Clockwork Heroes: Rescue Camp

Kurelion was in shock, mostly due to a giant turtle monster firing rockets at him. Luckily for him, Skyla somehow managed to redirect most of them. While Cobalt almost got crushed as Kurelion heard him shout, "Someone, get those injured knights to a safe place on the Cage!". He didn't even hear him saying he'd keep that monster away as he dashed straight to the injured knights to save them, Kind of returning the favor to Cobalt.

Kurelion dashed all around, without a shield, nor gun, and only his trusted shovel carrying each knight towards the cage, all while the other knights were doing all kinds of things to stop the turtle monster. He found Den, lying unconscious, he carried him to the 'safe zone' he made and gave him some basic medical care.

And then another volley of missiles shot out, one of the missiles heading straight to his face, to where the injured knights were. He took quick action and just like how Skyla redirected the missiles he did too, but this time, thanks to his agility, straight to the turtle monster's front.

Amaria circled the beast while Cobalt retreated to the edge of the cage, pumping plasma into the target's face. Kurelion struggled to move the wounded to a remote corner and shouted, "Someone, get those injured knights to a safe place on the Cage!" When he batted one of the missiles back at the tortodrone's face, it roared and charged at him. With the wounded in his care, that probably wasn't his brightest moment, but at the time, it sure beat getting blown up.

Cherub, wounded as he was, realized that they weren't going to survive using their current strategy. He glanced up; there was a hole in the top of the cage that a knight could fit through. He gripped the railing, then carefully planted his feet on them. Yes, he could climb it! "Everyone! Climb!"

He glanced back. The platform was approaching the cylinder at the 3:00 position. Jet streams of boiling water fired out of it. We might survive getting bathed in that, but I wouldn't want to be anywhere near it, he thought. All the more reason to keep climbing.

Cobalt barely managed to evade the charging Tortodrone. He quickly spun on his heel, and grunted in shock, when he realized something. The tortodrone wasn't aiming for him, rather the knight he had saved earlier, and the other wounded. Quickly jamming more bullets into his antigua's cylinder, he yelled at the monster.

"YOU'RE FIGHTING ME, NOT THEM!" He roared at his target, slamming the cylinder back into place. He quickly aimed at its legs again, and fired another burst of three shots at the Tortodrone's feet.

Most of Cobalt's bullets ricocheted off the tortodrone's metal skin, but one of them jammed itself in a joint, causing the beast to stumble. It wouldn't be able to charge as fast anymore.

But this was a combat-tested veteran of a beast; it wasn't going to be stopped so easily. It looked Cobalt in the eye, took aim with its left arm cannon, and fired off a single shard round.

Kurelion saw the beast charge at him, it was probably a bad idea to divert the rocket to it, but hey, at least he didn't blow up. He heard Cherub shout, telling everyone to climb the railing up through some exit above. If only we didn't have so many injured knights it might be possible, but we can't leave them all behind. Kurelion barely dodged the beast charging at him, he was still injured and still had a tough time dodging, even with his agility.

He saw Cobalt shooting at the beast, which switched it's attention to him, with some relief he shouted to Cherub, "We have too many injured knights! They can't climb the railing! We need another way out!" That was when he saw incoming jet streams of boiling water, Yup, we're screwed, we can't evacuate the injured while being under constant attack... But what if we have a way of getting rid of this attack...

Kurelion knew that knights are able to stand boiling water since all recruits have at least basic armor, it doesn't feel nice, but all knights are able to handle it. Hopefully this monster isn't heat or water resistant he thought as he continued dragging injured knights to the corner, which luckily, was the farthest away from the jet streams. He shouted to Cobalt, "Cobalt! Try to carefully lead that beast to the jet streams on 3:00! Maybe it'll give him a beating!"

OOC: I got SNIIIPE'd

IC:
It was then he noticed the beast shooting some weird shard thing towards Cobalt... With being on another planet, for all we know it might explode like dynamite and taste like chocolate.

