(what a swell guy. The terminators we built are even nicer.)

>>285367

The Angel has reached one of the lower testing chambers.

The turrets open fire. You focus all your processing power on analyzing the camera feeds, slowing down your subjective time.

Your sentry guns fire subsonic bullets, so the experimental sonic weapon surround the Angel in dischord and dissonance for a fraction of a second. It definitely feels it; whether it's hurting it or not, these do a better job than the dazzlers at disorienting it, impeding its progress. It perceives the sound waves as a solid walls, and has a fraction of a second to make a mime-trapped-in-a-box impression.

Then the bullets hit. Malaussene, who has been listening in through a hydrophone, braces.

The bullets pass through the Angel like they would through ballistic gel, but do not leave a mark, other than on what it's wearing. A couple of sentries end up shooting each other, but you have dozens.

In the Mediterranean, Malaussene screams through the hydrophone... and then calms down when he realizes that he's still in there and in one piece.

Unfortunately, so's the Angel, as far as you can tell.

# Turn off the projectile weapons, or wait for them to run out of bullets, and focus on the emitters.

# Turn off the sonic emitters, and let the Angel get to the heavy-caliber turrets.

# Turn off both and let the Angel through.

>>285391
Turn off ballistics, leave sonics on for a minute.

>>285395

Preliminary analysis of bullet trajectories show that the bullets DID go through the Angel and slowed down accordingly, just, they didn't hurt it or even leave a mark.

The room goes quiet, but that's simply because half the microphones melted and the other half shut down in self-preservation.

You see the Angel slowly make its way through the room, stumbling, hands grasping forward. It's as if it's pushing a giant boulder. By the time it reaches the heavy emitters, you can see its limbs shaking, its feet moving hesitantly.

The people in the control room are cheering and high-fiving. You are years away from this sort of performance in the field of course -- these rooms were designed with resonance in mind, and the Angel has a good thirty emitters trained on it -- but even so.

# Abort heavy emitters and allow it to proceed to the next room.

# Let the mother of all basses drop.

- Angels do not sweat.
- Angels can experience fatigue.
- Angels either do not experience pain, or do not show.
- The sonic emitters are vulnerable to their own output, as you've lost a few.
- Vee is going to smash the DJ charts next year if any of this data is shared in the Packet.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0AHHOTDzWuM

(LOL, Kill it with dubstep)

Save the mother of all basses for the arena. Abort the emitters. Open the door. What's the last room before Quinn's arena again?

>>285406

The only rooms left are

>a neutron emitter;

>an arena room with, optionally, Quinn to face.

>>285412
Ok. Let's go neutron. No idea how that is supposed to work though. So surprise me.

((in fact. While we wait for the Neutron room data. Let's give quinn as much of the data we gathered amd see if she can't figure something out for fighting it. The disable and run plan stands. Capture is not an option right now, even if the neutron room gives us something we can work with later.))

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>>285414

The next chamber is very simple; a corridor with a sharp turn at the end. As the Angel walks through the corridor, a neutron beam coming from a Farnsworth-Hirsch-Hull fusor illuminates the being. The beam is strong enough to guarantee that any living creature will get cancer of the everything after a few minutes' exposure, but surprisingly, not enough to case radiation sickness. Ziggy apologized profusely to everyone about that and will try to make a bigger one later on.

The first thing that you notice is that the Angel is clearly fatigued. It doesn't sweat, but its skin looks somewhat translucent and its step is slower and more uncertain than it was at the beginning of the gauntlet.

The second thing you notice is that it's clearly as uncomfortable with the neutron source as it was with the dazzling light.

The third thing you get out of this is a rough X-ray of the Angel (it'd be higher resolution if it wasn't walking towards the exit, but so it goes). Its skeletal structure is humanoid, but the organs are a lot less well defined, almost stylized, it looks like an ancient Egyptian embalming chart in motion.

The beam is unfocused, so the closest it gets to the bend, the stronger it will be. It's aimed roughly at its chest. As the Angel advances, small static discharges appear around the unraveled fibers of its robe where a bullet severed them.

The Angel holds out its arms as if to push away the walls of the corridor; it's clearly fatigued.

Eventually, it reaches the bend. Ziggy quickly drops the lead ingot that blocks the neutron source. "Nobody go in there for a few days, the secondary radiation has to work itself out."

At the bend, camera coverage drops for a moment. Rather than regenerating its clothing, the Angel comes through the bend wearing nothing but a loincloth. Its hair is a little longer. It's now carrying a sword.

- Angels seem to have an anatomy designed by an ancient-antiquity Frankenstein.

- Angels can be fatigued, and do not recover from fatigue instantly.

- Angels can see x-rays and possibly gamma rays.

- Angels can apparently summon things, but are limited by conservation of, if not mass, volume?

>>285425

Quinn goes over the telemetry and video that has been collected so far. She lets out an appreciative whistle.

"Ignores bullets, strong as three men and faster than me with the juice all the way up, recovers instantly from flashbangs and the only stuff that disorients him would do a worse number on me. I can fight deaf and I can probably fight blind, Omega, but not both. But, damn if I don't want to kick its ass."

During the slow walk through the neutron chamber, a couple of your agents have hastily moved the heavy emitters downstairs into the arena room. Vee is busy trying to recalibrate them to the different environment; they'll work, but not at capacity. The arena does have normal strobe lights and speakers.

# Abort.

# Let Quinn fight without interference, saving the emitters in case she falls.

# Let Quinn fight while using the emitters.

# Talk to the Angel through someone, before letting it reach the last room.

>>285437

Raymie has been quietly praying the whole time.

# Let him see his rescuer.

# Communicate.

# Leave him be.

It's weaker now. Hmm. Have quinn fight it with the emitters on a setting where they won't damage themselves. In the event she starts getting her can kicked, have her either duck out through the collapsible service tunnel or some MECs extract her through it while I drop all the bass.

>>285439
Turn off the audio and let him know the angel is now at the final chamber. "You are likely to be released soon. Thank you."

https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https://www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3Dx2rQzv8OWEY&ved=0ahUKEwju9dzv1rjNAhUI12MKHT5lDGwQFghNMAc&usg=AFQjCNGXaVuTNc6lHSgj5lVLT64AiNOxCQ&sig2=HQhoB5rZP0wNmxTcPVRkgA

I dont want to be (That) angel.

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76 KB JPG

>>285441

Raymie thanks God and, to you, he says triumphantly "Ha! I knew you couldn't keep me here forever"!

"Actually, we kinda let it win" Ziggy interjects, but he's not on mic.

>>285443

Vee expertly adds the heterodyning frequencies to your selection of soundtrack for this fight. The Angel imperiously opens the penultimate door to find a double-ceiling room with wall holds of the sort you'd find in a rock climbing gym. Projectors around the room make the place look like it's underwater, if underwater was Tron - they can be quickly re-aimed to dazzle.

Quinn is standing right in front of the final elevator door; she double checked her maintenance and disconnects the tubes giving her power, organic superlubricant, and endocrine refillers at the last minute.

She's mostly naked, with some of her cybernetics showing, except for what looks like a looted Psalty helmet which protects her face and contains a couple of sonar rangefinders to at least let her give chase if the Angel goes invisible.

The Angel takes a good look, and his sword catches fire -- the purple, cold flame of a corona discharge.

"What is the meaning of this whited sepulchre?! From dirt it came and to dirt it must return."

Quinn blows it a kiss. "Dirt's so last century. The cool kids use organometallic mesh now. Fight me!"

The Angel circles around. "I will not soil myself with a corpse."

Just like that, it disappears without any sort of special effect, including the sword and the loincloth. The music goes lower, and the sonars begin to track its movement as it walks past Quinn. She's wearing a sonar helmet, and can follow up to a point; the projectors in the room make that redundant by simply highlighting where the Angel is with a white circle on the floor.

- Sonar can track invisible Angels.

- The optical camouflage, as far as you can tell, is perfect.

- The Angel doesn't show up on termograph, IR or ultraviolet either.

"Cheater! What, neutron beam got your balls? Oh that's right, you never had any!"

- Angels do not respond to trash talk.

# Have Quinn attack it.

# Have Quinn get in the way, but not attack.

# Have Quinn follow it two steps behind.

And,

# Make it painfully obvious that you know where the Angel is by projecting various markers on the floor and walls.

# Let it think that it's managing to be invisible, and stop following him with the projection (but keep tracking him)

Have quinn get in the way and put the lights on him to make it obvious. Then have Veronica state over the mic. "This chamber is the last one leading to Raymie, the premises is simple it is a sparing match. one of you must either submit or be made unfit to go continue in combat for the door to unlock."

Good luck quinn. Don't get beat.

>>285463
(Gah, damn auto correct.)

>>285463

The Angel listens, walks to the door, commands it to open - it unlocks, but the servos lock it again too fast for either it or Rayie to react, although the Glorified missionary starts banging on the door. Ignoring Quinn, the Angel addresses Raymie.

"Do not fear, warrior for Christ. Know that I am Colopatiron, Angel of Liberation. May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make His face shine upon you and give you peace."

Raymie's tears of joy and expressions of thanks are genuinely moving, but other than that, he doesn't do anything to change the situation, even though the lock servos are on his side of the door.

After all that, Colopatiron lifts a hand to reach the door handle, like it did before. It stops its hand just shy of Quinn's midriff.

The Angel finally deigns itself to ackownedge Quinn's presence, takes two steps back, and tries to get around her. Grinning, she simply turns to face him.

The Angel tries again on the other side of Quinn, with the same result. This time, it tries to reach the door handle THROUGH Quinn.

She takes what amounts to a very mild punch in the gut. "Naughty naughty. Nobody ever told you to not hit a girl?"

The Angel again takes a step back, then its sonar profile changes -- wider and fuzzier, it probably spread its wings. "Watch out!" Veronica calls.

Quinn jumps almost to the ceiling, legs collected under her and arms spread, the Angel's flaming sword right under her feet at arm's height, reappearing mid-swing. The Angel is visible again.

Quinn, still in midair, kicks it in the chest with a cybernetic foot - and the foot finds no purchase; she's pushed back a little, as if she had striken true, but all that happens to the Angel is a shimmer in his midsection.

Quinn lands and, by learned reflex, follows up with a jab on the shoulder. Her right hand is mostly flesh and bone for this iteration. That staggers the Angel half a step back. Quinn lets herself be pushed back, bounces against the wall, and gets clear of another sword swing.

"You damned soul, you made your eternal choice! There will be no blessing from me even if I wrestle your corpse!"

"Blessing? I'm gonna lay you out!"

"What's Colapasta talking about?" Veronica asks. Since the Angel is visible again, the sonic emitters can be deployed again.

Colopatiron swings again, Quinn jumping back and bounding to the side again just fast enough to avoid the charged sword.

She counters with a light kick on the sword itself; this time her foot impact with the clank of metal on metal. The plasma discharge earths itself harmlessly through Quinn's lightning-proof body, but electric field survey shows that it would probably sear through an unaugmented human.

"Don't I get a weapon?" Quinn taunts.

"You are damned! You cannot fight me, you've already lost! You are beyond blessings!"

"Yeah, what's the angel talking about with the blessing?" Ziggy interjects.

Let this continue. Dispense Quinn's cat o nine, have the MECs ready to charge in and pull Quinn out if she can't do it herself, and prepare the sonics to MOAB if things get to dangerous for comfort.

