A Displaced Samurai

I carefully climbed the mountain with Herbie, until I reached the big hole. It turned out to be an entrance to a burnt out industrial plant of unknown purpose. At one point the ruins of a tunnel leading to the outside of the facility were still visible. We entered the underground complex, with the Battle Bugs taking point to flush out surviving Macks.

The building was more of a ruin than a usable building, especially close to the hole. The explosion or whatever had not done it any favors. On top of that, the fire had further weakened the structure, with the ceiling being the worst off. That, too, was worst close to the hole. I did not want to linger under the most ramshackle part of the roof, so I walked my metal spider to the end of the room. From there a tunnel led deeper into the mountain, but my walking vehicle did not quite fit through the door.

We proceeded down the tunnel, the only light coming from our flashlights. Mantis and Longhorn first, Ladybug and Pink Orchid immediately behind. The HANAF soldiers guarded the flanks. Benjamin and Mark stayed in the middle, I brought up the rear.

To the left and right, we saw smashed doors and behind them destroyed machinery. In a few rooms oil had been spilled and set ablaze, but the destruction had been limited. Sometimes puddles of oil still covered the floor. Creepy.

Longhorn remarked “It seems there was not enough oxygen to burn all the oil.”

That is plausible. It would explain why the destruction is so limited.

We moved deeper into the facility. I soon noticed that the destruction was not one hundred percent thorough. There were a few machine parts left that might still yield valuable information.

Suddenly we heard a machine gun firing from the direction of the entry hole.

BRAAAP

An explosion shook the complex, followed by the crashing down of massive amounts of material. We moved back towards the hole where we entered the complex, only to find that there was no hole anymore. The roof had come down in half of the hall, followed by rock and soil. The exit was blocked.

Ladybug exclaimed “Oh drat, how can we get out now? I don’t want to starve down here!”

From the soldiers came a few half-suppressed curses, but otherwise they kept their composure.

Longhorn took control again. “Mark, you and Caitlin work on digging us out. Benjamin stays with you for now. The hands of the Type Three should be useful for lifting and digging. Team Battle Bug and the rangers are coming with me. We continue exploring the base.”

The first thing we needed to do was turn my Mack around, cockpit and hands towards the collapsed exit. I printed out an Omni-Cutter, and Mark and I started to cut up and drag away some of the burnt-out machinery. Soon there was room enough for the maneuver.

Next, Mark came up with ideas for improvised tools for the Mack to remove the bigger rubble blocks safely.

I countered “Good tool ideas, but we need to improvise a lot less than you think. We can make these with the fabricator.”

Mark: “Wait a moment, you have a full blown fabricator here? Like the one we just got at SHOCKS?”

“Exactly. The original fabber in the Type Three is quite good. But the Protector version still has a few important advantages. That was reason enough for me to upgrade this one.”

“I’ve heard SHOCKS requisitioned a Type Three from you four months ago. Have we been sitting on the tech all along?”

“Yes. Of course, it is only useful once you have figured out how to operate the fabber. Now let me take these two designs and get them into printable shape.”

A few minutes later the printer went to work. The design was a gripper on a take-apart long metal tube. Which could be extended with additional segments we could print at any time..

I climbed into Herbie and slipped my legs and arms into the controls of the Mack’s limbs. With that, I could control the arms and hands of the Mack like my own, but they gave me a lot more strength. I took the gripper and went to work dragging the bigger blocks in the rubble away.

In the meantime, Mark designed a big shovel for use by Herbie. Even somewhat scaled down, its limbs were far stronger than those of a human. Except maybe some high level Magical Girls.

We used the shovel to remove soil and smaller rocks from the top of the heap first. Eventually a small ray of sunshine came in. And a Type Six entered the hole from outside, sliding down the dirt slope.

BRAAAP

BOOM

In my cockpit I was reasonably well protected. Some shrapnel from the Type Six was pinging off the windows, but doing no damage.

