Scenario: Exponential Invasion (IC)

[R-9 Pilot]

[fieldbox=", #5fd4a3, solid"]

Ellen ate silently for a while, to think about things so far. They were probably safe, which was a load off her shoulders, although also one to consider carefully, as some of those qualifiers like "should" didn't mean certainty. She still felt like she was a little more overtly vulnerable than the others, since it wasn't a brain chip they'd needed. Still, the whole thing seemed strange. Why would some demon need to subvert someone through cybernetics?

At least it seemed like everyone was on board with helping their benefactor, although how would still be a good question. Checking around the streets for discarded things, or just collecting some their families would otherwise throw out would be an easy start, but other than that, she couldn't think of good ways to get any really juicy or cutting-edge electronics. At least it was something they could do together, and setting aside the thought of clubs for now, they don't really need an officially-sanctioned excuse to spend time together. She'd have to speak with Farron privately later, though.

"I think we'll have to save the rest of this for after school," she said, cutting the rest of the conversation short. "Lunch is almost over, so we'd better get going back to our classrooms." She stood up to deal with any dishes and garbage she'd generated, and take her own advice.
[/fieldbox]

 

[Insomnant]

27092115582215145.9​

The students who had been lucky enough to find an empty spot in the cafeteria were now emptying out, while last-minute eaters scarfed down the stuff on their trays. The warning bell to get to fifth period would soon ring.

Mita didn't seem entirely sure how to respond to Yu-Ri's question, blinking a few times in deep thought. "Well... theoretically? The virulence is only a presumed construct at this stage- more study and examination is needed! ... and more specimens," she explained, stressing that point meaningfully, in spite of all of its unpleasant ramifications.

"But... it is..." she pursed her lips and leaned on the zipper, trying to figure out how to word her thoughts. "It's more productive to operate from a position that the problem can be fixed- if it turns out it can't be, that... will require a drastically different solution! And, it's something we can consider should things come to that." She sounded like she desperately wanted to avoid that point, as desperate positions require equally desperate measures; desperation is hardly a breeding ground for pleasantness.

The lack of a decision regarding their excuse for spending time together made the little tech-fairy a little frustrated, sighing and slumping back into Ellen's bag. But the grab for said bag obscured her exasperation with their refusal or inability to work together.

And then it was back to class, to listen to teachers and try not to think about the ongoing assault on their world, their species, and their way of life.

---

27092115582219555.6​

But such things waited for no one, and a mere fifteen minutes into fifth period, Ellen's bag rustled slightly. With their internet access controlled by the school's portal, there was little connection to the outside world beyond the wall of scholastic material. But one bridge did remain, in the form of the minuscule assistant in Ellen's backpack.

And either the initial unzipping noise would catch the cat-eared girl's attention or the tapping sound of Mita rasping her knuckles on the binder in there with her, or perhaps the green glow of agitated wings buzzing behind her- something. She made a very serious, stern face up at her hostess, before pantomiming a punch, and... an angry tiger? And choking herself, before flopping over. And then standing up and flailing her arms anxiously. Her charades game perhaps left something to be desired but it was clear that something was amiss.


Upon being liberated from the tyranny of backpack and smuggled out into the hall, Mita burst into exposition. "Miss Ellen! Human media is reporting another attack, going on right now! Five blocks West of here, one block South, two Madness-infected citizens are attacking a residential area and the authorities are engaging them! There... there are reports of casualties. I don't know if we're too late, but, I don't know if the Civic Defense Force will be able to prevail against them..."[/hr]

 

[R-9 Pilot]

[fieldbox=", #5fd4a3, solid"]

Ellen was somehow not too surprised by the explanation of things. "Well shit," she quietly said to the miniature girl. "We'll have to just sneak away, then, won't we?" She already began thinking of an excuse of some sort to use on why she should get to just leave early. Feigning illness was usually the simplest method. just up and obviously disappearing could work, but it could also cause problems. Again, life was not easy for a magical girl.