Even though Cobalt saw the Tortodrone load the shard, he still wasn't fast enough to completely dodge the crystal flying towards him. It cut into his left arm, splitting his armor open and receiving quite the nasty cut. Still, he continued to strafe around, firing shot after shot at the Monster. He perked up as he heard his name, but never moved his attention away from his target. He quickly glanced at the stream of boiling water that the cage was advancing on. Not having enough time to speak, he simply nodded and began to hammer out shots faster, aiming for the beast's head to try and push it backwards.

I don't know if I'll be able to keep him distracted for that long... Cobalt quickly shoved more rounds into the antigua, and closed the cylinder.

But I can damn sure try.

Looking at the two knights for a brief moment Amaria gathered what he could between the sounds of the beast, jets of heated water, and yelling. It wasn't a safe plan but at least it would buy them some time to think of a better escape or tactic other then 'shoot it till it drops'.

Coming to a stop behind the beast the Swordsmen stopped to have a look at his blade, the simmering red saber giving off it's ambient heat as always.

They want a detraction, well it responds to gun shots, and getting into its face.

Amaria had a rather painful though as he got back into a battle stance, his blade behind him as always. Well, hopefully this works. Because if that thing hits me, I am going to regret it.

Taking a deep breath in preparation the Iron Wolf looked at his target. The lugging creature moving as if it was injured but truth be told there was no way. Letting the held breath go he dashed forwards, thankfully the creature seemed detracted enough that it wasn't really caring who was around, still this wasn't a time to get sloppy.

Coming up behind the monster Amaria quickly hooked a left, circling around the creature. Hoping to pull its attention onto him he jumped into its face and slashed at it's metal mug. Knowing full well even with his weapon at full heat the best he could do was warp the metal. Not caring wither or not his attempt to take it's mind off the others worked or not Amaira did his best to ground himself and bolted around in the 3 o'clock direction to pull it away.

Come on big guy, you know you want to get me.

Kam was knocked back by the blast and landed flat on her back. Head and ears ringing she took a moment to compose herself until someone laid hands on her person and she panicked. Or, she would have if she was more aware of what was going on. Instead she made a grunt of disapproval, waving a hand where she thought there was a body and mimicked a pushing motion. Eventually, she groaned out,

"I-I'm fine, just had the wind knocked out of me..."

She barely heard the words to climb upwards, and sitting up and shaking her head, the world spinning around her soon came to a stand still. Climb? She looked around and eventually looked up at the railing now against her back. Kam would surely try if her stupid ankle wouldn't give out on her. But...was there really anything that she could do? Then again Kam really didn't want to take a blast like that again. That really hurt. Pulling herself up to her feet she watched the stronger, more braver knights deal with the beast. The jets really did seem like a good idea but would it be enough? They'd need something to stop it in it's tracks entirely, and a little hot water wasn't going to phase it how things were going. Her head turned skywards, looking for something to drop on the monster's head.

Skyla weighed her options carefully.
She could stay to divert the attention of the Tortodrone with the upside of having a steel body as opposed to flesh, nevermind the armor stacked on top.
This would mean risking a continuous hot blast of water. Skyla wasn't sure if she was built to survive water. One quick scan of the blueprints later, and she determined: No, she was not waterproof. On top of that, the pressure from the water was probably too much. Since she could distract the Tortodrone, however, this also meant she could attempt to move it aside, or flip it.
...The only other options were to jump down, or climb up.

One fluid action later, Skyla was streaming past the Tortodrone, kicking it in the face as a boost to jump up higher, and get a higher move on the climb.

After Kurelion saw Cobalt get hit by that weird shard he noticed there were much more wounded then he thought. At least a dozen of unconscious knights were scattered all over the cage. He kept dragging knights to the not very safe 'safe corner' and giving them some basic medical care. Without his medical kit he couldn't do much, but he did knew a few helpful things and besides, with just a shovel and basic armor, he couldn't do much against the monster.

One of the knights he carried there was Kam. He heard her murmur "I-I'm fine, just had the wind knocked out of me...", after some struggling she stood back up, looking up. He wondered what was she thinking about. And then, Kurelion noticed her ankle. It was injured very badly, he was surprised she was able to stand. "Hang on! Your ankle is in very rough shape, let me take care of that."