Mark was not quite as well off. He seemed to be unhurt by the shrapnel, but covered his ears with a pained expression. I turned Herbie to the side to give us some degree of shielding, then I scrambled down the side of the cockpit. “ What’s up? Hey? Can you hear me?”

Mark finally noticed me and said “I think my ears are busted. I can barely hear you.”

Damn, the explosion in the small room must have been devastating. Even in the closed cockpit it had sounded like a hammerblow on the hull. With a sledgehammer. I had to come up with some protection.

“Elya, we need some hearing protection. What options do I have?”

If you want something low cost but reusable, there are the Combat Sonic Suppressors Mark I from the Supplemental Protective Equipment I class. Unlocking the class and the blueprint cost fifty points each.

“OK, I’ll take those.”

Class I Visual/Aural Protective Equipment unlocked!

Price… 50 points

Purchased: Combat Sonic Suppressors Mark I (blueprint)

Price… 50 points

New balance: One token and 4307 points

I ordered enough for all members of the expedition and gave the first pair to Mark. He seemed to feel a bit put upon, judging by his next comment. “It would have been nice to have these earlier. But my hearing is slowly coming back, and I hope they will at least help next time.”

“In my defense, we did expect an empty base, not surviving Macks that fight back.”

But we did not find the time to keep bickering, because new combat noises came from the tunnel. I said to Mark “I think we need to regroup with the rest. Here we are too easy prey."

I looked through the door to the tunnel, rifle ready. A dozen dead Macks lay around, but Mantis was also injured, She leaned against the wall with blood on her chest. Apparently her armor had not held. Pink Orchid called out “Walter, I need a QuikClot! … Walter? … WALTER?”

It looked like she had lost connection to her operator. I did not know what MGs used for a data uplink, but apparently it was not immune to signal attenuation when they went underground. Come to think of it, there was a lot I needed to know about how MGs operated if we were to keep working together.

For the current problem I had a solution: the XXL first aid kit in my Mack. It contained a few cans of QuikClot. Most of the stuff the MGs used for first aid was available on the civilian market, and I had packed a small reserve. So I sprinted back and took the whole kit from the cockpit, then I brought a QuikClot to Pink Orchid.

Orchid had taken Crystal’s chest armor off by now and cut her shirt open. When she saw me coming with the first aid supplies, she just extended a hand and said “Give!”

Pretty curt, but I could appreciate the purposefulness. I asked the others “Can you reach your operators?”

Longhorn: “Ethan, please come in. Ethan, can you hear me?” With a shake of her head “No.”

Ladybug: “Brian?...Brian, are you there?...Oh drat!”

The situation looked pretty grim. We would probably be able to dig ourselves out, but…

BRAAAP

BOOM

leaving the complex might be unhealthy. Also, the ammo in the Avian Eliminator was not unlimited.

Back in the tunnel, Longhorn brought me up to speed. Sixty meters down the tunnel, the corridor made a narrow sixty degree curve, leading into a big hall. When they had tried to cross it, they had been attacked by a horde of Type Four machines. In a short skirmish, the Bugs had destroyed two of the Fours, but then had to retreat. Also, Crystal AKA Mantis had been injured in the fight.

I said ”Let me queue up some stuff on the fabber. A few of my EMP grenades, new ammo for the little turret on my Mack and maybe some Macks of our own.”

After thinking about it for a moment, I added “How EMP resistant are your augs anyway? I’d hate to fry them with ‘friendly fire’!”

Longhorn replied “Classified even from us MGs. And now I regret that I accepted this much secrecy.”

“I hope we don’t have to find out the hard way.” Subvocalized: “Elya, can you navigate a Spectracopter in here?”

Yes, as long as it does not stray too far from you.

I went to my mobile fabber and queued up things. First a Spectracopter, then extra ammo for the AE, then the EMP grenades I was not sure I should use. Finally, I found myself confronted with the problem that my Macks would not be EMP proof either. We might have to do some quick design work here or find another solution.

