Head Crab Invasion Part 1

Things are not looking good from Takor Alx's point of view. Aleran and Ninjageek are down, and the latter wis being zombified at the moment. Sraine is at the front of the craft, protecting the bewildered woman valiantly.
Alx finally gets the craft under control; he takes a remote probe from his wrist and attatches it to the controls. The device will pilot the speeder for long enough to kill the rest of the creatures.

He draws his serrablade, a weapon made of liquid metal that is able to take any shape needed for the task at hand. It takes the form of a short sword at the moment, which he immediately drives through the head of an approaching zombie. Its body slumps to the cold floor and Alx steps over it, his animal instincts taking over. Spinning quickly to assess his enemies, he sights four headcrabs crawling over the railings and preparing to leap toward his waiting cranium. The serrablade becomes longer with a thought. Alx swings it at two of the predators. One is cleaved in two, the other leaps over the arcing blade and lands squarely on Takor's visored face. He scratches at the beast with his free hand, removing it from his face and throwing it violently overboard... suddenly he feels the weight of the other two crabs on his back. Their razor teeth slice through his body suit and reach his scaly skin, scaping and gnawing. He realizes now that his back is not as important as Ninjageek's brain. He ignores the pain, knowing he has little time, and lunges to Ray's side to aid him.

Noticing Alx had joined him he nodded to him, and then froze the headcrabs that were on his back. They fell to the floor of the speeder with a -thunk-

"If you could wipe out these guys in front of us I can make for NINJAGEEK in no time at all."

Ray was referring to the 2 speed demons in front of them, plus the 13 headcrabs

Sinking further down on the deck, now resting on his hands and knees, Aleran can feel his energy draining away from the loss of blood. He slowly sinks down, closer and closer to the floor. A crab jumps on his back, but is quickly thrown off by the force of the flames erupting from Aleran towards the crab. One less little marshmallow to worry about, as it flings itself off the side of the craft: burning all the way down.

There will be time to rest later. He raises himself up onto his knees, then up onto his feet. He looks to his side and sees Ninjageek's head being eaten. S***. He reaches over, grabs the crab with both hands, and rips it off. Then, with a evil looking smile, he melts the crab. Who knew that crabs could melt?

OOC: Hey, people NINJAGEEK is not entirely there so decide how bad I got hurt and have me healed. I won't be posting until I get healed. NINJAGEEK should have a major problem right now and it should require me to change around how he works and everything so I am thinking part of his brain being missing. But I want you guys to decide how bad he got hurt.

Seeing Aleran climb to his feet gives Alx new determination. His weapon splits in two to become twin daggers, each etched with cryptic runes and boasting serrated edges. He swings around and sweeps the legs out from under one speed zombie, then dives to finish the work by stabbing steel into the crab.
The second zombie aims a kick for Takor's torso, which is now at knee level. Alx grabs the foot with a taloned hand and pulls it to the floor, pinning it there immediately with a dagger. He rises and puts his second blade where human and crab meet. He pries the beast from the head of its victim, letting the body fall. He finishes the crab with a quick one-two stab.

"Ray, we need a more efficient way to destroy the rest. Aleran could toast them, I suppose, but he looks weak enough already."

The craft is now high enough to avoid new boarders.

"Ray! Ice!"

Aleran shouts at Ray from across the craft while, once again sitting down, he reaches his arms out in preparation. One crab gets too close and gets fried. Aleran still is not sure enough of his abilities to try and kill anything from any distance. There's too much of a risk of catching Ray or Takor Alx on fire.

Noticing one of his daggers on the ground, he picks it up. "I wonder what happened to the other one...I like these daggers."

I must be near the center of the city...
He soars over the rooftops with his angelic wings. There's something not too far ahead that could serve as a citadel, but he is not yet sure.
"Oh, great goddess, help me. I am weak and you are great. Please guide me to where you need me to be."

Then a hovercraft flies by in front of his face, and it looks like there's fighting on board. Drakkus knew this was what the goddesses wanted him to do. He turned to follow the craft, straining to catch up and help those on board. He morphed in midair into a falcon, hoping this body will prove faster than his normal one.

"ALRIGHTY!! I DIDN"T WANT TO DO THIS BUT.....ALERAN YOU BETTER PUT SOME SORTA HEAT SHIELDS ON EVERYONE!!!!!"

Ray swirled around, a cold blast of wind freezing everything around him. Hopefully he didn't freeze his friends......

Everything becomes very warm all of a sudden. Then all becomes cold. Alx opens his eyes to an interesting scene. Twelve frozen headcrabs litter the hovercraft floor, looking like ice sculptures.

"Ray, Aleran, your skill with magic is impressive. If you could, Fireman, warm up the engine again? It might not take well to that sudden frost."

He turns to see an even more interesting spectacle. A bird of somekind, perhaps a hawk, is perched on the rear railing of the craft, frozen solid. He flashes a pocket scanner over it to check its vitals. It yields unexpected results.

"By the Halls of Kraftaj! A sentient bird! Will the surprises of this world never end?"

He holds the animal in his warm hands and it begins to thaw.