After giving Kam some quick basic medical care so she'd be able to walk normally, Kurelion turned to see he had gathered all the knights in the '"safe" corner'. He saw Amaria grabbing the attention of the monster and dragging it towards the jet streams. Hopefully this works, he thought to himself Because if it doesn't and we don't get another idea quickly, we're toast

Furor was completely paralyzed by the Tortodrone appearing. He was not able to respond due to its abrupt presence. It was one of the rare times the berserker ever flinched. Hearing Cherub's orders and the flowing water, Furor climbed up, but had a lot of difficulties due to a combination of the other knights, his giant sword and bulky armour. Realising the problems, he slammed his spike-covered gauntlets into the surface as he climbed to make it easier to cling to it.

Kurelion thought about what he saw Kam do beforehand, He looked up, and thought if except for opening Cherub saw, if there's anything else that could get them out of here, and does the key to do that is in the roof. Kurelion had many ideas that didn't quite make sense. One of them was to build a huge crane out of a long rope going to a beam in the ceiling and with something heavy, like the rest of the platform, it would lift the cage up. It doesn't make any sense but Kurelion was desperate.

He saw a Furor climb up the railing to the opening... That gave him an idea, which is a great backup plan for the jet streams, because that plan is pretty unlikely to work at all. Maybe the injured can't climb... But if the jet streams fail, couldn't we aggravate this beast up the railing and then close the opening? Kurelion once again knew it wasn't the best plan, like the jet streams, it can fail miserably. Hopefully it wouldn't.

He shouted at Amaria, who was currently had the beast's attention, "Amaria! If the jet stream plan fails, which it probably will, hear this! Make the beast follow you up the railing to the opening Cherub told us about! Get it up there and seal it out by blocking it with your shield!" That was... If Amaria would even survive until then.... Quite a depressive thought. Hopefully this works. He thought to himself as he could do nothing but watch this scene of madness.

"Roger."

Well at least some one has come up with a plan be. So far from what I can see the only way to move in this maze is to go down, so I guess we have not choice.

Keeping in mind he might as well be the beast current choice in target Amaria kept his speed, knowing full well that if the monster behind him did something brash or unexpected it would end up costing more then just a bump or ding. Still putting such thoughts out of his mind Amaria made it to the far side of the cage, starting to climb up.

All I have to do is hold it here long enough to see if the jet streams effect it...If we could just get a hole in its hide maybe the liquid could get inside it.

Looking around he remembered some of these knights had guns on them, as much as he detested the idea it seemed the best advantage they had for this plan at least.

"If you have Physical rounds, try shooting the same spot till a hole is punched. Maybe we can help the water short the creature out from the inside!" He yelled, rather aloud to make sure others could hear him, the inhuman voice not helping this case.

Kurelion heard Amaria shout to anyone who has physical rounds to shoot at it to punch a hole so the water shorts out the monster. The answer to who, was quite obvious, and so was how. Kurelion saw one of Cobalt's bullets get jammed into a joint, if they fire enough there, maybe they can make a hole straight to the monster's kinetic system and thus short it out. I really am a nerd. he thought to himself. He yelled at Cobalt "Cobalt! Remember the shot that got in the monster left leg's joint which is preventing it from charging?! Try jamming more bullets in and drill a hole in so the jet streams can short out the monster from inside!"

Kurelion noticed how most knights were either too shocked to act or heavily injured. If both the plans he has fail, then they're pretty much doomed. He didn't feel useless because he came up with the jet stream plan, but he didn't feel very useful just standing there shouting to Amaria and Cobalt and now after finishing the medical care for the wounded, he wasn't doing anything.

He remembered Grael was messing with the control panel beforehand, to do.... Well... Something. Kurelion had no idea, where did he go anyways? Is he okay? For now, he decided he'd rather try to think of a way to get the injured out when they win this battle... Or rather... If.

((OOC: @Thinslayer if you don't do anything to end this fight, I'm taking over this RP #Kurelivolution2016 So yeah... Do something))

Cobalt simply nodded at Kurelion's order. It was a good enough plan; and he was one of the only ones who could delay this enough to get those injured knights to a safer place. Hearing the unsettling click of an empty cylinder, he flipped it out, and began to jam more bullets in. "K, if this doesn't work..." He'd trail off, finding the next few words that were going to come out of his mouth rather rude. Finished with his reloading, he flicked the cylinder shut again, and took aim. His eyepiece flashed.