>>285494

A hatch opens in a wall to drop Quinn's whip; avoiding sword swings, she makes her way to it and picks it up. Colopatiron seems to be executing a kata, swinging and thrusting at places where Quinn quite simply isn't. That said, this prevents her from getting a head of steam for hitting back; despite the Angel being visibly larger than Quinn, neither has a mass advantage due to her organometallic frame.

Quinn cracks the whip - actually just makes it hit the ceiling, it's not long enough to be cracked - and again taunts Colopatiron as it gets closer to the door to Raymie. "Fair fight, yeah?"

The Angel again repeats that the Hellbound have no authority to seek a blessing, much to the confusion of Ziggy and Vee.

Colopatiron again gets to the door, again commands it to open, and again hears it open and close immediately. The camera in the elevator shows that Raymie has finally noticed he door servos moving, and is ineffectually pulling at the handle on his side.

Quinn lashes out with the whip! She aims at Colopatiron's sword, and manages to wrap around it. The whip is made of stranded wire, and ends up welding itself to the sword due to the plasma discharge; with a bit of an uncoordinated movement, Quinn yanks as strongly as she can, and both weapons end up sliding pat her on the ground. "Hey, if I stick that in a rock, can I be the queen of England? Come on, Cologne, mano a mano!"

The Angel keeps trying to unlock the door and get it to stay unlocked. Quinn pushes against a wall and slams herself into the Angel's shoulder, pushing him off it.

He gets back up. "Wrestling me will grant you no blessings! Let go of this corpse and return to the lake of fire!"

"Oooh baby, wanna wrestle?"

Quinn's style is more aerial than that, so she delivers another kick to the Angel, pushing it backwards.

Ziggy and Vee figure that the Angel is just spouting nonsense; Vee's finger is on the MOAB button.

Both combatants have been moving very fast; you look at Quinn's metabolic telemetry and see that she's using up adrenaline and ATP a bit faster than her metabolic extender can replenish it.

>>285494

Quinn is fresh and unhurt/undamaged. Colopatiron is tired and unhurt.


# Let the fight continue.

# Bail Quinn out in some way, be it with wubs, another weapon, or assistance from her cabal.

# Have Quinn retreat.

# Talking is a free action, but it's also a free distraction.

Tell quinn we have as much data as we need. She is welcome to stop at anytime. Have vee (assuming that's Veronica's nickname) request the angel elaborate on what a blessing is in this context. I want that info for my records.

>>285515

The two move back and forth, Colopatiron swinging and mostly missing - you note that he's going for grapples like a pankration fighter, more than punches like a boxer, and he doesn't kick - and Quinn keeping him at distance and delivering the occasional kick or jab. He's accusing the jabs more than the kicks, so the end result looks a little like a mixed martial artist fighting a luchadore. Quinn keeps guarding Raymie's door.

"What blessing? What are you talking about?" Veronica asks.

"Remain in blind unbelief if that is your choice, little girl! The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge!"

There's a loud "Amen" from Raymie. Ziggy says maybe it's a bible quote or something, and asks permission to punch Raymie just a little bit. You suspect that he would actively enjoy spontaneous combustion.

Your datalinks, of course, contain a copy of the Bible.

Colopatiron gets a grapple! Quinn reacts by delivering a headbutt. You have to play it back twice from two angles, but - the helmet went THROUGH the Angel's face, much the same way that the bullets did; only when Quinn's actual forehead impacts Colopatiron's nose does the being stagger back. Quinn breaks free of its grasp, bounds back, takes a low defensive stance, and whispers at you.

"Omega? That was WEIRD. It looked like a neurosuppressor glitch feels."

Vee is keeping the sonars trained at the Angel; Ziggy is all but growling at Raymie; a couple of the technicians are trying to speedread the Bible, one start to end, one end to start.

(I'm kinda falling asleep at the keyboard, is a cliffhanger OK? Paul and the other person might be able to rejoin. Hope this is interesting!)

# Let the fight continue.

# Bail Quinn out in some way, be it with wubs, another weapon, or assistance from her cabal.

# Have Quinn retreat.

# Talking is a free action, but it's also a free distraction.

# ANything else!

>>285515

( Oh, and about my being silly about Twinkies... http://bangordailynews.com/2016/06/20/news/hancock/40-years-later-twinkie-remains-intact-at-maine-school/?utm_source=fark&utm_medium=website&utm_content=link )

>>285530
((Yeah, a cliffhanger is fine, I was going to have quinn bail but I want to see what the others come up with.))

(XD all that over a twinkie! That is unreal!)

[[Sorry, I had to sleep!]]

I vote talk, distract the angel, and then bail Quinn out with the WUBMACHINE.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dttyOcPi_Rg

Little side action during this. I think Ziggy is a little to wound up, so let's cut his mic from the others without disabling the receiving half of it so we can talk in private and he can still know when quinn goes through the exit so he can collapse it.once she's clear.

"Ziggy, I'm detecting a little more hostility and reckless aggression than would be advisable right now. Think of something or someone that would make you happy and calm down. Hitting Steele is not currently worth spontaneous combustion."

>>285716
(You dont need to apologize for sleep either! It's not that big a deal and sleep is more important anyway, just like work!)

((found out the blessing is the breaking of the Victor's hip and a name change. IE we better pull Quinn out before she wins, unless she has armor to keep her hip in place or her MEC body counts as such.))

>>286022

Ziggy sits down in a corner and tries to calm down, and drops the crazy lecherous pyromaniac facade for a moment. "The someone I care about is in there fighting and I'm here watching! That's backwards!"

>>285716

Vee is ready with the emitters. They've been reinstalled hastily, so she doesn't know how well it will work, but at minimum they'll slow Colopatiron down. "No idea what it'll do to Quinn though..."

The two combatants keep circling around the arena, Colopatiron going for a grapple, Quinn dodging and weaving and delivering jabs with the one fleshy extremity she was wearing today. This doesn't go well with her fighting style; she's used to delivering precise, strong kicks with her cybernetic legs, and a hit with those just seem to turn Colopatiron into a blob just long enough for the hit to pass through harmlessly.

# Drop the bass!

# Quinn's adrenaline dispenser still has a lot of juice, and Colopatiron is tired - let them slug it out.

>>286959

You find the relevant Bible verse. While her helmet went through Colopatiron when she delivered a headbutt, maybe the rules are different for this "blessing"; no way to tell.

# Play it back, either to Quinn or globally, to warn her.

# Quinn can do without a hip until a new one is grown/built, and how this "blessing" works would be a very juicy piece of data. Don't warn her.

Colopatiron manages to grab onto Quinn's left hand! The grip is strong, but when she yanks the mechanical hand off, the blobbing effect prevents the Angel from getting a good grip; she only loses a few bits of skin at the elbow.

"Even now you crumble to dust!" it says.

- Angels can trash talk, at least a little.
- Angels are very hit and miss when it comes to situational awareness.

Vee puts some snippets from the Rocky 4 soundtrack on the speakers to cheer Quinn on.

Ok, let's hit it with bass, the data we have is just enough for now. There will be opportunities to try melee combat again in the future.

"Ziggy, were going to have to have a discussion when we get back"

"Q get ready to bolt when the speakers are live. We have enough data."

"Vee, MOAB."

"We're packing up!"

>>287691
And retrieve that arm. Don't give them anything.

>>287691

Wuinn dodges a grapple, and instead of punching, she scratches its arm; if she was hoping to make it bleed, it doesn't work. The Angel goes for a grapple again, managing to hold onto Quinn's hand.

She flips him the bird and detaches the limb at the elbow, then hisses at the Angel like a snapping turtle. The escape hatch opens.

Colopatiron looks at the severed limb; the some blood falls on the Angel's loincloth, evaporating instantly. It drops the forearm, and moves to retrieve its sword, still spot-welded to Quinn's whip.

Veronica drops the bass. Half the sonar sensors in the room crap out from overload; the plasma speakers are aimed straight at the Angel. This doesn't seem to hurt it so much as making it think it's trapped - you get a few seconds of video showing Colopatiron staggering and pushing back agianst invisible walls.

Quinn turns around and gets her hand back. "That's MINE!" she growls. A few more seconds of scurrying and she gets her whip back too, dragging the angelic sword along by the weld spot and finally disappearing into the tunnel.

While Quinn and the support personnel make their retreat, Colopatiron kneels, and says something in an unknown langauge. Your semantics subroutine can't make heads or tail of it, so to you, it sounds like the Angel loudly proclaimed to the world, "YOU CRACKPOT!"

The reverb from that is sufficient to avalanche the plasma speakers; they keep buzzing, but lose their effect on the Angel. Visibly relieved, it gets up, walks to Raymie's door, and once again commands it to open.

"Ow! My finger's stuck!" Raymie complains.

With the Glorified young man's finger stuck in the servo - he'd been poking and prodding at it throughout the fight - Colopatiron finally opens the door. The two say a brief prayer, and when the Angel touches Raymie, they both disappear.

# The remaining sensors are sufficient to track both of them, at least until they get out of the building.

# Not only that, but while Quinn probably needs a bit of time in the shop, you have a MEC with sonars, who can follow them (Infiltrator or Heavy?)

# Just let them go and focus on a safe evac; the psalties will be here in maybe an hour.

# Collapse the building on them!

>>287772

You lost:

- Quinn for a few days. She's trying to hang on to her original fleshy bits, and will want to get to a combination surgery/workshop quickly.

- Raymie, probably, even if you track him, it's very unlikely that you can recapture him.

- Mr Malaussene. He got a play by play of the whole thing, and he wants to quit doing fieldwork, it's too nerve wracking.

You gained:

- A lot of information about Angels.

- A bit of information about sonic weapons.

- An Angel's sword.

- Material for a seriously bitchin' music video.

>>287786
I'd say it's a success.

The engineer will work on sonic equipment. He no longer needs to do fieldwork.

When they are out of the building and we evacuate. Collapse that building.

"Thank you both, and sorry for the inconvenience"

>>287831

You make a note on the project file; huge success.

While her various bits are put on ice, Quinn lets herself be hugged by Ziggy and only elbows him off after he cops a feel, after a minute or so.

Satisfied that it's at least experimentally possible to track a cloaked Angel, you collapse the building as soon as your crew is safely away in a small fleet of unmarked cars.

Careful scraping of Quinn's fingernails show that she didn't pick up any dead skin from Colopatiron. You do, however, have its sword.

It looks like Heavy MECs will have a problem fighting Angels directly, although of course, fitting a sonic weapon on a large chassis that already has a generation will be easier than making handheld weapons; as it has happened through history, the solution will involve combined arms.

>>287866
Excellent, we should contact the seven, this could net us the manpower to make the projects and finish them. Not to mention, we have a holy weapon to analyze, enough data to produce countermeasures, and behavioral data to take advantage of in the field should the event arise.

(My turn)

#talk to Ziggy first?

#contact the seven, with Ziggy, Quinn, and Vee.

>>285367

You have 7 cabals available. One of them is maintaining your systems and either fulfilling or stalling the occasional request from the Seven. Incidentally this should be Tuesday's last year of service as per the 5150 rule, and he mentioned that Sunday's older than him.

Quinn lets her adrenaline pump drop, staggers to a terminal, and tiredly tells you that she needs a vacation.

Ziggy laments that spicy food no longer exists.

Veronica is probably the happiest human being you've seen since you came online.

