Grayditch

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

The scene that presents itself to the people arriving from Milliways is one of devastation old and new. The shattered, weathered remains of what had once been a city street spill out to either side, and half-standing, half-slumping outer walls are all that remain of most of the buildings. There are no people here, no animals, no life to be seen...

Well, no. That's not necessarily true. Here and there, fires burn merrily, and the occasional scratching scuttling sound can be heard on the sullen August winds that wind through the empty streets.

"This is it," Ellen says. "Welcome to Grayditch."

Comments

[there-is-a-me.livejournal.com]

"Huh." says the werewolf, peering around. The mask at his side helpfully translates it into a series of clicks. He's got his armour on, a dull black that used to be Xenomorph and is now really, really comfortable, and it would be fair to say he's bristling with weapons and trophies. (Teeth trophies, not full skulls. It's traditional.)

[alertcommando]

Tanya looks around and curses low in german: the place reminds her way too much of the wastelands left behind when the Reds bombed and nuked 'strategic targets'. Strikes close to home, that her Earth might end the same way.

She does not bother readjusting her small backpack, everything is where it should be, firm in the tactical harness. Pistols, a carbine, ammo, a knife, and a few assorted supplies.

In times like this, she turns to her training: survey the scene, locate immediate threats.

[magic_ferret]

Yuuno is not a threat, he's mostly harmless. Except, you know, for the metal staff with tasers built into the ends and a couple of other odds and sods stashed in the pouches of his Barrier Jacket. He's also carrying a fair amount of water.

Feel free to ignore the small sad sound he just made too. He's from a nuclear-phobic culture. His entire civilization essentially had a nightmare like this.

He'll be looking more at the sky and the architecture. It's where the problems have always come from for him in the past.

[time_dancer]

Val takes a quick look around as she adjusts the backpack with the extra water and food rations. Her armor takes care of a lot of things but food and water unfortunately it does not. Next she checks the sling bag with the supplies for taking samples. All is good and sitting right. Tanya may note a familiar looking symbolic four on her tunic, Ben Grimm had a similar one on his belt buckle.

She then raises her left arm and says, "Heads up display." A small holographic interface with various windows appears and she begins making settings; radiation level alert, a new map with an anchor point for their current location and a reading on magnetic north.

"I'm assuming we're all basically human? I'm setting an alert for radiation levels," she says as she works. She pauses as she is about to activate the mapping radar. "Is anything up here sensitive to radio signals?"

[bprd_agent_red]

Red is traveling light. He's got his trench coat, the Samaritan in its holster and a couple cigars tucked away in his coat pocket. There may also be a candy bar or three and Red Bull stashed somewhere.

Bringing up the rear he takes a look around at their surroundings. If the desolate landscape bothers him he doesn't show it. Tanya's German gets a quick sideways glance but it's not a problem.

"Works for me, lady," He replies to Val. His tolerance will be higher but he doesn't need any special monitoring for that.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"I have a little bit of a radiation-induced mutation, but other than that I think we're all good- Spoon? How about you?"

[there-is-a-me.livejournal.com]

"Pretty close to as human as the big guy." Spoon says with a small snort, "Got monitors of me own in the mask geared towards d'nax amedha, werewolves, I'll take care of meself."

Yunno's small, sad sound hits a visceral part of the canine in Spoon's brain, so he helpfully (he thinks) offers the boy a reassuring (he hopes) shoulder bump.

Then he puts his mask on and looks pretty much exactly like the world's smallest Predator.

[alertcommando]

Tanya took her rad-meds before, so... unless they walk into something really radiated, she will be fine. "Which way, Ellen?"

The commando unslings the carbine, thumbs the safety off, but keeps her finger off the trigger and the gun pointed down.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"As far as I know, nothing around here's sensitive to radio except my Pip-Boy." She holds up her left forearm and indicates the gauntlet. "I promised Bryan that I'd find his father, living or dead. Bryan's hiding in a Pulowski Preservation Shelter next to the old diner. The ants can't get in, but I don't think it's fireproof, so if we fan out to search the area houses and alleys in pairs or so we should stand a better chance of finding Mr. Wilks quickly."

