Anomalous Trip (Part II)

[slicsinatra]

“What do you mean, I see those dots but what else?”

[Dragnoxz]

Captain Davis: “Those don’t look natural. Could be the enemy.”

2nd Lt. Bardlaw: “Those look like dogs.” He sounds shaky. “And giants. There’s so many.”

The landscape is dotted by many. They appear to be at a state of rest. The smaller pockets of dog like creatures seem to just be idle and sniffing about in their areas. Hyla zooms in. They appear organized in groups.

2nd Lt. Hyla: “That’s something from movies, or books. It’s like an army of hell hounds.” The thought invokes chills.

Captain Davis: “Well, let’s sneak through them.” His sarcasm isn’t taken with humor by the others. “Around, I meant.”

2nd Lt. Bardlaw: “How does that glow look ?”

2nd Lt. Hyla: “Let me check.” She zooms to the town, as close as possible. “FLIR, check the image.” She sends an image. “This looks like two different types of heat signatures. One side shows no large blobs. The other has them, with these clusters.” She points at ge the clusters of dogs and giants are on one side and something else is bordered with them.

2nd Lt. Bardlaw: “Two kinds of army units ?”

Captain Davis: “Od say let’s piggyback the drones again but we won’t have enough without the rest of the team.”

[slicsinatra]

“This isn’t the best position. What could this mean. I mean they may be connected but they also may not be.”

[Dragnoxz]

Captain Davis: “Recon immediate area. We can move through them if we plot a course around them. Think of them all being radar. We can stay low and between them and out of their sound and scent range.”

2nd Lt. Hyla: “Look.” She zooms in at the river. “It’s a bridge. No heat nearby.”

Captain Davis: “Found our path through them. Let’s go that way. Keep passive drone. Alerts set for unknown heat’s.” The team walks along the river toward the bridge. Two hours later, the drone in passive alerts to last waypoint before bridge.

2nd Lt. Hyla: “Sir. The bridge is damaged.” She pans to the path entering the bridge and the planks and road over the bridge are missing, as if they were ripped out of the bridge. The bridge looks as if it could handle two wagons side by side, plus some clearance. It looks as if it could have supported a small modern day car. The supports and superstructure look intact. Nothing is guarding it, though there are some heat signatures toward the top that look like bird like creatures, warm blooded. Other creatures seem to have made a nest mid way down the top of the super structure of the teams side. There is a big chunk dug out just beside the bridge as if a massive excavator took a chunk of the bank out, just to the right of it on your side. Some of the trees are on their side as well, roots exposed. There’s a destroyed structure amidst the trees. Everything looks as if it happened weeks, even months prior, as other plants have started to grow there. “What do you guys think ?”

[slicsinatra]

“I’ll volunteer to test stability. Tie a rope on me incase it falls, I’ll be fine. Then if it’s stable, one by one we do the same.”

[Dragnoxz]

Captain Davis: “We need to make sure there’s no traps, like sharp objects with toxins. You can swim across to the pylon and drill a hole and attach a rope to it, then go to the next and set us up a rope line so we can pull ourselves across, so we don’t expose ourselves top side, or risk a loud splash from falling in.” He pulls out and holds his rope to you. “You got that mini-drill, haha.”

[slicsinatra]

I reach into my gear to get the supplies. “Couldn’t let me do the dangerous thing like a badass could ya Cap?” I chuckle. “I need more scars to show the moderately…or unattractive ladies at the bar.”

[Dragnoxz]

Captain Davis: “Don’t you already have scars from before you signed up ?” He nearly loses his footing when a small sinkhole is triggered. “You might find some ugly ladies here, heavy boned, masculine, tall as these trees, can make you scars mentally and physically, but can’t promise you’ll have to shower before coming back to the team, haha.”

2nd Lt. Hyla: “Activity across river. Dogs are following another dog to somewhere.” The feed shows a very fast slender dog sprinting through the forest. It gets snagged by a vine and flips before recovering back to a sprint. It dives into a creek, splashing the area with the cool water signatures, and follows the creek down. It reaches another body of water before submerging from view. The pack of dogs begins to sniff and search the area, almost as if in a search pattern. “I think it was being chased by them.” It all happened about 2,200 meters to the left of the bridge inland about 750 meters.

Captain Davis: “Search the destroyed structure and surrounding area of the bridge, quietly. Don’t wake the locals.” He looks up and gestures to the nest and creatures above. “Caston, carryon, get the line for us to cross.” He taps on the wrist device and has his drone take off.

Roll strength, roll to hit, and dex twice in succession (6 D-20’s). Each group is for the fight against the current, also reaching out to grab the pylon, and then doing the work itself, connecting the rope. The last isn’t gonna require a roll because you’ll be hanging onto the rope. You are basically drilling in a loop ring that the rope will go into. Then the team can cross easily and fast.

Two groups of 3 D-20’s.

[slicsinatra]

20, 1, 16. 18, 10, 14. 19, 17, 13.

[Dragnoxz]

You easily swim against the current. When you reach out to grab the pylon, you completely miss and snag on some wood, losing one of your very expensive gloves, and begin to tumble, and even get sucked under the water. You thrash and kick to recover and manage to reach out and grab a small tree branch floating in the water. You use it to steer and are now fighting the current again to reach the pylon on the other side of the bridge. You barely make it with the 10 roll. You manage to drill into the wooden pylon and install the first ring loop. You thread the rope through it and pull enough slack to make it across the river. You make another attempt to swim to the next pylon, and swim easily to the next, and grab it without an issue, and successfully drill the second loop ring in, thread the rope and again, pull enough slack to reach the end. You make it almost to the other side and there before you is a wolf in the water, under the bridge, shivering. It also looks scared, it’s gray fur drenched and murky.

Captain Davis: “All teams, hold.” His voice quiet and firm. “Line of big mother f**kers approaching from our side to the bridge. Find cover, Caston. We are backing off from the bridge.” According to the drone feed, the giants are half the height of the bridges pylons, meaning the bridges tallest portion is around 80 feet high, from the land, but reach up to 115 from the water. Hyla pilots the drone to match the top of the pylon and hovers it over the water, and the range finder on the drone says 112.67 feet above the water. It varies depending on the waters wave motion. “They look relaxed. I don’t think they are aware of us.”

The wolf gets up, then stops, yelping slightly.

Perception.

[slicsinatra]

Perception 16.

[Dragnoxz]

You see the wolf is caught in a metal wire like contraption, almost like a barbed wire snare, and it’s digging into the wolfs legs. It has both hind legs caught.

Captain Davis: “Giants are about five minutes out.”

[slicsinatra]

“Wolf is caught in a trap. Look for pursuers possibly hidden. Might be another bump in the road.”

[Dragnoxz]

The wolf has tears in its eyes. It yelps softly when it adjusts its position.

Captain Davis: “All clear. Four minutes out. Get to cover.”

The wolf has the droopy puppy dog eyes, and moves but can’t move all the way like it wants and stops as it shivers. It moans softly.

[slicsinatra]

I try my best to get to cover out of the way of the giants along with my team.