Fighting in Ruins 17

<Omicron>

"Very well then. Which would you like to see first?"

"Adaptrix. Definitely," Mithril replied immediately.

"I'd like to see Seraph's schematics," Orvtre said a bit more sedately. I directed him off toward another simulacrum, then motioned for Mithril to follow me. Sloth, having expended more energy than he was comfortable with, wandered off for a power nap.

"Now," I began as we headed toward the room Adaptrix was stored in, a few Plugs hovering up beside me, "Adaptrix has been inactive for nearly ten years at this point, so his information and combat routines are probably a bit out of date. Not really a major problem, he should be up to snuff within a few minutes. This is provided, of course, he actually deigns to wake up."

"What, you can't just make him turn on?"

"I could, yes, but he has the capacity to turn himself back off. He was quite upset to lose his sparring partner," I halted for a moment. The door to his room was demolished, probably hit by a stray shot when Strosek had fired the Hundred Million. The interior, thankfully, seems unharmed. The contents of the room are little more than a large capsule mounted atop a console. I sent a few plugs to engage the console and tapped out a few keys.

"Someone wishes to speak with you, Adaptrix," I said shortly. The metal walls of the capsule withdrew into the ceiling and floor, revealing a glass pod. Within was what appeared to be a pool of thick silver liquid. The liquid bobbed a bit, but there was otherwise no reaction.

A moment of silence passed. Mithril, getting fed up, started to say something but I held a hand up to her.

"Private conversation," I said shortly. Another moment of silence passed before the silver liquid stirred again, this time moving upward. I tapped a few keys on the console, causing the glass to recede, and the silver liquid lazily spilled out and collected at our feet, coalescing into a Pikminoid shape.

"Alright, alright, fine. I'm up. Quit reciting that at me, sheesh," Adaptrix said, rolling his shoulders. "You said somebody wanted to talk to me?"

I simply pointed at Mithril. Adaptrix tilted his head to the side.

"... Did you make another me?" he said innocently. I took a very conspicuous step away from Mithril.

<]-Mithril-[>

Ok, initial impressions. Yeah, Rip Van Winkle here looks kind of like me. Though the angst coma thing is definitely not what I would do.

"Listen up, cause this is important: I'm no therapist, and I'm no miracle worker. I can't make whoever that Omega person was alive again, but what I can do is fight. You can get back in the swing of things if you become my training buddy and an all-around new Hero Squad member."

"Don't want to," replied Adaptrix. "I don't wanna lose anyone again, and I certainly don't want to relive my days with Omega."

"Look, I have failsafes implemented. I can't promise you I will never, ever die (though complete immortality would be sweet), though I have ways to reasonably deal with things and we're working on making things better."

Adaptrix said nothing and just made a gloomy face in response.

"Just do something. As far as I know, your current state is because you don't have enough power to solve all your problems. So join us, and we'll get more power together and fix everything."

"That depends on if you can keep up with me," said Adaptrix.

"Hmm, A fight? Fine then, I-" was as far as I got before I was interrupted by a mild cough. Despite not having lungs or whatever.

"You know what? A bit later. I have things to deal with and the fact that I'm less than 100% after the Gamma Mark II thing. And nobody tells me these things, like his name, for example."

"For the record, it's Strosek," Omicron pointed out.

"Yeah, not 100% after Strosek. Anyways, it might take around a day or two to finish, and until then, you can explore Hero Squad HQ for once. Talk to the locals. And no spying, Omicron. It will be a private battle. Mostly."

Omicron nodded. "Acceptable. I have never been able to fully parse Adaptrix's combat data anyway. Omega programmed some obscene encryption key that I never managed to crack, and after a while I stopped trying."

A chuckle rang at the back of my head at Omicron's failure. So very amusing, indeed.

But back to business. "Adaptrix, if you're up for it, then come on down to Hero Squad HQ and talk to people. Get an idea of what the life is like. Then after some time passes, we sort things out my way. And by my way I mean fighting. Deal?"

"Sure, whatever. As long as Omicron quits reciting Pi at me," Adaptrix huffed.

"Oh, so that's what it was."

"Sometimes the best form of torture is the simplest," Omicron admitted.

<Omicron>

Meanwhile, another simulacrum led Orvtre to the robotics bay, once again finding him in front of the inactive former body of Seraph. I set a Plug into the console nearby, waited a moment, then withdrew it and handed it to the shrouded 'min.

