With no additional Minions attacking on Spog's orders, the group was able to easily coast through the Tower segments ahead of them while Twilight and Nefarious worked on the Darkstar Fission Tether together to see what they could make of it. Meanwhile, Qwark and Alister focused on manipulating the various gadgets in the path to open the gates to the way forward. After a time, Qwark decided to make some conversation. "So...how goes that experimentation?" he asked Twilight.
"Not so good," Twilight admitted ruefully. "We're trying to come up with something new to do with this weapon...but everything we've come up with so far are things that can be done more efficiently with some of the older Gadgetron weapons. We don't want to repeat anything."
"Unfortunately, coming up with new ways to use lightning weapons is rather difficult," Nefarious grumbled irritably. "There's only so many ways to tame lightning. There's already been charged spheres, draining weapons, rolling electrical spheres, lightning whips, lightning wall generators, even lightning rockets. What else are we supposed to do with it?"
"It's really frustrating," Twilight confirmed, putting the weapon away. "We can't have used up all the ways to use lightning! I mean, it's frikkin' lightning!"
"Remote control Lightning Elemental drones?" Alister joked.
"I thought about that, but it doesn't work with FtF tech," Twilight countered. "No real way for the energies to combine."
"What if you made it so they could merge to become a giant lightning drone with multiple turrets?" Qwark offered.
Nefarious glowered at Qwark. "Stop having all the good ideas!" he snarled angrily.
"We'd need to stop to make those tweaks, though," Twilight admitted. "That's changing the entire nature of the weapon after all. We'll leave that till later. For now, let's keep moving. If we stop for too long, Spog will get impatient and send more minions after us."
"Good thing you're done now," Alister called out. "We're about to hit a different kind of path." He pointed forward to where a spinning swingshot target awaited.
"Right," Twilight confirmed, putting away her weapon and pulling out her swingshot.
The four latched on before letting themselves be launched through a large glass window to land grinding on another massive pipeline. As Alister, Nefarious, and Qwark rode the pipe and Twilight glided nearby, Spog floated into view. "There you are!" he proclaimed angrily. "I'll show you how I deal with interlopers around here!"
"File a report?" Qwark shouted out tauntingly.
With a scream of rage, Spog smashed the pipe ahead of them, forcing them to jump to the conveniently placed pipe nearby.
"Qwark, once the battle starts, don't taunt the enemy unless you have stable ground!" Twilight hissed angrily.
"Oops!" Qwark admitted. "Sorry!"
Spog flew ahead, dropping mines along the new pipe that the group had leapt to, forcing them to evade. As they continued, eventually Spog got angrier. "You've wasted enough of my time!" he proclaimed angrily as he sent buzzsaws down the pipe towards the group...which were still easily evaded.
"You ever get the feeling he's not really trying?" Nefarious muttered dryly. "I mean, there's not even a challenge here! I thought he was supposed to be a boss?"
"Commander, the interlopers are still alive," 'Stuart' informed Spog.
"I know they're still alive," Spog growled. "I'm rectifying the situation right now!"
"Are you sure?" 'Stuart' asked curiously. "Because that's what you said a few minutes ago. Were you being humorous?"
"Can we talk about this later?" Spog begged.
"Stuart has a point," Twilight pointed out. "If you really wanted to destroy us, you could have just smashed the pipe we were on and dropped us into the pit below. Even with jetpacks, that kind of fall would have been debilitating, if not lethal."
Spog actually managed to look somewhat awkward. "Err, well..."
"Commander Spog has already exceeded his allowed collateral damage allotment," 'Stuart' intoned. "Any further collateral damage he inflicts on the Master's construction will be deducted from his pay and marked on his record."
"So...basically you're being forced to choose between being marked down for excessive damage, or for failing to stop us?" Qwark called out as the group reached the end of the pipeline.
"Yes!" Spog cried out despairingly. "And I had a flawless record before now! I could have retired happily a few days from now with a clean slate if it weren't for you lot, and taken pride in knowing I had done the best job possible! But now, thanks to you meddling brats, my record will be forever marred!"
