Chronicles of The Omniverse Archived Van Leugen: The Nillies

Warehouses, they were so cliche and almost impossible to secure; but it seemed like the only place Marlene could meet Ariadne. In the dark Halloween night, two nondescript black vans drove through the noisome streets of the south side of the Nillies, the orange glow of the streetlamps cast briefly into the passenger compartment, Michael Samuelle was driving the first van, and Kathryn Connors the second. In the passenger seat, Marlene was making final preparations for the meeting, buckling the straps on her combat skin, and cinching everything just right.

She checked the charge in her personal aegis, and cast a nod towards Tidus Khaine, who was running last-minute systems diagnostics in his own powered armor. It hissed, and clunked with his movements, shaking the entire van as he shifted; he was Marlene's heavy, and he was all about overkill; as he chambered a round into his modified heavy magnetron.

She cast an assured glance over towards the walking apocalypse, in his nearly invulnerable armor, which sported several modifications from their time in Van Leugen, before climbing out of the passenger seat and moving into the back of the van.

"We're almost there..." Marlene said, grabbing the MC-1 Assault carbine off the rack, looking it over. "You took a big risk getting us this gear." She said, turning towards Dion Costas, the newest addition to her team.

"Just try not to burn through all the ammo." He grunted, chambering a round into his own MC-1.

The two vans slowly came to a stop in front of the meeting place, Marlene nodded and grabbed her communicator. "Beta Team, move into position and wait for my signal."

Turning around, the second van pulled to the rear of the warehouse, an eight-man IIA team moving quickly into the darkness to secure the warehouse. Their movements would be in almost total silence.

Opening the back doors, Marlene threw a thick wool trenchcoat over her combat skin, and fastened it securely before starting to the bay door of the warehouse; Khaine, Dion, and Michael immediately behind her. Michael faded into the darkness, while Khaine grasped his heavy weapon firmly.

Marlene opened the roll up bay door, hoping her contacts were inside.
 
Standing in the warehouse was Ariadne, Lars and the rogue Terran marine, Grier, flanking her.

"Nice to finally make your acquaintance." Ariadne said loudly, "Assuming you are who I'm waiting for." She said, looking to Lars for confirmation.

He nodded to his employer, "This is them. I did my due diligence." The young man told her.

"Good. Let's get to it, shall we?" Ariadne said, beckoning Marlene closer.
 
"Special Agent Marlene Angel, Imperial Intelligence; these are my associates, Khaine, and Gaul." She said, introducing the other two operatives that flanked either side. Confirming, who they were.

Tidus stood out more than your average thug. Clad head to toe in an all-black adept power armor, and towering at nearly nine feet tall, no one in Van Leugen gave him so much as a second glance on Halloween, assuming the IIA team was a group of partygoers in costume.

Kathryn closed the roll up door behind them, latching it shut while Beta team checked in on the radio.

"Beta Team checking in; all clear." The hushed voice played out on their earpieces.

"I have a mutually beneficial business proposition." Marlene said, nodding towards 'Gaul' who flipped open a briefcase with a file folder inside, a thick dossier watermarked Confidential of the Paragon, whom the Aschen labeled as an 'arch-terrorist'

"I've heard the chatter in the bars, and on the chatrooms, there's a vigilante busting up deals left, right, and center, like a regular comicbook superhero; I've also heard chatter you'd like to... open things up between yourself and the Aschen; I've got it in good intel that the markets back on Langara are going to be wide open soon, and the IIA is going to sit back and let it all happen." Marlene said, as Kathryn approached Ariadne with the file.

"Moonman busted up the wrong deals, and Miles Hagan put a massive price on this guy's head."

Marlene took a step forward.

"Thirty two billion; you help me nab this guy, we'll split the bounty, seventy-thirty, my way. That's dead or alive, mind you." She said. "I'll sweeten the pot with some Aschen tech, whatever I can get my hands on."

"What do you say, Miss Kale?" Marlene asked, while Kathryn held the dossier out.
 
They'd picked a curious night to hold a meeting. Halloween would be a busy evening anywhere in Van Leugen, doubly so in the Nillies. Even in the relatively secluded stretch of concrete which held the warehouse, the sounds of nightclubs, parties, sirens, traffic and human debauchery were never far away. An automobile sped down the nearby street every so often, the warehouse windows strobing with infrequent traffic lights.