"This Plug now contains all of the relevant schematics for Seraph's body, both before and after my modifications. Mind you, I aimed here to not change it too much, so it is still quite similar to Gear's designs," I explained. "I believe you will find creations of my own design to be much different. This way, please."

I lead Orvtre to a different room of the robotics bay, this one a huge hangar, with dozens of machines hanging from the ceiling.

"I must admit that I perhaps go a bit overboard when I am designing. So many designs to test out, so little time to do it all in. We are here simply to see the Ebo series, though. There are currently eight machines in the Ebo line, though the three larger ones are unfinished. Cycelea, the Ebo series, if you would?"

The first to drop down was a rather small black and white Pikminoid machine, circled by eight diamond-shaped drones.

"EBO-01, or Vector 1K. He specializes in saturating an area in bullets, leaving no room for escape."

Next was not one machine but five identical ones, little black Pikminoid mechs with white, eye-covering helmets.

"EBO-02, or Venom 5K. They work best together as a scouting troop, though you would be surprised at their combined firepower."

The third to drop down, another black and white mech, this one with curved white winglets and a thick, black tail with spikes on the end.

"EBO-03, or Lance 10K. He specializes in close quarters combat and area denial."

The fourth was quite large, a stocky, mostly white mech with black missile pods mounted on its back.

"EBO-04, or Rapier 20K. His specialization is wide-area bombardment, with a... special surprise in store."

The fifth one was smaller, a completely black, sleek machine.

"And lastly, EBO-05, or Phantom 50K. A persistent assault unit with four modes, any enemy will be hard pressed to shake it."

"You mentioned there being three more?" Orvtre asked.

"Yes. Virgo 400K, Cancer 900K, and SBS 1300K. They are, unfortunately, unfinished and unready for deployment. Any further questions?"

Orvtre took a moment to consider before snapping his fingers. "Oh yeah, could we have the schematics for all of these guys?"

"Certainly," I replied, a few extra Plugs hovering up around me. I'll upload the schematics to these in a bit.

"So, what were the others, G3, G4 and Chevalier?"

I glanced off to the side. "Chevalier is here. G3 and G4 are... sealed in special rooms. Honestly I do not think you want either of those two. Cycelea, Chevalier?"

The mech that dropped down could only vaguely be described as Pikminoid. Mostly gunmetal grey with a bit of red and silver, with six thrusters attached to its upper back and what appeared to be a large, bulky tail fin. Attached to one arm was a shield, and the other, a red blade.

"C-024TR, Chevalier. Close quarters combat specialist, not much of a personality."

Orvtre gave it a once-over and shrugged. "I know you keep saying we're not gonna want, G3 or G4, but I really want to see them."

"You know, Libera was not kidding about the breakdown of physics thing. I... may have induced an artificial high with electricity when I helped him build those two so the details are just a little bit fuzzy."

"That bad?"

"I believe Captain went blind when he saw G3, only to recover his sight immediately in the mere presence of G4."

"... Worse than that bad, then," Orvtre said, looking a bit uneasy now.

"More than you know. Still want to see them?"

"I'm... gonna take one for the team. Show me G3 and G4."

I shrugged. So be it. I lead Orvtre deep into the robotics bay, and sent a message off to have Libera sent here as well. The two of us waited for a moment in front of a very thick door before Libera arrived.

"So you just couldn't resist, could you?" he said, grinning widely. "Well, don't blame me for any severe side effects."

"You designed them. You are completely at fault for any 'severe side effects'," I informed him. Libera stuck his tongue out at me. Good to see him looking a bit livelier, at least.

"Alright, so G3 is in this room. I would advise preemptively shielding your eyes," I warned Orvtre, and opened the door. Fortunately no one was instantly struck blind.

It was kinda short, stocky, and had the most absurdly shaped wings. I think the lion face on the chest was a bit over the top, really. The air in the room started wavering the moment Libera stepped inside.

"Like I said, breakdown of physics."

"I am NOT turning that thing on," I said resolutely. Absolutely not.

"well that was... a little underwhelming, to be honest. I figured the room would explode or something."

"Nah, we save that for G4," Libera replied, and led onward. The room G4 was stored in had an even thicker door. I disengaged all the locks and prepared to open it.