Such as a cheapskate kamikaze drone of our own. Perhaps we could repeat my little minion collection trick from mid-March. I was not sure if it would work in the face of the Macks’ improved friend/foe identification, but it seemed worth a try.

I returned to the group and told them about my plans. Due to lack of better ideas, Longhorn accepted and I added four of the kami-drones to the printer queue. These were budget versions of the Spectracopter, optimized to deliver an EMP grenade for cheap.

Finally, I wanted something to cut up power lines without risk of being electrocuted. I queued up an Omni-Cutter on an insulated pole. For the guy who would operate it, I needed some extra equipment. “Elya, I think we need some welder’s goggles for the guy who will use this.”

There is a Class 0 auto darkening welding helmet that will fit the bill. Blueprint is cheap at 20 points.

“Yes please, and queue it up right after the kami drones.”

Purchased: Welding helmet (blueprint)

Price… 20 points

New balance: One token and 4297 points

The fabricator went to work, the time to complete the entire list was about an hour. To top off the feedstock reserves, I dragged several dozen kilograms of scrap to the mouth end of the Type Three to feed it. But I did not linger because of the Sixes threat.

An hour later, we were ready to set out. I reminded the group one more time of the risk involved with my EMP grenades. The first thing that moved out was the Spectracopter. It immediately spotted the Macks, all of them Type Four. They had ganged up for an ambush behind a corner. I recalled the Spectracopter and sent an EMP kamikaze drone to explode in the midst of the Macks. Because I was not close enough myself, I did not manage to hack any Macks this time, but the EMP killed more than half of them.

“Elya, queue up four more kami drones.”

Manufacturing started.

I sent the Spectracopter ahead again, this time past the surviving Macks. As far as it could go without losing connection, I did not find additional enemies.

Then Ladybug came up to me and said “My power doesn’t scramble the augs of the team”.

“Good point. But there are still half a dozen active Macks behind that corner. Do you guys think you can handle this? My taming trick is no silver bullet, it depends a lot on chance.”

Longhorn answered “Yes, that’s doable. Mantis, are you fit again?”

“Fit enough. With only half the opponents and Caitlin we should be fine.”

I subvocalized “Elya, this time our Macks go after the tentacles!”

We advanced in a loose group to avoid gettíng in each other’s way. The moment we crossed the corner, the six surviving enemy Macks attacked. And ran directly into Ladybug’s Mana Surge.

“Thunderbolt!” Lightning flashed from Ladybug’s fingers and played over the enemy macks.

Elya turned two of them immediately, a third one started shaking and its eye was flickering wildly. Seconds later the eye popped and this Mack dropped dead.

In the meantime, Longhorn had speared number four and filled it with thermite injected through her spear.

Mantis fought off number five, but stayed visibly on the defensive. Her injury seemed to trouble her more than she let on. Elya solved the problem by having her two captured Fours attack Mantis’ opponent from the rear. With a handful of well aimed strikes they destroyed the tentacles and left the Type Four helpless.

Number Six went after Pink Orchid, but had trouble getting through her repulsor field. It looked like it was swimming upstream against a strong current. That made it easy for me to step up to it and shoot it through the battery.

“Listen up, these are mine” I called out. Subvocalized “Elya, how solid is your control?

Very reliable for one of them, but the other is shaky. I’ll make its eye blink.

Promptly one of them started to blink. I shot it through the eye. Curious looks around me.

“That one was unreliable”.

“When we are out of here, you have to tell me in detail how you are doing this”, Longhorn retorted.

From a hundred meters back, we heard

BRAAAP

BOOM

“That reminds me, we should not leave our supply lines unguarded!” I said.

Ladybug: “Speaking of supplies, I’m getting hungry! And thirsty!”