"Gosh...I'm really sorry about that," Qwark offered sympathetically. "I know how hard it is to live down a mistake, especially when it comes to a record of good works." He ignored Nefarious making gagging motions, much to Twilight's amusement.
"And I know how hard it is to live down the one mistake that destroys a stellar lifetime of service," Alister added, looking somewhat sorrowful as he gazed into his own memories.
Spog sniffed to himself. "You do? That...that makes me feel a bit better, thanks." He was silent for a time. "Does that mean you'll let me obliterate the three of you and capture the equine for the Master's experiments?"
"We're not that sympathetic!" Qwark snapped out.
"Hypocrite!" Spog snapped out, shifting into position as he started dropping in more assault robots.
"So much for peaceful negotiations," Nefarious joked as he hauled out his weapons.
LOL nice chapter!
Diplomacy has failed, TEAM UNITE UP!
That awkward moment when you realize you have more in common with your enemy than you thought.
believe that's DaRkstar
Diplomacy failed, time to bring out the heavy artillery. *take that a small box that is quickly opened and enlarged to reveal a large rack filled with guns, weapons, and explosives* all right ponies and whatever species you are choose your weapon. *takes a FHG (freaking huge gun) and a double-sided battle ax* Alright, I've got my babies anyone else want to join me for mass destruction?
7368113 You got any katana's?
7368113 I'm in
7368113 any poisoned knives in there?
7368113 *Grabs Turok Dinosaur Hunter Fusion Cannon* I may only have 2 shots, but there'll be a BIG BOOM before I am done!
7368113 how about an overcharged Gravity hammer? And ditch the FHG, use the BFG-90000! That gun is basically four BFG 9000 rigged together and there won't be much left of the Enemy after firing the gun... nor the area surrounding the enemy....
7368113 I'll take Ea, Vimana, Excalibur, and Avalon. Hmm... and some God Hand for shits 'n' giggles.
If Noble Phantasms aren't available... I'll take a Twilight-modified "Fat Man Launcher".
7368113 I've got my own*pulls out RWBYesq halberd/sniper rifle combo*
7368027 When diplomacy fails, who do you call?
Unarmed drones to watch an ambassador take spy-level punishment leaving their family traumatized and possibly breaking. Thanks Obama and Hillary.Marines.Twilight Sparkle and the Lombax race!7368113 Eh, I'm fine with a grenade launcher.
You are supposed to exhaust the enemy and defeat them BEFORE reasoning with them.
I know these 4 have broken the mold at times, but there IS an order to these things.
The last part of this chapter gave me some TFS Dr. Wheelo vibes until Qwark refused to be destroyed
I honestly thought they were gonna work something out.
7368113 I'll take a bunch of lightsabers. *Proceed to grab every Legends type of lightsaber there is ( over fifty, if I'm remembering correctly), then teleport out into a Bolo Transport Pod ( carries a Bolo Mark XXXIII berthed semiexternally ). Enters into the Primary Command Deck of "Raven" (Bolos are sentient).*
"Greetings, Commander. It is good to see you again."
Raven, we've got another mission. *Proceeds to activate the neural interface*
Raven/Revan entity jumps the Pod into Hyperspace.
7369538
Eh, I'll go with something a bit more esoteric on this site.
*jumps into command cockpit for Progenitor-type Commander unit*
Let's see Spog deal with a Von Neumann swarm of killbots, tanks, aircraft, and warships.
7375610
I'll just call in one of my dimensional counterparts.
7368113
"Thanks, but no thanks!" Turns to Spog and says, "Kamehameha!" releasing the blast and disintegrating the bot.
7368113
*eyes light up like a child at Christmas* So many wonderful toys... *grabs a pair of copies of the Sword art Online Black Iron Great Sword/Monolith, straps them to my back, then grabs two RYNOs–the RYNO from R&C '16, and the RYNO V–while activating a suit of hi-tech black and silver-white armor* Oh... Yeah... *primes both RYNOs* Let's dance, Spog.
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*gears up in blood raven terminator armor with the full might of the chapter with me* COME BROTHERS! WE HAVE RELICS TO FIND AND GIFTS TO RECEIVE! FOR THE EMPEROR!
9836808
Get's out a gaster blaster
Ready