acts_of_gord | Assault on City 17: Team Ninja

In better times City 17 had many, many ways of crossing town. For the most part, the citizens of today travel on the surface, and mostly on foot. This is partly because they're easier to track down, and partly because the alternatives haven't been maintained lately. On the other hand, the Combine don't use the underpassages any more either. Clearing one of the tunnels that crosses half the City is a priority for the Resistance; it'll give them a much better crack at getting behind enemy lines. Thus the infiltration team finds themselves in a small courtyard at the back of what was once a highway maintenance building, facing a poorly lit flight of stairs leading down.

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From:

jv-034.livejournal.com

John takes advantage of the couch to shuffle to the open side of the door, shimmying in and then crouching until right before the couch, when he stands up--

whe-whe-whe go the darts as all three stike post-human flesh where the skull meets the next.

From:

acts_of_gord

The sniper doesn't even get to send off a startled signal to his comrades, but only slumps to the floor, knocking his emplaced gun wide of any possible target.

(This is not an area normally prone to necrotics. This is an area of citizens and rebels. There is no guidance laser. People would notice.)

From:

jv-034.livejournal.com

John reloaded his gun, cocks it, and backs out just as slowly.

He does the same thing for every other room with a sniper in it, smooth as clockwork, and then comes back to the rebel. "Floor's cleared. Don't know if there's anything you want from here: ammo, health."

From:

acts_of_gord

"You're good," Aloysius says admiringly, but that's all. He's got to grab those ammo clips and a couple of the health vials. Not like there's a medic around, after all.

From:

jv-034.livejournal.com

"Not good. Conditioned, same as you." John gives a grim smile. "You alright? Lose any blood? Can take care of that, too."

From:

acts_of_gord

"A couple of places," Aloysius admits. "Nothing I haven't handled with some bandages and vials over the course of the past week, but if you can lend a hand, that'd be great."

From:

acts_of_gord

Meanwhile, down in the street...

The Combine haven't been patrolling at street level here. Their foot soldiers are needed elsewhere, and anyway there were headcrab zombies wandering about. The snipers could take care of those when they became an issue. On the other hand, no one had much wanted to deal with zombies coming after the actual foot soldiers, so the last few ranks of Overwatch had taken a few steps. Dinah may find, as she makes her way down Linden Street, that there's a faint chirping noise coming from some oddly metallic lumps scattered about the place.

From:

raptorcanaria

Chirping, huh?

Dinah had been making her way fairly energetically, determined to present a moving target to any sniper that might see her. Chirping little robot things, however are a different matter.

She crouches in the middle of the street, bringing her face closer to ground level, and screams.

"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE"

From:

acts_of_gord

There are quite a lot of the mines. They're placed relatively close together, so that if someone survives the explosion of one, the next one'll be set off, and so on and so forth. The Combine are efficient that way.

They're also set to leap into the air and detonate somewhere between one and two meters above the surface if proximity or concussion sets them off.

We're not sure what someone from England would consider appropriate music for what happens next, but any American who'd ever watched more than one or two fireworks displays would consider the ensuing demonstration of hopping and exploding and shattering in all directions to be well worth the final movement of the 1812 Overture.

From:

raptorcanaria

Dinah is, fortunately, very much American.

Though she's busy right now, curled up into a protective ball with her hands over her ears.

For the first ten seconds, anyway. After that she's running through, avoiding explosions and watching for any other dangers.

From:

acts_of_gord

The only remaining danger at street level- John and his tranq gun are rampaging through the dormitory like there's no tomorrow- is up ahead: an entrenched Combine soldier manning a heavy pulse machine gun, mounted on top of an oddly shimmering glassy wall. He stares at Dinah, or at least gives the impression of doing so- it's not as if the glowing orange lenses set into that dark helmet can blink, after all- and brings the gun to bear...

From:

raptorcanaria

Ted would tell her that a decent hero could unarm a man with a gun without even breaking a sweat. He's been over this over and over with Dinah, insisting that she should be able to deal with this. She even knows how she would: somersault on to the wall, use her momentum and his surprise to spin and kick, knock the gun to the ground and even the score.

But she's already tired, and she already has the energy from screaming, so she just takes another breath and pitches another note.

"EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE"

This is a shattering move. One she's honed and practiced so it will dismantle machinery.

From:

acts_of_gord

The human Resistance does not have access to sonic weapons. The Combine have never tried to reinforce against them, therefore, and so the gun- and the wall it's mounted on- shatter into a thousand pieces.

The silence that follows is broken only by the hoarse croaking of "Outbreak! Outbreak! Outbreak!" as the soldier radios for help.

Edited Date: 2008-09-20 05:40 pm (UTC)

From:

raptorcanaria

Oh no he doesn't.

Dinah follows up the scream by doing the move she would have if she were more confident in her skills. She throws herself towards the solider and leaps - not at him exactly, but over him, using him as s pivot. As she upends herself over him, she grabs his helmet, pulling it off and with her on the follow through.

No damn technology.

From:

acts_of_gord

The motion snaps his head back, hard; the helmet is a full-face model that catches on the jaw, but nonetheless comes off thanks to Dinah's sheer momentum. The post-human face that appears is dazed and confused in the daylight, but the objective remains: stop the encroaching anti-citizens.

Combine hand-to-hand programming for their augmented humans is woefully unattractive to watch, but it may be effective. We'll just have to see, won't we?

From:

raptorcanaria

Not the pleasantest looking opponent Dinah's ever faced, but not the scariest either. Regardless, she's done with using superpowers now and falling into her forte. The helmet abandoned, she turns back to the solider without even stopping.

Judo's good to start, then she combines Ninjitsu and Pankration, with one objective - to get him unconscious as soon as possible.

From:

acts_of_gord

The closest analogue to the Combine soldier's responses is the Earth martial art of krav maga. It assumes all combat is final combat, that no quarter will be given, and that the objective is attacker neutralization. It is not, however, a set of coded responses that has seen much practice. The Combine generally rely heavily on their guns and armor, as that's been most of what's necessary to date.

And having to repeatedly defend one's unexpectedly vulnerable head puts a real crimp in the drive to move from defense to offense.

From:

raptorcanaria

She hasn't seen some of these moves, and if she was in any state of mind other than extreme concentration, Dinah might note them to learn later. As it is, she'll just remember them later anyway.

But unlike him, Dinah has a lot of practice under her belt, and it's a matter of minutes before she finds his weakness and shoots in a firm nerve strike to his exposed neck.

From:

acts_of_gord

There's a reason the Overwatch normally wears those helmets. The post-human modifications made by the Combine leave certain areas unavoidably exposed. The stricken soldier drops like a brick.