Baltimore: Deployment

[Trask]

"Alpha Team, you have a go."

Eight dark forms detached themselves from the wind-tossed helicopter and descended toward the besieged NovaTeX building. Eight black and grey knots of armour and hydraulics. They plunged to earth like colossal hailstones birthed from the boiling thunderheads above.

"Alpha team, this is Alpha leader, begin cycling jump-jets for full burn on my mark in three ... two ... one ... "

Three hundred feet up, the air was filled with a low whine that rapidly rose in pitch to a sonic screech as powerful jets slowed the meteoric plunge of tons of military hardware. The thrust vapourised the slashing rain and kicked up a fine spray that lent each unit of Alpha Team a little island of calm amidst the thrashing storm as they finally touched ground.

THWUMP!

"Alpha Leader to Alpha Team, we have contact, deploy around the perimeter and fire at will upon identified targets only."

The eight massive forms uncurled with a whine of servos and hissing of hydraulics. Alpha Leader strode with purpose toward with crumpled gates of the complex, toward where the fighting was thickest.

THWUMP! THWUMP! THWUMP! THWUMP!

The heavy tread of eight and a half feet of armoured frame shook the earth with each step. With a mechanical whirr Alpha leader raised his arm and the mounted, tri-barreled cannon cycled up.

In the cockpit a small, green, ready light winked on.

The virtual display hummed, the targeting reticle dancing across the thrashing mass of combatants, highlighting them in red and blue accordingly.

---[TARGET IDENTIFIED]---
---[UNIT DESIGNATION : WOLVERINE]---
---[AFFILIATION : X-MEN]---
---[CLASS : MELEE]---
---[THREAT : MEDIUM/HIGH]---

Designated X-Men mutants were not targets, however any mutant engaged in the battle would have to stand down or be regarded as a potential terrorist.

There could be no compromise.

"CIVILIAN SECURITY FORCES ARE TO WITHDRAW WITH IMMEDIATE EFFECT," a human, but somewhat tinny voice thundered. Most of the police had already retreated from the battle as best they could, as had the majority of NovaTeX security.

"ALL MUTANTS ENGAGED IN COMBAT WILL STAND DOWN WITH IMMEDIATE EFFECT OR BE TAKEN INTO CUSTODY. YOU HAVE THIRTY SECONDS TO COMPLY!"

[logan]

Logan was amidst the successful chopping up of these animated freaks. After battling them for a few minutes, it had become obvious they were no longer living – he’d seen enough combat to know a fatal wound when he saw one. Somehow they were all screaming and horrified at what was going on, but it was certain they were being somehow manipulated – some powerful psychic perhaps. Someone who could make the dead walk.

Hot wind blasted him as light flooded into his chaotic melee. He raised his head just long enough to see the eight foot armored frames approaching him… they had particularly large guns.

"ALL MUTANTS ENGAGED IN COMBAT WILL STAND DOWN WITH IMMEDIATE EFFECT OR BE TAKEN INTO CUSTODY. YOU HAVE THIRTY SECONDS TO COMPLY!"

Like that was even an option. These damn zombies weren’t going to stop fighting, that was sure… doing his best to resist assault without attacking, Logan decided for a more strategic option. Struggling partially free, he attempted to leap clear of the clutter of corpses.

No such luck.

Two of the ‘cops’ grabbed him around the waist, and were pulling him back in. He screamed a frustrated battle cry, and stabbed directly through the head of one of them.

“Ah fuck it, just bring it on ya’ robot bastards!” He had a feeling the inevitable had arrived. Now the situation REALLY got bad.

[conduit]

Rayen's heart stopped as the machines dropped out of the sky. She hadn't seen- hadn' t even dreamed of- anything like them. Suddenly the whole thing seemed far, far more dangerous. A sense of dread crawled beneath her skin, and in panic, she looked for Bandero.

For Logan.

Anyone?