The very instant the last lock was undone, the door exploded open of its own volition as a blinding light burst forth. The object inside the room was, unfortunately, beyond description, and so no attempt will be made to describe it.

"HOLY CRAP CLOSE THE DOOR, CLOSE THE DOOR!" Libera yelled. It took all three of us to push the door back shut against whatever invisible force pushed it open, and I re-engaged the locks as quickly as possible.

"... So that was G4," I said lamely.

?-Orvtre-?

Okay...

"Hey, here's a thought. Can we take the room containing G4? I don't think we can take G4 without its packaging."

Omicron paused, before stating, "Uh... I am not sure how safe that would be. The dampeners are built into the sphere."

"Then build them into the room. From outside."

"That is not feasible. They are quite large," Omicron protested.

I turned towards our Mark II Hero Squad member. "Any ideas, Libera? You built the thing."

"If you're wondering, they're AWESOMENESS DAMPENERS. We'd have all been vaporized if those weren't there. In fact, we had to build the dampeners BEFORE we built G4. Keep in mind that this is G4, when its turned off."

I tried to find a solution to this. "You like to... do the impossible, right? Well, can you find a way? We're taking this, if only for a desperate trump-card kind of thing."

"I did the impossible when we built it. Doing DOUBLE the impossible is just asking for trouble. I'd know. I've been there."

"Don't you always ask for trouble anyways?"

"Well yes, but there are some levels of trouble that have... significant fallout involved."

"Also Libera... you've 'been there'? Is this one of your mysterious past things again?"

"Man, I have been to QUINTUPLE the impossible. No you do not want me to describe that."

"I hate to ask, but did you build even more robots that are... more ridiculous than this?"

"... Maybe you'd sleep better at night if I didn't answer that."

"Can we just file G4 under 'maybe deal with it later' and just deal with G3?"

Libera shrugged. "Sure, let's go with that."

"Okay, start by finding a way to haul G3 out of here safely. Omicron... you're a genius, right? Think of something."

"There are LIMITS, you know. Maybe if I go to the Madness Place. I would advise not being present for that, though."

"Sigh... do that, if you must. Very much unfortunately, we might NEED G4 later on, as much as I hate to say it."

"Look, if we ever encounter something that requires THAT thing to deal with it, I will just teleport G4 to the location of the problem and let the universe deal with the fallout."

"Libera, can you build a robot that DOESN'T horribly screw around with... things? Sigh. Just... find a way to bring G3 to base."

"No I can't!" Libera cheerfully exclaimed, with a crazy grin. "But yeah I'll get G3 there."

"Also what do G3 and G4 do?

"G3 punches things until they explode. G4... kinda just sits there and the problem solves itself."

"Can G3 deal with the Silver Scythe problem? You know, Gear's new robot."

Libera paused in thought. "Uh... excellent question!"

"Why did you build those things, Libera?"

"For the lulz."

"And why did you help him build those things, Omicron?"

"For the challenge."

I sighed. "Both of you are crazy."

"Craziness comes in many forms," Omicron said, almost sagely.

"Okay, is that everything, and we can go now? Or am I forgetting something?"

"Yes, I believe that is everything."

"Libera? What do you think?"

"Yeah that sounds like everything."

"Then let's start hauling everything over," I stated, as we got to work.

<]-Mithril-[>

I was strolling through Hero Squad HQ's lobby when I noticed that Rune was talking to Orvtre. Oh, and Libera was there too.

"What is all of this?" Rune asked. She was giving the recent robot acquisitions a look over.

"These are most of the robots we got from Omicron. And of course, we checked them over for bugs. Feel free to do another look-over if you want," said Orvtre.

"Most? I'm guessing that Adaptrix one is another robot of his, but what is... that container over there?" Rune asked, pointing to the package half the size of Juggernaut.

"That's G3," said Orvtre. "I've left a little closeable slit in case one's curious enough to look at it, but do so at your own risk."

Cautiously, Rune approached the container, flicked open the slit, and took a look inside the container. She almost immediately closed the slit and turned to face Libera.

"You like it?" the golden 'min asked enthusiastically.

"To be honest, no. It's a tad too ridiculous for my tastes," Rune stated, as she strolled away to continue her work.

