exsiliumlogs | Other Worlds: V 2.0

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Other Worlds: V 2.0

Date & Time: May 21st, beginning at 0900.
Location: The Initiative Hold and all throughout Elmer's world
Characters: Anyone participating in the fighting, anyone staying behind.
Summary: Elmer's world is fought for and lost.
Warnings: Violence, death.

They reopen the portal at 0900, May 21st. The first scientist who stepped through was killed within thirty seconds; the rest who followed made it back through to Exsilium, albeit not unscathed. The portal was shut again by a panicked operator, although a second operator knew to keep the coordinates locked.

Within ten minutes, the alert had been sent out. There's no time to wait for the Transports to gather en masse; as soon as they have a sizable enough force to stand a chance at fighting through and clearing their gateway's location, the door is opened again.

Immediately inside the door is a desolate, grim scene. What had previously been the coast of Japan is now scorched earth, blasted sand, and little else. As the first point of contact for this world, it has undoubtedly suffered the worst. Here, the UE didn't stop at governments, financial centers, and capitols — the UE destroyed everything in sight. There are enough UE soldiers remaining in the broken country to give the Transports a difficult battle, although by now the bulk of their forces have moved on.

The Initiative will soon realize the necessity of opening more gateways, just as the UE had done. Transports will be deployed to London, Berlin, Paris, DC Washington, Moscow, Beijing, New York City, Hong Kong, Madrid. Through each of these windows, the destruction is staggering. Buildings are more husks than structures, everything that can burn is alight, and the death toll is off the charts. Blackened bodies seem to line every street, while pieces litter the ground among the rubble. There's no doubt that the UE has no need of the people of this world. They're after resources only, and anything and anyone already here is to be removed.

You can find UE soldiers everywhere. They move in coordinated squadrons of 20, and each of them carries a small arsenal. Even without their incredibly advanced and destructive weaponry, they're fearfully formidable. Each soldier, while still only human, is a genetically perfect clone, further enhanced by technological implants. They're all highly trained in physical combat. Even if you can disarm one of them, don't count on close-range attacks being any easier to handle. They've brought along cannons, small flying craft, and lightweight tanks. Each of these is the top of the line in terms of technology, geared toward destroying as much as it can, as quickly as it can. The United Earth is here to destroy, and they won't stop to wonder why their targets go from being civilians and scrambling, off-guard, comparatively primitive militaries, to trained and powered Transports.

For anyone staying at home, they'll find that any Initiative presence has withdrawn fully to the Hold. All Initiative employees are needed, and most of them in the med bays. The majority of the Initiative focus is on recalling and resurrecting fallen Transports, but attention is still needed for the living-but-wounded. Any Transports who stay in Exsilium and offer their help will have it immediately accepted; they'll be put to work in the medical wings, runnings supplies, or simply set at a machine and told to keep an eye on the numbers: Transport vitals, UE movements, and maps upon maps of changing statistics and colors.

At 1500, the Initiative will recall all Transport soldiers back to Exsilium and seal shut the gateway. The UE numbers are too great, their soldiers too powerful, and Elmer's world is lost.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The soldier wouldn't get his chance to fire. While he was lining up his shot, a trail of blue flame tore through the ground toward him and he shouted in surprise and pain as it enveloped his lower body. He was put out of his misery a second later as Margulis landed next to him, using the momentum from his jump as part of a slash from one of his two sabers that left the man cut in two.

"You shouldn't risk that kind of vulnerability in battle without backup."

Flora saw her would-have-been assailant and her heart stopped as she tried to race against him, but there was no need. Everything that she'd planned on saying--that this wasn't something that she planned for, to have great pieces of land burning as they were, that she couldn't have afforded not to risk it, that she usually had plenty of backup--is cleaved as cleanly and as surely as the man he cut down.

"Margulis." Wide-eyed and breathless, it was all she knew how to say.

Flora's killed things, destroyed others, but this was different. Someone that bled and bled red, she'd never downed before. She'd never killed before. This was what she needed to do, wasn't it?

Margulis had been a soldier for a long time, become so desensitized to the killing that he didn't even think anything of it. But he'd worked with enough new recruits to know that face, the face of someone who had just seen blood spilled for the first time. When he had been in charge, he'd always assigned the fresh meat with more experienced soldiers, where a moment of hesitation would be less likely to cost the battle. Obviously nobody had thought of that here.

"This is your first time in real combat, isn't it?"

"No."

At any other time, there'd be more there. Defensive bite or perhaps patience, who could say? She was of no mind to give either, and so her answer was a simple one. This wasn't her first time in real combat. Hardly. But, this was different. She shouldn't look, but her eyes were drawn to the sight like a moth to a flame, and just like its inevitable end, the image too would be burned in her memory.

"No, of course--Spring Ring!" Movement flashed in the corner of her eye, and there was no time for thought, only action when she pivoted, shield forming at a moment's notice when they'd suddenly come under fire.

Margulis sheathed his off sword and held out his hand in the direction of their assailants. Electricity briefly crackled between his fingers before spreading out in front of his palm in a wide net.

"But only of the sort where you could afford to show your enemy mercy, right?"

"Not always, no. Not that I think there's anything wrong with it." She knew what he was getting and she didn't care for it, even if he might have had a point. Especially if he had one. It reminded her of what happened before she came here, and that was the last thing she needed, right now. She put those thoughts aside. She glanced askance to see that net of electricity, but only for a moment. There was a squadron advancing in earnest. Flora dropped her shield and reached for her ear. She flipped a sharp crescent-shaped earring in front of her like a coin, but it stayed hovering and spinning in the air, never going past arm's reach.

"Belladonna!" There was a burst of light and suddenly a very large scythe, elegant and vicious, appeared in front of her. Flora wasted no time swiftly taking hold of it and pointed at a flank of soldiers, shouting.

"Summer Thunder!" A bolt of light was fired off the tip. Some soldiers dove out of the way, a couple weren't so lucky, but it was no small loss if she hadn't hit everyone. Why? Because that's not what it was for.

Thick vines sprouted from the Earth, faster than blinking, to entangle the soldiers in their tendrils.

"There's a time and a place for non-lethal force and taking prisoners. But in this case, we can't afford to hold back. Every enemy we spare has the potential to return to the battle and cause more damage. Say you leave those men like that...do you plan to remain here for the duration of the battle so you can prevent their allies from freeing them?"

He pointed one of his swords at the entangled soldiers, but he wasn't looking at them. Instead his gaze was on Flora, waiting for her answer.

Flora felt his eyes on her, but she wouldn't turn to meet them. She's never appreciated as much before now, but if there was ever a time, ever a place that she was always self-assured, it was in a battle. They may have been hard, sometimes very hard, but her duty and conviction have always been a jewel in her palm, clear and unshakable and reassuring.

He'd found the flaw that threatened to shatter it.

"I...." Margulis was right, she knew he was, but what did that matter if she didn't know that she could do it. This was different than past battles. The United Earth had to be stopped, and the lives of Earth's people were at stake here, but could she end the lives of others to save others?

She's never felt so uncertain before, not even in her first fight years ago. But this was still a fight--no, that was the problem. It wasn't just a fight. This was war.

"Autumn Wind!" A very wide beam of green light and iridescent leaves was next, and as it left, knocking enemies much farther back than she'd ever been able to on her own, Flora blinked. She hadn't expected it to be that big.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Other Worlds: V 2.0

930

HAI :3

Oh hi~ Don't mind his lack of manners, he's in a foul mood.

psh they're in a war he's entitled

And this hits a bit close to home, because Miltia.

lmao oh miltia

He has so much guilt over Miltia.

/points and laughs at his guilt 8D