In the chaos, everyone had melted into a mass of plant and corpse and human- all she could think to do was get out of the Sentinel's line of sight. Running behind a news van, Rayen clutched her shoulder, finally taking a moment to notice the deep gashes radiating hot pain through her upper body. Adrenaline still had her, so the wound wouldn't slow her down, had she any idea what to do. Fear locked her in place; her feet planted to the ground, unmoving.

[chamber]

Jonothan heard them before he saw them, and closed his leather jacket, stepping back beneath the tree. His inner fire lit up the underside like a beacon in the hellish chaos.

He watched the Sentinels land, calmly examining their features. It wouldn't be too hard to take one of them out; they seemed markedly weak to the sort of attack a mutant could bring on. That wasn't what made them dangerous. What made them dangerous was their firepower. Jonothan continued to look them over, hoping the X-Men would have no reason to go up against the beasts.

Thinking back to the meeting, it seemed likely he was the only one that realized the mess they'd be in if they did. Unafraid for his life, he couldn't deny the government had authority on their side.

Logan. Bandero. Rayen. Do not make criminals out of yourselves. Back down.

[forge]

Forge threw down his gun, a scowl on his face. The voice in his head was no doubt Chamber, and it was no doubt correct… He held up his hands. They were not here to fight the government.

Only there was still the problem of the Giant Fly Traps and the F’n pedestrians that have LOST THEIR MINDS.

He looked straight at the Sentinels, but his vision was taking in everything around him. He saw an old lady pick herself up off the ground, where she’d been seemingly trampled by the vacating crowd…

She stood slowly, and then began to scream. When she swiveled his direction, her head was lolling limply on a clearly broken neck – the skin a rubbery contortion that made him instantly want to scream and vomit at the same time…

She started to trot towards him screaming in abject terror… her face looked sadly confused, and horribly afraid. He could tell she was mumbling between her guttural sounds of misery: “Oh no oh no oh no oh no oh no oh no oh no”

Forge’s heart sank. Had Hell itself opened it’s gates today?

[Juggers]

The Juggernaut grinned happily to himself and hoisted another car before launching it casually over the fence toward the Nova TeX building. The press of fleeing people had dwindled to a few stragglers and the lurching, screaming unfortunates that had fallen victim to dead man.

Or if they were really unlucky, a giant plant, THEN Dead Man.

Up on the roof-top Python scanned the chaos through the scope of his rifle. Nothing had been worth shooting yet. Police, security forces, even the soldiers were horribly out matched. He'd briefly considered taking pot shots at some of the marauding X-Men, but that hadn't seemed worth revealing his hiding place either. So he waited.

And got wetter.

Then the roar of engines filled the air and the huge, illuminated suits had arrived.

Cain paused, his attention shifting away for a moment from his latest choice of projectile; a unattended news van.

One of the armoured titans stomped its way down to the crushed gate, the large, three barreled cannon aimed threateningly.

"ALL MUTANTS ENGAGED IN COMBAT WILL STAND DOWN WITH IMMEDIATE EFFECT OR BE TAKEN INTO CUSTODY. YOU HAVE THIRTY SECONDS TO COMPLY!"

Cain laughed out loud.

"Fuck off tin man!" He yelled before grabbing the van and lobbing it straight at the approaching Sentinel. The fact that he had revealed a shivering, wounded girl who had been sheltering behind the vehicle didn't even register.

Cain was in his happy place; small things like people rarely registered there.

For its part the Sentinel seemed to brace itself, rubble clamps on its feet biting deeply into concrete and extended its arms out ahead of it. The van crashed into the frame front-end first and crumpled almost like a crushed can.

Behind the mangled wreck the Sentinel still stood.

Up on the roof, Python swore.

[forge]

On one side, the old lady zombie was charging him. On the other, Juggernaut was seconds away from squishing his sister.

Decisions, decisions.

Forge picked up his massive cannon, ducking instantly to do so, and drew a 9mm pistol out of the waistband of his jacket with the other hand. Crossing arms, he aimed the cannon at Juggernauts feet, and the opposite arm at the zombie.