Complexity 1 (auto success):

# Harass or sabotage a Hero.

# Send a cabal to a region you have no presence in, to see what unique opportunities that region offers.

# Take advantage of discovered opportunties:

Pacific Islands: The evacuation went well; have a cabal work with your sysadmins to help you analyze combat data for anything you may have missed. This includes metallurgical survey of Colopatiron's sword.

Complexity 2 (50/100 success):

# Further research on sonic weapons, nuclear engineering, or your own subsystems.

# Produce MECs at a base. This adds one dot to the MEC cabal counter per base. All your base can work on this (2 bases = 2 counter ticks).

# Use a base to produce propaganda and infrastructure to bring a territory under your control (Osaze: 4/5, since there was backlash; Pacific Islands: 1/5)

# Use a base to build Sky Eyes for Osaze and the West Coast.

# Recruit from TOL. This raises TOL suspicion towards you.

Complexity 3 jobs available (33/66/100 success):

# Continue pursuing MEC research. Past 7/10 this will become a complexity 4 job.

# Continue pursuing space research.

# Attempt to eliminate a Hero.

Complexity 4 jobs available (25/50/75/100 success):

# Recruit from the general unbelieving population, this has the advantage of not generating TOL suspicion towards you.

Complexity 5 jobs available (20/40/60/80/100 success):

# Estabilish a base in a region where you have no contact, just by finding a suitable location and moving in.


Oddly, Raymie Steele doesn't resurface immediately. After a few days, he delivers a brief testimony on how an Angel rescued him from "insane Other Light scientists who are trying to use the dead as soldiers" and describes a "rotting robot skeleton" being eventually beaten by Colopatiron. You know that the Glorified cannot lie, so you suspect that this is what Raymie actually perceived; as far as you're aware, your infiltrator MECs have no problem interacting with the Glorified, at least as long as they keep it brief.

The Glorified missionary then announces that he will spend more time caring for his ailing father. Interestingly, nobody fields the question as to how many people Raymie has converted during his captivity.

NOTE: The two elite missionaries in Osaze are actively reverting your progress with the takeover plan.


After being once more pushed off by Quinn as she takes an oil bath, Ziggy is available for debriefing.

"Omega, why didn't we just blow Collie up?"

>>287890

(Can do that before planning if you prefer)

Ziggy is available immediately; Quinn needs a bit of R&R, and Vee can't hear you over the sound of how awesome the music video she's cutting from the fight is going to be.

>>287930
Put Ziggy on task with Vee on sonics, two cabals.

Put four cabals on task to kill both of the missionary's.

Quinn gets her vacation. Once again, so long as she is careful.

Jeb assist the planning phase of the assassination of the missionary's.

"Because I'm not looking to incite a manhunt against all my forces, reasearchers, and suppliers. if they are alive and well, it will be considered the act of a weak TOL group by the general believer population"

>>287959
(Is Vee not working and on brake or is that a joke?)

>>287890

(I'd rather deal with Ziggy first is all).

The short, hairy teenager perches on an office chair in the California base; there's a mic and headphones on his head. Just so that this former cubicle doesn't look like a confessional, it's open to the air; privacy is guaranteed by a very loud office fan on top of that one cubicle.

>>287990

"... I get it. Get ready for the big punch later. Just - I like Quinn, you know." He makes a "big boobs" gesture, even though she didn't have those on for the fight. "I should've... I don't know, protected her. Yeah, I know, traditional gender role crap, just..."

Ziggy figures that as much as TOL proper are just wasting time, you're right and it's not time for a hard confrontation yet.

>>287997

Vee is indeed cutting a music video; she is available, just not for a couple of days after the Angel caper. Same for Quinn, although in her case she's unavailable for longer. I just wanted to deal with Ziggy first.

>>288015
"Ziggy, she is a combat capable MEC. You are an unaugmented human. And I'd like to keep you that way, MECs still don't have their sense of touch and pleasure and I'd like to preserve that aspect of my men. It gives motivation. You want to help protect her, work on the sonics. Beat divine smite with a shield, make an angel and glorified neutrazing rifle, or anything else. Leave combat for those who can't be killed by lightning."

(which reminds me. Restore sense of touch and pleasure to MEC's gets added to the MEC programs future plans, but not before functionality and survivability improvements.)

>>288038

Ziggy doesn't really have much expertise to offer, but he's used to loud noises and dangerous experiments -- and, despite the bravado, smart enough to recognize the need for safety gear. His and Vee's team make progress with the handheld emitter, and design a larger version that can be mounted on a heavy MEC chassis. Notably, they're confident that it may make some sense to start building what Veronica calls "wubbing modules" until someone comes up with a better name; they have considerably less range than conventional firearms, but give you a nonlethal option. The current designs are a standalone small tool that can be concealed, and an attachment to your standard combat rifle (TOL has standardized on the AK design simply because they've been stockpiling small arms for centuries and it's a proven, durable system).

>>287990

Quinn takes advantage of your largesse to do a club tour; she genuinely enjoys dancing. In general, most MECs react to the dulling of their senses by throwing themselves into a displacement activity; for some it's chess (oddly enough for a sapient AI, you are not particularly good at it, although you have solved checkers), some obsessively carve wooden chairs, you name it. For Quinn it's dancing. She's actually makes a point of showing your rank and file workers who frequent discos and raves that even she needs to stop and drink water from time to time, which reduces the first-aid overhead at such places considerably.

>>288055

That's going to be really, really difficult; MEC souls are in Hell, and the only way to prevent them from going mad from the pain of burning eternally is to disable pain altogether. Unfortunately, that comes with a heavy price, at least for now...

Rolled 8, 19 = 27 (2d100)

>>288038

Ziggy may not know much about sound, but he does about blast waves. A sonic "shield" is an interesting concept; while there's no way it would ever work against bullets or blows, it may be a way to keep tear gas out of an area.

Rolled 55, 47 = 102 (2d100)

>>288095

You perform basic analysis on the fight and more or less confirm your initial observations; Colopatiron's sword is left in storage. Presumably, the Angel has disappeared by now, but the sword has not.

>>288055
((Its probably going to come up towards the end of the campaign))
>>288090
((For exactly that reason. It's a mission for when we aren't trying to save humanity from going extinct.))

>>288095
(That's XCOM, baby... Actually why don't you roll 2d100 for the neutralization attempts?)


Jeb is an excellent pilot and his enthusiasm for aerospace is extremely motivating, but he's not a warrior, so he mostly makes plans for capturing Sarsour and Beverly, rather than killing them.

Thanks to their efforts, mostly Beverly's, the Osaze renaissance has lost some momentum; he's pretty miffed at this, especially since he had a spaceport all planned out as soon as it's possible to operate in the open, but doesn't want to kill anyone if it can be helped. Jeb's theory about Heaven is that it's actually as bad as Hell, just with endless monotonous pleasure instead of endless monotonous pain.

# Spread neutralization efforts equally (66% and 66% of success for both Sarsour and Beverly)

# Focus on one target (Guaranteed success on one, 33% on the other)

Rolled 53, 21 = 74 (2d100)

>>288130
Hmmnn. Let's go with two birds. (In feeling lucky) Basically trying to highjack the plane they will be boarding with MEC's with parachute equipment. We can capture them alive or we can kill them with a plane crash if things go wrong. "Faulty parts on instillation" would be to blame on the latter. Odd disappearance on the other. Ether way the bodies will have to be destroyed.

(yeah. That may require some writing.)

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>>288170

It's a daring plan; with a few exceptions, airliners aren't really a thing in the Millennial Kingdom (When Rayford Steele retired from piloting, so went the last fully-loaded Boeing 747) and the few people who travel by air charter business jets, usually designed to be able to take off and land from unimproved airfields once per trip.

After the debates, Sarsour and Beverly found themselves cooperating at least some of the time, and this involved sharing travel arrangements; Sarsour has insisted on allowing the occasional unbeliever to tag along, as part of the limited cooperation between the Millennium Force and independent (or even your own) infrastructure teams. The hope is generally to make the point that there are perks to being clever and geeky within the estabilishment rather than outside of it, and also to have a captive audience for a sermon during the flight, of course.

As unbearable as that sort of altar call is to someone who has experienced Hell, even for just a few minutes, it's not hard to get one of your infiltrators on one of these trips, ostensibly as a thank-you for offering geriatric quality-of-life devices like gyroscopic gloves to cut down on hand tremors. The infiltrator is posing as a kid with some sort of neurological disease that mimics the symptoms of senile dementia, explaining why he's been developing this sort of equipment and why he's wearing it. Another infiltrator posing as his sister comes along for the trip; she lets you know that if Beverly had tried to talk her out of pursuing her ambition to be a marine biologist in favor of being a homemaker one more time, she was going to throw her into the turbojet intake.

Halfway through a flight from Amman to Gilbraltar, one of the few remaining tourist spots on the planet thanks to you (the Rock is gone, but the monkeys are still there and so is the beach), one of your infiltrators activates a LORAN disruptor; the plane's pilot still has his bearings, but doesn't know how far he went. After quickly praying for guidance, the pilot keeps flying in the right direction. That didn't work.

The infiltrator then sets the LORAN disruptor to short itself; this causes a small fire, and to be on the safe side, the pilot decides to land early if that's at all possible. On cue, Jeb's small rig below radios the missionaries' plane, and the aviator offers to act as a follow-me to a village on the Algerian coast that happens to have a bus there - the missionaries can requisition it to complete their trip, at least. After a brief argument, Beverly and Sarsour agree, and the pilot drops and follows Jeb.

The "village" had been abandoned for years after an aborted attempt at kelp farming in the Mediterranean, but your cabals have done a passable job of making it look busy; of course, everyone there is in on it. Jeb guides the plane into what used to be a stretch of road without incident.

# Fake a failed landing, and go for the kill!

# Attempt a capture.

>>288275

Jeb lands his homemade plane next to the business jet and, while the jet's pilot is still doing a shutdown, installs parasite trim tabs on the plane's rudder and ailerons. This effectively gives his cabal the ability to remote control the plane, if it does take off again.

A quick thermographic survey shows that there are no intruders in the fake village.

Hmmnn. Attempt a capture. It may be possible to kill at least one of them if we fake this planes crash or have one of them bail with the only parachute when the plane goes a spiral.

>>288319
Actually, have someone leap out to save themselves when there's a plane problem, capture the other when a "miracle" occures.

>>288319

Sarsour and Beverly were going to Girbraltar to visit a rest home, and show them the new tools.

Jeb and a couple of his agents helps the pilot repair the plane, making sure that he doesn't see the parasite tabs.

While in the fake village, Beverly gets off the plane for refreshments. She is downright shocked at being asked to pay for anything, even after someone explains to her that the village is small and somewhat poor, so while the missionaries are welcome to any and all help for repairs, a meal should be paid for and loading water and snacks on the plane should definitely be paid for.

This perplexes Beverly greatly; in the Millennial Kingdom, missionaries are used to operating in a gift economy ( http://emlia.org/pmwiki/pub/web/LeftBeyond.LBStuff.html ).

She's even more surprised upon learning that nobody in the village is a believer except for the couple of people that you're having pose as believers. In a huff, she drops the food and goes to talk to Sarsour on the plane, demanding that one of the two of them stay there and minister to the benighted natives who are doing a flawless job of repairing their business jet.

Beverly gathers most of the fake village's population around and gives them a brief "Firefighters rescue, only Jesus saves" spiel, and explains how they should be grateful that the missionaries showed up, after a sincere but very brief prayer of apology for missing the village in the first place. To his credit, Sarsour facepalms. This is a good opportunity to separate the two missionaries.

