>>23310317
Drag Rex behind cover and begin administering first aid.
Skeety, Philips, and Morris, take out the truck raiders first.

>>23310317
Remind me, what exactly does the route south entail?

>>23310506
The crash site is why you're detouring down south first. You were trying to get past the bridge because your limited info on the maps and Morris' knowledge of places will at least keep your bearings.

http://suptg.thisisnotatrueending.com/archive/23193893/#p23195012

>>23310557
Alright. Let's follow this guy's plan. >>23310381

Also, try to throw another bomb at the legs of those walkers that still have drivers.

>>23310703
The flatbed truck was on the middle of the bridge, but the other enemy walker is on the opposite end fighting another flatbed.

That's pretty far.

>>23310737
I don't think we should chance it. It's too far to throw the sticky bomb, and there's already people shooting at us.

>>23310737
>>23310781
Oh, my mistake, I thought there was a two-leg walker on the train level with us. My bad. Ignore that order.

Rolled 23, 44, 20 = 87

>>23310781
You and Soong try to stabilize Rex behind cover. It's going to take a while. Meanwhile, the other three start taking shots at the truck raiders....

You asses how badly Rex was shot when he messed up taking out that truck...

>>23310891
The Dice Gods of TG Quest followed us. D:

>>23310891
"Get a bead on those guys!" Skeety shouts, taking aim. The other two follow and the three of them start taking shots at the truck raiders.

At least, to buy you guys time to patch up Rex. You look at where Rex was shot, and it's pretty bad. It's going to take a while to stop him from bleeding out, and to stabilize him. As far as it goes, he's not in any shape to get into any more gunfights.

Your teammates miss in the heat of the firefight, but it keeps the truck raiders from going after you. As it is, there's too many enemies going at each other for them to tie you up, for now. That truck however, is serving as a barricade for them for a while, but it won't last under a lot of gunfire and two walker robots.

>>23311007
"Keep firing, but only do so when they shoot at us or move towards us. We want them away from us and shooting at each other. Don't worry Rex, we'll get you patched up."

Keep working on Rex.

>>23311007
Stabilize Rex, tell the others to take aimed shots only.

>>23311199
The raiders turn away from you and towards the walkers. Blasts graze the bridge, the shockwaves rattling the area as you work on Rex.

Skeety meanwhile, manages to take out one of the gunmen on truck.

It'll take a while, and moving Rex to a safer place will be harder at this rate. It seems that, the building where you came from would be best to hide Rex in, somewhere near the tunnels.

>>23311262
Has Rex been stabilized? We can't risk moving him until he is. Then we can move him once a few more of the gunmen on the truck are dead.

>>23311262
>>23311346
Make sure he's stable and that the fighting groups aren't focused on us. Only then should we move him. Have Skeety, Philips, and Morris provide a distraction by moving to cover in the opposite direction.

>>23311380
It takes several minutes, but you finally can move Rex. He's going to need to be lifted, and you don't have a stretcher to keep him stable as you move him.

You and Soong lift him up on each end, and slowly bring him inside the building where nobody would bother to find him.

"You can't follow us anymore. Stay here, and hang in there," as you pump Rex with stims to prevent him from blacking out.

Outside, the battle has shifted again. One of the flatbed trucks goes up in flames as a damaged walker starts running down the remaining groups on the bridge with it's buddies fighting it out on foot.

Skeety takes out the driver with a well-aimed shot , causing the walker to keep going and fall over. Meanwhile, the people using the trains as cover have dispersed, with burning wrecks and bullet-ridden train cars all over to show for it.

Everyone else seems scattered, looking for cover and trying to get a good position against the other....

Morris is patching himself up again, with a near-miss. He seems to be having terrible luck today, but not as bad as Rex. Being beat up like this is going to slow him down, he thought.

>>23311801
Maybe we should have Morris stay behind with Rex to make sure the both of them don't get picked off. Although that would basically mean we're down another man. Thoughts?

>>23311801
>>23311865
We need Morris as a guide, though. We need him with us.

As it is, are the flatbeds clear, or are there still more raiders there?

>>23311865
>>23311931
Okay, let's keep him with us, but let's not push ourselves if it'll risk his capabilities.