The 9 cracked multiple reports, blasting the lolling head of the zombie to bloody bits. The cannon let off the buzzing noise again, the white-hot laser melted the concrete below Juggernauts feet in an instant.

The street gave way, crumbling into the sewers below, and the Juggernaut went with it. He fell through a hole about seven feet in diameter, rubble following him in.

Forge looked up at the Sentinel, who was undoubtedly about to unload on him with whatever payload it was hauling – but he’d managed to stop the undead gross once-a-gramma and save his sister. It was a good death.

But he blinked as the Sentinel was suddenly being blasted from behind by a hail of small arms fire! The Special Ops troops, who were live not ten minutes ago, had apparently been killed in some fashion. They were reanimated now, of course, and he could clearly see crushed skulls and broken bones… Beyond them were the remains of two giant plants, which had fallen over onto their covered area, presumably killing them. He could still see Colossus struggling with more plants, and Poseidon using his acid to eat through others.

Now the Spec Ops guys were hosing into the Sentinels with guns that were probably doing no damage… either way, it got the guy’s attention. The mutant controlling the dead must have been looking out for Juggernaut.

What stupidly good luck.

[logan]

Unsurprisingly to Logan, the Sentinels opened fire. He had assumed he’d be feeling the hot-rounds of depleted uranium chain gun ammunition ripping him to pieces, but found himself being pelted with a spray of darts. They seemed to be the same kind that he was hit with over a year earlier, from William Stryker.

His flesh felt as if on fire, and he fell back onto the hood, the poison making him sluggish… it was a big enough dose to immediately drop most people, but Logan’s healing factor made him nearly immune to the affects of it. Still… it was a LOT of poison.

The Zombies paid no attention to it at all. They stumbled a bit as they were shot into, but one turned around and drew his side arm, firing at the Sentinel. Two others were on top of Logan, smashing his face with a rain of brutal stomps, denting the hood of the police car in. He could see his own blood spraying into the air. And it hurt. Oh God did it hurt.

[conduit]

Rayen had stared at the impossibly huge man as the van was swept away from her as if it were made of styrofoam. Backing away, she was just out of range as Forge's gun sunk the ground beneath Juggernaut's feet.

Her eyes met Bandero's for a split second.

Logan was yelling a few yards behind, and she watched as the sentinels took him down, and the zombies closed in. Without thinking, she ran towards him, kicking an- ugh, what is that? -to one side. Looking up at a sentinel, she took her chance.

Pulling volts from the machine, only enough to waver its basic functions for a moment, she brought the current out in all directions. It connected with the corpses around her, knocking them back just enough for her to grab Logan and get him to his feet, dragging him out of the path of the Sentinels.

She hoped tapping their circuits hadn't pissed anyone off.

[preacher]

"ALL MUTANTS ENGAGED IN COMBAT WILL STAND DOWN WITH IMMEDIATE EFFECT OR BE TAKEN INTO CUSTODY. YOU HAVE THIRTY SECONDS TO COMPLY!"

It was a good thing he wasn't in combat then. Those robots looked like they meant business. Someone was emptying their bullets on them, but they showed no signs of slowing down. Despite the obvious dangers, Adam found himself moving closer to where the action was. He was mezmerized.

He hadn't been prepared for the chaos that was taking place before his eyes, but he was slowly adapting. He began watching the key members of the action, and suddenly recognized the Juggernaut. He was one of the Brotherhood! But he looked busy right now. And Adam didn't really want to get close to those robotic weapons.

[Nightingale]

The building, no longer protected by gates and walls thanks to Juggernaut's car throwing, was easy to get into. The boy who'd forced her to heal her mother was gone, long gone, and Angie looked around at the destruction with confusion. There was no panic in here, no destruction beyond the front walls, where Juggernaut had hit with his massive projectiles. With an idle thought that a mutant olympics would be a great thing, Angie left the building, gripping her sports drink, and ran as quickly as she could back out onto the street, to where the fighting was and where she would be needed. Where's Pyro? Probably out the back destroying the stores still, but she couldn't help him and help the rest of the Brotherhood at the same time. Torn, looking down the alley that led out toward the back and then at the street where the fighting was going on, her mind was made up by a sudden crack and the sight of the Juggernaut falling down and out of sight.

