Gnome Interrogation, Tira and Garrus
The gnome would briefly wrap its arms around itself and squint its eyes as it listened to Tira’s threats, but it would then return to a more neutral pose shortly after.
Jaroline/Nepbike-Outside City Hall
Low Charge
This was probably the last thing the pair expected to do today.
I mean, they just came in to perform, get some money for necessities, and move on.
Having your wrist broken, losing your knife, and Rocket Launchers were not on the menu.
They didn't want a second helping either, but they got it anyways.
"Left!"
The two juked to the side, spinning out again from the launchers impact, this time less gracefully, landing very close to it's side, Jaroline only barely not touching the ground.
"I'm... starting to get tired..." Nepbike said
"Just a bit more... please..."
The truck grew even father away from them.
Lizard Metabolism
Space Girl
The soldiers seemed to think the situation is under control, and Monica could not argue otherwise; they were better at assessing danger than her, probably. "Right. Godspeed, gentlemen."
Then she looked back at returning Shalltear. "I guess we're done here? We should go back, see if Swarm and Crenshaw's friend found anything of note."
Space Bug (and Lil' Buglettes)
The one Ripper under fire skittered away, nimbly avoiding the gunfire. Once it subsided, it remained put. Not for long, it jumped right on the arm of a passing Swarmlord as the massive Tyranid prowled after the fleeing Clown, bonesabres at the ready. It made no sound other than the heavy, clicking breath and the steady rhythm of its chimneys working.
The Rippers near the soldier group remained motionless for a bit before they passed by them without acknowledging them for long, focus primed on the dead organic matter over there. The two creatures scampered close to the cadaver, examining it to ensure it was indeed dead - apparently it was considered bad form to eat still-living matter now - before mindlessly digging into the deceased's arm, taking surprisingly large chunks off it for such small critters.
How do lizards fly?
"C'mon ya dang honky, git!" Pulling his leg back and then attempting to smash it down yet again on the toad clown while dexterously using his other leg to try to open the door's handles to dislodge the troublesome thing, Johnny put 120 percent into doing his best to throw a wrench into the clown's plans. A strong hand groping around randomly towards whatever was deemed important enough for continued driving such as the dashboard or the steering wheel, Johnny would then clench down on whatever he could find and then try to yank it out with gorilla like strength.
Shalltear and Monica
Shalltear grimaced as the gnome burst. He had shot her up with that gun as she had guessed it was a strong weapon. She had many holes in her, and she was bleeding. Trying not to show her injury, she moved to pick up what the gnome left behind. "I suppose we should. If we have encounters like this again someone is going to die." It was incredibly painful to move around with bullets in her, but as an undead and as a battle hardened warrior she could tolerate her arm being shredded, but that would be made a little easier in the rush of battle.
She handed Monica the gnome's weapon and ammo. "Can you use this? I'm afraid I have only trained with this handgun. I don't have a weapon proficiency for a rifle."
Lizard Metabolism
Monica
Suddenly she was given an assault rifle. "I suppose we'll see." She hummed, examining the gun in question. It must have worked on the same basic principles, though its recoil was likely bigger.
"You sure you can keep going with these wounds?" Tulpa or not, it seemed Shalltear did not come out of her fight with a gnome unscathed.
How do lizards fly?
Southwest Residential, Swarmlord and Rippers
At the site where the soldiers were gathered, the group would back away as the two Rippers approached the corpse.
“Hey, what are you…?” one of the soldiers began to say.
“Careful,” said another soldier, “no telling what those things might do, or how many of them are out there. We don’t wanna make any more enemies than we have to.”
As the Rippers began to eat away at the corpse, the soldiers would try to tiptoe around the rippers and begin searching the rest of the home, relaying most of their actions through gestures.
Back near Swarmlord’s location, the Clown would let out an “Eh?” as the sole Ripper seemed to run away.
As Swarmlord entered the house, the Clown’s squishy footsteps could be heard on the other side, within the kitchen area.
“Huh,” the Clown would suddenly utter.
Swarmlord and the Ripper with it would hear a turn and then a creak, as if a door seemed to be opening.
To Swarmlord’s left, was a small welcoming area (complete with a slide-open closet) and a door leading to the house’s previously unmentioned garage. There also seemed to be a small hallway leading further into the house, though the Clown could not be seen through here. Four doors sat at various points on the left side of this hallway. The hallway would also open up to what appeared to be the kitchen, along with a dining area further past that. One final door sat on the far right side of this hallway.
There also seemed to be some space within the house blocked off by the walls in front of Swarmlord, which did not seem to have any direct access point from Swarmlord’s point of view.
