A Rustling, But More Than Bushes (MT/PMT)

They follow, with weapons holstered.

The Chameleon sits down, still messing around with the datapad. His own sidearm is holstered. He's not drawn attention to it either.

By this time, the information has finally gotten to D'Arc, who is just stunned and joins K'Rina and Rould at the Rutian Consulate. One of the Rutians has put a datapad in the room, which is now transmitting audio and video of the meeting that's about to take place.

High Priest Radon walks in and sits at the head of the table. Xenon comes in moments after, and Neon moments after that, taking two of the other chairs at the table.

That last chair remains eerily empty.

It looks like Neon changed rather quickly, because he's in his immaculate robes despite having left only moments before.

High Priest Radon is leaning back in his chair, stroking his chin in thought. The Bismouthi soldiers are silent, though glancing suspiciously at the foreigners from time to time. The High Priests are very quiet as well, though a few of them are whispering something to each other.

"He isn't going to come," High Priest Krypton declares. The silence is now complete, and all eyes turn to him. "You know he isn't."

High Priest Radon leans forward. "We will commence," he says, "when I say that we will commence."

"You're not really insisting that we wait for h-"

"And right now, we do not commence," High Priest Radon finishes as though High Priest Krypton hadn't tried to start speaking.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

"It will work," the voice repeats.

"I do not understand," High Priest Argon replies resignedly.

"The others do not know what they want. We know what we want. It is our greatest advantage."

"They know exactly what they want!" High Priest Argon exclaims. "They want my guts!"

"And so your guts they shall have."

"That is the wor-" High Priest Argon stops and takes a deep breath. "I respectfully disagree with your plan."

"Noted," the voice responds. There's a pause.

"Noted..."

"Yes. Noted."

High Priest Argon narrows his eyes. "You know how impor-"

"Not now Bruce," the voice seems to sigh. "It isn't a choice."

The Chameleon will continue to mess around with the datapad until things get started.

And so they wait.

Krypton crosses his arms. The whispering does not begin again. High Priest Radon continues stroking his chin in thought.

"Um, Brother?" High Priest Helium begins carefully.

"Yes?" High Priest Radon responds absently.

"Why are we waiting again?"

"Because if we commence without waiting for High Priest Argon to arrive, it will appear that we framed him. Or that we deliberately used him as a scape goat."

"But we are not," High Priest Helium responds. It's not a question.

"No."

"Then why do we care what it looks like?"

"I believe we've had this discussion before," High Priest Radon replies with a smile.

"Similar," High Priest Helium admits.

High Priest Radon looks around. He nods to himself. "Any sign of High Priest Argon?"

Just as he finishes, the door bursts open, revealing several armed men. The soldiers in the back of the room jump up, raising their weapons, but the men outside the door fire on them...

The Chameleon touches something on his belt and something shimmers around him. He just sits there calmly, still messing with the datapad. Any projectiles coming his way would rebound back on the same trajectory to the shooter.

Linda Lang dives down as the Special Forces troopers move around to protect her as incoming rounds are deflected a centimeter or so away from the armor itself. Hey, it's old Rhean commando armor that comes with its own personal deflector shields. 300 suits of those, used, cost as much as an aircraft carrier and it looks to be a worthwhile investment. They fire back. Blasters are not set to stun.

The lower High Priests (heh) look stunned. Radon doesn't lose a drop of poise. He presses his panic button, and an alarm begins to ring over some hidden speaker system.

The Bismouthi soldiers who rose to meet the attackers are gunned down in the first volley. The attackers turn their guns on the Swiss, now taking losses from the Swiss attacks.

They fall back outside the doorway, and something clinks into the room. An apparently not-so-dead Bismouthi soldier leaps/slides over to it, his left leg trailing behind him uselessly, and his left arm dripping blood. From the ground, he throws the grenade back at the doorway with all his strength. Which isn't much because it only goes partway there before exploding, killing the soldier.

The alarm eerily stops ringing, and no amount of button pressing will make it begin again. No one comes to their rescue. The Chameleon's data pad would work, but be unable to make any connections outside the building.

Just as the immediate danger subsides with the end of the grenade incident, a new alarm bell starts ringing. It's a much different sound. It sounds aggressive.

Upon hearing it, High Priest Radon says, "Quickly, everyone put any electronic devices you have on the table and back away. No, don't ask. Later. Quickly, now."

The other High Priests are doing this before he even finishes the statement. There's a clamor from outside the doorway.

The Chameleon raises a brow, but places the datapad on the table. He stands, taps a device on his belt, then removes his belt and puts it on the table. Shield device must be electronic. He steps away from the table. If it's an EMP, the devices are shielded from it. They also have surge protection. Basically, anything short of FT electronic disruption won't hurt either device. Prior to that, however, when the datapad wouldn't connect, he did attempt to connect directly to a Rutian satellite that's in orbit.

They comply and put phones and helmets and blasters on the table.

(OOC: Panzer, doesn't your armor have electrical systems in it? )

As the Chameleon begins putting his electronics, the High Priests start to explain. They must have practiced this or something, because it's like they can all read the minds of all the others.

"Now this is information we don't normally give to outsiders, but since we seem to be in a situation right now," High Priest Xenon begins.

"An exception may be in order," High Priest Krypton finishes smoothly.