>>23311931
"Damn, boss! The walkers are still shooting it out! They're all over the place, taking potshots, hiding and sticking their guns from corners and holes..." Skeety comments.

As it is, the walker on the bridge is focused on a shootout at the train tracks, but there's the problem of those bunch of guys following it.........

The flatbeds are clear, and smoke is billowing out from the wreckages.

>>23311945
You leave Rex behind in the building and keep Morris with you.

Hopefully he'll still be alive when you get back.

>>23312013
If they're concentrating on the train track shootout, then we should be able to take them out with aimed shots.

Give Rex the remaining amount of our own SMG ammo so he can defend himself until we get back, and switch his hunting rifle to Soong.

Everyone pick a target and fire as one.
Skeety is the marksman, so he takes out the driver of the walker.
Us, Soong, Philips, and Morris aim for the infantry supporting the walker.

We are all targeting the walker on the bridge and its infantry support.

>>23312084
Sounds like a plan. Seconded.

Rolled 90, 12, 7, 87, 75 = 271

>>23312084
You switch weapons with Rex and pass the rifle to Soong. He's not as used to using this rifle, but he'll try, he says.

You all pick your targets and take the shots at the walker and its support...

>>23312221
...Seriously.

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>>23312221
While the replacement driver for the walker removed the dead driver, he's not as good as the one before him.

Skeety takes him down again, the walker going out of control once more. Two of the other raiders are down.

Reduced to two people, they're routed. Your team takes the opportunity to cross the bridge and watch out for those two raiders that ran away.

Meanwhile, the gunfight slows down underneath you as the other group start sweeping the tracks.

It's a bit of a journey going south, taking the city map as a guide, roughly. There are barely any street names to go on, but a rough approximation and some general landmarks seem to help.

You suspect there's the occasional raider or two trying to get out of your way, but the odd one watching what you'll be up to.

A block away to the side, you see a group gathering before a man preaching inside a ruined building....

>>23312342
"Heads down, move to cover. Let's get a look at what we're dealing with here."

>>23312342
Stop. Use binoculars to look at the group.

>>23312443
They're a large mob, an assorted mix of raiders and a whole lot of underequipped survivors. From the way they look, their guard is down. A lot are shuffling and sitting around, others are watching the skies, looking at those things flying around, out of reach.

>>23312482
Can we use the helms to focus what the preacher is saying? If this guy is preaching SUE worship I think we should miss today's service.

>>23312482
Check them with the milspec helmet, see if it included a sound amplifier.

Either way, we should get moving in minute or two; we've got to get to the crash site before it can get picked over by other scavengers.

>>23312549
The helms only give imaging solutions.

"If we hide our weapons, we could try to blend in," Soong suggests. He slings the shotgun and rifle on his back, and hides it with a cloak. Skeety glances and doesn't like it as much, "You look suspicious that way. Maybe you gotta somehow look friendlier..."

>>23312624
The preacher in the distance, holds out an open book to the crowd. A lot are astonished and shocked in horror. Others are quiet about what's been shown...

>>23312624
Do any of the raiders in the group have weapons on them?

>>23312644
I want to focus in on what the book looks like, and if the helms are good enough I want to read the damned words.

>>23312644
Focus on that book. Let's see what it is.

>>23312648
Yes, but they're not acting on a high alert. Others have their weapons down.

You consider using your tools to look at the book from a distance. It would arouse a lot of suspicion at that rate.

>>23312699
Use our binoculars. They're the least threatening of our tools.

>>23312699
>>23312821
Alright, just binoculars I guess.

>>23312821
You try the binoculars. You can't see exactly the words, but you can see a book where the letters on pages get smeared, and some scribbled nonsense.

Meanwhile, one of the people on watch notices you, and shouts.........

>>23312901
Put the binoculars to the side and shout out that we don't mean any harm.

>>23312901
Shout out and demand to know who they are. Get ready to throw a stickybomb into their midst and run if they want to fight.

Sorry guys, we'll have to cut it short tonight, but we'll continue the thread tomorrow, but we'll start in the afternoon, so that's about six hours earlier.

>>23313059
Sounds good.