Oh, and we were gearing up for Me vs Adaptrix. I strolled over to the training bot over in another zone, where he was taking in the sights of the various landscapes.

"You like it?"

"Yeah, it's... nice." Adaptrix said.

"Well good, cause Me vs You is coming up. And when I mean coming up, I mean almost here. And when I mean almost here I mean. Right. HERE," I said, slamming my hand on a button that had seemingly popped out of nowhere.

Wanna know what happened? Epic landscape changes. The sea burned. The forests withered to dust. The sky darkened, replacing the sunset sky with lightning. This was mostly just for show.

The important thing that happened was that we were apparently hit by an earthquake. Except not really. That was just the ground opening up, chasming apart to take us to a location underground.

And so, we fell towards our battle location, a humongous stadium visible even this high up. While we fell, there were neon lights, and, eventually, jets of fire surrounding us.

"Also, there's something I need to tell you," I said, facing Adaptrix.

"What?" Adaptrix wondered.

I pointed my finger up into the air, and on cue...

FIGHT.

... a voice reverberated across the stadium and this tunnel, signaling the beginning of our battle. I kicked off the fight by literally kicking, spawning an ice skate on my foot, and bringing my foot down on Adaptrix, who generated a shield to block my initial kick.

I followed up by breaking off the ice skate's blade, launching a repeating slashing attack from it, which Adaptrix dealt with by detaching the shield and his arm. He retaliated by creating a spear and stabbing it at me, which I dealt with by putting up a shield of my own.

Adaptrix decided to copy me by having the spear's center break out and refire, to bypass my defense. But hey.

Remember my power nullifier? I finished it!

My power nullifier was immediately put to good use, slowing the speed at which the spear went through its motions. Against that, I countered by morphing my shield into a rope, wrapping around Adaptrix's arm and dragging him towards me.

And remember, we were still falling towards the stadium, flame jets and all. I dragged my elbow along the sides of the tunnel, lighting it up with fire, and...

"BURNING ELBOW DROP!"

... brought it down on Adaptrix's head, causing him to plummet to the stadium below and crash into the tile floor. Always wanted to use that move. Anyways, I executed a three-point landing, surrounded by the lights, the bling, and the HD tv.

Adaptrix rose up, a dent in his face, like the one Cross had given me. Power nullifier is working great. Now let's do this.

>Adaptrix<

Calculating force parameters... adjusting nanite flow... analyzing target combat capacity...

Output within expected threshold. All systems nominal. Let's see how you like a taste of the kinds of things Omega threw at me. I morphed into a formless blob and launched bladed tendrils in Mithril's direction, which she countered by creating a bunch of swords and parrying them all. I responded by shifting the tips of the tendrils into plasma cannons and unleashing an enormous burst of raw power at her, kicking up a massive cloud.

Clearly, however, her damage resistance is roughly similar to Omega's own, as I was promptly assaulted by a barrage of steel rods. I simply morphed and twisted around them, slithering to the top of one pole and morphing into a massive hand to throw them all back. This really wasn't as effective as I'd have liked - metal control, apparently. Not impossible to deal with. I morphed into a missile launcher and opened fire.

Mithril threw the metal poles back at my missiles... which simply bent and looped around them in simple defiance of logic. Rather than even attempt to shoot them down, Mithril made a huge metal shield, which didn't help when the missiles stopped dead still outside of it, transformed into bunker busters, and then slammed into it, the warheads punching clean though the shield and detonating right in her face. She took that amazingly well, not so much when I shifted out of one of the warheads and slammed a plasma blast into her torso, blasting her all over the room.

"Too much?" I said, shortly before each and every one of the little metal bits turned into more Mithrils. Oh, so she can do that too. A barrage of grey beams lanced out of each of them, which I simply took head on. All the little bits of me promptly transformed into little bombs and bounced all over the room, blowing the stands to smithereens. From the explosions emerged an enormous swarm of micro-missiles, because I'm a dirty cheater like that. The large number of Mithril clones responded with a mix of shields and firing at the missiles, and they're too small for bunker busters anyway. So each and every one shifted into a little laser gun and unleashed a storm of lasery pain.

Now, remember that missile launcher? It shifted into what looked vaguely like a sprinkler, and then unloaded a horrible hailstorm of plasma in all directions. I topped it off by popping out from the top of said death-sprinkler and firing what appeared to be a disco ball into the air, which sucked all the flames from the tunnel leading down here into it and then sprayed them all over the room. Because comedy.