# Have the "villagers" request that Beverly stay.

# Have the "villagers" request that Sarsour stay.

# Both. Please, tell us all about your faith, as we hadn't heard it every day for all our lives!

# Neither. Push off!

The plane is repaired (and rigged to dive) and can take off at any time.

>>288332

This is still an option, but there are others on the table :) sorry, crosspost.

>>288376

If plausible deniability is needed...

# Nobody would expect a small village to have a good enough workshop to patch up a jet, even though this small village happens to have one; your infiltrators have internal parachutes anyway.

# Faking a TOL terror attack on this village would be trivial; just have your guys pretend to fight each other. For extra realism, MECs can be shot in the chest and survive on the secondary cardiopump until they get patched up, and they won't feel being shot.

>>288376
Have Sarsour stay, that way Beverly can return safely. Change of script. She is likely to damage the Renaissance, or at least try and wind up strengthening it.

Sarsour's improvements will let him be recognized as a hero to the people who was killed by a savage tribe, one that historically called god their enemy. They would be originally from Africa.

(Got the idea from tvtropes)

>>288446
That would involve faking a terror attack but not by TOL. Which gives THEM deniability.

>>288446

Beverly is allowed to take off; the two infiltrators stay with her in case there's a change of plans. Jeb decides to fly on their wing, and for his troubles, he's subject to two hours of sermonizing on the radio.

That leaves you with Sarsour. His first order of business is ask if the villagers have heard of the Millennium Force.

# Just kill the guy. Clean death.

# Just kill the guy. Make it last a bit.

# Blackjack or chlorophorm the guy and tie him up.

# Play along for a while.

>>288516
Play along till Beverly is out of lightning bolt visibility range.

>>288527

Sarsour gathers the villagers round and explains the MF's current theology, which has been reined in considerably by Beverly's cooperation. You allow a few villagers to snark about them just copying TOL's technologies, and have a few villagers argue back that it's the other way round. Sarsour himself says that Jesus invented everything first anyway, so it's not an issue. Unaware of the MECs in the audience, he explains how needing the geriatric tech invented by your infiltrators isn't a big deal compared to being in Hell. He's just finishing making this one point when Beverly's plane is a full horizon away; Jeb hates to admit it, but the small jetliner left him in the dust to some degree.

Proceed.

>>288564

# Just kill the guy. Clean death.

# Just kill the guy. Make it last a bit.

# Blackjack or chlorophorm the guy and carry him away. An Angel is likely to show up. Your agents aren't quite ready to face one in the field.

>>288575
Clean kill. Then prepare the base for a fake slaughter.

>>288586

As Sarsour does his best to mask what's essentially an extortionist's threat by delivering it with genuinely kind words in a grandfatherly tone, one of the MECs in the audience stands up, throws back his hood, and produces an ordinary gun from his sleeve. Noone else seems to notice.

Sarsour sees it, and realizes that nobody else is reacting even after he points at the assassin.

"...no... this is how it happens in nightmares..."

Snap! Right through the medulla. Sarsour falls without a whimper. Supposedly, he's in a better place.

The MEC raises his hands at an angle and empties the handgun's clip at the sky; the lightning bifurcates and strikes his heads and hands. You're pretty sure that correlates with a movie; unfortunately any sequels were never recovered. That actually elicits applause from the other members of the cabal.

Ten seconds later, your agent is standing back up.

You've brought fresh bodies and expired transfusion blood, so how will you set up the fake massacre?

>>288632
Make it look like a tribe armed with old rifles that haven't been maitnaced In years killed a group of villagers, the fact that only a few were believers would make it so only a couple fake tribesmen corpses with lightning burns are needed. Shoot up the village in ways that match the wounds and ballistics patterns and it's ready to be discovered by the believers.

>>288668

The Millennial Kingdom, as a society, has had little need of forensics; the fakery is discoverable, but you're counting on nobody bothering with it.

After the cabals involved enjoy a few minutes of going full-auto on random things with AK47s until they get the handguards to burst into flame, they pack up and leave the place empty.

Your few remaining sensors wait half an hour and watch Jeb land by following the smoke, sigh, and retrieve said sensors before leaving.

Hours later, Beverly LaHaye makes a somber statement about the powerful testimony of martyrdom, and announces that she will personally lobby the Osaze government to crack down on militants.

Echoing the words of Tsion Ben-Judah after the first Osaze uprising, she announces in a shrill voice,

“Now we His servants shall travel throughout Osaze, teaching the whole counsel of God to the wicked and the undecided and the unbelieving. Woe to anyone who attempts to hamper this effort! There shall be no more even temporary tolerance of disbelief. Those who choose their own way will continue to perish by their hundredth birthdays, and anyone who dares blaspheme before that shall immediately surely die.”

Most parties and even some game nights and harmless gatherings have been postponed with the expectation of a crackdown, but at that statement, quite a few MECs are bought drinks at your bases and outposts.

Operation success. We're looking at a woman inciting a full-scale revolt of people who have had enough of being downtrodden and forced around by the authority. Now that they have tasted freedom and equality I can expect an actual fight for "equal rights"

It's time to brief the seven on recent developments. Let's gather my "council"

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>>288668

BRIGHT EVENT: Abdullah (“Smith” / “Smitty”) Ababneh has come out of retirement, not to work as a missionary, but to search for extremists and bring them to justice. FILE: former fighter pilot, Royal Jordanian Air Force, Amman; lost divorced wife and two children in Rapture; former first officer, Phoenix 216; a principal Trib Force pilot assigned to Petra; witnessed the Glorious Appearing; now residing near the Valley of Jehoshaphat, Israel. To this end, he's going to retrain himself in patrol and combat maneuvers, and train others who wish to follow. This will take at least a full year.

This in itself is unusual: historically, throughout the Millennial Kingdom people have been content to let Divine justice operate; it looks like you're succeeding in changing the narrative, at least in some people's heads. Abdullah will have full support from believers on the ground, but nobody is joining his one-man aerial quest.

One hour after your tendrils in the MF network report this (there has been no public announcement) Jeb was seen painting his pulsejet plane red and adding a second and third set of wings.

>>288761

Due to the recent promise of a crackdown, the conference is audio only for four out of seven members, including Sunday. Unusually, Tuesday speaks first, indicating that he is 98 years old and wishes to step down.

# Offer MEC conversion again.

# Ask for the position.

# Say your piece first.

>>288761

Beverly LaHaye is considered hardline even for the Millennial Kingdom, and her popularity with unbelieving or even undecided young women is somewhere in the negatives.

She has been on the air a lot, and you have her number by now.

Sabotaging her can be either preventing her from doing her missionary work, or goading her into being more hardline than usual, with a 50/50 chance of failing the sabotage or immediately gaining a takeover level for the territory she's in.

>>288803
I'll ask if he has decided against the process. Then let them give a report of their progress or setbacks first for a change.

>>288826

You hear Sunday speak quietly, in a deep voice.

"We are, of course, the stalwart champions of humanity against the One Above All. We will provide guidance to Omega, but remain in control."

General assent. The other councilmen seem antsy.

"What.... about... the missionary?"

Sunday answers.

"The dove falls and the hawk yet remains. We will have to retrench, at least for the time being."

There are some murmurs of assent.

"We are all agreed then, that this matter was too trivial for us to convene over it?"

"Sure. A useful tool thinking that it is more than a means to an end."

"Humanity is the end. Machines are just machines. What matters are soldiers, not the weapon they wield."

Sunday speaks again. "Does this matter require... a vote?"

The murmuring this time is more on negative tones.

Thursday asks when was the last time that a vote had been needed. Some paper rustling and some PDA beeping, then Sunday again speaks. Did you hear Thursday whimper? "Details. Let's focus on the bigger picture. We can all check the minutes later for such... minutiae. Monday, how proceeds the raising of the Army of the Other Light?"

Monday gives a brief report in terms of number of troops estimated to be ready by year +1000, of stockpiled rifles, jeeps, tanks and the like.

"Tuesday, is the Army of the Other Light well equipped?"

Tuesday gives figures that you know more intimately than he ever will. Hesitantly, he adds that he will take his chances with being put in cold storage until after the victory. You're aware of the technology; it's been available to high ranking TOLers since the beginning, and there's a vault in Antarctica. Your projections indicate a reanimation rate of less than 2%.

Each of the other Seven gives a report. You get the impression that other than the numbers, they've said the same words many times. Your overall impression is that TOL participation has slumped slightly, although there are a lot more undcided youth than there used to be, in Osaze and elsewhere.

Sunday closes. "Excellent. I commend all of you for the work you have done. Our direction is set; we must keep cooperating with each other, for the future of humanity."

Assent.

You get the idea that you've seen this before.

"Omega will now speak" Sunday announces.

(Be back in 20)

>>288869
(Alright. ill use the time to make a text dump)

". . . Irritating but very well. Firstly it should be common knowledge Raymie Steele has been freed, what is not common knowledge is that my forces for his capture to lure an angel into the abandoned facility in the east pacific to run a gauntlet of test on it. Our findings in order of importance and relivance are as follows.

Angels can be stunned by sonic equipment at high enough frequencies.

Angels can be weekend by radiation. Specifically tested was neutron radiation.

Angels can avoid basic ballistics by mearly letting them pass through. But this seems to require part of its concentration. No divine smite effect seems to be triggeed by fighting an angel.

Angels are immune to chemical weapons.

This suggest the best course of action for base defense would be to focus on the creation of better energy weapons. Specifically nuclear or sonic equipment.

Angelic behavior seems to be single minded focus on its current goal, this may be taken advantage of.

Angels invisibility can worked around with sonar.

Angels weaponry can be summoned. But apparently requires contact to be returned. We have one sword in our possession now.

There is more data, but those are the most prominent bits of it.

Any questions? Incompetants?

>>289010

Almost instantly, Sunday asks if you would be willing to part with the sword, and what would you request in return.

You send a small file indicating your observations about the Angel, and Wednesday asks you if you plan to follow up on it.

# Are you actually calling them incompetent?

# If you take Sunday's proposal, what will you want in return?

>>289140

Monday expresses concern that these techniques might work on Lucifer; Saturday retorts that it frankly wouldn't be a bad idea, and the two start to bicker.

Tuesday uses the time to say that he's looked into MEC technology - by asking your sysadmins, since he is technically their boss - and finds that the price to pay is too high. Instead, he will wait in cold storage.

Thursday opines that it would be good if any videos were released without explanation.

Eventually, Sunday shushes everyone to let you answer.

... since you first contacted me from the holiday raid, I have had to sit through your inability to recognise what your up against, and what you could be doing to stand a chance. My compatriots have done more than TOL could hope to accomplish in 20 years while you all had 900.

"The champions of humanity" you claim. I have seen the champions of humanity and you are not them. An exhibitionist woman who put literal life and cybernetic limb on the line to save your men and find out what angels are capable of. A teenage pyromaniac hazardous materials expert who basically developed the radiation laser before the nuclear bomb, he worked backwards and got us results and information I never would have dreamed of having. A nerdy young lady who basically rebuilt the concepts of the the CATs weapons program and made vast functional improvments. A young child, a child for fucks sake, basically reinvented the space program. The men and woman who built the MEC program and the ones willing to take the plunge and become the test subjects. All of those are the champions of humanity.

I have two questions for you all. What have you and your great mass of forces and resources put at risk, and does it compare to my measly 6 cabals worth of workers, reasearchers, and fighters?