All right, do your stuff.

The reticle of his heads up display began to rapidly shrink, as Cobalt became stable, his breathing slowing and his aim getting to levels of those legendary cowboys in the movies he had watched. He fired three shots in deadly accuracy, two slamming nearly directly into the bullet that was lodged into the Tortodrone's leg. The other one bounced off the armor of the tortodrone, just to the left of the lodged bullet. Pain shot through Cobalt's left arm, as the recoil from his pistol jarred his whole body.

We better finish this quick, otherwise my arm's not going to be much use soon.

With an unseen smile Amaria dropped down to ground level.

Good, they got the message.

Looking up to the large bot Amaria said in a rather dark tone. "Don't take your eyes off the enemy. For the greatest threat isn't the one you see, but the one that slips by unseen."

With that said, knowing full well a creature like that was going to dervert its attention to what ever the greater threat was, the Swordsmen dashed in with as much speed as he could muster. Showing fall right then why he was as effective an Iron Wolf Unit.

Silences, Movement, Target, Elimination. Amaria said to himself as he moved, slashing at the creature saying mentally the creed of the Iron Wolf's to keep him clam in those moments. Being so close to something this armored wasn't really helping calm him down but at least between attacking it and just moving around making himself both annoying and hard to hit. The movements hard to track for a normal person's prediction thanks to his random changes in direction.

Just keep attacking, keep moving. Silences, Movement, Target... Unseen the man grit his teeth each time his blade landed, the blading being deflected back or at a strange angle making him change his momentum to keep from stumbling in his current state.

Amaria reached the jet streams just as they started once again to fire warm water upwards. While Amaria managed to dodge most of the streams, the monster got hit many times. It tried to charge at Amaria, but failed due to Cobalt's bullets. The monster was struggling, as incredibly hot water was entering it's kinetic system. All of it's system began to fail but because of that, the water became filled with electric energy. Amaria managed to get out of the jet streams before he was badly hurt, yet he was still in shock.

With the monster defeated, oddly enough, the cage came down, and an elevator upwards has been opened, as if this is all some kind of arena.

Cobalt was still badly injured from the shard. The knights didn't know what that shard was, but if they could make a weapon like that, they'll be able to survive for a while.

Some knights looked at what's left of the monster, they wanted to salvage some of the materials to make weapons, but due to the electric water, it was literally impossible to reach the monster's body.

((OOC: Since Thinslayer has disappeared, I'm taking over!! Now I am the one making decisions :D So good luck to you cause when I'm feeling evil.... Lets just say you're gonna have a bad time))

IC:

Kurelion was completely shocked that 3 knights managed to kill that beast. But then he saw the casualties. Most knights were fine due to medical care he gave them but both Cobalt and Amaria were wounded. He ran up to Amaria, and after he's been shocked, tried to stabilize his energetic flow. Weirdly enough it seems that something ha already done that. Amaria looked mostly fine, he opened his eyes, and after a small chit-chat he went with the other knights to the elevator.

It was then Kurelion went to Cobalt, who was in huge pain due to the shard. Kurelion didn't have much he could do, and so he just used a basic bandage and some disinfecting medicine. It was then he noticed he was out of medical supplies. If the knights want any more help, which they will need to survive seeing that basically everyone were wounded, they'll have to go to the rescue camp and make a solid plan on what to do, if the rescue camp still exists after the Valkyrie that is.

((OOC: When I thought of the jet streams, I didn't think it'd actually work but I guess we found a way it would :P and yes I am the new narrator, well, at least until thinslayer comes back, if he comes back.))

The loud thud that marked the monster's demise filled Cobalt with relief. He exhaled, grateful for the moment's rest. With a few spins, he holstered his pistol. Kurelion, which Cobalt had nicknamed "K", had done a decent job patching up his arm, considering what he had. The pain wasn't exactly the worst thing he'd experienced, but it was fairly close.

"Where are we going now?" He questioned to really no one in particular, as he picked himself up from seating himself on the cold floor. "We can't keep exploring forever - The wolf over there..." With that comment, he'd gesture to the iron wolf, who was covered in water."... And I can't really protect everyone against an attack like that again. Besides, I'd probably be more of a hindrance than anything, if I continued to fight without letting my arm heal."