Somewhere in the darkness, hidden behind the rafters and purposefully positioned towards the backsides of the Aschen, someone was watching - soundless, motionless and all but completely invisible to the human eye and any means of technological detection. This hidden figure had been here from the beginning - his handiwork already plastered to four of the beams criss-crossing the ceiling of the room. He dared not make a fifth.
 
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"That's a lot of cash." Grier said to Ariadne, stepping forward to grab the dossier from Kathryn. "We don't even have to capture him alive." The Terran said as he thumbed through the file.

"It is. You'll need it more than me to fund your operations." Ariadne said to him, "And, you?" She continued, bringing her gaze to Lars.

"You'll need it to take your sister and be done with this. A deal is a deal, after all." She told the young man, watching as Grier passed him the dossier.

"I believe this could be the same one that the Hessian and Jacob described. I've heard rumors. Sure fits whatever came to me in Windcrest awhile back." Lars told the group, taking his own look through the files.

Whatever, whoever, Paragon was, he had forced the plan to change. Lars wasn't too keen on working with the Aschen, but it had to be done.

"We'll help you. Between the yourselves and my people, this Paragon stands little chance." Ariadne finally told Marlene.
 
Marlene silently watched her surroundings, listening to Kale as she considered the offer, she was happy, being out here, making allies. Tidus on the other hand was watching his display, eyeing it from time to time to check for any new readings, one could never be too prepared. Something caught in the corner of his eye, however, a slight ping on his Heads-up display, a reflection in the window; something was watching them.

The Paragon was probably used to hiding from thugs, rather than trained agents of the Aschen Empire.

Khaine made no outward gestures that he had detected the Paragon, rather the hulking adept of war placed a cigar in his mouth, and moved to light the sweet fumerella leaf, before taking a step forward. The visor in his powered armor snapped shut with a 'snick'

Perhaps the adept was uncomfortable, or he opted to enjoy the fumerella within the confines of his helmet, but it sent an all too obvious signal to Marlene.

"Indeed, I will enjoy delivering his head to my superiors, and while we would like a body with which to deliver a public execution, sometimes it's the results that matter.

She extended her hand out towards Ariadne, and if Ariadne opted to shake on this newly founded deal, Marlene would grasp Ariadne's hand in a firm handshake to seal the deal.

The moment Marlene stepped back, the visor in her suit snapped shut, obscuring her face as she shouted to Ariadne.

"Get down!"

The instant Marlene called out, Khaine whipped around with superhuman speed and opened fire up at the rafters where Paragon was hiding. His keen eyes and suit's systems allowed him to see the vigilante in the darkness clear as day, his speedy target acquisition meant his aim would be dead on.

'Boom-boom-boom' the heavy magnetron barked, as rounds streamed upwards, center mass at the previously hidden vigilante.

Connors dove for cover, opting to move behind a stack of crates, she brought her own weapon up towards the rafters, while. Marlene racked her own MC-1, turned around, and fired the weapon upwards, the ratta-tatta of the weapon echoing through the warehouse.

This was likely a strange sight for Paragon, considering the Aschen had a penchant for using energy weapons. Every projectile fired from Khaine's weapon packed enough kinetic energy to tear through shields, and heavy armor alike with ease, and a single hit was more than enough to put Paragon in a world of hurt.

The projectiles fired from Marlene's weapon were similar, an eight-point-eight millimeter projectile with the same kinetic energy as a fifty cal, it's small size and kinetic energy meant it could pierce most shields and armors with ease.

Marlene's personal cloaking engaged and she vanished from sight, and from detection, though Khaine's transphase scanner system still could pick her up. "Beta Team, hold position, cover the exits." Marlene hissed, ducking low near an antique model T-like automobile, while reloading her weapon.
 
Khaine was lighting a cigar. Something wasn't right - the adept was in the middle of a meeting with a potentially hostile faction. He should be at ready. His visor closed. Paragon began charging his shields, readying himself for potential combat. He should not have been noticed. Every possible precaution had been taken against their methods of detection. It would take a feat of extraordinary bad luck for him to be noticed. A one-in-twenty chance, at best...

Marlene turned from the handshake with her visor shut. Paragon stiffened. They knew. He was already moving as Tidus's rounds hammered through the air, obliterating the beam Paragon was hiding behind and narrowly missing the vigilante. Paragon did not waste a second. The time for stealth was over. Now he needed to fight.