((sorry for the long post. Seemed fitting.))

((Yes. He did call them incompetent))

>>289258

You are met with shouts of anger and indignation.

According to your internal tables, TOL resources have gone towards amassing the industrial facilities to build a land-based army intended to be a billion strong (meaning that with current population growth curve, almost all of humanity's youth will join you by the year +1000) and have begun building the actual army around the time when you came online. That does indeed require a lot of work, since much of it has to be done from first principle - mining, smelting, forging, machining, and so on.

The problem is that no effort has been put towards determining whether any of that will be effective. Monday indignantly claims that Lucifer has a plan and will share it with TOL leaders on the last day, and that will be sufficient. Sunday agrees. Most of the others aren't so sure anymore.

Then there's the continual low-level back and forth petty sabotage that has kept various missionary organizations off your back...

Overall you get the impression, stupid as it may be, that these people are enjoying a political game which is essentially in equilibrium and don't want to rock the boat. Unfortunately for them and fortunately for everyone else, you rocked it under their feet.

Your text channel is inundated with thousands of mostly (but not completely) meaningless statistics about missionary meetings interrupted, jeeps constructed, broadcasts taking off the air, blog posts about counter-apologetics written, and so on.

The man who was Thursday speaks, without sounding intimidated, for once. "You know, Omega. It is one thing to rabble rouse. To sweep into town and declare a holiday. You've raised the members' expectations. You've... You've excited and confused them. They imagine this world to be some sort of delightful ongoing science fair. Now. You and I know things are not so simple. There'll be disappointments and rude shocks. And you will have vanished. How fortunate."

"Ah, yes" Sunday says icily "Next on the agenda. Due to the unfortunate reappearance of the Millennium Force as a modern intelligence gathering and media operation, we will discuss Project Number. Our chief strategic goal remains raising the Army. To prevent information warfare disruptions that would jeopardize our great work, the motion has been tabled to return to graphitics-based accounting for our logistic needs. Human accountants."

>>289313

Just then, one of your sysadmins sends the project scope to your main terminal -- it's indicated to come from the Council, but not from who, and well, they're all here talking to you.

Basically, the proposal indicates that due to a possible leak between your network and that of the Millennium Force (the leak, of course, exists but it's entirely under your control and going the other way) The Other Light should abandon the pilot program, started 40 years ago, to have an automated supply chain management system, AKA you. This is a very transparent attempt at blackmail.

The sysadmin lets you know that this would effectively prevent TOL from doing anything for a good 20 years unless they build up to it. "Simply put, they cannot afford it. It's a bluff."

>>289327
reply. "Is this a joke or your admission that you are not committed to the cause you claim to champion?

I'm not stupid. I know your movements. But in case you haven't noticed, progress has been slow. You have yet to be able to take a single territory from our enemy because you focused to much on your games of politics, building an army you won't be able to use before hand because of its lethal equipment. Meanwhile I have been setting you up for a chance to play heros to the oppressed

I have Osaze working towards a Renaissance that will ultimately dismantle their ability to keep the undecided from coming together under a common banner, right now the missionary's are after "militants" a question remains. Will TOL fight these boogymen for the people of osaze and prove to the rest of the world that it's more than a bunch of weapon hoarding party goers or will you willingly stay under the authorities foot when a chance to start with the upperhand presents itself.

Gentlemen, you unknowingly gave me intellect, and I'm giving you the chance to rebel against your tyrant. I'm giving you non lethal options in a world where lethal force kills the applyer.

Also I know the numbers of what you have to lose. You can't bluff me.

*Spout off more accurate and important statistics*

>>289437

Again, the Council members start to bicker. Thursday and Saturday argue that this will make completing the Army impossible, Friday and Wednesday say that humanity must rely on humanity. Monday proclaims that this is all pointless, Lucifer is smarter than any of you and will have a better plan than any of you anyway.

Sunday just makes you hear that he's smiling.

The only one that's quiet is Tuesday.

You quickly generate a predictive model - it's accurate to the best of your abilities, given the rush - showing that turning over operations back to human clerks would effectively cut the TOL workforce in half. Doing the math -so work exponentials- , in +1000 the TOL army would be barely a twentieth of its intended size.

"You are a machine! You cannot lead humanity!" Monday exclaims.

"And Lucifer can?!?" retorts Tuesday.


"Excuse us. Our esteemed Head of Logistics was just announcing his retirement" Sunday interrupts. "Very well. You, Omega, are a necessary part of the necessary plan. State your terms."

# State your terms.

# Where are these seven people anyway? Trace the calls, while we're at it.

>>289313

( I am, of course, referencing http://downlode.org/Etext/power.html )

>>289466
Simple. I run logistics should Tuesday retire to Cold storage, I assist in spoting raids as I have been. I require more manpower to finish the equipment necessary to defend against angels and glorified so some more manpower to those projects. That means human reasearchers. Industry will continue on as it has been, with modification to produce finished equipment. Finally we give Osaze a show.

If this year goes poorly. You can go back to your patterns as they have been and I return to independent development. But if we manage to turn Osaze into the center of controversy and the following year, a safe haven for non believers, then we follow my predictions and my sys admins input. Without them, without those men and women, I would not be where I am now and neither would you.

An independent team will be assigned the swords research from both out forces. Ill have video of the entire angel testing experiments and complete data on it to each of you who are staying. Tuesday, the success of cold storage is 2% i wish you luck. The rest of you, your considerations. I'll take no later input then now. Pattern recognition is a bitch isn't it?

>>289510
((Good reading so far.))

>>289510
((That was hilarious.))

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>>289529

Sunday quiets the rest of the Council.

"Hear this, machine: in return for the sword, you will three five years to do with Osaze what you will. All the men and women we can spare will follow your direction. Let us build for ourselves a city, and a tower whose top will reach into heaven, and let us make for ourselves a name, otherwise we will be scattered abroad over the face of the whole earth."

It's not exactly your proposal: you asked for two years, and have been offered three. But it's apparent that Sunday wants the sword for himself.

TOL has little research capability to speak of, but being able to direct TOL production in the open instead of redirecting overtime at the bases you control saves you having to assign cabals to the task.

- Relinquish the sword after a shallow, nondestructive study
- After 3 years, Osaze must be in better shape than it is now, and under your control
- Failure means Project Number begins
+ Success means being left alone
+ For the next 3 years, directing production at your bases is now complexity 0
+ For the next 3 years, production at your bases is doubled, since they don't have to work on the Army
+ Local TOL cells will make detours following your directions; reveal opportunities for all territories TOL has a base in

# Accept

# Refuse

# Counteroffer while tracing the various calls

# Counteroffer in earnest


TOL at large is not aware of the fact that you are an AI.

# Make this public

# Keep it hidden; while the Council may reveal it as a blackmailing chip, you would have a chance to "disprove" it

(Unrelated but maybe not really: http://www.npr.org/sections/thesalt/2016/06/21/482322571/silicon-valley-s-bloody-plant-burger-smells-tastes-and-sizzles-like-meat )

>>290000

(Yay quads? Also, typo, "you will get three years", not "you will get five years")

>>290000
Acceptable, I have two final request. Try to keep Abdullah away from Osaze and the California area. The last thing I need is a false gunfight between your forces and tribal militants having an authorities high explosive bomb dropped on it. Not to mention what he could do if he attacks a rocket launch. Finally produce another cannopy camera or select one to move to Osaze.

Have we reached an agreement?

Quick question:

I'm thinking about starting my own Hebrew-based quest. Would two be too many?

>>291742
If that's you Spiritplumber= no but it might be hard to handle at the same time.

If it's someone else= i don't see a reason two religious based quest would be to much.

In both cases=but my opinion doesn't really matter.

>>291742

The stuff on the wiki is Creative Commons, so you can go ahead and use it.

>>290749

Support, also as a side- can we look into genetically modifying some animals to not be herbivores again?

>>291919
That would be resource consuming. By resources I mean researchers and by consuming i mean would be better to do when we don't have a deadline to flip Osaze and prove to the seven that the authority can be fought.

>>291919
>>291929

Humanity has been eating a bland diet of vegetables and dairy for 900 years at this point. Recently, you have reintroduced Twinkies, which have become a subversive icon; the new ones taste a bit different, but close enough to the original. Ziggy's research into irritants has proven that spicy foods, as described in movies and books, existed, so naturally he's been lobbying for trying it.

Starting a genetics program would be difficult, but it's possible; you have some radioactive ore, so 1950s-style "atomic gardens" can be set up by Ziggy's team.

>>290749
>>291919

"We will make an attempt."

Having the TOL bases build canopy cameras to also cover your territories is fairly trivial; the only catch is that you won't be able to shut down their access to it. Even so, each of the fifteen cities other than Greater Jerusalem and most significant towns or strategic areas will have a handful of Sky Eyes covering them by the end of the year.

After some exchange of pleasantries, the Seven log off. Last is Tuesday, who tells you, "I spoke to one of your MECs. Honestly? I joined up because I am a hedonist, and I make no apologies for that. Living without the sense of touch wouldn't be living, for me."

>>292057
"That is Understandable. Your decision will be respected. May you be of the lucky 2%"

>>291929
>>291919

TOL at large is not aware of the fact that you are an AI.

# Make this public

# Keep it hidden; while the Council may reveal it as a blackmailing chip, you would have a chance to "disprove" it.


You have 7 cabals available. One of them is maintaining your systems and, for the near future anyway, officially coordinating your efforts with TOL's. Your internal calendar indicates that this is Sunday's last year in power, as he is 99 years old.

Jeb has recovered from participating in a violent mission and is looking up Abdullah's flying style. He wouldn't shoot a man, but he would shoot down an airplane in a fair fight, apparently.

Sunday demands the angelic sword almost immediately, to be turned over to a courier.

# Stall.

# Honor the bargain.

Osaze Project turn 1 of 3

Complexity 0 (auto success, no cabals needed):

# Produce MECs at a base. This adds TWO dots to the MEC cabal counter per base.

# Use a base to produce propaganda and infrastructure to help bring a territory under your control (Osaze: 5/5, California: 2/5)

# Use a base to build Sky Eyes in territories that you have no presence in.

Complexity 1 (auto success):

# Harass or sabotage a Hero.

# Send a cabal to a region you have no presence in, to see what unique opportunities that region offers.

# Take advantage of discovered opportunties. TOL has shared their intel with you recently, so many are available.

(See next post for list)

Complexity 2 (50/100 success):

# Further research on sonic weapons, nuclear engineering, or your own subsystems.

Complexity 3 jobs available (33/66/100 success):

# Continue pursuing space research.

# Attempt to eliminate a Hero.

Complexity 4 jobs available (25/50/75/100 success):

# Continue pursuing MEC research.

# Recruit from the general unbelieving population.

Complexity 5 jobs available (20/40/60/80/100 success):

# Estabilish a base in a region where you have no contact, just by finding a suitable location and moving in.

>>292112
While the weapon is retrived, can a chip be taken from the tip of the blade?

Don't reveal it yet.

And I'll need a minute to do turns, gotta think.

>>292112


California: Have a cabal perform a thorough analysis of Colopatiron's gauntlet. They will also attempt to get a bit of data about its sword before turning it in.

Western Europe: A small independent group has been trying to restore red peppers that are actually spicy; with assistance this can be reproduced, or even weaponized (pepper spray).

Eastern Europe: A large part of the Wieliczka Salt Mine, in what used to be Poland, has survived. Reclaiming it would give you an unique environment: a large cavern in which the night sky can be simulated.