"You are all likely aware that Bismouthi warplanes have never been seen operating anywhere outside of Bismouth. Never for any reason. And that Bismouthi citizens don't bring electronics outside our borders," High Priest Neon Says. The Swiss are now putting their electronics on the table.

"There's a perfectly good explanation for that," High Priest Helium puts in.

"You see, every culture we've encountered uses technology which requires electricity," High Priest Krypton says.

"But ours has always been different, because," High Priest Neon continues. The final Swiss soldier puts his blaster on the table and steps away.

"It requires no external power source. As long as one remains in Bismouth, the electronic field generated by our power plants throughout the country allows any device to pull a constant flow of electricity from thin air," High Priest Xenon finishes.

"Which, in this case," High Priest Radon cuts in drily, "means that a run-of-the-mill EMP is -"

He is interrupted when the electronics on the table begin exploding one by one, down the row. Yes, exploding. Boom. Blowing up. The table catches on fire too.

"Amplified. A lot," High Priest Radon finishes triumphantly.

In any case, High Priest Radon moves over to the dead Bismouthi soldiers and picks up a rifle. He looks like he knows how to use it. He throws the other High Priests sidearms, and all but Neon look like they know how to use them.

It's good, because those soldiers that retreated from the Swiss before step through the doorway again...

The Chameleon raises a brow again. The datapad, with it's EMP shielding is spared, though the screen is now blank. The shield device on his belt seems untouched. He glances it, then up to the door shortly before the soldiers come back in. He hits stealth mode immediately, clearly going into action. His immediate whereabouts can be located only when something stabs one of the enemy soldiers from behind. He seems good at not being hit, though with all the insanity going on, it's possible he could be hit.

(OOC: It's imported FT stuff. The phone will explode, but that's it.)
They raise eyebrows, put their helmets back on, pick up their blasters, and keep shooting.

(OOC: Panpan, the ensuing battle with be excessively boring if you have bullet-warping armor and futuristic blasters. Rut played nice and disabled her shield you know. If your stuff all still works, then her stuff will all still work too, and the whole MT thing will have been a lie! )

(OOC: If you insist.)

They raise eyebrows and put their helmets back on. The deflector shield is fried, as is the HUD, but it seems ok otherwise. When they try the blasters, it farts out a bit of plasma and dies out. They drop it, pick up rifles from dead Bismouthi soldiers and start shooting. If they run out of ammo, they pop out their knuckle vibroblades and start punching them to death.

The attackers are gunned down, partially due to their confusion as to how they're splitting in half randomly with no apparent cause.

"What the HELL is going on?" High Priest Helium asks.

"More importantly," High Priest Xenon says, "is everyone OK?"

Once the attackers are dead, the Chameleon drops stealth and just comes into focus. His left arm is bleeding from where he's been shot, but he seems fine. "Actually, I'd agree with the first question." He slips his knife into a leg sheath hiding under his pants at the ankle. He goes over to his datapad and, with his right hand, taps on it. He raises a brow, then does something that reboots it. It comes up, but it looks like it's rebooting the entire system. He curses in Rutian. "Well, if I can't get a signal, then everything I had to show you is gone. While the datapad itself isn't fried, that EMP reset the system. Wiped it clean. I did store a copy on our satellite as well as sending it out to others. So, I didn't have the only copy." He finally turns his attention to his left arm. "Don't suppose you guys have a medic standing by?"

They nod. One of them was winged in a gap in the armor but he'll be fine. He's being attended to. The soldier attending to him moves to treat the Chameleon as well.

"With our electronics fried, we have no way of directly downloading it onto any of our devices. If there is a way to contact our government, we may be able to have a hard copy of the data sent here."

The Chameleon just looks at the Swiss for a moment before responding. "By the time it takes your government to even locate our satellite, I could have another datapad here straight from the Imperial Republic." Probably true. The Rutian satellite isn't easily located in orbit. Even if they do know about it, and with the contact with Rhea, they likely do, it has to be accessed with Rutian technology.

"That is problematic." She sits down to think.

Meanwhile, concerned that their ability to track their negotiating team is suddenly gone, the government in Bern consults with the Rhean embassy, who had been earlier informed of Rutian involvement in the affairs. The Rutians are notified of what seems to have happened. If they do not desire to go to Earth, they ask for what information the Rutians possess and will head over in a Lambda-class shuttle themselves to make a delivery and then leave.

The High Priests, who spent most of their time cowering in a corner, are unharmed since they weren't the threatening target.

High Priest Neon looks like he's going to be sick.

"There is only one person who has anything to gain from this," High Priest Krypton declares. "And hiding it now will make no difference."

High Priest Radon nods. "It must be Argon's doing," he concurs. "Which means that whatever is going on in this compound must be stopped at all costs."

The Chameleon raises an eyebrow. "That's precisely who what I had pointed to." He starts messing around with the datapad, trying to get a signal.

*****************************

The Rutians are a little confused at first. They do go look to see if they can find out what information might be needed. Oddly enough, the one copy that's found was sitting in Shein's inbox still, unread. It's retrieved and send to the Rheans, considering they can't get hold of the Chameleon at the moment. They do ask to be notified of his status, alive or dead.

(OOC: BTW Rut, regarding a medic:

Panzersharkcat wrote:

The soldier attending to him moves to treat the Chameleon as well.

)