((I respect what you did, but next time try not to take control that hard. Still at least now progression is back in flow.))

Drenched but still functioning the Iron Wolf shook himself off, sure getting partly cooked by hot water wasn't his idea of a good time but he had been through worse, much worse considering. Still the fact his little hair-ball plan worked was rather surprising, at best he though the bullets worn't big enough or had enough punch force behind them. Still it worked and that's what mattered.

I really want to take this helm off and have a drink, but I am on duty. Now as far as where we should go, down might be worse and considering what we just ran into further into this maze might just end up being all of our graves. It might be better to head back up, after all we are in a different location then when we started.

Looking up all Amaria could see was the sky, which had to fake considering they where underground. Still somewhere in the back of his mind he knew they where in a different spot. The whole time they where in motion, not still as some might have predicted.

"Hay, lets get Top side. It might be safer with the wounded."

Den raised his arm weakly in agreement from where he was (presumably) placed over the duration of the battle.

With a bit of a limp the Swordsmen walked over to start moving the wounded onto the battle, still feeling little shocks in his body. Looking at Den he gave a soft chuckle as he moved him.

"You remind me, when I was more naive." His deadpan voice not really helping the situation.

"Hay if your able to walk, get people on this thing, we are leaving and that's final."

With that said Amaria found his legs giving out on him. It seemed, despite his training, skill, and battle tested body, lack of sleep and the sudden movements had finally started to take its toll on him.

Damn, I really did over do myself today. Waking up from a Cryo-chamber, dropping into a battle zone, no sleep, now this. Still it would be nice if I could move still.

Looking at his legs the Swordsmen felt the muscles twitching and burning from the non-stop use. In his mind he fought every instinct he had to keep from falling asleep, yet he still felt the urge. Yet fear had it's tight grip around logic, keeping him awake for fear of what might happen if he did.

Back on the elevator, everyone felt like they could release their breaths. The challenge was over, the wounded could get focused medical care, and the exhausted could find rest. Cherub, for his part, felt like he could take a nap right where he stood, and might have if the elevator hadn't jolted on the way up. Leading people was always a challenging task, made many times worse by having to deal with casualties in tight spaces. Amaria was a good soldier to have on his side when times got tough.

That said, the man needed his rest. Cherub gave Amaria a light, friendly punch in the shoulder. "Hey. Rest up. You did well out there. I still have my energy, so I can keep watch. I'll wake you if anything happens."

Skyla scrambled to her feet, and looked around frantically for the tortodrone.
"Wh- What? Where's the- What the- WHAT!?"
Skyla found what she was looking for, defeated.
"No, nonono, did I fizz out?" Skyla looked around, disbelieving, as if this were some horrible prank.
A look at her allies faces confirmed that it was not a prank, and Skyla heaved a sigh.
". . . Well, I may as well be useful."
Skyla did a quick scan on the Tortodrone, and punched it open, to pull some parts out.
"I'm sure that the technicians will be glad to get their hands on this." Skyla sighed, as she packed it up, attempting not to be embarrassed or even acknowledge that she had possibly blown a circuit.
"Well, on we go then."
(Edit: Semininja'd, ooh. Still, good to make a post anyway.)

As the elevator rose up the shaft, the first glimmers of light began to peek through. Satisfied that they would reach the surface soon, Cherub returned his gaze to the elevator, and soon found himself staring more or less in Skyla's direction. Apparently, she'd managed to gather some parts from the monster they'd fought earlier. Cherub tapped her shoulder and asked, "Hey, Skyla, what did you manage to pick up? Anything useful?"

Looking in the direction of the punch Amaria's instances told him to move, but his body refused. Letting his tense body relax the Swordsmen closed his eyes, leaving the waking world behind for his endless nightmares of war...

((Kinda short but mah))

With the enemy defeated, Cobalt deemed it a good time to get some rest before they got to... Where ever they were going. Fashioning a makeshift seat out of his bag, he found a nice comfortable pocket of space on the edge of the elevator platform. Unsettling thoughts filled his head as he sat there by himself, having only his theories to accompany him.

