylor?" Some blonde chick with dark facepaint asked nonchalantly as she just appeared out of nowhere." Then, commotion. Annava could only hear the last bit from Alexis Starr.


“Your world knows cluster bombs, yeah? Well it's kinda like those... Except each bomblet is an individual 50 kiloton nuclear weapon. Eac missile contains eight of them. Twelve Mk 53's means they are prepared to level everything from here to Alexandria...” Starr threw a glance at Tiffany. “I think your interdimensional buddies just right properly fucked us.”

"What is going on?" Daniel Animus muttered sleepily. "I was asleep."

"Seems like whatever happened in the park just got us clusterfucked." Annava muttered. "Not that the blast could kill me."

"What blasts? What clusterfuck? What about Omicron 70?" Daniel asked as he stood up to look around.

"Well, from what I can get from the conversations, we are gonna get nuked. With nuke bomblets within bombs. Lots of Nukes." Annava smiled sadly. Daniel Animus just stared.

"Here in their own capital?" Annava nodded. "Hell, I don't think i could survive." Daniel gave a sigh as he slumped down.

"Hrm... bad time to manifest, huh?" Appearing blond chick said. Annava rolled her eyes.

"Definitely."


Edit: Malachus, this is before Animus asks Justinian "What did you say", alright?

[Siege]

Major John Baylor, ISA cell code-named PALE HORSE

"What in the name of all that's holy is going on there" Baylor barked as blasts of energy rocked toward the heavens in the not-too-distant distance, drowning out the sounds of explosions and crashing helicopters.

"A god-damn warzone is what it is out there sir" his adjutant shrugged. The man pressed a headset to his ear, listening intently to the information relayed to the rapidly moving convoy from the remote ISA headquarters through a series of proprietary, highly scrambled satellite channels. "Looks like the Stalkers are getting it on with our mystery guests -- HQ says Starr is running for it but someone just took out two Rods from God. Theyre-" he stopped mid-sentence. Even in the green light in the back of the HMMWV Baylor could see the color drain from the man's face, which was worrying because Activity personnel wasn't shocked very easily. It was kind of their thing.

"Not good news?" Baylor asked grimly. He knew who he was up against. If Teague felt sufficiently threatened there was no telling what he might do, and taking out a BRILLIANT PEBBLE strike, just like that, definitely classified as 'sufficiently threatened' in the major's book.

The adjutant nodded. "Sir... HQ says the 160th just put in a call for an Aurora strike, delivery of twelve Mike-five-threes right on top of us." The man had regained his composure but his voice was still a bit shaky. That could be forgiven. It wasn't every day you heard someone was about to drop 4 megatons of hurtin' on your head.

Baylor whistled. "So he's finally gone over the edge, has he? Driver" he tapped the soldier behind the wheel of the black Humm-vee on the shoulder and pointed "get me to those people stat. Rigsby" he looked back at the adjutant. "Tell Jones and his people to hang back and form a perimeter to cover our retreat from the park, and for Captain Hoyle to bring up the LIMAs." He crossed his arms. "I've got a feeling we're about to find out if they're as good as Saint says they are."

Twenty seconds later

The HMMWV convoy shuddered to an abrupt halt in front of the first few runners. Doors slammed open, disgorging a handful of ISA operators in black combat gear, sleek night vision equipment rendering them insectlike against the gloomy, ruined parkland as they secured the immedate area.

"John" Alexis Starr hurried up to the major as soon as he stepped out of the lead vehicle, ignoring decorum. "We have a serious problem" she motioned at the red-headed lady following her. "Teague has-"

"Already on it" Baylor cut her off and gestured at the vehicle. "Get in. Talk later. Bad guys with big guns are coming."

His words were punctuated by a building mechanical whine as if from a gigantic spinning oscilloscope, followed by a popping discharge, a shriek and the muffled thud of displaced, superheated air. A lightning-like blast crackled through the park, distinct in that it arched upward into the sky, rather than downward into the ground.