Southwest Residential, Shalltear and Monica
The gun that Monica picked up seemed to be, or was at least similar in outward appearance, to an M4 Carbine.
Coco Adel - Clowntown Truck Depot Wherever the Goddamn Truck Is!
While running to avoid the truck so that Bethany could get at it, Coco made a keen observation - it was heading right for them. Jumping away from the vehicle's path, she got fairly close to an approaching girl on a motorbike of some sort. If they were this close and not dead, they were either morons or willing to fight, so she simply nodded in their direction as she pulled her assault rifle out of her pocket and held it out in her left hand, Bethany still securely tucked away under her right arm.
With a vise-like grip on her rifle to hold it steady, Coco lined up the gnome in her sights and fired a burst at the damned little creature.
edited 19th Sep '17 8:25:26 PM by nman
Near City Hall
“GYAAA-WAAAAAH!”
The Toad-Clown once again yelled out in apparent pain as Johnny once more stepped into it.
Despite the difficulty of the maneuver, the door would also pry open when Johnny used his leg on its handles.
The steering wheel would also be wrested from its place once Johnny yanked it out. The truck’s overall course did not seem to change, though it was already swerving with wild abandon.
“Hehe…”
After taking a moment to reload its gun, the driver-Clown would thrust its hand through the hole Johnny had previously created, and would attempt to shoot his body at close range.
The Toad-Clown, after recovering from Johnny’s blow, would attempt to grab onto whichever of Johnny’s limbs was closest to it, and would attempt to throw itself out of the truck through the now open door, regardless of whether it had succeeded in its grab. However, if it was successful, Johnny might notice that the Toad-Clown’s grip didn’t quite have the strength it did before.
Back outside, now that Jaroline was further away, the rocket-launcher Clown turned its sights toward Coco and Bethany.
“Bon Voyage, Baby!” the Clown would say, just before firing off its weapon.
The single gnome would not have much time to react, but once Coco was in sight, it would attempt to fire off as many rounds as it could before Coco’s shots landed. The gnome’s upper body shattered into whitish, pottery-like fragments, and the rest of the gnome’s body tumbled off the truck as it proceeded on its course.
During its attempt to drive through Coco and Bethany, the truck would make a leftward turn, veering towards one of the buildings on the east side of the street. As it passed by, the semi-trailer’s back door would begin to open.
edited 19th Sep '17 8:30:31 PM by CathariSarad
"You don't let up, don't ya, honky?" Irate at how the thing continued to claw away at his leg, Johnny still felt an iota of satisfaction that he managed to set the truck to wildly swerve around, making it harder for the operators to actually cause their havoc as before. Still, there was a gun being pointed his way and no matter how tough he was, something that big in such a close space would do a lot of damage.
Picking the lesser of the two evils, Johnny then let Toad Clown drag him on out of the speeding vehicle in question, actively pushing off the seat with both hands so that he had enough momentum to flip his body like a carp. Using superior core muscle strength and parkour skills, Johnny would then attempt to use the force to drag the Clown along for the ride before attempting yet another kick to try to actually be freed of the thing.
First off, she did apply Timelessness to Coco. Though it probably wouldn't be immediately noticeable to her, her body would stop feeling any more exhausted...or, because she applied it late, wouldn't feel any less tired.
Second, in between constant panicked call-outs of things and directions to dodge, Bethany noticed the back door of the truck opening. Considering all the opposition they were facing at this point, this wouldn't do at all. She directed her vine to immediately launch forth and try to pull the door back closed and, if it succeeded, to wrap itself around the handle and trailer hitch to keep it closed.
2 Spooky 4 U
For what felt like several long, silent minutes Garrus looked at Tira and he formed a plan. In every operation you can't perfectly plan for chance. The target not being at the location, increased security from out of nowhere, someone acting before you. All of those tiny, impossible to predict events. Now, the difference between a ok soldier and a good soldier is whatever or not you can just barely adapt to those changes or if you can take advantage of those changes to make some spectacular results.
And has it just so happens, crazy is a change that you can really take advantage of. "That sounds like a wonderful idea Tira," said Garrus in a agreeing tone. "But before you do that, I need to talk to him privately first. You know, official lawn ornament regulation business. Very serious and especially boring."
edited 19th Sep '17 10:57:58 PM by LightToAll
Tira nodded rapidly, not wanting to be bored.
Ok, sure, have fun Gary! I'm going to search the house to make sure he's not hiding in there, call me when you're done!