Longhorn insisted on proceeding through the enemy base though. We passed through cavernous bays with half completed Type 21s, and almost completed ones that had been smashed up by the strike team that took out the base. Suddenly Longhorn held out her hand and signaled us to stop. In the hall ahead, Model Sixes were swarming around something we could not see.

I said “We could go back and start building a small AAA vehicle with an Avian Eliminator on top. Might take two or three hours though, depending on how many features we want.”

“No, we can’t let them build even more units. Send that Spectracopter ahead and find out what is so interesting over there.”

I sent my faithful little observer on a course along the opposite site of the hall. Soon it had an unobstructed view into the opposite corner. In a niche, there was a fabricator that somehow had escaped complete destruction. Sloppy of the strike team, but if we could take this one somewhat intact it might be a step ahead in my quest for looted technology. It was much larger than the one in my Type Three and might give hints at how to further scale these things up.

The fabber was active, and we saw a Type Six flying out.

Three Type Fours were assembled before it.

Longhorn: “Can we hit them with the kami drones?”

I replied: “Should be doable. With luck, I may even get one we can use against the others.”

I sent a kami drone along an indirect path that would hopefully conceal where it came from, then right into the middle of the swarming Sixes.

BANG

Half of the Sixes immediately fell down. Another exploded and ripped off the rotors of two others nearby. My Spectracopter also crashed, first its computer, then it fell to the ground physically. Now it was the job of the HANAF soldiers in the team to eliminate the fallen machines that were not dead yet. I received a handful of ten point rewards for outright kills, and a few five point rewards for “support” where someone else finished off the damaged Mack.

Next the Fours came out of the niche. Nice of them to line up like targets in a shooting gallery. This was the perfect opportunity to show off my rifle. First shot, first kill. The HANAF soldiers killed a second one quickly, but on the third one they had difficulty getting through the armor. Less of a problem for me. My rifle was not that much better, but here it had just the decisive bit more of penetration.

Time to secure a fabber without blowing it up. I said to Longhorn “Let me cut that power cable to the fabber. Then it should be off.”

I took the Omni-Cutter on the pole and put the welding helmet on. One EMP kami drone accompanied me in case another enemy unit would emerge in an unlucky moment. I sprinted across the hall and turned around the corner. Before me lay the power cable that supplied the fabricator with energy. I activated the Omni-Cutter and rammed it into the cable.

A massive flash overwhelmed my vision even through the welding helmet. My bare hands felt like they had been burned. I quickly took a few steps back. The power cable was still spitting sparks and fire, until something exploded deeper in the facility.

Yet another explosion of a more familiar kind followed, from all the way at our entry point.

BRAAAP

BOOM

A loud reminder that the complex was not entirely clear yet. That little point defense was really good though.

I went to pick up the Spectracopter. It was scratched but did not look seriously broken. The little computer aboard had also rebooted by now, and there was still enough charge in the battery to fly a few rounds across the factory. It was entirely quiet now in the complex.

We also found the tunnel where the Sixes had emerged from the complex, but no further ones inside. That left the question of how many were out there and how long they could remain active.

Waiting out their remaining battery charge was tempting, but hunger was increasingly a problem for our Magical Girls. Their metabolism ran at high power to keep their mana organs supplied with energy, and they needed more food and more regularly than average humans. Especially Ladybug was already flagging, she had used her mana surge more than the other girls today.

So we chose to take a risk in digging ourselves out, but not without a final trick up our collective sleeve. We dug a large enough hole to fly the Spectracopter and the remaining EMP kamikaze drones through. Then we used the Spectracopter to observe and as a communications relay, while our kamikaze drones sought out the remaining Sixes for an explosive rendez-vous.

After that, it did not take us long to enlarge the hole to the point where a person could climb out. And nobody could keep the girls from storming the camp and wolfing down the first food they could find. Communication with the girls’ operators was possible again.

A few hours later we were cooking a more substantial meal and finally settled down for the night. I asked Elya “Update on my point status please.”

You now have one token and 4697 points