"Woah, how'd I do that?" He is referring to the "shields" of heat. He sees the iced crabs, sees the frozen bird, hears the request that he heat the engine.
"Right, heat the engine, got it."
He stumbles to the back end of the craft, hoping to find something that looks remotely like and engine. Seeing a likely object, he transfers heat into it, hoping that he didn't just find the fuel tank instead of the engine.

It was cold, so cold...As soon as he landed on the rail of the ship he was frozen. Thinking quickly, he slowed his internal functions to as slow as they could go while still keeping him alive. This would conserve every and allow him to survive the freezing cold. Before losing consciousness, he thanked the goddesses that he finished his training in advanced meditation.
And then the world went black.

NINJAGEEK's body violently twitches and shudders with the change of temperature. God knows how he is still alive but at this rate he won't last much longer.

OOC: hint hint. Hurry it up people, I want to get back into action but half my brain is missing right now so it's kind of hard.

Takor sees the twitching body of Ninja and puts the bird down gently on a seat. He opens a storage compartment in the floor and extracts a bandage. He walks to the brainless figure on the ground and begins to inspect the damage.

"A third of his brain function will be gone when he awakes... unless... let us see if this works."

Takor pulls a small computer chip from his belt and inserts it into Ninja's exposed cerebellum. Tiny wires extend from the device and join with the brain.

"An AI chip. It should restore his previous mental capabilities, and perhaps increase them. Another voice inside his head is a probable side effect as well."

Ninja twitches again and his eyes fly open as the chip does its work.

NINJAGEEK feels sensation in his head. Then something strange happens. The shadows around NINJAGEEK start to swirl. Suddenly the shadow jumps at the small chip and destroys it but doesn't let any small bit stay in NINJAGEEK's head. Then the shadow hovers almost protectively over NINJAGEEK's head.

Ray was off to the side, eating a few cookies to get back his strength. Ice blasts like that made his stamina go down a lot. It'd be a few hours before he'd be able to do anything like that again.

After eating his cookies he went over to NINJAGEEK and noticed something hovering around him

"Yo dood, what's that?"

"Apparently he doesn't want my help. Very well."

Takor is slightly irritated. The ninja could have at least returned the chip to him in one piece.

The three spires of the Citadel are very close. The plaza surrounding the immense building is filled with zombies and crabs by the thousands. Takor pilots the craft higher and begins an orbital path around the structure.

"There is no way in. They appear to be pouring in through all of the doorways... We can only hope that Bale and the rest are still alive. Any ideas for entry?"

"Hmm, I guess that means I didn't just blow up the craft! Good!"
He sees the bird, frozen in Takor Alx's hands. He reaches out one hand for the Bird, and Takor Alx hands him off. Slowly, Aleran begins to thaw out the bird while pondering their situation.
"Ninjageek and I are wounded, we need rest. Consider that before landing in a mass of crabs that we'll need to fight out of."
He takes a good look at the building.

"It's an old building, not up to modern defensive standards. We should be able to land on the top of one of the towers with a flat top. It wasn't build to prevent entry from the air. Should be no problem. Then we work our way down until we meet with some friendly fighters. The crabs are at the bottom, so it makes sense that any survivors would be further up."

NINJAGEEK's body twitched again. The shadow unconcerned continued letting nothing get near NINJAGEEK's head. For some strange reason it looked like his brain was starting to work itself back together but with shadow mixed into it. As the brain was healing, the body was starting to twitch more and more. This was a strange occurance and didn't make sense, but it was happening.

"NINJAGEEK?.....NINJAGEEK?...." With a sigh Ray realized he wasn't responding..... He went over to Talor Alx and Aleran who were looking at their destination. Overhearing the plan he nodded in agreement with them. It sounded good.

"Well I'm ready when you guys are." Truthfully, Ray was itching to use his Chain/Rapier combo somemore

With a screech, he leaps from Aleran's hands onto the deck of the hovercraft. Spreading his wings, he leaps straight into the air, halting just a few feet off the deck. It only takes a few seconds before he's back into his normal form: small and old.
Falling to the deck, he turns on Ninjageek.
"He has a darkness..."
He reaches out one hand towards his shadow-covered head, but quickly pulls it back in pain. "Only the Great Goddess herself can help you now."

After turning around to face the others, he makes a slight bow at the waste.
"Forgive my rudeness. I am Father Drakkus, servant of the goddesses. I am here to help save this city."

"That was a pretty awesome trick!! My name is Ray....um....is NINJAGEEK going to be okay?" Ray wondered if his friend was going to be alright. Despite his urge to get going

"He's going to be okay.. If you're going to ask how I know that well, I had a premonition. I can predict the future if a decision has been made. So as long as you don't change what you are planning to do now, he's okay.. My name is Alice, by the way."

"GAH!" Ray was a bit startled at another voice on the hovercraft. After asking for a repeat of her words and her name he asked a question, "so if we decide again that we don't go in and destroy the headcrabs, then he wouldn't be okay? ((ooc:Is that what u mean by making a desicion?))

(OOC: yea)

"Yep, but I'm not 100% sure if he wouldn't be okay when you change your plans. He could still be okay, but in another way. An "alternate" future. Also, once you change your plans, I will have another premonition that will be different from the one that I just had."

"Hmm, interesting...." He turned to everyone else.... "Is everyone ready to go in?"