<]-Mithril-[>

Oh hey, recap. The person I am essentially fighting right now is me, if I had some unnatural fondness for plasma. Anyways, goal: To get Adaptrix to join Hero Squad, be my other training partner (I fight Orvtre sometimes, remember?), and kick some ass. Getting him to join is mission accomplished, victory is, theoretically, optional, but highly preferred.

Now then, if you've been paying attention, there is one thing in recent memory that sticks out in particular. Yeah, that Strosek megaattack thing that works against people like me. And all those people in the colonies. And probably against people like Adaptrix. TIME TO STEAL STROSEK'S STUFF.

Possible way to get to accomplish Triple S: Power nullifier. Mixed with other stuff. That should, in theory, create a reasonable emulation of whatever Strosek's big attack was. Also, the great thing about these fights? I can test things. Though I can't screw around too much: Have to win over a new member, after all.

Anyways, back to business: Adaptrix's sprinkler thing, and the shower of plasma. Ok. One of my clones had one of her hands glow with the fancy energy or whatnot, slamming it into the clone in front of her, causing said clone to vibrate like a tuning fork. Tuning fork clone's hand glowed brighter than the last one, slamming her hand into the clone in front of her. Rinse and repeat, until...

"Platinum Pulse!"

Yeah, large metal energy/power nullifier pulse. Snuffed out all the flames scattered around the arena, and made approaching Adaptrix easier. Oh, and it knocked him off that sprinkler thing. Time for some close-range combat.

I personally lead the charge. Was it me or one of me, if that makes sense? WHO KNOWS. Anyways yeah, he took out some clones of mine, and I'm now in range. Oh yeah, and he tried a close-range plasma blast again. I responded by stabbing his hand. Both our hands exploded after that.

Where was my other hand, you ask? Heading straight for his face. Oh, and he decapitated me with a plasma blade, but that didn't stop from punching in his face with my...

"Iron Crossbow Fist!"

Which messed up his face real nice. Yes, there is a reason I'm returning fire more than blocking/dodging now. Also, remember my clones? Yeah, one of them wrecked that disco ball of his with a well-aimed telephone pole. Others dealt with the laser guns.

I grew a third hand. Adaptrix did likewise, arming himself with some sort of incredibly spiky, glowing, plasma power fist. I armed myself with thorns, a sword, and oh I just blitzed Adaptrix, literally disarming him. Remember how I said that I was retaliating more than blocking? That's because I can chain together hits infused with my power nullifier, each one slowing down his shifting and stuff.

Oh and another of my clones charged at me from behind after all of this, both her hands morphed into spears. I phased and did my liquid metal thing to let her through, giving Adaptrix a taste of my...

"Platinum Twin Lancer!"

... impaling him. I maneuvered into position behind lancer me, while the aforementioned spearing me took advantage of that opportunity to hoist him up and suplex him right into the path of my...

"CONCUSSIVE IRON UPPERCUT!"

... striking him with enough force to cause dust, dirt, and other gravel to fly everywhere.

>Adaptrix<

Opponent's blows slow nanomachine reaction speed. Adjusting for input lag... done. Cycling out damaged nanos... done. Selecting appropriate counter...

I did all of that before reaching the apex of my flight from that uppercut, and simply halted myself at that point by creating a pair of gyrojets on my back. Now then, to stop the multiple clones currently closing in on me...

"Adapt: Equal Speed," I said, and then projected hundreds of little ball bearings around myself to form a seamless shell. The sound of Mithril's clones impacting it and being stopped dead was actually kinda funny. I then applied a very light pressure wave to set the ball bearings in motion, very, very slowly pushing them all away... and punching holes through Mithril's clones as they went.

"What laws of motion?" I said innocently to myself. One Mithril - presumably the real one - hovered off to the side, having abandoned her charge to observe once the clones had been halted.

"That's pretty fancy," she said lightly, slowly circling around me, passing close by one of the ball bearings. She tapped at it, to absolutely no effect on its forward velocity.

"An object under Equal Speed maintains its current velocity regardless of outside forces. You may as well attempt to stop the planet's revolution around the sun, because you'd have a better chance at succeeding," I said as way of explanation. Just one of many tricks I picked up from Omega.