With a mental command, the four turrets which Paragon had placed on other rafter beams throughout the warehouse whirred to life. One of them began strobing the room with intense flashes of light, likely blinding anyone without ocular protection. The other three began firing nonlethal concussive rounds into the mob of enemies, curiously avoiding the armored Khaine and Marlene, focusing instead on Dion, Ariadne, Lars, Grier and Michael (if he was visible). Simultaneously, he threw two projectiles at Marlene and Khaine - boomerangs which, at proximity, exploded into a hot black goo, writhing in electric overcharge. They would splatter over their visors and stick with vengeance, seizing their armor with several million volts of electricity. The attack cost him. One of Marlene's rounds seared his side, rippling his shields and tearing off a chunk of ceramite. Had that been a straight shot, rather than a glancing strike...

There was no time to contemplate bad luck. Diving from the rafters with augmented speed, the Paragon slammed into the space of no-man's-land between Ariadne's group and the IIA task force. A shockwave of energy rippled from the impact, smoke rising from grenades thrown an eyeblink earlier. The woman called Ariadne Kale might have seen his face for a brief instance, lidless black eyes glaring at her from behind a shroud of pulped concrete. "Kale." A voice hissed from the darkness, pitiless, choked in hate. "Kale. Kale. Kale."

A device dropped at his feet, behind him. Taloned fingers swept into his cloak and drew a bright and shining blade, humming with strange, ethereal light. Wreathed in smoke and shadow, blade brandished against his foes, the Paragon lifted his head to the moon and unleashed an ear-shattering banshee scream. Every soul present heard it differently - each discerning their own name, their own sins within the howl. To Marlene, it was the anguished cry of a nameless prisoner, flesh bubbling beneath the heat of a smoking rebar. To Lars, it came as the voice of his sister, the pleading whimper of an innocent girl unwillingly thrust into a world of death and suffering. To Kale, it was a thousand voices - a million - men, women, children, wailing in the hell of nuclear fire.

To all, it was an ultimatum, a litany of fear and retribution. They paid tonight. The Paragon had come, and vengeance with him.
 
Ariadne smiled at Marlene, extending her hand to take the other woman's. But they would never make contact as Kale's hand would pass through the Aschen agent's own.

"Can never be too careful." She told her, opening her mouth to say more but falling silent at the closing of Marlene's visor and then her warning.

"Get down!"

Gunfire destroyed the peace of the meeting, but there was their quarry. He couldn't stay away, could he?

As Grier and Lars drew their weapons and ran for cover, Ariadne flickered in and out of view as her hologram was disrupted by the concussive rounds and gunfire.

The... thing, Paragon, coming down in front of her and calling her name so boldy and with impudence caused a scowl to come across the businesswoman's visage.

Was he trying to make himself worthy of her hate? Getting between her and her pound of flesh was surely the way to do it. She worked hard to get to where she was.

How dare he?

Lars covered his ears at the scream, Ariadne wincing as she heard it. "Take care of this. I won't tolerate failure." Ariadne said, waving to someone unseen.

Her ear was visibly beginning to bleed, and then the hologram suddenly disappeared.

"You heard her. Barely. Failure isn't an option!" Grier called out to Lars, "We need a game plan. We're not equipped for this." Lars told him.

"Retreat and gather ourselves?" Grier asked, "First chance we get." Lars answered.
 
It all happened suddenly, concussive blasts, blinding light. These weren't problems for Marlene, and Khaine, protected by their combat suits, nor was it an issue for Connors, who had dove for cover and was curiously left out of the barrage. Michael, having staked his own vantage point outside the warehouse kept his eyes focused, checking his weapons and nodding to the men in beta team, who moved quickly to cover the windows.

"Take out those turrets." Michael said quietly, and from outside, the IIA team began firing through the windows at the turrets mounted on the rafters, glass shattered in a hail of gunfire from outside, projectiles peppering the weapons as they fired down into the warehouse.

With cat-like reaction, Khaine engaged his suit's thrust-vents, and with a loud roar, he lunged backwards roughly a dozen feet as the boomerang detonated, slinging electrified goo all over the place. The Adept dropped his weapon's magazine, and loaded a fresh one as Paragon came sailing down to the ground.

Marlene had gone out of phase, making a face as her boomerang detonated, but the black goo passed right through her, splattering onto the ground. It was time to end this as she called out to Lars and Grier. "Keep him busy!"