She has no military experience, but kids used to get lost in the Vault all the time. Search drills were just a part of life.

[magic_ferret]

Yuuno's rocked a bit by Spoon's shoulder bump as he replies, "I can receive and transmit radio if I need to, but it's distracting."

Then to Ellen," How risky would it be if I popped up and took a look from the air, do you think?"

She's local and has a better idea what the risks are for distance attacks.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"I don't think there's anyone else alive around here, frankly," says Ellen. "Um, unless Mr. Wilks is a lot better at holding off the ants than I think he is."

She nods down the street to one of the fires, which is happily consuming what used to be some kind of newsstand or fruit seller or something.

"That was one ant's work, and there's a lot of them around here. Be careful."

[bprd_agent_red]

Red is used to running the show, or ignoring whoever is and doing his own thing. This isn't his world though and he doesn't know where they're headed or the guy they're looking for so he's just gonna follow for the time being.

When something shows up that he can hit, then he'll step forward.

In the meantime he'll try and be helpful.

"I'm fireproof, if we're splittin' up I can go with someone who ain't."

[there-is-a-me.livejournal.com]

"Give me a direction an' a partner. Not fire-proof, but, uh. Pretty much anything but silver resistant." Spoon says with a nod. Again, his helmet (now on) translates it into rattling clicks and soft roars, "You're Hunt-master here, lass."

[alertcommando]

"As long as I can see them first, the ants should not be a problem." Tanya is not at all fireproof, but all her shots are critical headshots or better, so...

Distance from fire and she can pile up mutated insect corpses. And she is also used to looking for survivors.

[time_dancer]

"Okay," Val in response to Ellen and then to the rest of the ground, "I'll be making a map with basic elevation as we go. The device uses a radio signal pulse like radar to take the reading. It's only good for about one kilometer at a ping but will build the map as we go."

She looks to Yuuno and says, "I'm sending the first ping now. It'll ping once or twice ever five minutes so I hope it won't be too distracting?"

"My armor should protect me from fire and I can make force fields, so I can protect whoever I go with."

[magic_ferret]

"That should be fine Val," says Yuuno before he crouches a bit a springs up into the air. He'll do a quick check for clusters of ant, blocked streets and any obvious signs of survivors before dropping back down to report.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"All right. Um." Ellen chews on her bottom lip, thinking. "Val, can you go with Tanya? Spoon, you and Yuuno, please, and Red, come with me? This is good armor-" It's the black stuff she got from the Talon Company merc, although she's taken some effort to remove the white claw logo and replace it with '101'. "-but it's not fireproof."

[alertcommando]

She nods to Ellen and the others, ready to move out the moment Yunno reports with a general view of the area.

[bprd_agent_red]

"You got it."

He moves to stand beside Ellen, glad for the pairing because now he shouldn't have to mess with any map.

[there-is-a-me.livejournal.com]

Spoon grins at Yunno and nods, "Right. Any problems with me for a partner, lad?"

He promises not to talk about cows.

Probably.

[magic_ferret]

"Um, the streets are mostly clear and it looks like there's about fifteen of the ants," starts Yuuno, "They keep heading in and out of the transit station over there-" he points east"-so it was hard to count them. North and south entrances to to the town are barricaded and it looks like the houses are as well. There's also the diner and some cars in a yard that's fenced with a shack."

Briefing done Yuuno joins up with his partner, "No problem with it Spoon."

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"Okay then," Ellen says. "Let's see what we can find. Oh, um, just so you know- try not to be near any of the cars if you hit one when you're trying to shoot an ant, okay? They might not be workable any more, but the fusion plants inside them make a pretty spectacular explosion if a bullet or something breaches their cores."

[time_dancer]

"Nice to know," Val says as she walks over to stand near Tanya. "How are we going to keep in contact? Or should we just rendezvous at a certain time?"

[alertcommando]

Tanya locks the gun again, before opening her backpack and pulling out three slender, minimalist headsets. "What about these? They should work unless we trip into any strong radioactive residues." But they are just three: she had no idea how many people would come in total.

[aaaaaaaagh_sky]

"One for each pair, I think," says Ellen. "Sound good?"