"Girls, trouble," she sent to the other heroines. "Some sort of thing nearby, talk more in person." The alert that messages could not be sent during class time caused her to exhale sharply in frustration. The others would be warned, but not fast enough for them all to be there at the same time. Slipping away from class would still be easy enough. But they couldn't pull this one without being seen. And probably shot at. She doubted Civil Defense would take too kindly to anyone crashing their party, even if they were on the same side.

Ellen carefully hid Mita again and made her way back into the classroom, and addressed the teacher again. "Sorry, but I think one of my legs is acting up...I might need to leave to get some maintenance..." The excuses kids could use these days. She gave her teacher the best pitiable look she could muster, and swept it over toward Yu-Ri and Chie, where it became a different sort of request for help.
[/fieldbox]

 

[ERode]

The routine of note-taking and studying was rudely interrupted by Ellen abruptly rising up, before making an excuse to leave. Yu-Ri, partway from learning new things about the wonders of algebra, perked up when Ellen's eyes caught her own for a moment, before closing her eyes. Is this something random? No. Mita was in Ellen's bag, and was the only person who was connected to the world outside the school. Though the raven-haired girl wouldn't usually care about the problems of another student, Ellen was both smart, had parents working in a large company, and was one of the more agreeable Valiants…not that her competition was very strong.

Rising up from her seat, Yu-Ri said, "I'll take her there, Mr. Nye."

The logic should be obvious for an adult. A malfunctioning leg could end up not working at all during critical segments such as going down stairs and whatever else. After gaining approval, she headed out, lent Ellen a shoulder, and left the room. Hopefully Chie's 'I need to go pee' excuse or whatever would work out too.

 

[Atenthirtyone]

[fieldbox=, pink, solid]

Chie watched as the raven haired girl escorted the cat cybernetic girl out of the room. She needed her to get out of the class as well. Asking to go to the bathroom was probably not an ideal excuse as valiant duty might take longer than needed. Perhaps, sickness or injury? Chie placed her hands into desk, when her hand touched an object that felt cold... and metal. It was her letter opener...

"Aaaaaaah!!" yelped Chie with a hint of innocence. She purposely rasied her hands in the air, allowing the entire class including the teacher see a large cut on her left palm. Blood was streaming down on it, dripping onto the desk and onto the floor. A few girls in the class yell back shrieks, while the boy that sat next to her got up as if he was going to defend Chie from further harm. Chie started to tear from her eyes a bit, although she was mostly faking it, the pain helped out a lot.

"Sir... C-can I go to the nurse's office?"

That silly protector next to her got out and asked to take Chie to the nurse's office. Chie was about to open her mouth to interrupt, but it didn't seem wise. And the boy may prove to be useful for later if needed. Perhaps, she could persuade him to lie about or use him as a distraction in a bit.
[/fieldbox]

 

[R-9 Pilot]

[fieldbox=", #5fd4a3, solid"]

Ellen gratefully accepted the help and put an arm around Yu-ri's shoulders. "Thanks a lot," she said. "You're a lifesaver." She did her best affectation of a limp as they moved along, to be as authentic as possible, and Mita was still secreted away (more or less) on her person. But, she started her own explanation of things in a hurried whisper. "Sounds like more trouble, and really bad news: there's two of them, and they're already engaged." She probably didn't need to say by whom. "Good news, it's a few blocks away."

Once they'd made it down one flight of stairs, with Ellen being a little less in need of assistance, to avoid any possible falls, she stopped at the next floor landing. "Before we keep going, let's make a quick detour," she said, with a smile toward Yu-Ri. There was a pretty good reason to end up at the floor where their younger teammates were studying, even if it was obviously out of the way. "It shouldn't take long."