She thrust herself back into phase and engaged her suit's blink packs, flashing out of existence as Paragon landed in the no-man's land between them. It was instantaneous as she flashed in behind him, and while he brandished his sword at Kale, Marlene moved, swinging the stock of her rifle hard towards the back of his head with a feral scream. Using her own superhuman strength and the suit's augmented power, the rifle stock, which carried the power of a sledgehammer came barreling down on the Paragon from behind. While greeted by a vision of someone being tortured; it was curious, but made Marlene lick her lips in enjoyment while she fought. Dion struggled to recover from the concussive blast, holding his ears, he had gone temporarily deaf, but reached for his MC-1 anyway.

Immediately following Marlene's attempted strike, she blinked out again, just in time for Khaine to re-acquire and fire his weapon, dead-center mass once more.
 
Paragon had hoped that his position between Kale and the Aschen would trick the two parties into firing at each other. No such luck; they were too trained to fall for such a ruse. Fortunately, it still forced them to engage him in melee combat rather than gun him down from afar. He only had a moment before the Imperials made a counter attack, a moment spent flinging a minuscule tracking device for the edge of Kale's jacket. If stuck, it would camouflage itself to the fabric of her coat. Between the smoke, the lights and the noise, it would be very difficult to detect.

A rush of air and a surge of relativistic energy warned of an incoming teleportation,and Paragon steeled himself for the attack. He ducked, letting the rifle butt swish overhead. He slashed twice with his blade in response - first for the frame of Marlene's gun, attempting to split the weapon in two, the second for her chest, attempting to cleave a line through her power armor.

Though Paragon put on an air of supernaturalism, the majority of his weapons were tech based, steeped in theatricality but founded in science and realism. The blade was the exception. Basking in the light of an unseen moon, the sword was incredibly damaging to both shields and metal, rending through matter as easily as it did the open air. Moving swiftly, Paragon closed the distance between himself and Marlene in an eyeblink, poised low. He struck for her shoulder, sidestepping left, attempting to take her backside. Marlene would find herself unable to blink while she was in proximity to Paragon. He must have taken antirelativity precautions.

Reloaded, Titus would have to make his shots with Marlene still entangled with Paragon.

"Orphic," the vigilante spoke into his comms, voice inaudible to the exterior, "Send the bike. Prepare pursuit and countermeasure protocols."

The IIA troops firing into the warehouse would swiftly dispatch two of the four turrets mounted on the support rafters, the heavy wood beams splintering beneath the barrage of gunfire. The building groaned at the damages. The remaining two turrets turned and began firing at the troops, taking accurate, concussive shots at the agents peeking in from the windows.

With Paragon occupied, Kale and her men would appear to have the perfect opportunity to make an escape.
 
Grier and Lars popped out of cover, taking turns firing shots at Paragon in hopes of creating an opening for the Aschen to take him out.

If that couldn't be done, they could at least buy time for them to escape.

"I'm going to be empty soon." Grier called out, "Me too." Lars told him, watching as Paragon's tracking device hit the ground where Ariadne's hologram was.

"We have to go." Lars said, ducking low as he ran to scoop up the tracking device while Paragon was preoccupied with Marlene.

"What is that?" Grier asked as Lars scrambled back over to him, "I'll tell you later. We gotta go." The young man said, gesturing for the Terran to follow him as he ran for the exit.
 
Marlene caught herself quickly as the stock of the rifle sailed past a ducking Paragon, but her blink packs didn't seem to be working. The mental feedback was given by the suit as he cleaved for her rifle, slicing it in two with a shower of sparks, the blade lodging in the chestplate of her combat skin thanks to the subtle elasticity of kanvium, it cut, but also absorbed a great deal of the kinetic energy behind the blade, stopping it like lead would stop an axe.

The chest-plate subtly rippled, and sparks showered as Marlene recoiled in pain. She felt the searing pain of flesh being cut, and the warmth of blood which began to ooze from the gash in her chestplate.

It was bright red, super-oxygenated, far beyond that of a normal human.

Something tugged at her, and as Paragon moved low for a follow up strike, Marlene sent another lightspeed mental command. She kicked herself to the left, lunging away from Paragon and landing on the floor with an audible thud. She brought her palm out, stretched forward to bathe Paragon in a brilliant green light. The flash came and went in an instant, and for a moment Paragon would likely feel nothing. Had whatever it was failed?