Why do I feel bad for killing something that tried to kill me?

The image of the tortodrone's face before the fight started shot through his brain. He shook his head. In an attempt to take his mind off of the grief, he unholstered his pistol once again, and began cleaning it with his palm.

Skyla fiddled with the parts she had... Salvaged.
No matter how you put it, a generator is a generator, foreign or not.
The only question was it's compatibility with their tech, which, considering the mecha knight situation, was probably not compatible.
On the other hand, it didn't look anything like the parts on the mecha knights.
Poor things were being disassembled by Skyla mid battle.
The Shell fragments, though, confused Skyla. Not only did they emit very small, slight vibrations, but Skyla felt as if she could not leave the tortodrone until she grabbed the shell parts, like they were calling to her.
Skyla had gotten so into examining the parts that she kind of jumped when Cherub tapped her on the shoulder.
"VZsusazuhzamhm- what!" Upon hearing Cherub, she showed him the Generator, Shell, and some... Crystals? They seemed to be important to the internal process of the Tortodrone.
Yet another nervous breakdown. How embarrassing.

"Still can't believe I overslept again."

Cherub and his team had left without him, and Ragnir got orders from Greta to give them support. Now here he was, marching across a strange mechanical world, to catch up to Cherub. Hopefully he'd figure out what happened to Serah and how to get her back into fighting condition- or, failing that, retiring condition.

"Well, look at it this way. At least you get to stretch your legs before inevitably running into a ravenous horde of zombies, robots, and zombie robots."

"Oh, gee, thanks, sis. That's comforting." Intel Agents in any condition to operate were in short supply at the Camp, so Ragnir's little sister Rega was providing CPU support.

"Hey, I wouldn't make a joke about it if I didn't think you could handle it. So, according to the terrain data we've got, you should meet up with Skyla if you take a sharp left around that turbine..."

"You can tell it's a turbine from the support terminal?"

"I don't see what else would use a program called Turbinecoolantcontrol.exe."

"Eh, guess that gives it away." Ragnir looked to his left at the turbine in question. Ragnir, being only slightly more tech-savvy than you'd expect him to be, couldn't tell much about it, beyond the fact that it was big, shiny and spun really fast. "Wonder what it does?"

As the elevator rose up Kurelion was filled with pride. His plan worked! They're alive! But... So many are injured... And that monster, when they first saw it, it didn't seem hostile. He felt bad for the monster. Poor thing, He thought to himself It was just defending itself... But I guess we were too... He snapped back into reality, it was then he finally noticed how grim the situation really was. Most of the knights were injured, and were in huge pain even with the medical care. Kurelion realized this can't go on for long.

Kurelion started thinking about another plan, this time not to get them out of a trap, but to get them somewhere safe. If they would stay at the camp, if there's anything left of it, they would barely survive on night without supplies. They need to make contact with another group of knights as soon as possible.

Kurelion saw the parts Skyla managed to salvage from the monster, one of them was some kind of weird generator. Perhaps with that energy source and a transmitter they could contact other knights? But how would they get a transmitter? Will the generator even be compatible with such a thing? Once again Kurelion's head was filled with thoughts which were most likely to not matter, at all.

Skyla, apparently surprised by Cherub's greeting, exclaimed with an unintelligible noise, followed by a confused "what". Cherub giggled. "Ha ha ha ha! That was too funny. Anyway, what kinds of things did you manage to pick up? I see you have some kind of generator and tortodrone shell scales, along with other odds and ends I can't quite identify. I guess I'm wondering whether you know if they could be useful."

The elevator drew closer to the surface. The sunlight at the end flickered.

Skyla, still embarrassed, mumbled, fairly quietly, the first bit. "That's mean..."
Regaining her composure, she looked up, and continued.
"Well, the Generator might help us understand this world a bit better, seeing as everything's..."
Skyla paused, attempting to avoid speaking about what she saw further down the world.
"Machinery and whatnot."
Skyla couldn't make sense of why she grabbed the shell parts and the gems.
"Then there's these, which... I'm not sure about."
With a flick to the shell, a small pinging noise came from Skyla's finger. "The shells should be useful protection at least."
The gems... How does a gem dictate a machine's power system? It didn't make any sense.
Gems. . .
Skyla was reminded of the gem she had started to carve into with lazer out of boredom.
The patterns were interesting, and very square.
When did she do this. . .? Right, a little after the Mech outbreak. She supposed she would forget some things at low power.
On a whim, she handed the carved gem to Cherub.
"Here, you can keep this."
Skyla awkwardly patted at her neck, unsure what to do.