It took a while to find the right classroom, but once she did, at least she was pretty sure she did, Ellen stopped briefly near the door and took a deep breath to steel herself. Then she stepped forward and...did her best pratfall right into the door, knocking it open enough to spill onto the ground on the other side. It hurt just a little more than she would have liked, but making a scene would at least get her attention, and at least it made her pained groaning genuine, as she pushed herself up with her arms. "Ah...sorry to interrupt," she said, sheepishly. "My leg's acting up today...I think one of the servos seized at just the wrong time." Yu-ri could, of course, come to her rescue and help her up and away. It was, well, it was jack shit to really go on, but it was enough to get attention drawn to herself and let the others know something was up.
[/fieldbox]

 

[Ailucia]

[fieldbox=, yellow, solid]

Remi was back in her classroom, listening intently to her teacher now. Good student at school, crime fighter after school. Maybe I should just not associate with any of them She thought to herself, starting to think this team is slowly becoming less and less team seeing as they can't even fully agree on a cover-up. Tch. Whatever, I'll just figure it out as it goes on I guess. That's when another thought popped up in her mind. She mentioned to the others she could tinker with her suit to see what she could do but... she was just speaking out of her ass to sound like she could do something about it and sound cool. She sunk into her desk with a reddened face, mumbling a small bit.

Suddenly, the door flung open and a face and chest she recognized walked in. Well, fell in rather, seeing as she was on the floor and complaining about some sort of leg problem. Maybe her leg received more damage than she thought from last night? Remi thought, completely believing the act put out in front of her. She quickly got up from her seat, speedily walking over to Ellen and offering her a hand up. "I'm going to help her to the nurse's room." She said to her teacher, not particularly caring about their response when someone in front of her looks to be in trouble. She moved closer to Ellen to whisper without anyone hearing. "Was last night too hard on your leg?"

[/fieldbox]

 

[Izurich]

[fieldbox=, Red, solid]

"..." Well, not to be rude against the tech-fairy, but Mita's explanations weren't exactly helping. It was more than likely that she realized it herself, what with her confused tone and stutters. If Srade and her followers had been fighting against this space-demonic entity, couldn't they at least know more? Or was Lesadra just that powerful and mysterious? Either way, Mita's obvious suggestions weren't of much use. "Mita..." Akni sighed, "Fine, we'll get you more materials to study, but... tell Srade to make it quick, alright? We're still waiting on her report about the stuff we got from the deranged doc." Right now, time to get back to the hilariously unneeded compulsory education sessions. Standing up, Akni grabbed her own bag then left after a small wave of goodbye.

---

Hours later, In class...

"Uuurgh..." Groaned Miss Red Twintails as she held her chin up with her right hand, elbow on the table. Fifth period, even after this was done, they still got one more period to go. Either nothing was happening or they were just blind to the outside world with the school forcing students to connect their SmartViews to the teachers' network during class. Akni's customized SmartView had a backdoor installed so the CDF could send her encrypted messages as long as there was a connection, regardless of any third party influences, no messages whatsoever so... nothing of note was really taking place.

"...!?" Oh scratch that, something did happen in the form of a blonde-haired blue-eyed green-eyed cat-eared cyborg upperclassman. "Ellen?" Akni raised an eyebrow, turning her head to the older girl's flopped form, she definitely got everyone's attention alright. Narrowing her eyes, Akni figured out the subtle message behind the girl's exaggerated actions, good thing she was an investigator, huh? Well... not like it'd take much effort to notice considering their little secret arrangements. Getting up from her seat at the same time with Remi, the redhead took Ellen's shoulder then helped her up. "I'll also assist her, it'd be best if she's assisted from each side."

[/fieldbox]

 

[ERode]

Ellen's trick…did its trick, really. As she faceplanted through the door, Yu-Ri quickly rushed over to the side, pulling her cat-eared classmate up. "Ellen," she chided, "don't walk off on your own, ok? Sorry for the interruption, teacher."

It looked like Remi and Farron were heading off for assistance as well, though, which, along with Yu-Ri's own appearance, posed a number of problems. One, the two of them looked much too eager to find an excuse to skip their class. Two, you didn't need an excess of three people to help out. Three, Farron was stupid enough. She should STAY in class. And even though the mention of there being two corrupted individuals already present on the scene, the raven-haired girl still didn't really want Farron to show her face at all. The CDF were going to be enough of a problem. Didn't exactly need the dumb redhead to be going bonkers as well.

