Faulty Wiring: Bad Dog

Participants:

Hopper_icon.jpg Dion_icon.jpgAillen_Icon.jpg Jocelyn_icon.jpg

Scene Title Faulty Wiring: Bad Dog!
Synopsis Dion, Jocelyn, and Aillen are discovered by the Gremlin's massive mechanical steam hound.

Gremlin's Factory

Hot, dark, and smokey, now with more molten death and angry things.


When we last left the Scoobies, Dion, Jocelyn and Aillen have been watching Hopper play his infiltration skills out. So far so good, and thanks to quick and accurate action by Aillen the Rabbit never got to sound the alarm that Hopper is not who he now is believed to be. Glitch, that is Hopper in Boss Gremlin form, has talked with a trio at the bottom, drank with them, and was pointed up to an upper office. He gives you an 'I'm Ok' signal as he heads up the stairs and throws the door open. There is some barking in German and then all is quiet for a while. From the window you can see Glitch turn back into Hopper and have a long conversation with the figure inside, both of them looking over something on a computer.

Dion has no real idea what's going on. Sure, he could understand some of the German after a few minutes, but still. He's got his goblet in one hand, filled with caffeinated goodness, and his wireless microphone of bliss in the other. He edges his way over towards that office to try to get some idea what's going on, but on the whole he just stands there looking pretty.

Aillen watches everything going on curiously, his spear at the ready and dangerous as any weapon could be in his hands when Hopper entered the office, especially when he changed back into himself. "What the hell does he think he's doing?" He frowns as he keeps his spear at ready, looking to the window, and all around the ebil laboratory to make sure nothing disturbs them, or goes wrong when he can do anything about it.

Jocelyn frowns slightly, straining to hear the conversation in the office, watching with curiosity to see just what Hopper is trying to do. She panics slightly when he drops his disguise, but apparently there's nothing amiss, so she relaxes slightly. Well, admittedly, not very relaxed, as she's still brandishing her sword, getting a feeling that nothing can actually go this easily. It's never that easy. She looks to Aillen, shaking her head and shrugging slightly, "I honestly don't know. This just seems off, entirely. But hopefully Hopper knows what he's doing."

The conversation goes pleasantly. There is a handshake made, and the LARGE gremlin in the office looks almost pleased by Hopper's reaction to something. Hopper bends to put a zipdrive in a computer and then pauses about the same time Aillen's faeries start to freak out. They find a nice safe place inside Aillen's clothes to hide. Hopper stares at the screen and then turns instantly to look out the window, his eyes getting wide as saucers. He starts to yell something, that can't be heard over the sound of the factory's thrumming and humming. But he is pointing directly behind you and looks scared out of his damned minds. Now, as a reminder, the three of you are on a catwalk about 40 feet in the air, over large vats of molten liquid.

When Hopper points behind them, Dion gets an unfortunate sort of feeling. "Has… anyone been watching behind us?" he asks in a worried sort of voice before turning to see what awful thing is there. He's pretty sure he doesn't want to know, but it seems like a really, really important thing to know.

Jo goes slightly pale as Hopper points, part of her not really wanting to see just what had him so scared from his nice secure little box above them. At Dion's question, she looks to her friend and shakes her head, "Ah, no, not exactly…" She smirks when Aillen's faeries seek shelter in his clothing, rather amused by the sight of Aillen glowing slightly from the faerie light, although the amusement is very, very short lived. She forces herself to turn around and look over her shoulder, dreading what was waiting for them back there.

Aillen just responds to the look of horror like any other call to battle, flipping his spear to point that direction as he pivots to face the oncoming horror. "Dion get back behind us hurry!" He adjusts his spear as he concentrates into the space behind them to see what it might be.

Behind you is something that probably you wish you hadn't seen. The loud noises and shaking in the factory have all but covered the sounds of a 2 story large steam-powered mechanical construct that looks like a giant hell hound, only made in the strange method of steam-punk construction. Spotlights the size of Dion stare down like eyes. The maw on the creature looks like it is made out of some sort of enormous bear trap, as it opens it's mouth to let out a loud roar, you can see a thousand grinding gears churning and threatening to tear whatever gets in there apart. It has climbed up easily from the floor, propping it's front 'paws' on the sides of the vats, unbothered by the heat.