Lifeboating this.

bump

Bump

QUEST IS NOW RESUMING.

Maidens are now doing their best and preparing. Please wait warmly until ready.

>>23325638
Maidens? What maidens?

>>23325714
The mythical kind of course.

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WE ARE BACK.

Hmm, which one shall we go with?

[ ]Put the binoculars to the side and shout out that we don't mean any harm.

[ ]Shout out and demand to know who they are. Get ready to throw a stickybomb into their midst and run if they want to fight.

If I do not get enough votes between these two, I shall put the decision to the dice.

>>23327889
Sticking with the first choice.

>>23327889
I'm sticking with the second. We're in the wastes; paranoia is what keeps us alive.

>>23327992
Yeah but we're already down a man and our guide is wounded. We don't need another firefight so soon.

>>23328001
But letting down our guard will be disastrous if they turn out to be hostile.
There's more of them than us, and while we can more easily get to cover, their numbers could overwhelm us.

>>23328093
There's a lot of civilians in that crowd, right?

>>23328162
If by civilian, you mean someone who isn't an obvious raider and just a scavenger.

>>23328093
>>23328162
>>23328311
We can't just expect that everybody wants to kill us. But I understand your point. Let's have our hands kept on our weapons and our heads down, and if we can't talk our way out of this then we'll take a small detour.

>>23328311
Like the difference between the decked out marauders/nomads and the regular bandits/psychos in Borderlands?

>>23328162
>>23328311

When OP uses the word "survivor", does he roughly mean "civilian"?

>>23328364
There really aren't "civilians" in a post-apocalyptic sense, but everyone is at least a survivor of some kind even after a couple generations, even with hidden towns established.

So yes there is some sort of line you can draw between a bandit and those who really make it their job to go around with the guns.

>>23328472
Right. Not everybody is a blood-crazed psychopath just because they've got a gun.

Rolled 90, 40, 25 = 155

>>23327889
Since this looks like this is just going back and forth, I'll leave it to this with three dice rolls.

>>23328674
O_O
What...what does that mean?

>>23328674
>>Would be a little unfair to resolve this with an all-or-nothing roll right now.

>>Anyway, since the average ended up at 51...

"Who the hell are you guys?" shouts one of the watchful men, rifles raised to your presence.

You were curious as to what exactly the book was. You certainly didn't mean to do harm, right? It seems that these men, are at an advantage compared to you. Smooth-talking with them and not a shouting match or a shootout, would solve the problem cleanly.

"We're wondering what's up with the crowd? What's happening here?" you ask out loud to the men guarding at the edges.

"Everyone's here to listen to what the old man's got to say about the library. You're not one of us, so what are you here for?"

One man among your team is down, and another is about to go down. You turn your head to your guys, and...

Where the hell is Soong? How are you going to get close enough to listen?

>>23328924
Wait, Soong's missing? Did anybody see where he went? Let's also shout back that we've also come seeking news of the library, if they'll let us pass.

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>>23328966
A quick glance, and everyone (Rex not included) seems to be accounted for, save for Soong.

You ask Skeety to quickly look for Soong. Hopefully, it's not gonna turn into more trouble right now. In front, is a man wanting to hear what you've got to say for yourself. "We're here because of that library," you explain. "We heard about those calls, and we want to know more about it. I want to know if that old man over there has something good to tell."

The guard waves his gun at you. "No guns up. If we see you try anything, you're dead."

That seemed quick. You get Skeety to look for Soong, but as you're let off, you see him ahead. Much further ahead, and he's listening in. Seems he decided to make a detour and sneak in.

You squeeze yourself into the crowd, past children, adults, and the occasional old person. The man preaching before the crowd is feverishly trying to teach the crowd.

"Everything on our homeland has been tainted by the sues. We cannot even trust the libraries now!" he shouts. In his hands is that book. You can clearly see the pages now. The words keep going properly for a while, but soon enough the letters stretch, spill and smear into pages of nonsense, scribbles, and rambling of the greatness and little matters of a sue. Much like a diary, with random graffiti scrawled in, with bright, clashing colors and drawings.

"This book, this very book where we trust that the knowledge we could put to use against the sues, has been warped!"