"Well that's interesting," Mithril replied. "By the way, Platinum Laser Crasher."

That was the sound of about half a dozen huge trucks firing lasers being flung at me. I projected a metal wall in front of all of them and applied Equal Speed. That was the sound of six trucks pancaking on immovable walls. I then drew all six walls up to myself and launched them at Mithril, applying Equal Speed as they were launched. Unfortunately she seems able to disable Equal Speed simply by punching the metal plates, though not without flattening most of her arm in the process.

Hmm... technique identified. That negation of a power comes from Zeta, though her mimicry of it is a mere shadow of what the real deal is capable of. I assume this is also behind the lag my nanos are suffering from. Something a bit more high power is called for.

"Adapt: Meltdowner," I called, followed by three small green spheres popping into existence around me. Each one fired an extremely high-power electron beam, punching clean through the metal plates like tissue paper. One skimmed Mithril and melted a hole into her side, and she split into a bunch of clones to avoid the other two.

Three more green spheres appeared and fired, obliterating three of the clones instantly. I repeated this a few times, managing to clear out all of the clones before she finally reached me, pulling one fist back for a heavy punch. I pulled a fist back as well, gathering plasma.

"Iron-"

"Plasma-"

"Star!"

"Smasher!"

The resultant explosion actually cut out my nanos' connection for a second, which is about as close as I come to unconsciousness. I hit the floor with a splat, liquid silver spreading a few feet before congealing back into a little blob. A little blob firing electron particle beams.

Kinda sick of college work, so not one of my better days.
_______________
<]-Mithril-[>

I hit the tile floor with a splat, reforming myself in time for Adaptrix to try and shoot me some more. Now for something a little fancy. I morphed one of my arms into an unholy lovechild of a telephone pole and a crossbow, and declared...

"Platinum Rapid,"

... which resulted in lots of metal spears, arrows, and other items being fired at a very fast rate. Accuracy? Nah, there were projectiles scattered everywhere in the arena now. Including in the huge HD tv up top.

As he dealt with that, I was charging up one of my attacks with my other hand. Adaptrix saw this, so he had a few of the green spheres fire at me. Okay, remember when I said I could test things in these types of fights? Well, time for teleportation.

Snipped for length, but the short version: I'm a stubborn git. I prefer to get my powers and achievements and such on my own. Hence acquisition delay.

Also, since I made this warping power on my own, it has my own spin on things: metal portals. I still need to use metal as a physical "portal" to teleport, unlike Orvtre's free-warping, but now is a good chance to put it to the test.

I stepped backwards, out of my own "skin", letting a clone finish the charge. Yeah, I think I can get the timing right on Adaptrix's "Meltdowner"...

Okay, charge complete. I had my clone jam the attack in her own face, the cylinder phasing through her... and exiting through one of the projectiles I had earlier fired with the Platinum Rapid. This gave Adaptrix a face full of my...

"Silver Smasher!"

... which did the repeating spear thing, with a laser and power nullifier bonus, to boot. Also Adaptrix had been firing those beams at me, remember? Since I just hit him with my nullifier, which cancels immunities (like to his own Meltdowner, for instance), I tried to redirect that back into Adaptrix, via metal portal me. The result?

It kinda worked, in that I couldn't redirect all the damage. Unlike with my own attacks, which I can 100% redirect and warp just fine, my clone-portal and the corresponding projectile-portal exploded, in the case of the former, in my face. However, I did manage to transfer enough of Adaptrix's attack to melt his head off. All in all, a fair trade.

Oh and I warped to the location of one of the few projectiles left from my Rapid, splitting up into clones as I approached Adaptrix. He used Equal Speed barriers again to try and defend against being mobbed, but this time I wouldn't have it.

I personally led off the attack with a lead-in hit, punching Adaptrix's barrier with a shockwave punch infused with nullifier, and followed up on it by having my clones swarm in and bringing forth their palm strikes as well, concentrating our power to destroy the barrier.

Also he tried to do something again, but meh. Metal Gate. "Metal Hell Rapid." Ridiculous amounts of rocket fists. Again blitzing him, this time with my sudden increase in speed, strength, and firepower, blasting him across the arena again.

"You okay? 'Cause I'm not. Still stuck in ramble mode from staying up several days to finish up the power nullifier and something else and bleh," I blathered on.