Western Russia: There is a small Cosmist cult that has formed around Yuri Gagarin's statue. They are likely to be interested in Jeb's work.

Central America: Rumors of undiscovered Mayan gold have been around for centuries.

Eastern Asia: There may be unrecovered nuclear assets. Unfortunately, they would be close to the regional "capitol" in Pyongyang.

Southeastern Africa: This is where the Nile's springs are. The cultural connections between the river and Osaze are ancient; monitoring the source may be useful, although nothing specific is going on.

Southern Africa: There is a (mildly) blighted area where corn and fruit grow in funny shapes. Radioactive minerals, perhaps?

Australia: Uluru (Ayer's Rock) is one of the few elevated places left in the world, due to its peculiar orography that made it almost immune to the global earthquake. Instead, God has simply pushed the Rock downwards so that its tip would be just a bit lower than the roof of the Temple in Greater Jerusalem.

(Yeah, I had a bunch of side quests set up)

>>291742

If you start a quest similar to this one, please tell me what it's called! :)

Here's what I got. Have two cabals and Ziggy go to south east Africa and take a look at that water supply. Then have Vee and Jeb take a look at that sonics with 2 cabals. Then have quinn and the "TOL missionarys" 2 cabals, work to improve the condition in Ozase. Possibly by taking advantage of Beverlys intolerance policies. I have a big caper planned for soon.

So how are our champions of humanity anyhow?

>>292211

(Why send more than one cabal on an exploration mission?)

I figure it will take quite a bit of manpower to get the water to Ozase.

>>292238

The Nile's water is flowing regularly. But your logs do indeed show that in +93 after the remaining, the springs ran dry until a missionary team was able to visit every village in Osaze and get at least one convert from each.

(Good catch, but you've got to scout before you do any terraforming :) Having an extra cabal won't help much, the sources are mapped, this isn't 1885. So you get one cabal to allocate still)

Jeb is excited about a potental confrontation with Abdullah. Other than reading up on WW1 and WW2 fighter aces, he's available to work.

Ziggy is... growing glow-in-the-dark fungi under a neutron source for some reason. He's available to work, but will have to be thrown into a shower first.

Quinn has managed to take a break and is back in action. She's available to work.

Vee, if not otherwise busy, has been trying to learn the trade from any good deejays that are still around in the world, and is likewise available to work.

What are the production orders for your bases? Since they are working for you openly, they won't cost cabals and produce double.

>>292268
Ok then the extra cabal will go to Australia. With ziggy, jeb will take the cabal to southeast Africa, Vee continues with the sonics. Production for now will be the canopy eye, unless more can be done.

And what about the sword chip?

>>292284

# If both bases produce MECs, you will get 4/3rds of a cabal worth of undead agents

# Having both bases produce Sky Eyes is sufficient to get at least basic surveillance everywhere in the world, except Greater Jerusalem. That will require a custom design, because it has to be launched elsewhere, and then has to make the "sea" trek on the canopy.

# Having the Osaze base focus on infrastructure and propaganda allows for attempting to take over the territory next year (since it's at 3/5 and it would then be at 5/5). This would leave the California base free for other uses.

>>292314

> California: Have a cabal perform a thorough analysis of Colopatiron's gauntlet. They will also attempt to get a bit of data about its sword before turning it in to Sunday.

Sunday has requested the sword as-is, and intact. A research cabal can do a quick round of spectrometry before turning it in. Alternatively, you can cut a chip off and hope Sunday doesn't notice - it'd have to be macroscopic in size to be able to do some tests, but you coudl explain it as a dent received in combat.

>>292327
I'd go with the eyes.

And cut the chip. Say we locked it up real tight so it will take a while to retrieve. The chip can be explained by the whip welding and quinns kicking of it. He probably has the footage.

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>>292351

Removing the chip requires a lot of work; since no cabal is assigned to this, the job is done by one of the manufacturing workshops. They take a bit of time to make it look like a ding. The sword itself is one piece of metal, with no wrapping on the hilt.

>>292351

Your bases take over production of rockets for the Army's missile launchers, and implement Jeb's design for a modified version thereof that will stick a Sky Eye to the inside of the water canopy. Over the course of the year, the small "subsatellites" are looking down on every continent and island except Greater Jerusalem. A few launches fail, and a few launchers are confiscated by the authorities after launch, but overall the effort is very successful; barring some crazy contrivedness, you now have a continuously updated view of the entire world. You even get a handful of cameras in Antarctica, where the cold storage facility is. The TOL base there is barely connected to your network, but only houses a handful of technicians and, of course, many cold-storage capsules for those who could afford it and opted to use it.

>>292284

Ziggy and Jeb head to southeast Africa and take time to note that finding the source of the Nile is a much easier job than books written in the late 1800s make it sound; there, Jeb personally launches one of the last Sky Eyes to be deployed.

The main sources of the mighty river are precision-mapped and their hydrographic profile stored. Given how flat the Earth is, there's basically a deep swamp, an uniform aquifer feeds most sources. Lake Victoria has lost most of its unique fauna, and now looks as serene and peaceful as any other lake on the planet.

Formerly, Lake Tanganyika drained northwards along the African Rift Valley into the White Nile, making the Nile about 1,400 kilometers (870 mi) longer, until it was blocked in Miocene times by the bulk of the Virunga Volcanoes (Unless, of course, the earth really is 6000 years old). Due to the global earthquake, the volcanoes have been flattened; restoring this connection would require an impressive effort and a lot of explosives, but it can be done. Ziggy is able to tell you exactly how much explosive this will require, but recommends making double that, just as a matter of good engineering practice.

>>292284

Veronica and her group keep working on sonic weapons, focusing on making them combat ready. The emitters are very delicate and prone to shorting themselves out if bumped around (after all, these are audio circuits sitting right next to a plasma arc!)

# Focus on handheld weapons that can be used by humans and humanoids. With some production, everyone gets one.

# Focus on medium sized weapons that can be mounted on a jeep or turret, or carried by a Heavy MEC. These can be deployed to support a cabal on a violent mission.

# Focus on large weapons that require a truck or a boat to carry. This is more or less CATS' original design.

Vee thinks production will be an option in a year or two.

Focus on handhelds. We need those the most for now.

>>292434
># Focus on medium sized weapons that can be mounted on a jeep or turret, or carried by a Heavy MEC. These can be deployed to support a cabal on a violent mission.

>>292434

>>292211

Quinn makes a tour of Osaze, essentially opposite Beverly.

The old missionary has taken over administration of the Millennium Force and, without a hint of irony, decided that its priority should be internal reform - there are too many girls working on lathes and not enough at home making casseroles. (OOC Note: Not kidding here, the real Beverly LaHaye is a traveling activist for returning women to a traditional role!)

The two never engage directly, but do end up having a bit of a back-and-forth over the airwaves. Beverly blames her for Sarsour's martyrdom; Quinn retorts that she had nothing to do with it, which is true, and offers to sit for "any lie detector test devised by man or God" to prove it. During a publicly broadcasted prayer meeting, Beverly receives a direct answer from the Throne - Quinn indeed had nothing to do with it. The old missionary says that "it wasn't the point anyway" and telling one truth doesn't make one not a deceiver, and keeps campaigning, but the incident is laughed at pretty much universally, even by some believers.

Osaze's population is mostly young, especially since quite a few nonbelliever and undecided move there because, well, it's the most interesting place in the world right now. Next year, you will be able to take control of the territory; you have to plan on how to do it, however.

# Have an early election called and do this fairly.

# Stage a coup and scour the current, unpopular representatives out of parliament.

# Allow the believing minority to remain nominally in charge, but make their government irrelevant.

>>292461
>>292467

Eventually, as the research progresses, you'll get all three; it's a matter of picking which will be ready for deployment first. The handheld units replace or complement small arms, and have much worse range than projectile weapons - but can be set to stun and brown-note in addition to kill. The medium size units are generally on a swivel (or on a shoulder mount for a heavy MEC) and can be used for crowd control and for anti-materiel in addition to stun and soft-target kill. The catch is that you don't have many heavy MECs and that they are bulky and absolutely not concealable.

((quick discussion on why we want which system first and for what tactical reason, then we make a choice?))

>>292495

Winning an election is what happened the last time. It will give you control of the country fair and square. In +92, this worked without a hitch; in +93 a decision to not send representatives to Greater Jerusalem was retaliated by a drought, which lasted until missionaries converted enough people that unbelievers were no longer the majority.

Staging a coup, as a show of force, would probably be good if you want to keep the Seven in their place, but it's a virtual guarantee of immediate Divine retribution.

Leaving the nominal government in charge but effectively bypassing it (people will call TOL security rather than the police, will use a TOL delivery service rather than the mail, etc.) has significant overhead, as you will have to assign a cabal to run a shadow government through your network, but is likely to delay Divine retribution.

>>292478
A coup would destabilize. We should start protest to hold elections for governing offices. I'm counting on the mill fo to start engaging more violently towards non believers at beverlys behest.

Also, we should find someone who exemplifies the ideals we want to instill in Ozase as well as is willing to cooperate with TOL as long as TOL assist the region. They would make a good candidate.

Ideals.
1:Non violent handling of justice for believers and non believers alike.

2:everyone here has the same rights, man or woman, believer or non believers, nobody is above anyone else.

3.Science and technology will make quality of life better for all. As suggested by Sasour, on of this nations greats.

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>>292539

In Australia, a survey team shows that Uluru has been crushed into the bedrock, lest it be taller than Greater Jerusalem. The offshoot of this is that a lot of heavy metals and radioactive ore have become considerably easier to quarry; building a base here would allow access to resources needed for a nuclear program.

A good thing about the Millennial Kingdom is that Australia no longer actively wants to kill you, although this detracts from the place's charm.

>>292467

If you have any input on the coup (or lack thereof) please tell! As it is, I'll need a decision on the sonic weapons, too.

>>292351

After a very cursory analysis, you hand Colopatiron's sword over to Sunday's courier. His reply comes via text a few days later.

"We had a deal, Omega. But I thank you for making my job easier."

>>292571
I still say sonics should pursue the handhelds course for tactical applications and use in base defense.

On the coup I'm basically going to turn shutdown raids into what the general public rally's are against, as well as move for an election as well as a candidate who pledges to crack down on these unjust raids to take control of the region. Then continue spuring the Renaissance to eventually put my inventions out into the open after a few years.

A small "attack" will occur as those tribal raiders attack a Christian makerspace. Then "TOL defenders" will quickly eliminate the attacker to protect them. Basically establishing TOL and the believers have equal standing here. In reality it will all be my MEC troops faking a rescue.

>>292478
># Have an early election called and do this fairly.

>>292602
Basically turn Beverlys raiding streak into this.

>>292597
>>292602

(Do pick an initial direction please!)

>>292597
>>292621
>>292602

The election is called for the day after Pentecost next year.

Quinn does not take part in the raid; instead, she's very visibly elsewhere. So are the people you've picked to run for office.

A small group of MECs in outlandish black-and-red costumes with a scorpion motif attack a Millennium Force mission office; they cause a number of casualties, do not get up when they are zapped, and end up holding the people left alive hostage inside the building.

Before the police or the salties can be called, a TOL security squad shows up and makes a show of quickly and efficiently dispatching the raiders. Of course, a number of concerned citizens with cameras, as well as your MF network infiltration and some webcams, make sure the incident is well covered from every angle.