At first, you might think this was a trick, but the book appears to be unusually old, with a cover that couldn't have been easily made, nor the pages so easily made to be crammed, pages wrinkled and crackled in some places, and unnaturally turning pristine in the later sue-tainted parts...

>>23329592
This...is bad. Where did you find this?

>>23329639
The old man laments, "All this precious knowledge, now useless.." as the sue-tainted pages wriggle ever so slightly, tainting the other pages bit by it.

"There are more of these... our best men tried to save the other libraries, but it was all lies" the old man reaches out to a sack and reveals a sparkly rainbow book completely filled with nonsense and ego rambling...

The old man, preaches, gravely, "There is one thing we must do, and that is, we must burn the taint, we must start anew. We must journey to this library wherever it might be, and erase it before a new sue nation is born. Those people trying to save it, they'll become sues, they'll bring in sues into this world with those books."

"What about the clean books?" a young survivor asks, from the midst of the crowd.

"The old world was full of sin and blood! The sues came to purge the unfit to birth the new world! Now that the sues are gone, we are the people left behind to set things right!" With that, he brings a flame to the book in his hand, and rallies a cry from the crowd. A thunderous roar from the crowd erupts.

"To the last library!"

>>23329942
"Yeah, yeah, we can all agree to burn the tainted books. But to burn them all? Do you even know how to make paper and the basics of a printing press, old man?"

This preacher needs to be put down before he can cause more problems than he fixes.

>>23329942
Everybody, calm down! I can understand burning the tainted books, but some of them might be saved!

We're in the middle of a crowd and we're outnumbered. We won't be able to walk away alive so easily.

How probable is it that this preacher is actually a SUE-infiltrator who means to destroy the last library by tricking people into thinking that it's irrecoverable?

>>23330419
What do you think we should do?

>>23330481
Call him out on it. Poke logical holes in his story.
Bring up the fact that logic is our bulwark against the SUE, and that if his arguments can't stand up to logic, then perhaps he should check himself for SUE-taint.

If we can't convince these people, just say we can't agree with what they're doing and try to disengage. Then we can either try to kill them all at an ambush, or we try to get to our objectives faster than them.

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>>23330161
>>23330419
Uh, oh...

>>23329942
"You say to set things right, but how are you even going to start? You're suggesting that we destroy the library regardless of whether it's been tainted or not, and without even trying to recover what books can be saved.
"And what, are you going to write new books? How are you going to print them? What information will you put into them? You've obviously not thought this through...just like a SUE."

>>23330548
>>23330745
A voice retorts from the crowd. Yours. In the midst of a frenzied crowd, you break their fervor and draw attention to yourself, with words.

"Why do you want to destroy all the books when there's some books that can be saved?" you ask.

"A bad apple can spoil the whole bunch," the old man answers. It's an old saying, alright. "How do you know the library isn't a trap by a new sue to watch us cry at the spoiling of the books?" he asks back.

You turn the question around back at him, "How do we know you're not a sue? Logic and facts drive away the sues. What's not to say that you're a sue who's tainted all these books yourself?".

"Our men managed to find these books in the middle of a fight against bandits. You've all heard about the struggles for new homes and the remaining libraries in between. Some of us have fought to protect some of the books, but we've lost not just the books, but people and homes! There's others who've kept all the food and the best sanctuaries to themselves, and how the bandits have decided to take everything away in the night!"

Others in the crowd start to feel antagonized by your presence...

GUYS!
Please..

Lets not get ourselves killed because we decided to piss off a righteous mob of people..

Lets just quietly go along with it, and disrupt the plans later?

ALSO..

What about Rex???

"You obviously don't understand what it's like, outsider," a guy taps you on the shoulder. You continue anyway.

"Are you going to write new books? How are you going to print them? What information will you put into them?"

"Yes, we will!" the old man proclaims. "We'll rebuild everything we know, and we'll learn everything all over again, but we'll get it right this time. We don't know everything right now, but we'll take as long as we have to, to make new knowledge and make sure the old world will not be remembered!"

>>23330965
"Yeah, it's too bad you lost folks, but so have all of us. And what the fuck does bandits have to do with whether or not books are tainted or if the last library can be saved? Don't change the subject; that's a SUE tactic."