"Ah," Yu-Ri said, brushing Farron away, "Thanks for the offer, but she should be enough. Don't exactly need three, when there's only two shoulders."

 

[R-9 Pilot]

[fieldbox=", #5fd4a3, solid"]

"Ah, thanks," Ellen graciously accepted the help from her younger peers and Yu-Ri. She didn't need help from all of them,and Farron was too late to really join in, it would seem.

"No," she whispered in response to Remi's question, "trouble outside." She hoped the kind of trouble would need no further explanation. For the sake of acting, she did still accept the two offered shoulders to lean on and carefully picked her way back out into the hallway. "We'll need to sneak out," she said in hushed tones once out into the hallway. "Though for the sake of the excuse, I probably should go by the nurse first, just in case somebody asks later..." That might take her out of the immediate fight, but at this point, the important thing was getting the information out. It was urgent, and they'd need to move quickly.
[/fieldbox]

 

[Insomnant]

27092115582221459.1​

With four out of the five girls having escaped class through dubious means that they would no doubt be lectured about later, they were free to follow Mita's guidance. What's more, now that they'd escaped the school (which would certainly be logged and lead to disciplinary action later), they were free to check the internet. And news sites were already sharing video streaming showing chaotic scenes of destruction. Clips taken through windows of an ongoing battle on the street... that moved into a building, and spilled back out onto the street. The evidence coming in was confusing- definitely two combatants, but some reports said they were fighting each other, while others indicated they were both taking on the CDF who had showed up and barricaded the street.

The ferocity of the fight far exceeded the encounter they went through the night before. Smoke rose from the street in the direction of the fight and made it easy to track their way to the battle zone. Civilians mostly fled the block while Chie, Ellen, Remi, and Yu-Ri made their way toward the disturbance. As they got within ablock, a couple of stopped to tell them to go back, with one CDF Street Enforcer approaching them and telling them to turn around- "Hey, shouldn't you be in school right now! Get out of here, this area is off limits!"

Actually getting to the fight wouldn't be easy: CDF APCs jammed the streets and between them plenty of armored personnel with automatic and sniper rifles aimed beyond. There was little firing however, and much anxious shifting. Above them, no less than three Hornets circled through the air, with one hanging low and unleashing the periodic furious buzzing of a rotary machine gun sending streams of tracer rounds into the ground below. Although they couldn't see the result, the fact that the Strike Aircraft continued to engage told an uncomfortable story. Even an attempt to infiltrate the fight through the building from another street proved difficult, with several CDF agents leading the evacuation at nearly every exit. At least one stood guard over the doors to ensure no one was getting back into the buildings- only the gruff teams pulling and/or shoving the last stragglers out.

 

[ERode]

This…this was certainly going to be a problem. Though the automated warning from the SchoolNet made it obvious that they were going to get busted for their escape from school grounds, Yu-Ri's brows furrowed more deeply at how large-scale this confrontation was. The CDF were really going all-out now, from their APCs to their coilgun snipers to their machine-gunning aircraft. No doubt, they were desperate to grab onto leads before they were snatched away, and as Yu-Ri progressed, more worries began to mount up.

One: there was no way for them to go quickly and take down those corrupted individuals.

Two: she was already on the CDF's watchlist, so stuff like this was definitely going to be troublesome for her.

Three: their opponent last night was using scalpels. This time, there was a third party that used the sort of weaponry that'd shred a human body to pieces.

It was frustrating, all things considered. Their Cyberframes were powerful, perhaps, but none of them had really tested out the defensive capabilities of their wares. Could they take a bullet? Could they take the pressure? Could they do anything in this exponentially more difficult scenario?

Yu-Ri narrowed her eyes, her steps becoming heavier, more hesitant, almost considering obeying that Street Enforcer's orders.

All this was a lot to adapt to, and this whole situation was a buttload of stupid.

"Perhaps," she said, "this isn't something we want to get involved in. Too many eyes. Too many weapons. Two instead of one."

After all, they weren't just focused on killing those infected by Lesedra's power. They had to escape with the parts as well, and escaping, when the CDF had their full force out? During daylight?