Cherub took the gem from Skyla's hand and held it up to the light. Blue as the sea and pulsing with energy, it was a beautiful thing, and might come useful later on. Cherub clasped it in his hand and gave her a warm smile. "Thank you." He looked up the elevator shaft; they had arrived at their destination.

The elevator came to a halt at the entrance to a city. Though its adobe structures and elaborate architecture at first might lead one to believe it was filled with people, it was in fact quite devoid of life. The only sign of activity came from an odd robot-like individual, who stood beside the platform and bowed.

"Welcome to Haven," it said simply.

The structures were a spectacle to behold, indeed. Even from his position on the elevator, he could see the entrance to the mysterious city. "Haven..." He repeated the name of the city, rubbing the hilt of his trusty revolver in an attempt to calm his nerves. The place seemed safe enough, and the knights could use the rest - but he knew well enough to keep his guard up. He picked himself up off of his satchel, and slung the strap over his good shoulder.

"... Haven, eh? Looks pretty empty for something so big... Wonder what happened here." He spoke up again, as he holstered his pistol and made his way to the sleeping Iron wolf. He crouched down, placing his weight on his left knee, and tapped the knight's helmet. "Time to wake up, commando. We're here."

Skyla bowed courteously to the stranger, before quickly hopping up the town for a vantage point.
[Activating bird's view scanning. . . Light structural damage.]
The glowing diminished, and Skyla smiled out at the city.
It was structurally sound, and looked easy to defend.
The entrance had a long bridge that could easily be destroyed and rebuilt for the ultimate safety.
The only glaring weak point of worth was the elevator from which they had come from, but anyone could use it, so it seemed easy to counter.
Anyone could use it...?
Skyla realized that authorization code could keep out the majority of lesser entities, or even kill them depending on the setup.
Although, it was probably safe to say that there were intelligent beings elsewhere who could capture knights for their authorization codes. . .
On second thought, authorization codes were a bad idea until further planned out.
The town itself looked large, comfy, and... Jovial?
Grasses and leaves speckled the already very stone looking walls, leaving a very peaceful impression.
Skyla imagined this place would look beautiful with snow.

Hopping back down, Skyla spread her info.
"Alright, this is a very nice place, and it'll be easy to defend from mechs or otherwise if need be; We just need the proper sentries."
Considering the height of the town, Skyla added, "We might want to consider some ranged defenses too."
Relaxing a bit, Skyla chuckled, "I think everyone else is going to like this place!"

In responsive, as it where the only reaction the Iron Wolf gave was a quick grab. Still he was dead a sleep, perhaps a trained reaction from the Swordsmen. As it stood he was still too tired to react or even wake up in this case, and his gear didn't help with the phrase dead weight. Letting the mans hand go the Iron Wolf simply fell limp once more, his hand subconsciously coming back to rest on the hilt of his weapon. Even in his sleep he was still on edge of awareness.

Although frozen during the Tortodrone battle, Furor managed to make it out alive. As the elevator arrived at its destination, he could just feel the refreshing air going through his systems several times over. However, he also felt like as if he could not move his limbs due to the intensity of the series of events beforehand.

Ignoring his crippled condition, the Berserker tried to enjoy this opportunity after a long time of hardship which started ever since his escape pod crash-landed in everyone's absence. Furor heard the mysterious entity speak, then spoke to himself clearly, with a tone of freedom, "Haven... A safe Haven... This feeling of hope almost makes me forget about the Gr-g-g-g-" He could not spit out that last word for some reason. At that moment, he twitched while frustration and trauma filled his eyes, indicating he had a past before arriving at Rescue Camp. Trying to keep himself calm, Furor proceeded with the rest of the Knights, with his sword and shield in tow.