Even as the small group piled into the nearest armored vehicles the phenomenon repeated itself, echoing twice, followed by a pause and three successive cracks just before Baylor slammed the door shut and the HMMWV driver put his foot down, spinning the armored vehicle around and high-tailing it out of the park. Starr's raised eyebrows. The Lieutenant Colonel shook her head. "Are those... LIMA-66s? How'd you, of all people, get your hands on a set of experimental MASER cannons?"

The major smiled cockily. "Saint and his friends at General Atomics can be said to still be on the side of freedom, liberty an' apple pie. They hooked us up!" His grin widened. "We can take on anything from incoming missiles to Godzilla with these puppies." Then the grin disappeared, as quickly as it had come. "Too bad we now have to use 'em to stop our own guys from nuking our own capitol." As the convoy roared out of the park at high speed to link up with the rest of the ISA troops the major let his eyes drift across the handful of rain-soaked, mud-splattered individuals who'd invaded his command vehicle before letting his gaze rest on Starr. "So. 'Lexis, or anyone really... wanna tell me what the fuck just happened here?"

[Shroom Man 777]

Bilateral Baylors!

As the convoy roared out of the park at high speed to link up elsewhere, John Baylor let his eyes drift across the handful of mud-soaked and rain-splattered transdimensionals who'd crammed in along with him in the Humvee before letting his gaze rest on... John Baylor.

"So. 'Lexis, or anyone really... wanna tell me what the fuck just happened here?" That Baylor asked.

John Baylor wiped the mud off his face. He had been driving his turret topless tank in the park when he got hailed by the incoming Humvees, hailed by a voice that sounded very much like his own, which told him to pull over. That was exactly what he did, and mere seconds later the Humvees came in and without much ado, the Merry Band got themselves extracted by a bunch of very polite gun-totting operators led by a head honcho who looked very much like his own self. John Baylor.

Thunder and lightning crackled and boomed overhead, outside, but it wasn't really thunder and lightning - more like some kind of phased plasma phalanx these technological badasses were using to save their asses from the incoming nukes. That Baylor had obviously come very prepared, like crazy prepared.

Baylor laughed, and that caught that Baylor's attention.

"First off," John Baylor suppressed a chuckle. "I'd like to thank you for getting our asses out of there, and for hopefully saving us from those incoming nukes. I can't tell you how much we appreciate it, man."

That Baylor looked at him oddly. Very oddly, like a man who'd just looked into a mirror and rather than seeing himself, instead saw a muddy shitpiece-looking reflection in a Hawaiian shirt who laughed.

"Now, just who... are you?" That Baylor asked.

"I'm John Baylor," Baylor replied and did a mock salute. "Pleased to meet you, Major."

[Malchus]

Justinian was just about to give the bell on Rasa's neck one, final tap when he suddenly heard Tribonian's mind-voice cut into his head.

I believe that will no longer be necessary. there was a slight tinge of relief in the bird's mind-tone.

The boy looked up and blinked in confusion. For what seemed like a very long moment, nothing happened. Then they saw other vehicles start moving toward them. He was about to order Tribonian to hurl them away, but he was preempted by the quail.

I sense no ill intent toward our party.

Justinian relaxed. Some people came out of the vehicles, mostly dressed in black. One of their group strode over quickly and greeted one of the men. There was a brief conversation between the two before the man gestured that she and the rest of the group should get into some of the vehicles. Justinian deduced that these must be who they were going to meet.

As the people clambered off the topless tank, Justinian turned to Rasa.

"Looks like we won't need to do that after all, Rasa." he said, smiling. The girl gave a slight sigh of relief before standing up and holding onto his arm again. They both quickly made their war off the tank.

As their feet hit the ground, Justinian looked at the tank thoughtfully.

"I could use a souvenir..."

Justinian reached into one of his many vest pockets, tugging on the fabric of space and spinning it into a small green tesseract as his hand was in the pocket. He quickly pulled it out, glanced at it a bit, then pressed it to the tank. There was a flash of green as the tesseract expanded into its net, pulling the turret-less tank into it in a split second, before snapping back into the shape of a hypercube. He stuck his hand back in his pocket and dispelled the cube. 'Nother trip, 'nother 'verse, 'nother souvenir.

