Extreme Prejudice: Donovan and Xian attempt Flock Quest (09/09/2403)

Donovan and Xian would leave their subordinates out of the fray this time, leaving them to train in a residential area some distance from the battle itself.  While this happened, Donovan and Xian would combine their abilities to set up a rather extensive trap system in a single narrow in the area where the three remaining Tyrani now called their stomping ground.  The trap would consist of a pitfall filled with spikes and a flaming trap that would act as the cover once the creatures were trapped.

Donovan and Xian would spend quite a great deal of time doing this before they initiated their bait plan.  Unfortunately, since their last bait plan had been so successful, the creatures were now particularly cautious about seemingly free meals, especially those that seemed to lure them away from the group.  This caused them to stick together for the most part.  Donovan smiled at this adaptation now, noting that their bait would indeed draw all three creatures curiously towards their doom.  The bait took the shape of a large female herbivore which they had observed at the beach, who appeared to be wounded and caring for two juveniles of the same species.  The creature would leave an easily tracked blood trail as well as an ethereal trail to entice the Tyrani, leading them all into that single corridor.  The creatures would approach it cautiously, with the adult moving ahead to ‘test the waters’ before the creature attacked them.  This would cause them to jump back out of the range of Donovan’s trap as they observed the creature before the two adolescents took off.

This confused the two mercenaries considerably, who knew that they had one chance and one only to spring this trap on their prey.  Seconds later the adult would take off as well, following the adolescents as they began to search the area for potential signs of a trap.  At this point, Xian and Donovan would be as stealthy as possible, keeping their outputs low and allowing the Mercenary combat suit to hide their presence.

They would be forced to wait about half of an hour before the creatures returned and made their attempt at the prey, allowing Donovan to spring the trap.  The trap would be successful, but not as successful as they had planned it to be, as all three Tyrani concentrated their powerful ‘wing-claws’ at the roof of the trap, dissipating the third gambit and busting their way out.  Donovan cursed, wondering how it was that they could have anticipated the trap.  It was only when the creatures started making their way towards his location that he understood what was going on.  Unlike Xian who’s Environmental Simulator was rather potent, Donovan’s simulator was not as all-encompassing, so while it kept him stealthed from creatures that were unaware of his presence, he could still be found by entities that were looking for him.  His faint energy signature had made it hard for the creatures to pin-point his location in their thirty minute search, but it had not convinced them that he was not there.

Despite being aware of his presence and the possibility of the trap, they had not bargained for how much Donovan would put into springing it however, leaving them all rather damaged from the pitfall.  This allowed Donovan and Xian to spring into action now, dissipating their stealth abilities before concentrating their attacks on the incoming creatures.  Their speed would give them some ability to dodge the incoming ranged attacks, but both Xian and Donovan would manage to score damage on the creatures before they were engaged at close range.  This was particularly effect with Xian using his Edgefire on the ground on which they ran, fusing their feet into the earth itself to slow their movements while Donovan combined his Iridicon and Nautilus to deal damage to the creatures over time.  This would buy them enough time to fuse with their binding summons, unseal them and summon their drive gears while the birds dug themselves out of the solid earth that encased their feet.

Xian would waste no time engaging the two adolescents with his unsealed binding summon, keeping them both busy with his dimensional manipulation while Donovan took on the injured adult.  In both cases, the mercenaries would have the undeniable advantage in power, but their combat abilities would be far removed from those of the genetically modified Tyrani, who scored far more attacks than their opponents could.  This would force Xian onto the retreat as he attempted to heal himself and his teammate, while Donovan powered into his Omega Drive and used his Monstrous to project a dimensional barrier and at least slow their inbound opponents.

Unfortunately, even with his SAUCE, it would not be enough, the creatures would make their way through the dimensional distortion, delivering a power series of attacks to his form before he vanished with Monstrous now.  Xian would no become their target, but would be having none of it.  His saved Omega Drive would target the adult, warping him in a dimensional field before shunting him to the edge of Xian’s personal space, this time, straight down.  This would take care of one of them, but the incoming attacks from the two remaining Tyrani would deal more than enough damage to dispatch Xian’s binding summon and stun him in his tracks.  At this point, Donovan would re-emerge however, and use the rest of his Omega Drive on a single adolescent, creating a dimensional instability that cleaved the already damaged bird in half.  This would leave just the final adolescent, who did the smart thing and fled, being now outnumbered and over powered.  This would leave Xian and Donovan with another chase. Donovan would have the obvious head start as Xian recovered from his mental backlash, leaving the summon with a great deal of catching up to do.  His Inhuman Creation Station would have to do the trick as Xian summoned a mount for himself before he tried to catch up with Donovan.

Donovan would be the first to catch the adolescent Tyrani, trapping it in a Monstrous bubble to stop its motion as he flooded the inside of the construct with Iridicon.  This would be particularly effective, adding to the damage over time abilities that he had been filling the creature with since it entered the pitfall.  Unfortunately, with the sheer force of its physical attacks, the creature would manage to break the bubble.  By this time, Xian had arrived however, dissipating his mount before he realised a fully charged attack.  The Frost Edge attack would cause the creature’s form to start to crack like glass, a very painful effect that was only compounded by Donovan now imposing a powerful dimensional field.  Try as it might, escape was simply not a possibility and the creature would soon find itself completely shattered under the power of the two mercenary power houses. 

Outcome: With the shattering of the last adolescent a strange energetic resonance could be felt between the creature’s dissipating energy and Xian and Donovan’s form.  The energies would dissipate into them, bestowing them both with the ability to forcefully sever the links between ethereal constructs or components.

Xian: 360 Exp (healed)

Donovan: 350 Exp (healed)vv