Moments later, through, Paragon would likely feel searing pain, like a burning where he was exposed, through the armor, and the shields. The pain went full thickness, it was suffocating, intense, as skin cells, muscle, flesh, and internal organs began to rot from within, the organic cellular structures that made them up consumed at the molecular level. Marlene didn't take time to consider the effect her weapon had, rather she lay propped against a crate clutching her own wound. She didn't know the extent of his exposure, and she hoped her attack dealt a crippling blow.

"Finish him..." Marlene croaked, blood pouring through her fingers, dripping down the suit and pooling on the floor, the cut must have hit a major blood vessel, and all she could do was put pressure on the wound.
 
The moonblade sparked against Marlene's power armor, cleaving through shield and metal with indiscriminate ease. Unnaturally bright blood flecked the white glow of the sword. He spun as she fell, backhanding his blade for a second swipe...

Lars and Grier stole his attention for a half second - they were getting away. Kale. Where was Kale? Why wasn't she among them?

He turned back to Marlene, staring down at her extended palm. He had looked away for a half second. A fatal mistake.

The green surrounded him, consumed him, seeping deep into his shields, inching through the dense molecular fiber of his ceramite. It took a few seconds for the pain to set in. When it did, it was almost all he could think about.

"Hgnn.... gn..." he staggered back. His skin was ashing beneath his armor, organic material curdling, chalking into smoke, nerves wailing and dying in the dust. It was bad. Worse than anything he could have anticipated. He had minutes. Less than that.

In the throes of agony, he had a sudden flashback to his fight with Bishop and the vision he'd received at the battle's conclusion. This was it. This was the weapon Marlene was planning to unleash on Van Leugen.

"Orphic..." he mumbled, "...any time now... would be great..."

He thumbed a button on his belt, activating the device he had planted on the ground earlier. A modified hardlight shield sprang up from the device between himself and the Aschen, offering a brief barrier against their firepower.

 
As the hardlight shield sprang into life, so did an enormous monstrosity that appeared to be a house-sized cross between an alligator and a lion. Patchy bits of fur stuck up between the reptilian scales. Muscular back legs indicated that it could leap--and at great speed--while the rest of it was armored in thick scale. A long muzzle sported dripping fangs with a barbed tongue that curled in a guttural hiss, its tail lashing in anger and anticipation. The creature reared up on its hind legs and opened its maw to roar, sending spittle flying across the room. Green eyes glowed ferociously as it flexed its claws--terrible, hooked things that looked like they could easily open the side of a truck. A greedy, demonic grin graced its features as it suddenly lunged at Titus.

Meanwhile, outside, there was a revving sound--as though a motorcycle were racing at top speed towards the derelict warehouse district. Help was on the way...

...but...then...

There was a resounding boom as the motorcycle slammed into the warehouse wall. The motorcycle spit and puffed impotently as it sputtered in angry injury. Through the crumbled section of wall where the bike had slightly penetrated, a teenage girl's voice could be heard:

"Goddamnit!"
 
Marlene was slouched against a stack of ruined crates, her eyes on Paragon as he threw up the Hard Light shield, and the strange beast came fourth. Khaine too sprang to action, using vents in his armor to lunge him between Paragon and Marlene. He grit his teeth only briefly, switching the cigar from one side of the mouth to the other, checking the munition count inside his heavy magnetron, and grinning.

His bloodlust would soon be interrupted however, as Marlene waved for him to stand down, this signal coming as the motorcycle crashed through an adjacent wall.

This was an opportunity, an opportunity that the highly skilled Michael seized, by leveling his own weapon on the motorcycle, and firing a single projectile.

It was a subspace transponder the size of a grain of rice, coated in a special film that allowed it to instantly bond to any surface, the transponder would function regardless of the level of shielding that Paragon employed, and would need to be physically destroyed in order to stop tracking him.

His weapon whispered, hurling the small projectile towards a small nook within the bike, it would pass through shields with ease, as it was slightly out of phase while in transit.

"You're playing a dangerous game! The Empire knows about you, they know what you're about, and you will be hunted down to the ends of this galaxy and defeated!" She warned. "We're not common thugs to be beat up!" She called out, while struggling to her feet, the suit assisting her movements, which were unstable at best, she promptly reached into a pouch attached to her hip, producing a shimmering white crystalline shard. "I will end you, Paragon!"
 
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