Yu-Ri didn't like those chances.

 

[R-9 Pilot]

[fieldbox=", #5fd4a3, solid"]

The scope of the actual battle in progress had taken Ellen aback, as well. She didn't exactly regret skipping out on class to go see what was going on, particularly with the sheer scope of the spectacle. The CDF were keeping things cordoned off well enough, but they'd still turned the area into a veritable warzone, to the point she wondered just what sort of enemy they'd have to deal with, if so much massed firepower and so many eyes had yet to achieve a satisfactory result. That the CDF didn't even try to drown their problem in bodies was either a testament to the threat, or to their own worries of being caught in the resulting crossfire. For all the heavy ordinance, there was...less of it actively being deployed at any given moment, from what she could see at the perimeter, and that made her all the more worried. She did listen for the telltale chatter of gunfire, her mechanical ears uselessly perking up and scanning around as well.

Self-preservation warred with curiosity and a sense of justice spurring Ellen on to help, if they really were the only ones who could. Willingly jumping those barricades, even with a cyberframe, was just going to make oneself another target, and there was plenty of firepower incoming to make that a risky prospect. They couldn't just show up, say they were there to help, and expect to be allowed on through. Getting the CDF to cooperate would save a lot of trouble down the road, or, she thought, getting the CDF to accept their cooperation, as would more likely suit the organization.

"Yeah..." Ellen said with an exasperated sigh, once they were out of earshot of any obvious CDF troops, "I don't really like our odds either. Things are already nuts, so it might be too big of a risk." It was, at least, the rational thing to do. Looking around, she didn't even see a good place to hide long enough to get changed. "Not sure we could even get set up unseen."

When even their likely allies would probably shoot them in the back, it felt like the enemy had too much of an advantage. As if moving around freely with no means of detection wasn't already good enough. "This whole thing is really starting to piss me off," she grumbled, venting some frustration out loud.
[/fieldbox]

 

[Atenthirtyone]

[fieldbox=, pink, solid]

After some short medical treatment from the school's nurse, convincing the silly boy to keep the nurse busy, and sneaking out of the school, Chie was finally free. The usual adult that was suppose to be watching the exit was busy snoozing on the job. How typical. Now where could Chie find her fellow Valiants?

Chie was about to send a group message to them, when she noticed a major news breaking out on the net. There were reports of violence and the CDF apparently had been mobilized. That was likely the spot that her fellow Valiants were at. It was probably not a good idea to message them through the usual means as the CDF had became interested in her recently. Perhaps, they needed the tech fairy woman to do something about that.

Eventually,. Chie arrived at the scene -- or rather close enough to the scene. She could hear and see the sounds of CDF APCs everywhere in the area. With a bit of looking around, she spotted her fellow warriors of erhmm... justice she supposed. That was the word that twintailed girl liked to use a lot, and it seemed noble enough for what they were doing. Probably. Anyway, she could see Ellen and Yu-Ri ahead of the other two. It looked they had tried to get into the area, but were blocked off by the CDF.

Chie slowly creeped up behind Remi as quietly as she could. When she was close enough, she pounced on the younger girl with her two hands on her shoulders. It was then she remembered that her palm was injured, and the impact of slamming her palm against Remi's shoulder bone did not go well.

"H- aah... Hi girls! How's the field trip?"
[/fieldbox]

 

[Izurich]

[fieldbox=, Red, solid]

"That fucking BITCH!!!"

Of course, of-fucking-course! That little whore just had to interfere. How naive, how foolish, how stupid of her to remotely believe that even for a second, Yu-Ri was her ally. Even though all five of them were chosen by Srade, it didn't mean they were all her friends... Yu-Ri in particular, was obviously a massive thorn in her side, so much she'd rather try to talk out Remi's suspicion instead of dealing with this black-haired slut. "....." Taking a sharp deep breath to barely prevent herself from lashing out at the cocksucking cockblocker. "....yeah... yeah, you're right..." "Fuck you... I'm going to kill you later!" Nothing more needs to be said, cornered and defeated, Akni returned to her seat, her heart beating so hard, it might just burst out of her chest.