The trio then turned and quickly ran to and jumped into one of the last vehicles leaving the site. As the doors slammed shut and the vehicles began to speed away, the boy looked out the window and caught sight of what looked like lightning strikes, except they were going upward. He smiled.

"Cool."

[Destructionator]

A loud snap woke Leila up from her light sleep: "Is somebody firing lasers?"

"Today's just been full of surprises," Adam led her off the tank and into the other armored vehicle.

[Shroom Man 777]

"O-kay. Good day to you too," That Baylor continued to look at him oddly, which was no surprise and was pretty much understandable. "And where, might I ask, do you hail from?"

"From another universe... in the future." Baylor replied. "A long time ago, in a galaxy far away..."

That Baylor gave him another kind of look, the kind that said cut that shit out and get to the point.

Baylor, being Baylor, totally got that look.

"Right. Yeah. Okay." he smiled sheepishly. "I really am from another universe that's really in the future, and so's everyone else here too, I guess - save for the Lieutenant Colonel, who's a native 'round these parts. But if I'm correct, none of us are from the same 'verse, we're all from entirely different places."

"How did you get here?"

"Beats me," Baylor shrugged. "I was just feeding pidgeons in a park and then zap-wham-bam-voop! and suddenly, presto, I'm here in the rain with all these other gentlemen and robots - and fine ladies - and not soon afterward, your Teagle and his Nightstickers come gunning for us with tanks and helicopters and orbital weapons platforms and Mark 53 murder-death-kill devices. What a guy."

"What a guy, indeed. Seeing your buddies in swimming trunks punch his tanks around, before having Shadow creatures and robots and power armored soldiers ruin the shit out of all his borrowed tanks and helicopters probably wasn't so conducive to his sanity," That Baylor replied sardonically. "That's quite some way of making an entrance, dontchathink?"

"Yeah... but having a couple of people ruin the shit out of your orbital weapons platform can be totally explained by the fact that we're from other universes - and from the future!" Baylor gave him a funny look. "It makes sense, doesn't it?"

[Magister Militum]

"So your plan", said Rivers, jumping down from the tank to face the Tyrax, "is to try and blind them while sending someone up there to punch them out of the skies? Do I really have to mention that that is a bad plan? People maybe be able to do anything they want if they try hard enough where you come from. Where I come from we have a few little things we like to call; stealth, guile and misdirection."

He looked between the Tyrax and the Tech girl.

"Now I assume at least one of you has been monitoring the comm channels. What freqs and encryptions is he using?"

Chevalier was about to answer with the unmistakeable lightning crack sound of a laser caught her attention. Immediately spinning about, she was greeted by the sudden energy discharge that had cleared the skies of the nuclear munitions.

"Well, that made things a hell of a lot easier," said Chevalier as she registered the destruction of the missiles on her sensors.

"The others have been intercepted and picked up by Baylor's convoy," responded the Tyrax as he monitored the radio waves. "I suggest we leave now before that madman Teague escalates things to even more absurd levels."

"You'll get no argument from me," said Rivers with a sigh of relief.

"Let's meet up with Omicron and catch up with the convoy. Hopefully, they have the medical facilities needed to treat Jack," commented Chevalier as the trio raced toward Omicron's location.

[Heretic]

Omicron 70 did his best to shield Jack from the very unhealthy rain, using a blown away umbrella as he waited for the sensed rescue to come. He heard the cracking noise of counter-nuke objects hitting the bomblets above, or at least sensed it. It was an odd sight. A tall machine holding up in one hand an umbrella to shield from the rain, and cradling in the other a broken operating table with a hurting Fantastic Jack strapped on it, his butt still showing with the IV tube and the oxygen mask still in his mouth. The container rack was next to Omicron, as he waited for the incoming help.

[Booted Vulture]

"Well, that made things a hell of a lot easier," said Chevalier as she registered the destruction of the missiles on her sensors.

"The others have been intercepted and picked up by Baylor's convoy," responded the Tyrax as he monitored the radio waves. "I suggest we leave now before that madman Teague escalates things to even more absurd levels."

"You'll get no argument from me," said Rivers with a sigh of relief. My plan probably wouldn't have worked anyway.