The police eventually show up and arrest the TOL security squad, either because they can't tell who is who despite the obviously different uniforms, or just because they can. An unruly crowd forms very quickly, and surrounds the police vans - everyone's seen how it actually went.

One of the people you've groomed for office steps forward to defuse the situation, and makes a brief speech while standing in front of the police vans as they try to leave, to much cheering even from a few older believers. Nevertheless, the rescue squad is arrested and taken to the police station. They are released two hours later without charges, after having their obsolete weapons held as evidence; by the time a coroner gets to the office, the MECs who were playing dead have been "dragged off by unknown terrorist sympathisers".

Beverly's attempts at hardline control of Osaze backfire enough that the Christian party, used to running unopposed, asks her to stop campaigning on their behalf. She refuses.

>>292539

Your moderate platform, and the stunt you pulled, virtually guarantee an electoral victory; for the first time in 850 years, a country will have a constitution.

((I still say small arms because of the ability to use it defensivly while we can't openly move trucks and heavy MECs in the event angels or glorified attack. That's my reasoning. Why are you suggesting mid size weapons? I'm curious about your reasoning.))

>>292692
((Now we will just have to fake the extermination of the terror cell, we have a few years to get around to it.))

>>292434
># Focus on handheld weapons that can be used by humans and humanoids. With some production, everyone gets one.
changed my vote

>>292759
((Im still curious. :D ))

Vee focus on perfecting a design for a small "wubbing module" that can be carried in lieu of a pistol or attached to a rifle. The effective range is poorer than a firearm, but it's a much more versatile device - it can stun, disorient, cause instant dysentery in someone, and so on. It can also shatter glass at a distance.

Year 921

You have 7 cabals. Your sysadmins warn you that there have been some minor attacks on your network that aren't the incredibly amateurish attempts that the Millennial Force has been lazily pursuing so far. They are still incredibly amateurish, just from a different source.

Osaze Project turn 2 of 3

Complexity 0 (auto success, no cabals needed):

# Produce MECs at a base. This adds TWO dots to the MEC cabal counter per base.

# Produce sonic weapons. Both bases working together on this will be sufficient to arm your forces for a long time, since you are not building a conventional army. The sonic weapons are crude, but designed for modularity and ease of upgrading; Vee speculates that the hardware design won't change much, it's mostly a matter of software and improving reliability.

Complexity 1 (auto success):

# Harass or sabotage a Hero.

# Send a cabal to a region you have no presence in, to see what unique opportunities that region offers. A few regions remain unsurveyed.

# Take advantage of discovered opportunties. TOL has shared their intel with you recently, so many are available.

(See next post for list)

Complexity 2 (50/100 success):

# Further research on sonic weapons, nuclear engineering, or your own subsystems.

# Complete the takeover of Osaze by assisting campaign efforts.

Complexity 3 jobs available (33/66/100 success):

# Continue pursuing space research.

# Attempt to eliminate a Hero. Eliminating Beverly is possible, but likely to hamper the election results.

Complexity 4 jobs available (25/50/75/100 success):

# Continue pursuing MEC research.

# Recruit from the general unbelieving population.

Complexity 5 jobs available (20/40/60/80/100 success):

# Estabilish a base in a region where you have no contact, just by finding a suitable location and moving in. The Midwest and Australia have confirmed deposits of nuclear ore.

>>292774

Current opportunities:

California: Have a cabal perform a thorough analysis of Colopatiron's gauntlet. They will also attempt to analyze the sword fragment that was kept from Sunday.

Western Europe: A small independent group has been trying to restore red peppers that are actually spicy; with assistance this can be reproduced, or even weaponized (pepper spray).

Eastern Europe: A large part of the Wieliczka Salt Mine, in what used to be Poland, has survived. Reclaiming it would give you an unique environment: a large cavern in which the night sky can be simulated.

Western Russia: There is a small Cosmist cult that has formed around Yuri Gagarin's statue. They are likely to be interested in Jeb's work.

Central America: Rumors of undiscovered Mayan gold have been around for centuries.

Eastern Asia: There may be unrecovered nuclear assets. Unfortunately, they would be close to the regional "capitol" in Pyongyang.

Southern Africa: There is a (mildly) blighted area where corn and fruit grow in funny shapes. Radioactive minerals, perhaps?

>>292780

("gauntlet" as in "Colopatiron ran the gauntlet", not as in an actual glove)

Let's complete the takeover, two cabals. Send Ziggy and however. Many cabals to return water to Ozase. We can make it an independent effort by non-believers for the public eye.

>>292813
However many* where are the periods coming from!

Rolled 66 (1d100)

>>292813

The Nile is currently flowing, however, it is fairly likely that any Divine retribution will come in the form of a drought; it did last time. Preempting it would be a significant victory.

# How many cabals are you sending with Ziggy?

The campaign in Osaze goes smoothly; your party has associated itself with the Osaze Renaissance pretty thoroughly, and very little effort is required. While most of the people who count the votes are believers, they keep to the letter of the law, and count them honestly -- although there is an attempt in parliament to, just a few weeks before the election, raise the age of majority from 20 to 100.

The results are announced on state TV, with the heads of the various parties in attendance via teleconference.

>>292832
I was going to send two. But I thought it might be be difficulty 3.

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>>292813

The results are in! Your party has gained a supermajority. Ancient tomes on parliamentary procedures have to be consulted in order to switch over roles that have been strictly seniority-based since +95.

Beverly LaHaye returns to Greater Jerusalem in a huff, blames the late Sarsour for the result, denounces the Millennium Force as "milquetoast" and also blames them, and announces that she will focus her efforts back in her native America for the time being.

A constitutional convention is called in Cairo, and a basic charter of freedoms is passed, as per your party's program. Almost immediately, a delegation of diplomats is called to New Jerusalem.

# Let the politicians do their job.

# Send some human agents as bodyguards.

# Send some MECs as bodyguards.

>>292842

That leaves you with two cabals to allocate.

>>292842

Ziggy takes a few people and performs exhaustive preliminary work in what was South Sudan and Tanzania; the actual work of negating a drought, should it become necessary, will be greatly simplified. Ziggy's style is extremely direct; a canal from Lake Tanganica to Lake Victoria is dug by means of a lot of dynamite, and its wall glassed over by the liberal application of acid. A job that would take a month takes a year simply because it has to be done somewhat covertly; the result are a number of small ponds between the two lakes, which can be quickly joined together by a construction crew if need be.

>>292774

Smitty Abadeb makes headlines by landing in Amman, summarily requesting a hangar, and proclaiming that he will spend his time chasing down the mysterious terrorists who martyred Sarsour and the Millennium Force makerspace workers last year.

>>292880
(Was smithy glorified? Aksing for a pack of militants in the woods Im going to have to murder later.;b)

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>>292892

No, Abdullah "Smitty" Abdaneh is not glorified.

>>292880

You still have two cabals to allocate.

Your factories in Osaze and the Pacific Coast build a cache of wubbing modules that is distributed to your personnel and select TOL cells around the world; your combat personnel is trained in their use.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Twmc6jUrNw

>>292880
Send some human agents to bodyguard with the diplomats. To sensitive for the MECs.

Have the last two analyse the sword and the gauntlet run. Next year, Abdullah and some volunteers can "hunt down the militants who killed Sarsour."

>>292880
># Send some human agents as bodyguards.

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>>292918
>>292939

Unfortunately for your survey subsystems, the audience does not occur in Ezekiel's Temple; the diplomats are, corteously but coldly, led to it but then shunted off to a small amphiteatre-like concrete building to the side.

There, elder statesman Tsion Ben-Judah informs them that they are not worthy of setting foot in the Temple proper. There are a number of minor functionaries from other territories looking on at this, seated in the amphiteatre, with your diplomats being shuffled onto the stage.

Your bodyguards have been outfitted with the best sousveillance gear you could muster, and record everything.

( The passage below is taken almost directly from the last Left Behind book, with some changes related to the situation)

The man comes in, carrying himself himself with such authority and—clearly—anger. “On your knees!” he shouted, and immediately the assembled slid from their chairs to the floor.

“Woe to you, says the Lord God of Israel, for helping to scatter His people throughout the generations. He healed your land and reestablished you, populating you solely with believers until your offspring were born. Yet you allow unbelief and defiance to flourish in your nation, a stench in the nostrils of God. You call it a renaissance of the human spirit! Indeed! Where is this false god, this human spirit, in your time of need?"

“You deigned to rebuild your infrastructure after the global earthquake, somehow believing God would be pleased by an edifices that looks nothing like a temple dedicated to Him but rather harks back to your days worshiping patron deities? Still, all He required of you was to observe the proscriptions, and you thumbed your noses at Him. Is it any wonder He has cursed your land once before?"

“Where was your backbone, your leadership, when unbelievers persuaded you to commit the affront of putting to writing limits to God's ultimate authority?"

A man looking not much younger than the man who was Thursday stood. “Sir, if I may argue our side of the issue—”

“Your side? You are accursed! Or are you a believer, confident you shall live past your hundredth birthday?”

(1/2)

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>>292962

(2/2)


“It merely happens that I respectfully disagree—”

“Respectfully? You are fortunate you remain on this earth, for God willed that your young compatriots become examples for the rest of this nation.”

“But, sir, that is precisely our point. What kind of a loving God is so capricious that He would—”

“Demolish this building! By hand!” Tsion roared. “As your punishment. Rebuild it as a temple to the Lord. Delight in His ways. Seek His face. Follow His statutes. Never again disobey His commands. Lest you fear that His wrath evidences something other than His love, imagine what He could have done in the face of this ultimate insult."

“Now we His servants shall travel throughout Osaze, teaching the whole counsel of God to the wicked and the undecided and the unbelieving. Woe to anyone who attempts to hamper this effort! While the Lord has not told us if He may take away the life-giving waters, He hereby confirms His immediate judgment of sin. There shall be no more even temporary tolerance of disbelief. Those who choose their own way will continue to perish by their hundredth birthdays, and anyone who dares blaspheme before that shall immediately surely die.”

The entire auditorium was filled with weeping and men and women pleading for forgiveness and mercy.

(End passage)

The diplomats make another attempt to talk, but are drowned by the delegates from other territories. Pointedly, Tsion has left a copy of the new Osaze constitution on the ledger, unread.

It seems that for the "sins" of your diplomats, all of the territories' representatives will have to do carpentry and masonry for a year, save for being present at the Feast of Tabernacles.

# Well, it could have been worse; there is no Divinely ordained drought upon Osaze... yet. Recall the bodyguards.

# Fight back by sending a modern construction crew to make this absurd punishment moot and build a temple in record time.

# Blasphemy and madness!

>>292934

One of your cabals uses some of your CPU time to pore over Colopatiron's descent, perform Fourier analysis on the audio, and so on.

- Angels do have a sonic weapon of their own, a destructive "trumpet blast" from their throats.
- An exhaustive list of automated Divine retribution actions has been compiled (let me write it down) as it pertains to Glorified, Angels, Natrals, and Unbelievers, in that order of "How is God playing favorites".
- Angels seem to only exist to fulfill their purpose; they may very well be less sentient than you.
- Colopatiron's sword was a simple block of iron, which would make it a mighty weapon in the Bronze Age. From what can be gleaned from the small sample, the entire sword was in fact a single iron molecule, with no impurities whatsoever. This miracle of metallurgy puts it roughly on par with modern alloys.


You have one cabal unallocated.

>>292979
Send the cabal to Australia with Jeb.

