RP Wars on Distant Shores (Starbound USCM RP)

Jacobs nods, "Alright then. Follow me."

As the group walks down the maze of hallways in the base, the Lieutenant begins to speak "The obstacle course actually wasn't one originally. We had one up on the surface when we first came here, but it was burned down during a Floran attack, besides," gesturing to a nearby vent "it gets really hot outside. Unfortunately, by the time we decided to build another one, we were already finishing up with the base down here."

"So what we did was that we took an unused storage room, borrowed a few things from the depot, re-arranged the boxes and the containers inside and..." He sidestepped into an open door, "voila, our very own obstacle course."

True to the Lieutenant's story, the obstacle course was set in the a re-purposed storage room. Crates were stacked on top of the other and welded together to create climbing walls, and nets were placed for low-crawling segments. There were also deactivated Serpent Bots, standing still in randomly selected portions of the Obstacle Course.

"The robots are there because some of the more experienced marines wanted a challenge," explained Jacobs. "They're activated during the Obstacle Course and shoot at the personnel during the training. Don't worry- the bots can only fire low-power bolts. They hurt like hell, but they don't kill you."

 

d'Artangan's eyes lit up. "Oooh. Shiny. Can I run it?!"

 

"Go ahead," Jacobs said, walking over to a nearby console. "Want the robots on?"

 

"Something tells me we're not going up against regular florans."Smith said to Jacobs

 

"Yes please. Robots on surely." d'Artangan starts walking towards the start of it, and gets ready for the signal to start.

 

Jacobs tilted his head towards Smith, "What makes you think that, Corporal?"

 

Flamewing wasn't very interested in all the weapons that the UCSM had stockpiled. Well, he was kidding himself, he'd love take each weapon out on a test run. Not that they'd let mercs use their weapons. He wasn't at all surprised when the human in charge told them they would have to supply their own stuff. "Can we at least get grenades, Jacobs? I mean, what if a soldier isn't around to use one of their grenades...?" He asked.

 

"Offical USCM policy states that Quartermasters are not to provide Mercenaries with any gear, unless 'in extreme circumstances.' Unoffically, command turns a blind eye if you use USCM gear out in the field, as long as you return it back."

 

"Well at least it is possible. So, the course? Can I start it?"

 

"Right, turning on bots." Jacobs pressed a button, and the dull gray visors of the Serpent Droids turned a blue color.

"Time starts in three, two...one." A loud buzz filled the air, and a television display hanging above the room turned on, displaying time in minutes, seconds, and miliseconds.

 

Bustow leaned against the wall and watched as d'Artangan prepared to start. "Can I try next?" he asked.

 

d'Artangan booked it into the course and started climbing the crates, nimbly moving up a small climbing wall and descending down the side. He vaulted over a few objects and dived under a barbed-wire net, and started crawling through it. He looked up at the clock, 17 seconds, not bad at all. He started running down the next line of the course when a droid popped out from the other end and he had to take cover behind a few crates, before jumping over the cover and tackling the droid as it attempted to reload. He grinned at how well things were going and started climbing a rope straight up towards the ceiling of the room, then swung off of another rope onto an elevated platform, dodging droid fire all the way. He was hit by a few bullets and grunted upon landing, but kept going. Damn that hurt.... His hands were hurting by now but he couldn't help but grin. 31 seconds and so close to the end... He started running down the home stretch, full of things to jump over and duck under, when another droid attacked. and he realized he'd left himself exposed. He ran full speed at the droid and jumped in the air to execute a mid-air kick. He realized only too late that kicks such as this weren't going to end well when trying to kick something metal, and his foot crunched painfully as it connected with the droid. He fell on the ground and cried out in pain. To add insult to injury, the droid emptied 20 bullets into his chest. He pulled out his sword and slashed the droid in half, before staggering up, and slowly and painfully limping towards the end. Final time: 2:13. "I think I broke something...." he grunted, after returning to the group.

 

Bustow winced as he aatched d'Artangan's foot connect with the droid. "Damn... You okay?"

 

"Nope.'' d'Artangan, trying to disguise the pain in his voice.

 

"You tried to spin-kick a warbot," Jacobs said, "Of course you did." He sighed, running his hands through his hair, "I guess I have to show you the medbay too, don't I?"

He shrugged, "Sure, just let me reset everything." The Lieutenant pressed another series of buttons, and a Serpent Bot, originally sitting inactive against one of the walls, turned on, moving to a pre-designated position. When it arrived, it pushed the remains of it's predecessor out of the way before the machine turned off.

 

"Alright. Here we go," he said, grinning and walking over to the start. "Tell me when to go," he said.

 

The Lieutenant nodded. "Of course, turning Serpent Bots on," The dull gray visors shifted to bright blue, crowd control/training programming " and starting the timer in three, two...one." The monitor reset, back to 00:00:00.

 

Bustow started running. he jumped over some crates and ducked under a few more obstacles before he reached the climbing wall "Should be easy," he thought. He jumped, climbed swiftly over, and leapt off, landing gracefully on his feet. Then he continued sprinting. He ran past the first serpent bot, which immediately opened fire. He grunted as he rolled behind a box. Quickly, he checked the timer. 29 seconds. He sprang to his feet and sprinted past another serpent bot. Then he vaulted over a large stack of boxes. He could see the finish line... then a crushing burst of pain blosomed in his chedst, sending him flying backwards into the crates. A spray of bullets had hit him. He lay there, stunned, before running slowly to the finish line. He made sure to dodge the bullets as he went. He looked up, panting. 1 minute 12 seconds. Not bad, but not that great either. His back ached from where he collided with the crates. "That was fun," he said through gritted teeth.

 

"Well to be honest I have made very little contact florans and to me they posed a little threat but...."

 

Jacobs cut him off right there. "I would like to say that, Corporal: that Florans normally pose little threat. But the Florans are a great threat wherever they are. Whenever Florans land on a planet, the only thing guaranteed for us is massive casualties- regardless if we win or lose the battle. These security measures: some say they are overkill. Me, I say they are necessary."

"Now, is everyone done here? I believe Artangan needs a visit to the medbay."