As the other Valiants rushed into the whatever was going on out there, Akni was left unaware of the incident, damn the school rules... and screw the CDF for not sending any messages through the backdoor. Sure she was just a Junior Agent, but at least tell her what was happening. Unless... Srade was just arranging a meet-up, even then, the fact that Yu-Ri deliberately and consciously jeopardized her was there. "...." Alright, that was the last straw... she must find a way to deal with this bitch... by any means necessary. Looks like someone had been naughty... mingling with shady older men, selling herself, nobody would mind if some piss-poor whore 'disappeared' in the streets... right? Such things happened all the time. "Heh..." A mental grin spread in her head.

Don't try to fight the law, Yu-Ri, you'd lose.

[/fieldbox]

 

[Ailucia]

[fieldbox=, yellow, solid]

The blonde girl looked up at the sky and all the CDF vehicles she was able to see. Even if they were an enemy right now... they were still super cool! She couldn't wait until she could follow in her families footsteps and become one herself later. She was pretty sure she could name most of the items they had and their standard equipment, not that she would.

Remi jumped as she felt the hands slam against her shoulders, letting out a girly scream. "Hiiii!" She turned around to see Chie being the assailant, seeing that dumb face too close to her own, making her brush her senpai off her shoulders as she took a few steps away from her, noticing the injured hand. "You stay away. Far away." The girl said with a small blush. "I hope your hand is okay though, I don't want you making me do more work to heal you all over again because of it."

Either way, they were stuck in a real predicament. Should they charge in and deal with it as it goes? They could probably try to use her scanning ability to sneak in as best as they can without getting caught.

We're in a really shitty situation that even Ellen is cursing... Wait a minute. Shitty? That's it! An idea hit her head, although it wasn't a pleasant one.

"Well if we can't go above or on the ground... how about below? I'm sure there has to be some kinda sewer system leading over there."

[/fieldbox]

 

[Insomnant]

27092115582223057.0​

The battlefield was not silent while they waited. The tremendous roar of the minigun above ripped out over the three helicopters-worth of dual rotors chopping the air. Rubble being kicked out into the street and windows shattered under the barrage of bullets added to the cacophony and the ocasional staccato bursts of rifle shots by CDF agents on the sidelines were like sprinkles on the loaded cake of commotion. While the four girls reunited as if they'd met up at the mall, and tried to determine a plan of attack, the helicopter that had been engaging its unseen targets ceased its attacks and peeled off, turning and flying away. The other two still circled, all three hovering high enough to avoid any counter attack, especially after what had happened the previous morning.

But this still left all the Valiants but Red to determine their course of action. Mita, for her part, was not silent when it came to the strategizing, piping up from Ellen's bag, though not sticking more than her upper body out so as to avoid attracting attention beyond their clique. "The situation might change! Or... the authorities might have everything under control, that is possible too. But... remember, the important thing is that those suffering from the Madness are put down, right? If the authorities do it, that's fine too! And... there's no time limit on when the affected technology needs to be recovered..." she pointed out in a not-as-squeakily-yelled voice. Going in while guns were blazing might have been nigh suicidal, but there were other ways.

---

Meanwhile Akni still has another 25 minutes of class, to plot her revenge... and wonder what's going on~

 

[ERode]

Yu-Ri turned around slowly when Chie announced her presence, her face expressionless but her heart hammering. Nodding once at the love-love shenanigans between the senpai and her kouhai, the Chinese girl mulled over all the suggestions and knowledge shared by the others. Now, what did she know?

This was a risky situation. The CDF were keeping their distance, due to being afraid of a counterattack. There was a sewer system, though, that they could exploit to stay undetected. If they planned on going into the sewers, however, would mean that they can't really return to school, at least not until they took a long shower to get rid of the stench of human refuse. And finally, Mita claimed that it was fine to let the authorities do the killing, as long as the Valiants eventually recovered the technology.

If the Madness-infected were killed, they would probably be sent to the coroner's or whatever. Into a CDF Base. Would that be more difficult than the situation they were currently in? Perhaps.