With that said, she walked away to the nearest house, walking up to the door and trying it. If it happened to be locked, she would knock. Gloomy had taken great steps to tell Jolly that she should not just break into locked houses in this particular town without a good reason and checking to make sure the owner was not home, it drew too much attention.
edited 19th Sep '17 11:19:10 PM by Meanken
Shalltear and Monica
Shalltear shrugged to Monica's concerns. She spoke non-chalantly, as though explaining something simple and obvious. "I am undead, I will not be stopped by injuries. I will lay down my life if it obtains Ainz-sama's objective. Today, that is to stop the clown invasion." But I can't take my willingness to serve as an excuse to be reckless either. I should approach my next encounter with guns with more caution. This is my first time in real combat against them and I underestimated the impact this time.
She looked around and up at the sky. North was easy to find and they had a general direction of where the swarmlord had lumbered off to but Shalltear did not have a tracking skill to help with this task. "Unless you have some kind of tracking skill we should move in that direction until we hear commotion again and then follow it. That will give us the best chance to find him." He had tracking abilities though, at this point it would be a lot easier for him to find us than the other way around.
edited 20th Sep '17 6:38:14 AM by StephanReiken
Across Railroad Tracks, Garrus and Tira
As it so happened, the nearest house was literally right next to them, though it would take some time for Tira to circle around and find the nearest door. It was not the same house that Tira’s raven originally saw the gnome come out of or the one Tira and Garrus passed by when they proceeded through the area.
The house was for the most part a simple, single-story house, with a garage on the house’s north side, emptying into the street just west of it. When Tira moved to open one of the doors, it would open with little resistance.
The house had its own simple layout, a living room with a fireplace, a kitchen area, two bedrooms, a bathroom, a room for laundry, a few closets, and a basement. For the most part, should Tira have searched around the house, she would find it mostly empty. The floors were lined with dust and dead insects. A few cobwebs stretched along the corners. Even when searching the basement, she would not find much else other than whatever equipment was necessary to keep the house habitable, namely the heating system.
Should Tira have searched the garage, there still seemed to be a few tools inside from when people previously lived in the house. Namely, there was a lawnmower, a saw, a rake, a hand-drill (whose batteries had drained out), a snow shovel, several long wooden planks, and various simple crafting tools. Dust caked everything here as well, and there did not seem to be any clues as to the missing gnome’s whereabouts.
Back outside, the Gnome turned to listen to Garrus's private matters.
edited 20th Sep '17 7:50:49 AM by CathariSarad
Coco Adel - Near City Hall
Twisting to her right a bit, Coco made sure to minimize how much Bethany was exposed to the line-of-fire from anything on the truck, preferring to shield her against incoming bullets with her own body instead. She kept her gun trained on the back door of the truck - right now Bethany was working to keep it closed, and hopefully that would work, but it always paid to be careful.As she started running to try and keep up with the truck before it got too far away - why didn't this damn thing just crash already? Running after it was so passé - she turned her head towards the girl on a motorbike. It wasn't a model she knew of, but looked like it could maybe catch up to the truck better than someone with two legs could.
"That thing go any faster?" she called out at Jaroline.
2 Spooky 4 U
With the "bad cop", really crazy cop, off doing her thing, that left the "good cop", really the sane cop, to do his thing. Circling around the genome and looking at him, Garrus informed him, "Now, let's cut to chase. You have about five minutes to make a choice. Do you want to give me the intel willingly, no pain required, or would you prefer that I look the other way and let her do whatever she wants? Tell me, did she look like she was bluffing about breaking you?"
Garrus then stood in front of him and finished off with, "Either way we are getting results. It's up to you if you want to do this the easy way or the hard way but you better make it fast. Tira isn't going to be interested in that house for long and I'm sure she's excited to set up her new decoration."
Jaroline/Nepbike-Outside City Hall
Limo Service
"When not being shot at by a Rocket Launcher." Jaroline said to the Mayor after she approached her. "Thing can go roughly 7.67 Megahertz per hour."
How is that- oh. Haha, clever. Nepbike thought.
"Whyda ask? Need a lift?" Jaroline asked the girl.
Coco Adel - Near City Hall
"You're far too kind, but if you insist, who am I to turn you down?" Coco replied, jumping on the back of Nepbike. Bethany under her right arm, gun in her left, she resorted to putting her left elbow over Jaroline's shoulder and dig her heels into Nepbike to lock herself enough onto the bike to avoid falling.
Near City Hall
The Toad-Clown would be sent tumbling across the ground after Johnny’s kick, yet it would not make the cacophonous screams it made before.