"Let's meet up with Omicron and catch up with the convoy. Hopefully, they have the medical facilities needed to treat Jack," commented Chevalier as the trio raced toward Omicron's location.

Things moved more quickly after that. The group were quickly rounded up by very serious looking men, carrying various antique looking firearms and herded into the mist of the supposed friendly convoy of armoured vehicles. Jack was, of course, quickly hurried off to the medics, with his new robotic best friend trailing along to help them.

Almost everyone else was conveyed to their commanding officer; who was, as promised, a John Baylor, who was deep in conference with Lt. Col. Star, both of whom were trying very hard to ignore the antics and input of the hawaiian shirt clad clown version of Baylor Eric had hit.

Rivers was darnright disturbed; one Bylor was enough to make him uneasy, but two? That was unsettling. He growled towards Cheveliar who was still next to him;

"I bet, I'm not supposed to hit that one either am I?"

[Mobius 1]

John Baylor (CSW) - Coulda, Shoulda, Woulda - Whatever Post Number This Is

I held up my hands. "Look..." I paused, and mocked checking for a nametag.

The exasperated-looking black man rolled his eyes. "Rivers. Eric Rivers."

"Look, Eric Rivers. Beyond your James Bond introduction I honestly don't need anyone punching me. I'm just getting over the idea that, yeah, there's multiple universes and apparently there's more than one me." Giving up, I threw my hands into the air. "And he's a douchebag!"

"It would appear to go along with the name," said the giant friggin' metal robot.

"Jesus!" I shouted. "I know you're twelve feet tall and all, but you can't sneak up on people like that, you, you... whoever you are!"

"I am the Tyrax," stated, well, the Tyrax matter-of-factly. Starr buried her face in her hands when she saw my expression.

"The Tyrax," I repeated. "Couldn't go for something not-at-all threatening, like 'Sonny', or 'R2-D2?'"

The hawaiian shirt version of me stepped forward. I took a step back, fearing that touching him or looking at him too long would make the universe - omniverse, whatever - explode. I mean, the guy had only just told me that he had been through a ordeal in the past that was straight out of The One, but damn. "Actually, in CJ Monotow's Star Wars, Artoo actually does look kinda like him. In fact, a lot of stuff looks like him, come to think of-"

Starr held up a hand, thankfully quieting the bunch. "John. Other Universe John. We can go over the fine details of where we're from on the ride to-?" She turned and looked at me.

I nodded. "We're heading to Ronald Reagan International Airport, ladies and gents so we can get into the air under the cover of some Super Raptor jets. We can do introductions in the Humvees, but we got to go now." I finished off the last bit with a trademark Ahnuld flourish. Alex hid a small smile.

"I want Blondie, C-3PO, and the Odd Couple," I said, pointing at the injured metahuman, his robot companion, and the two soaked and self-absorbed techie-types (OOC: Destro, that's you), "in the lead HMMWV. Lady from Ghost in the Shell, Brother, Sister, Quail," I continued, point at the woman wielding tech that used tech millenia advanced and the creepy Epic Quail Trio (As I was now determined to call them), "you get next car."

"Revolver Ocelot, Ginger One, Jamie Foxx, and Invisible Woman," now highlighting (OOC: Animus, Annava, Rivers, and Phantasm) the omni-gun lady, that guy with the ridiculous trenchcoat, the man that had just threatened to punch me (for the sake of getting him away and not punching me), and the late-to-the-party girl in combat gear. "One down."

"Alex, Ginger Two, and alternate me. You're with me." The woman who had been constantly waving that tricorder or whatever the hell it was around grimaced at me, but I shrugged. Turning around, I rolled my eyes as I caught alternate crazy me pumping his fist in the air, presumably happy to have bagged a ride with me.

"Oh, and Megazord," I said, pointing at the Tyrax. "I presume you can run. Like, really fast? It'd be a pain on my soul if you got left behind."

"I can tell," agreed the Tyrax sarcastically. "This is going to be a bucket of fun."

"Alright!" I yelled to the party at large. "Mount up! You don't want to be hear when Teague gets his stuff together, people!"