Yu-Ri closed her eyes for a moment, connecting the points and trying to think clearly amongst this ear-wrenching atmosphere.

"Ok," she finally said, "Three choices. We can do sewers and use Remi's radar to get to where we need to. Looks like CDF are keeping things at a distance, so we should still be able to do this quickly. We can also, however, just let the CDF do all the fighting for us, wait until they're done, and then snatch up the bodies. That'll mean going up directly against their offense, but they might hesitate to use their big guns near their own men. Finally, we can attack a CDF HQ or wherever we think they're going to keep those bodies, and just take it from there. It'd give us time to prepare and work out the RFID stuff, but we'd have to get the location first."

"Choose quickly."

Before Farron can find an excuse to follow them.

 

[R-9 Pilot]

[fieldbox=", #5fd4a3, solid"]

Remi's idea certainly would work. It would be terrible, and probably unsubtle, given they probably wouldn't be able to just sneak back to school as if nothing had happened. On the other hand, if they just let the CDF handle it, it wouldn't be much better for them. Leaving it to the CDF may be all well and good, for some definitions of good. But breaking into a morgue and stealing from it would likely be much harder.

"It's still too dangerous to show up in there, unless you like the prospect of getting shot. Repeatedly." She probably didn't need to say much to really make the point. "The situation's already fucked. We might be able to at least get a better view of it if we can get on top of a building nearby, but other than watch, I think we should stay out of this one if we want to live on to fight another day."

One idea did already pop into Ellen's mind. They couldn't just jump in without being killed. They probably couldn't just waltz into any CDF facility and extract things from these two fighters, either. They could just leave these to the CDF completely, but if they wanted a prize and didn't mind something obviously criminal...which they'd be labeled as even if they were caught being actively heroic...there was a good chance while they bodies were in transit. Unless they just collected into some sort of entire platoon, it might be possible to just jump whatever ambulance or other vehicle trucked the corpses away and make off with what they needed.

"I just had an idea that might still get us what we want. It's still risky, but not suicidal. And, even I don't really like it..." She walked further off, motioning for the others to follow, as she looked for a likely place they could get a better vantage point. She did lay out her idea of attacking the transport after the fact. No actual plan for how, yet, but if nobody else liked the idea, best to drop it. She did have a question for Mita, though. "Speaking of a better view, don't we have an invisible eye in the sky we could leverage? I don't know if there's any way we could access a feed from it, but that drone would come in handy about now."
[/fieldbox]

 

[Insomnant]

27092115582223156.7​

The layout of the blocks across the street from the CDF barricade did provide a chance to get a better view! The best bet was the buildings on the corner of the intersection, since the conflict was taking place between two blocks, mostly venturing into the Southern one. There options were twofold: to the Southeast, a rundown library building, old and reminiscent of a time when books were still read, now most often used as 'net access points for those few who lacked SmartViews, as well as a neutral meeting ground for gangs since the entrance still had metal detectors.

To the Northeast lay a multi-tiered entertainment zone, with various food-making machines and a seating area on one floor, gambling venues of the physical and virtual type on another, seedy shops of definitely non-child friendly products on a third, and a no-kids-allowed floor to enjoy said products on the fourth. Above the risqué levels the building sat empty, a closed arcade and AR-enhanced laser tag arena on the fifth, and a shut down high-end restaurant at the top.

The library would log their entrance, while the entertainment zone would not... But in either building the presence of a child during school hours would attract attention if they were too noticeable.

When Mita was questioned on the presence of the spy drone, she looked a bit sad, her wings drooping. "The drone's stealth system is very effective, but... the authorities have so much attention on the area that Srade believes deploying it to the area poses a significant risk of detection. But... it's how I knew that this was going on in the first place! So, it... wasn't too useless, right?" She sounded extremely apologetic, on behalf of the spy drone, it would seem.

The sound of an additional vehicle driving down the street might attract their attention, another APC moving to join the blockade, with a squad of CDF enforcers piling out after parking. They toted some very heavy weaponry.