“Gyehhh…”
The Toad-Clown would feebly twitch and squirm on the ground where it landed, dropping the rag and probably broken vibro-knife it may have been carrying. The aura around it had almost completely subsided, and some of the white powder spilling out of it now took on brownish hues.
The driver-Clown’s gunshot could be heard shortly after, though it would land somewhere in the now less-than-useful dashboard.
There was some resistance when Bethany’s vines tried to shut the semi-trailer’s back door, and would successfully render it shut.
Speaking of crashing, as the front of the truck was about to collide straight into a building on the east side of the street, the RPG-Clown jumped off, and recklessly shot another rocket towards Johnny (and the Toad-Clown).
The walls would crumble upon collision. Banging could be heard from inside from the various weapons strewn about along with what remained of the crew. It was unclear how much the front side of the truck had crumpled upon impact, though from the outside, the truck now appeared to be immobilized.
One of the side-ports on the left side of the truck would swing open. Someone close enough might see the gnome with the exoskeleton sprawled upon the semi-trailer’s floor, struggling to regain its balance. Shortly after, the door leading to the secret control room would open. Although the driver-Clown still seemed to be alive, part of its body looked as though it had been crushed from the impact.
Far south down the street, the Abrams could be seen making its way downtown, though at the rate things were going, its presence might no longer be necessary.
Gnome Interrogation
The gnome seemed to ignore/pay no attention to Garrus’s threats. It crossed its arms, looked idly ahead, and sat down if it was not already doing so.
After some time, the gnome’s skin, clothes, and eyes would start to take on a more glossy or paint-like luster.
"Hey, Ms. Mayor, the army's coming and I don't think we'll die right now...so can you pull me up to the seat? And stop holding me like a rolled up rug?"
Lizard Metabolism
Ripper Feast
Uninterrupted, the two Rippers continued digging into the cadaver's arms, taking out huge chunks with each bite. Eventually, they would leave the corpse alone with his arm completely devoid of skin and muscle tissue. It seemed however that the creatures did not swallow their meals, instead holding them in like particularly grotesque hamsters.
Satisfied with that outcome, the Rippers skittered away towards where the Swarmlord was for reclamation.
Swarmlord
The remaining Ripper remained perched on its "mother" organism back as the Swarmlord slowly entered the kitchen, body tensed and ready to jump back in case the Clown was waiting at it with a gun primed.
Monica
"Still... where did these damn things get that kind of hardware from...?" She mused silently as she examined the carbine some more. "Then again, given how Americans are crazy about keeping guns in their houses..."
"Anyway, you might want to try and be careful. If you die, then Ainz-sama doesn't accomplish much beyond losing a friend and a capable helper." Sighing, Monica turned towards where they originally came from and began the trot. "Come on, time's a-wastin'."
How do lizards fly?
Coco Adel - Near City Hall
"Absolutely," Coco said to Bethany, pulling her up and setting her down between her and Jaroline. This was turning into one cramped ride."A rug is so inelegant, though. I think you're more like a clutch."
Southwest Residential, Swarmlord and Rippers
The soldiers let the two Rippers head on their way largely unopposed. They would eventually come across the house their leader was in, whose north-side door opened up just beyond the kitchen, though outside of Swarmlord’s current field of view.
Inside the house, the kitchen looked rather ordinary, with a sink, cabinets, drawers, a stove, a microwave, an oven, and a refrigerator all stacked on the left/west side of the room. The right side also contained a few cabinets along with a trash can, however, there were also two door standing side-by-side, both of which appeared to be closed. The first door looked as though it would open counterclockwise and outward, while the other looked as though it would open inward with the same rotation. It was likely that the Clown had escaped through one of these doors, though there did not seem to be any obvious signs of which one the Clown went through.
Tira had seen a couple of cop movies since her arrival on this world, and so Jolly quickly understood her role in this series of events. Knowing her other half was a lot better at being mean, she let her take over, and Tira walked over to grab the Gnome's head and force him to look at her.
Let me explain your situation, you piece of filth. The only hope you have of getting away from this situation alive and intact is by giving us useful information. If you waste our time, I'm going to take you back to my house, and make you wish you could scream.
Then, just as suddenly, Jolly took back over.
Oh, oh, or, maybe I can turn you into a lawn ornament! Tie up or maybe just break your legs and arms, plant you in the ground, maybe I can turn you into a bird feeder or something. You'll get to spend the rest of forever having a whole bunch of birds sitting on you and pooping on you! Doesn't that sound fun, Mr Gary?
Tira turned to look at Garrus, looking like she genuinely thought it was fun and fully expected Garrus to agree.
edited 16th Sep '17 9:21:56 PM by Meanken