"Whew! Finally."

There was Skyla, just a ways ahead. "Good going, sis! I didn't even have to fight anything! ...Yet."

"Hang on, Ragnir. I'm picking up an unidentified life form on your... head?"

Ragnir leaned his head backward, and spotted a corpulent blue bird staring down at him out of the corner of his eye. "No worries. It's a... bird."

The bird cocked its head to one side and chirped.

"Uh, hello to you too."

The bird made a loud tweet and flew back toward a small town's gate. Wait. Small town? "Uh... Rega?"

"Yeah?"

"Is there supposed to be a town there?" Ragnir reached for his shield, before realizing that, no, there weren't any Gremlins in there.

"A town?"

"Yeah. Looks like a small town." Ragnir began making his way toward Cherub's group, hoping they could explain what all was going on.

Kurelion was very surprised. As the elevator finally got to the surface, they weren't where they came down. They were now by some town of sorts with many knights applauding them on reaching to 'Haven'. Well, that's not a very creative name, is it? He thought to himself as the group approached the city on a bridge from the elevator.

The city was beautiful, filled with lush lime green grass, well, he assumed it's grass, and beautiful plants, that he assumed were trees, surrounding the city. The entire city was on a hill, and the only entrance on the surface he could see to the city was the bridge which they were crossing from the elevator. Like all of the rest of Cradle, it seemed to have stone architecture when it was really made out of complex machinery.

The bridge to the city was well defended. Dozens of knights were protecting it with many sentry stations and sand bags blocking the way to the bridge. Kurelion didn't doubt that even if it was attacked, Haven will be able to defend itself, yet, after both the Valkyrie and the Tortodrone, he didn't dare to put his guard down.

As they approached to the city they met with it's inhabitants, namely, the 'Strangers'. Yeah, we really need to work on our naming skills He thought. The Strangers were friendly, and welcomed the knights into the city, even though they knew there would be consequences for helping 'aliens' who have just been shot down by a weird laser from a powerful source. Kurelion appreciated their inclusiveness towards the knights even though they are complete strangers. Maybe we should've been called strangers, because no doubt we're the strangers here. He thought as the city drew closer and closer.

The marksman sighed, as he let his hand drop from the sleeping man's head. Truth be told, Cobalt felt the need for sleep. His arm was pretty banged up, and he would have liked nothing more than to sleep it off. "Lucky, wolf." He felt a smile grace his features.

I don't know what happened to these people before I got to the camp... But it looked like they'd been through hell. He deserves the sleep more than I do.

He pushed himself off of his knee, standing upright. He quickly checked his belongings - yes, they were all there - and quickly made his way to the front of the group. There he saw Kurelion. He tapped him on the shoulder, focusing on trying to keep up with his pace. "I didn't thank you for patching me up back there. Name's Cobalt." He stuck his hand out for a handshake. "My arm might look pretty bad, but it doesn't compare to the other knights. What happened before I got to that camp you were staying in?"

The most difficult thing for Cherub was to issue orders during peacetime. I order you to relax and enjoy yourselves! Or perhaps, Set up auto-defense batteries pronto! That would have been an absurd thing to ask of people untrained in engineering. They were the first to arrive at Haven, a place people at Rescue Camp spoke of like a myth. It existed all right, and it was a beautiful sight for sore eyes.

The first order of business would have to be...

"Okay everyone, explore. Map out the place, report everything you find, and when you get back, send the data to Skyla."

After hearing Cherub's orders, Furor quietly agreed, saluting before he left. He traveled further into the town, which had a scenery to behold. However, he was still troubled by the G word he tried to mention, and had is sword in the ready.

Looking at the scenery, though, it was not as lifeless as it seemed at first glance. Though not seeming heavily-populated, there were more tall, mysterious entities, similar to the one at the entrance. Furor could not tell if they were living or if they were machines because they spoke in robotic voices and they were not alerted in the slightest by his appearance; the latter of which would have been the usual reaction from life forms that did not recognise him, which he took note of. As for the location itself, he proceeded to the west of the entrance, and saw what appeared to be some kind of shopping district. While exploring, Furor looked up at one of the entities, then asked, "Excuse me. May I please know where we are and what it is?"