Yelling, noise without words, Angie's eyes widened as a huge robotic ... thing ... turned around in her direction. She hoped to pass herself off as a civilian, but if these were the sentinels she'd heard about... They'd surely have some way of telling that she was a mutant. Shit. Shit! She ducked down behind a dumpster, ducking her head out to see what was going on. It had turned around now, was being attacked by someone, and she ran back out and toward the Juggernaut. Another of the things was in the way, though, and she ran into a building, dark now and without power, and tried to find her way through the maze of hallways toward a door on the other side. She needed to check to see if the Juggernaut was ok, get him up and out, because it seemed like nothing was stopping these things. And nothing could stop the Juggernaut, she'd already heard his mantra and had seen the truth of it. For now, though, she was stuck in a dark hallway, sipping her sports drink and trying to find her way out. There didn't seem to be one and she backtracked to where she'd come in. "Shit!" The sentinel was still there, and she didn't dare run back out and risk drawing it's attention. She had no way of fixing herself if she was riddled with bullets, and if she was hurt, it would make her even less able to help the others.

[logan]

Wolverine had one arm around Rayen, staggering with her support away from the cluster of zombie as the Sentinels engaged them in melee combat. The robotic brutes were easily flattening and smashing them, an almost comic gesture of peskiness about their movements. To Logan, they looked like robotic farmers trying to squash bugs on the porch.

He managed a low groan as the last of the twelve odd injections of poison wore off. It had only been a few seconds. He stood fully and shook his head a bit, as if trying to clear up dizziness.

“Rayen,” He said, eyes finally focusing, and looking into her own.. “Good save.”

He smirked that trademark smirk, and went to say something else, but any addition was cut short by a concrete-bursting explosion in front of them. The two stumbled backwards, barely keeping their feet, as two more gigantic plants burst forth from beneath the streets.

A quick survey of the area showed more of the dead civilians (many of whom were shot by the zombie-police) were animating, getting up and looking around for their next victims.

“We gotta slow this shit down...” He said, then looked over at his gorgeous accomplice. “Think you can serve up some grilled veggies? I'll fend off the Romero fans.”

*SNIKT*

As if an answer to his prayers, and a wonderful irony due to his call-name, Angel piped up over the comm: [glow=red,2,300]“Talk to me guys, what can I do to help?” [/glow]

Wolverine grinned, driving blades through an approaching zombies head. He tapped his comm and shouted back:

[glow=red,2,300]“Angel, we gotta find whoever's controlling these goddam plants and zombies! They've gotta be on a rooftop or hiding in an alley or something. A balcony, anything! See what you can find!” [/glow]

Then, as an additional add-on, between slashing more zombies to bits. This was getting bloody.:

[glow=red,2,300]“Colossus – see if you can't help out Forge, I think he just pissed off the Juggernaut. No one piss off the Sentinels!” [/glow]

[angel]

Logan's voice came back over the communicator, and Warren nodded even though the other mutant seemed far too busy looking after Forge's sister to see. Moving up and away from the Sentinels, being careful not to make any move toward them that could be considered threatening, Warren scanned the area for whoever it was making so much trouble for them.

He checked rooftops, windows, alleyways and the throngs of people, but didn't spot anyone. Somehow, through all the noise, he heard a female voice, and he looked toward the source of it in desperation. His attention had been drawn to another alleyway, and Angel's keen eyes spotted two people standing on a dumpster. The man radiated creepiness, and the girl was... well, she was green. If there was any pair who would fit the bill more, Warren would eat his metaphorical hat, and he flew back up to the rooftop to try not to let them know he'd seen them.

