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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 4922531" data-attributes="member: 143">Session 1 (April 14, 2008)Chapter 4“You’ll live,” Allen said.  Vasily grunted, pulling his shirt back down over the mark left by the taser.  The device had been set to relatively low power, to stun rather than render unconscious, but that didn’t mean it hadn’t hurt.  Taking up his rifle—which still hadn’t been fired—he ignored the lingering pain as he got up and rejoined the others.  Buzz was still poking around the wreckage of the two—robots?  Vasily was growing somewhat impatient.  The things had caught him off-guard, but they’d responded to weapons fire as though they’d been human; likely they’d been programmed to simulate damage effects.  He recognized the sophistication of it, even as his patience continued to ebb. “Let us go,” he said, leading them to the next door.  They left the room and entered a crowded hallway, with several thick conduit pipes crossing the passage.  There was a sickly sweet stink in the air, just strong enough to be unpleasant. “Gas,” James said.  “We probably don’t want to spend longer down here than we have to.” The corridor continued, until they could see that the passage ended in another door up ahead.  This door, unlike the others they’d used, had a lock set into it next to the handle. “Door.  Is lock?” Vasily asked. Catalina drew out a small metal nail file.  She ran it over her nails, then walked over to the lock.  Grimacing at the dirty floor, she crouched next to it, probed at the lock with the file, then drew out a pin from her hair.  Using both impromptu tools together, she poked at the lock for about twenty seconds, then stood, and smiled.  Vasily leaned in, and grabbed the handle; the door drew open at his tug. “Hm.  Good.”“Thanks.”The room beyond the door looked like it had once been a repair bay or somesuch; it was difficult to tell with all of the heavy equipment removed.  A few unused power cables dangled from fixtures in the ceiling.  Another passage led off to the left through another doorway, this one standing open. Smith’s voice sounded over another speaker set into the ceiling.  “There’s a big bad robot blocking the way up ahead.  He’s waiting for your to arrive.  Guns might work… or maybe you can find something in that box that can help.”“There,” Catalina said, indicating the crate lying on the floor under the speaker.  She walked over to investigate, keeping her distance. “You want to deal with the box, Catalina?” Jane asked, coming up to join her.“I’ve no tools with me, which is making life difficult.  This one doesn’t look like a hairpin will work.”  She pointed to the locking mechanism on top of the box, which had a small numeric keypad attached and no apparent keyhole. Jane drew the bolt on her rifle, and pointed the barrel at the lock. “Hey!  No!  Box may have explosive…” Vasily yelled, but he was cut off by the sound of the rifle shot.  Catalina simply looked at Jane with an open-mouthed look of horror. “There you go,” Jane said.  “Next time I ask, there’s your choices.” “Would have been a good idea to make it clear to begin with, you trigger happy moron,” Catalina muttered under her breath, as Jane bent to examine the contents of the box.  “Hmm.  Grenades, explosives.”  She handed up a package to Catalina, who took it, after a moment.  “Anyone else want grenades?” Jane said, holding one up. “Surely these aren’t real?” Buzz asked.“Training gear, but same as real as far as robot concerned,” Vasily said.  “You think you can make ambush for robot?” he asked Catalina, who was still examining the explosive device Jane had given her. “I’m afraid explosives aren’t my specialty,” she said.  “Give it to Igor here,” James said, motioning to Vasily.  The Russian sent a hard look at the doctor, but finally said, “Give me explosives.  I try set trap.”They made their way down the other passage, which bent to the left after about fifteen paces.  Vasily progressed to the intersection, peered around the bend.  “Okay,” he said.  “Robot in next room.  I set trap, you bring it through here.”  He handed his rifle to James, who accepted it after a moment’s pause.  While the others went on ahead, he knelt at the corner, focusing upon the device, pulling out a tripwire from the mechanism, looking for a place to anchor it.  He wasn’t having much luck when there was a clank and clatter from ahead, followed by the rattle of automatic weapons fire, punctuated by the deep cough of single shots.   Catalina was the first back.  “Too late, it’s seen Calamity Jane.”“Incoming,” Jane said, with Buzz and James right behind her.  They bypassed Vasily, careful to avoid the tripwire he’d strung across the corridor.  The Russian cursed as he tried to find the trigger to arm the bomb; he wasn’t familiar with this particular type of construction.  The loud thump of the robot’s tread drew steadily louder.  “Fifty feet,” Jane said, glancing around the corner.  Vasily felt his fingers slip, but it was too late to do anything but close his eyes as the explosives went off in front of him.  The simulated blast was only about as strong as another flashbang, but it blinded him, searing his hands and face with the force of it.  He fell back, dazed.  He could still hear the others shouting. And the tread of the training bot, which came ponderously around the corner, right into the midst of the new recruits. SERVER : [DM]  Vasily Kasprjak : Demolitions Check, Roll 1d20: 3 + Modifier: -4 = Total: -1 The bot was twice the size of the man, and its servos whirled loudly under a shell of plate armor that covered most of its body.  It was armed with tasers that it fired at point-blank range, striking Catalina and Jane.  Both women screamed and fell, Catalina banging her head on the nearby wall, while Jane dropped her rifle and crumpled into a heap.  The bot came forward, almost stepping on Vasily’s hand as the Russian tried to recover from the explosion he’d inadvertently set off. With a whistling noise the bot drew the taser cables back into its torso, turning toward James Allen, who was backpedaling away from it, his eyes wide.  It had missed Buzz entirely, who’d fallen back against the far wall, still trying to blink away the flare from Vasily’s bomb.  As the bot started forward again, right toward the fallen Russian, something just snapped in him; he rushed forward, and grabbed the access port that sat squarely in the center of the robot’s lower back.  A confused welter of wires and gears was visible.  He reached in and started yanking.  Something flashed, burning his hand, and he screamed in pain.  He kept on screaming as he drew out the handgun that Jane had given him, held its muzzle up to the opening, and pulled the trigger.  There was a flash, a loud noise.  Suddenly the bot stiffened, and slumped over.  “Very cool,” Jane said, as quiet returned to the corridor.  She extended a hand and helped Vasily to his feet.  “Neat work,” Catalina added. When he could see and hear clearly again, Buzz took a closer look at the hole in the giant robot’s back.  He saw that his wild shot had penetrated what looked like a control box set right in the guts of the thing’s torso.  Tendrils of electricity still flashed around the opening. “We’re lucky someone wasn’t killed,” James said.  “This is getting ridiculous.” “All right, looks like you kids get to call it a day early,” Sergeant Smith’s voice came from the speaker in the room behind them.  “Too bad, we had a pool on how many times you’d each ‘die’.  Come on ahead, it’s clear back around to the elevator.” There were more than a few muttered growls in the direction of the speaker, as the battered recruits gathered together and made their way to the exit.</blockquote>

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