>>23331021
"Yeah? You know what bit of Lore we had drilled into us? 'Those that forget the past are doomed to repeat it'.
"You go on your fool's errand; we're not going to help you in your fucking book-burning."
"And as for you, what don't I understand? That I'm staying rational and logical when everyone is getting worked up into a fervor? I've had my share of fighting off bandits and burying friends; what don't I understand?"
Get out of here, and let's get to the crash site.

Wait a minute, why haven't we felt like we're losing ourselves here, like, we aren't under mind control?

>>23331100
Exactly. If we forget the old world, then the new world has no past, nothing to honor or improve on. If there are tainted books, then we'll destroy them. But I'll be damned if we let the rest be burned because of rampant paranoia. Let's go.

Again, another logical fallacy. If you forget and erase the past, how do you know that you're not just recreating the same mistakes?
This preacher is full of nothing but logical holes and non sequiturs.

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>>23331100
>>23331164
>>23331186

You will not be swayed, nor will you be stopped. "If you want to burn even the things that can be saved, that's what SUEs are going to do."

Skeety, Soong, Morris, Soong and Philips move in to shield you before someone from the mob grabs you. The air around the mob is getting tense, hostile. Someone might do something to you any moment now.

"If you burn all the knowledge down, erase the past, you'll never know if you're just repeating the same mistakes again!" you shout.

"That's enough from you!" so shouts someone from behind you.

"We will march! March and take down the last of the sue taint!" the old man preaches to the crowd.

Skeety and the others pull you away from the crowd, who are ever so becoming antsier and antsier from your meddling. "Shit boss, I thought we were just gonna find out what's up. Why'd you wanna pick a fight with that mob?" Skeety asks you...

"Come on, you know what he's doing is wrong, and probably, something a sue would do, right?"

"We could've been more quiet about it," Soong adds. "We could've slipped away and hit them when they didn't expect us later."

"So are we gonna get ahead of this mob, or are we going to get closer to the crash site?" Morris asks.

"It's just a little bit over there," Skeety points out with his finger. You can't tell exactly where or how far with his finger he's pointing right now, weaving around wreckages and ripped-apart flakes of road adding to the difficulty of telling what places match up on the map. Yet you trust him to do his job. These men trust you to do your job to keep the team alive and get this job done, even if shit's getting more and more complicated.

In the distant sky above, you hear faint series of low roars, crackles and pops, and the occasional flashes....

>>23331463
We go to the crash site. It's possible that the pilot survived, or that it has a survival kit with weapons that we can use.

Then we go to the library; that group is big, and doesn't have professional scavengers in it. It'll move slower than us.

>>23331463
>>23331543
Agreed. Let's head to the crash site first, but pick up the pace a little. We have to get to the library before the mob does.

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>>23331463
Around the corner, a trail of smoke billows in the wind. The signs of a crash, the heat of the surrounding area, and the ground streaked and wrecked hard by something plowing into it with such force, it's all there.

As you follow the trail of destruction, you take care to not get burnt, but Soong and Philips nearly do, out of curiosity.

"I've never seen anything like this before," Philips says. "Even after being on your team for a long time, this just hasn't happened before, or often..."

You have nothing on your face to show for what he said, but he continues on anyway. "We've seen trucks, and rovers crash and burn pretty hard sometimes, but this is something totally different..."

It soon becomes clear what that t-shaped thing that fell out of the sky was.

You see this.

>>23331767
>Terran Wraith Aerospace Fighter
Looks like the TG is back in town.

"Holy shit. I think...I think this is a gen-u-wine space fighter. I remember seeing one in an old mag once."

Let's go to the front and check the cockpit.

>>23331767
Where'd this thing COME from? If somebody has space-tech working on this planet, why haven't they started driving the SUEs back yet?

>>23331813
I agree, check to see if the pilot is still alive.

Alright, I think this is a good stopping point for a cliffhanger.

What time tomorrow would be best for you guys? After lunch? Early afternoon? Late afternoon?

>>23332219
Probably mid to late afternoon.

>>23332219
After lunch for me, then not until late evening.

And we're archived.