[glow=red,2,300]"There's a pair down the alleyway across from you and to your left, Logan. Creepy guy and a green chick. Might be the ones."[/glow]

[Iceman]

As he ran back into the scene of chaos, Bobby listened for the first time in ten minutes what the others were saying over the comm.

“Angel, we gotta find whoever's controlling these goddam plants and zombies! They've gotta be on a rooftop or hiding in an alley or something. A balcony, anything! See what you can find!”

"Colossus – see if you can't help out Forge, I think he just pissed off the Juggernaut. No one piss off the Sentinels!”

Bobby stopped. Literally stopped in the middle of the road, between two cop cars left unmanned as their owners rampaged around as the living undead. His eyes fell on a Sentinel, across the way. And blocks away, Emma turned the tiny thought, the feeling almost of deja vu, into knowledge. She opened up his mind and let him remember everything that had happened. Though of course she minimized his anger towards her at having possessed him.

Without that anger, Bobby was consumed by remorse. By guilt at what he'd done, and fear at the consequences that might face him. At that moment, he subconsciously struggled against Emma to be free from all of her power. It was like an unexpected hit from behind to Emma as she opened the back door of the truck, and rather than fight him, she let him go. Mostly. She went from supplying him with enough false energy to fight, to having just enough to walk. It would preoccupy him from fighting her further, she knew.

Immediately Bobby's knees gave, and he fell to the ground heavily. Logan's last command echoed in his mind. 'Don't piss off the Sentinels'. He turned and shifted his weight so that he was sitting against the side of the cop car, and a shaking hand fumbled for his comm button.

When he spoke, his voice through the comm sounded terrible. He sounded winded and tired, and his voice shook out of fear and the tears he was trying to fight back.

[glow=red,2,300]"Iceman to...everyone..."[/glow]

He suddenly felt like he was in confession, though he'd never been Catholic. His Dad had drug him into it a few times when he was younger, and he'd always hated it. He'd usually spent the time making up ridiculous stories of things he hadn't done. Suddenly confessing wasn't so amusing.

[glow=red,2,300]"I...killed a Sentinel cop..."[/glow]

Suddenly he wanted to explain everything. Which was exactly what Emma had known he would do, and was what she wanted.

[glow=red,2,300]"I didn't know it until after, but I was possessed! Or something! I could see what was happening, but I couldn't even react to it! Until now...I-I..."[/glow]

The cop car in front of him began to swim in his vision. Bobby closed his eyes and pressed his fingers over them. He was starting to feel extremely light-headed and dizzy. He tried to open his eyes again, but the sensation wasn't gone. His face broke out into a new, clammy sweat.

[glow=red,2,300]"I killed him."[/glow]

[angel]

[glow=red,2,300]"Oh, shit Bobby."[/glow] Forgetting completely about everything else, Warren turned and scanned the ground, looking for Bobby. Spotting his friend, he swooped down over the crowd, skimming over the heads of the zombies, the cops, the innocent bystanders, and landing near the other mutant.

"What the hell are you doing out here where the rest of them are? They'll know about it, they have to have some way of recording what happens in all that technology." He could see the headlines in his mind's eye. The publicity from this was going to be astounding.

"Please tell me that there's some way you can pass this off as self defence. We were ordered to stand down, Bobby!"

[Admin]

Sy was much too busy as the Sentinals touched down to bother with them. They were technology, they wore incorruptable suits, and they had guns. All things that didn't bode well for Sy. Instead, he kept up on the plants, fighting them one by one, and coming out of each mini-battle alive, but with a fair share of scratches and scrapes.

He was just finishing one such plant when another sprang up next to it and engulfed him. Rather annoyed with the situation before getting eaten, Sy's whole body broke out in sweat, melting away his clothes and then burning through the head of the plant. It's lower "jaw" gone, Sy fell ten feet to the pavement, where he lay for a moment, naked, the wind knocked out of him. And it was still hailing.