Send the construction crew. Have it be made up of the population of Ozase believing and unbelieving once again, no MECs. Fill it with technology that would be simple enough to piss off the clergy and not advanced enough it would force punishment. Finally, send them some fucking twinkies when their done. Record time. Emphasis the point.

Then it's time to work on the city seven want. just don't go higher than the capital of LJ for safety reasons.

>>293004
Oh, and no truly useful technology.

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>>293004

Jeb and his support group perform a careful survey of the area around Uluru (which is once again named Ayer's Rock on official maps) and find that the surrounding plateau, which has been "scrunched up" by God, is indeed rich in heavy metals and nuclear ore. Jeb takes the time to fly all over the region, taking beauiful photographs of one of the Earth's few remaining elevated areas.

The area around the formation is home to an abundance of springs, waterholes, rock caves, and ancient paintings that have survived. Some may be used to prove that the world is older than 6000 years, although that looks like an exceedingly long shot.

Building a base here would enable nuke construction if the research is there.

>>293004

Sunday may have been quoting a Bible verse, but building an actual modern city or even an arcology may not be a bad idea.

>>293004

Unfortunately, your construction crew is ordered to return home. Instead, they obtain the blueprints of the punishment temple, and build an exact replica of it fifty feet inside the Osaze border, taking only weeks to do it - it's a remarkably fast effort, although there have been faster; you calculate that construction crews of Heavy MECs operating in the open would make building any regular size building trivial.. It is topped with a radio antenna tall enough to be visible from New Jerusalem.

Tsion Ben-Judah either completely misses the point (or pretends to), praises the "volunteer effort of obedient Osaze citizens", and looks forward to a similar initiative "sending the blind Osaze government back to their homes, along with the horrid Charter of Licentiousness".

The Twinkies however are delivered and shared by the Osaze diplomats with all the other diplomats.

# Looks like that's it for this year, let's see a summary screen.

# See what your other Villains have been doing in the meantime.

# Attempt to interface with the Seven.

>>293048
Let's check in with the villians and call up the seven.

>>293048
># See what your other Villains have been doing in the meantime.

>>292158

I'm trying to find a good enough map, but you'd play as a bounty hunter in Old Testament times.

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>>293060
>>293069

Vee went on tour as "DJ BL4ST" and found that she's better at building walls of sound than at making people dance, only getting moderately good reviews. However, the music video she's cut from the test chambers is pretty successful.

Quinn has, to not put a fine point to it, been testing if quantity can substitute for quality when it comes to sexual experiences. She's an exhibitionist, so you learn of this when she almost manages to finish a photoshoot in what used to be Saint Peter's Cathedral in Rome and ends up needing an extraction across the Strait of Sicily.

Jeb is trying to figure out how to use sonic weapons on airplanes, which is difficult because even prop planes travel a a measurable fraction of the speed of sound. He's also designed a manned capsule for trying to get through the sky canopy.

Ziggy, after wrapping up the pre-work to fill the Nile again should it empty, has had the best sexual experience of his life (Quinn was feeling generous) and is currently rethinking his life priorities after discovering that the object of his affections can barely feel them. You make sure he stays away from brain-damaging drugs.

>>293139

That's pretty awesome right there! I'll see if I can help with the maps.

>>293060

You attempt to set up a teleconference with the Seven, but they don't answer, with various excuses through the text channel. Sunday says "We had a deal". The new Tuesday introduces himself and notes that he hopes that you and him can work together for a few years.

>>293199
Sunday, we still have the parts of the weapon embedding the the boots quinn wore as well as a few specs stuck in the whip it melted to. If you want them, just send a response and we can work on exstraction. Or would you like to see it put back to whole? No matter, Osaze is now safe for TOL to enter and leave as it pleases. All that's left is to go hunting for non existent terrorist and finish more sonic weapons development. By the way, please stop attacking my network.


To Tuesday, The same to you, I hope cooperative efforts last a long time.

(let's call a meeting of the four next year. I want to see what happens after were done with operation Osaze)

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>>293199

Sorry, forgot to edit.

As was expected after Ben-Judah's "negotiation", small-time missionaries are converging towards Osaze.

Expecting a hive of scum and villainy, they find instead a modern country; some of the cars are electric, a nascent videogame industry has produced more titles this year than the whole world has in the last twenty, alcohol is sold openly (which, if you don't count tourists, actually turns out to decrease drunkenness incidents), the live music scene is burgeoning, and the beaches of the southern half of the Mediterranean are beginning to populate with resorts and the occasional water slide.

Everybody knows that it's impossible to deconvert from the true faith, but Ozase is the place where it becomes very easy to find false vocations, to the point that some missionary trips are canceled.

A few independent groups start plant and fish biodiversity programs. Jeb's brothers, Bill and Bob, capitalize on their sibling's fame and start a Flying Inflatable Boat training facility cum sales center at Girbraltar, featuring Quinn's face in green paint and with the name Flying Monkeys.

Your control of Osaze is approximate and loose, but certain.

There are a few possible actions here.

# Encourage the return of the ancient Egyptian religion, which is currently being used as a revivalist theme for some clubs and pubs. This will invoke Divine wrath, of course, but in a predictable way that you can channel. After all, the Plagues of Egypt are known and manageable.

# Encourage scientific progress. This will result in some of your research programs getting a boost.

# Encourage infrastructure development. This will make base construction elsewhere easier, due to an industrial surplus. Increases prosperity.

# Encourage cultural growth. This will make recruitment easier. Increases prosperity.

Jeb wants to see a great launch complex like those of Baikonur and Cape Canaveral of old; Veronica would love to see a thousand startups and art houses bloom, just for the curiosity of it; Quinn has been reading old Extropian manifestos from the 1990s, and feels like playing the posthuman poster child; she believes that in +1000 we'll have reached the Singularity, and God can have the earth if He really wants it. Ziggy, unsurprisingly, is raring for a direct confrontation and if that means naked and oiled people in Pharaonic garb strutting about, so be it.

>>293246

Sunday simply responds "We had a deal. It's too late for you to honor it properly." Tuesday answers "To +1001 and beyond!"

>>293283

Your request for a meeting is answered with "We shall see". Having taken over Osaze means that an in-person meeting is possible; the Seven agree to such a meeting if you likewise show up in person, despite the fact that they know you're an AI.

# Rename Osaze?

>>293291

You have 7 cabals available. One of them is maintaining your systems and wrapping up direct coordination with TOL.

Osaze Project turn 3 of 3

Complexity 0 (auto success, no cabals needed):

# Produce MECs at a base. This adds TWO dots to the MEC cabal counter per base.

# Use a base to produce propaganda and infrastructure to help bring a territory under your control (California: 2/5)

# Use the base output to increase prosperity in a region you control.

Complexity 1 (auto success):

# Harass or sabotage a Hero.

# Send a cabal to a region you have no presence in, to see what unique opportunities that region offers. A few regions are still unsurveyed.

# Take advantage of discovered opportunties. TOL has shared their intel with you recently, so many are available.

(See next post for list)

Complexity 2 (50/100 success):

# Further research on sonic weapons, nuclear engineering, or your own subsystems.

# Recruit in Osaze.

Complexity 3 jobs available (33/66/100 success):

# Continue pursuing space research.

# Attempt to eliminate a Hero.

Complexity 4 jobs available (25/50/75/100 success):

# Continue pursuing MEC research.

# Recruit from the general unbelieving population.

Complexity 5 jobs available (20/40/60/80/100 success):

# Estabilish a base in a region where you have no contact, just by finding a suitable location and moving in.

>>293291

Current opportunities known:

California: Have a cabal perform a thorough analysis of Colopatiron's gauntlet. They will also attempt to get a bit of data about its sword before turning it in.

Western Europe: A small independent group has been trying to restore red peppers that are actually spicy; with assistance this can be reproduced, or even weaponized (pepper spray).

Eastern Europe: A large part of the Wieliczka Salt Mine, in what used to be Poland, has survived. Reclaiming it would give you an unique environment: a large cavern in which the night sky can be simulated.

Western Russia: There is a small Cosmist cult that has formed around Yuri Gagarin's statue. They are likely to be interested in Jeb's work.

Central America: Rumors of undiscovered Mayan gold have been around for centuries.

Eastern Asia: There may be unrecovered nuclear assets. Unfortunately, they would be close to the regional "capitol" in Pyongyang.

Southeastern Africa: This is where the Nile's springs are. The cultural connections between the river and Osaze are ancient; monitoring the source may be useful, although nothing specific is going on.

Southern Africa: There is a (mildly) blighted area where corn and fruit grow in funny shapes. Radioactive minerals, perhaps?

>>293246

Sunday (must be the new Sunday, unless something went very weird or Sunday stole MEC technology) answers as follows, in text:

"Due to your meddling, an Angelic sword has been turned into a nearly worthless lump of iron. Of course, we cannot expect a machine to understand the transcendental."

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>>293313

EDIT: California's thing already happened obviously my bad.


Here's the results of it.

>>293313
Sunday, I'm assuming you either stole MEC technology, in which case your welcome and enjoy, or are new, in which case welcome. I have a proposition. Let's prove that the plagues of Egypt are of no consequence in Egypt and take the "death angels" weapon for you to examine. Or will I have to engage to protect the rest of the seven and their resources.

By the way, Osaze is being renamed to the obvious.

>>293340

"Intriguing. If it does not disrupt the plan, we have no objection."

Interestingly, one of the many things booming in Osaze is the shipbuilding industry; you didn't see that coming.

>>293340

What's the obvious? (Note that "Egypt" is the English name for the country; 20th century Egyptians called their country "Misr"; in Hebrew it's "Mitsrayim" ,and Christian Coptic sects call their home country "Khemi"... which means that even in-universe, Tsion Ben-Judah is an idiot)

>>293358
I was going to call it Egypt lol. Had no clue about all that.

(I'm assuming the Egyptian plagues are a three cabal mission?)

>>293367

Neither did the guy who wrote Left Behind, I suspect...

>>293371

Each will have to be countered in some way. Some are easier and some are harder. For example, a plague of frogs can pretty much be ignored.

>>293371

(Random guy on 4chan not knowing? Fine. Bestselling author, writing a book that's supposed to be a fan sequel to the Bible, not knowing what Egypt is called in Hebrew? Not cool. Again, as it is, it mostly makes Tsion Ben-Judah look like a lunatic, which works for this story)

>>293376
"Is two years acceptable? I'll need to prepare countermeasures for the angel, as well a the plagues for the general populace to keep support of the government. By then the angel will stand no chance and you can Have your weapon."

>>293387
(Not a lunatic if quality of life improves. Law of public perception.)

>>293390

"The weapon is sundered. Do what you must, as shall I."

That's the last you hear of Sunday; the other six of the Seven issue the occasional system request, be it for luxury items, survey reports, or routine operation.

# Allocate work, and pick a direction for the country you've conquered!

>>293419
Encourage scientific development. Use base to boost.

Then we can put work on sonics again, 2 cabals, quinn and vee. Have Ziggy and jeb look at nuclear development again, to weaken the angel. Then allocate research to my own subsystems.

>>293419
Also I think it's time we talk to quinn about overexposure.

>>293458

(Quinn and overexposure... yeah, someone should XD)

(I'm going to have to do a bit of crunch as to what happens with Osaze, mind if we stop here for now? Also, it'll need a new thread)

>>293465
((Hey, your the QM. Lol))

>>293468

>>293981

Continuing here then!