He shivered as he sat up, gasping for breath. There was a low-mutant coming for him, but he didn't bother paying him much heed, just stood up and grabbed the mans face as he got to him, the screams behind his hand gurgling away into nothing as the thing fell down, a handprint of bubbling flesh left where the face should be.

He scanned the street quickly, noting what everyone was doing, although he'd fried his com during his adventure inside the plant so he couldn't hear them speaking.

The need to find some pants far outweighing the creepiness of the dead guy before him, Sy bent down and removed the corpses pants and put them on himself. They were a little big, but he sinched the belt up tight and turned his back on the body, ready for whatever might come next, bar a Sentinal.

[Iceman]

As Warren landed beside Bobby, he suddenly wanted to hear comforting words, to hear that they could fix everything. But he recieved the opposite, and as Warren spoke and Bobby's strength continued to fade away, Bobby grappled to explain.

"It wasn't me!" He said defensively, on the verge of yelling. "There was someone in my head! Controlling me! I was just trying to protect myself--And John--"

Bobby stopped as a thought occured to him. If this was made known...It would look like he was on John's side. The thought of what he'd done to the X-Men's reputation made him want to puke.

And he did. He leaned over, away from Angel, and he threw up on the road beside the cop car. After wiping his mouth, he leaned back against the cop car again, letting his head fall back against the metal. "Emma," he said weakly. "Her name was Emma Frost."

[Juggers]

The Juggernaut roared with laughter as the Sentinel all but caught the flying vehicle. He hadn't had this much fun in ages. Briefly, very briefly he wondered how everybody else was doing. Jane and Dead Man were clearly having a riot. Everybody Else must be doing their thing.

"You wanna play catch do ya?" He yelled at the lumbering machine, "you wanna play catch with the fuck ... "

Then the world gave way.

It was with no small amount of surprise that Cain suddenly found himself in the sewer. One moment he had been gleefully preparing the attack, the next he was standing ankle-deep in filth surrounded by the collapsed remains of the street.

He glanced down at himself and flexed his abundant muscles a few times, "could stand to loose a FEW pounds," he muttered to himself. Then he realised that he was out of the fight.

"Fuck this ... shit," he thundered. He scooped up a slab of the road remains and hurled it out of the hole in the direction of NovaTeX and then leapt after it. He landed with a resounding thump that shook the earth and buckled the paving slabs.

He made it just in time to see his improvised projectile come crashing down just to the left of one of the Sentinels, which for some reason was standing limp while Dead Mans minions climbed all over it.

Cain snapped his fingers. So close!

Then he spotted the happy looking science geek with the big, smoking gun who was grinning from ear to ear.

"Oh you are so fuckin' mine," he raged.

That said, he put his head down and charged.

[forge]

The world behind Forge seemed to zoom towards him as he seemed to zoom back. It was all he could do not to actually lose all bowel and bladder control.

Instead, he raised his cannon and fired. The laser cut a crackling beam through the air, leaving the smell of burnt ozone in it's wake...

only as the yellow beam hit Juggernaut's lowered, helmeted head, the beam split into a gamut of smaller rays - deflecting off harmlessly.

Forge had just enough time to picture the be-spectacled man in the movies who stands up slowly, and takes his glasses off only to slowly say "Mother of God..."

He must have at least Class 5000 invulnerability... remarkable...

[tingrin]

The same imaginary be-spectacled man would have finished the phrase 'Mother of God' only to turn around and add 'and all the holy angels of Heaven Above' at the sight of what was, quite literally, an oncoming silver giant.

Colossus, the plant tendril still hanging from his wrist, still covered in the sap of the foul things, was stampeding towards the Juggernaut with all the speed he could muster. Of all the Brotherhood adversaries they knew about, Colossus had studied the Juggernaut the most. The Unstoppable, they called him.

But Unstoppable didn't, in Colossus' book, mean Uninterruptable.

He ploughed into Juggernaut from the side, his shoulder acting as the contact point.