Dion was right. He absolutely did not want to know what was behind us. Certainly, Hopper's reaction to the thing is totally understandable and the effeminate teen does exactly the reasonable thing to do in this situation - he screams like a nine-year-old girl in pigtails. He wants to back up behind Aillen, but the thing is Right There. Chances are it won't do him a lot of good, instead then, he waves his microphone wildly in front of him, praying he'll hit the thing. And then praying that if he does, it'll actually work on Robo Hellhound. It worked on that mechanical bull, after all. Don't ask.

Jocelyn yelps slightly at the sight of the massive beast behind them, backing away slightly, her eyes going wide, before she steels herself and stands her ground, sword held at the ready. She frowns at the wicked foe, narrowing her gaze at it, attempting to analyze it, hoping to find some weakness.

Aillen shoved the spears haft into the back of his belt as he ran for the guiding hand rails of the catwalk, planting his foot onto it as he flung himself into the air to try and grab hold of one of the crane chains, hands grasping for the chain as he tried to latch hold.

The primary threat is Dion, why? Because thus far he is the only one who has attacked. The massive creature simply moves it's head with an unnatural speed, given it's massive size. The thing is 2 stories tall and made to destroy. It narrows those halogen light-eyes on Dion and in an instantly, he pushes up on the vats to throw his body up, opens his mouth and comes down hard and heavy on the walkway, trying to eat Dion in one bite, and in the process, he sends the catwalk wobbling and rocking.

There's a strong resemblance between Dion and a deer in headlights, as the massive thing turns its attention towards the terrified boy. He manages not to get eaten, but only because the catwalk throws him off balance. Unfortunately, it does get a piece of him as his arm gets snagged on one of those gears. He shrieks again, this time in pain. As though he's remembered he's not completely helpless - but rather just mostly - he finally thinks to activate Untouchable Opponent and then Not the Face. Hopefully, to not be hurt worse next time. And, of course, with the catwalk wobbling he needs to hang onto that for dear life.

Jocelyn manages to grab hold of the railing, preventing herself from being flung into a very unpleasant bath of molten metal. That near miss seems to remind her that she can fly, and she frowns, seeming to hover slightly off the wobbling catwalk. When Dion is hit, she starts moves along the path towards him, moving into position to catch him should he take a spill off the catwalk.

As he hits the apex of his swing from the crane, he sees the dog beast take a bite out of the rather defenseless Dion. He lets out a roar as he begins to swing back towards the dog, flipping the crane hook into his hand with his feet. "To the eyes ya bleeding cowards!" He calls out, the little fae shaken out of their terror hiding under his clothing at the direct order, and the swarm heads towards its eyes as a distraction as he swings into it with full momentum, his hand slamming the hook towards a section of its piping to latch hold.

The large creature, snorts and shakes his head angrily as the pixies get in his way. He snaps at them to try and get them out of the way, all the while, unaware of the chain getting hooked to him, or the fact that Aillen is now on his back. It sucks to not have nerve endings or pressure gauges…but then again, it can't feel pain. The Nemean-Steam-Hellhound, let's just call him, "Spike". Spike, starts to attack again, looking at Dion and then letting out a loud cloud of steam from his nostrils before shifting gears and whirring his head around to once again take a bite, this time out of Jocelyn.

Jocelyn shrieks in fury, and quite possibly a little bit of unbridled terror, as the hell hound lunges for her. Launching herself backwards off the catwalk and dropping slightly before grabbing hold of the metal platform and allowing the momentum of the fall to carry her up and under the grate, trying to get some cover from the attacking hound. This acrobatic action knocks a stray chunk of metal off from the catwalk, dropping into the molten vat below and releasing a puff of smoke and a loud hiss. She grimaces slightly, breaking out in a heavy sweat from the heat of the foundry below.

Hopper is pounding on the glass, angrily as he sees his friends being attacked. He looks around the room for a few moments before he appears at the window with an old PA-Mike. "It's made out of metal. Put it in the molten metal and then cool it quickly." He looks down at the three gremlins who are hiding. "Man the cranes, those people are on our side now." The gremlins start running for the crane controls.

Dion is not a fighter. He just isn't. But the thing hit him. Now that he's not in immediate threat of falling - as opposed to near-immediate threat - he kind of loses his shit. Growling in a most un-Dionlike way, he glares and then launches towards the creature. His goblet is a flask again, and stowed in an inside pocket, and he's swinging again with the microphone to try to tag the huge beast.

Jocelyn lunges at the beast from below the catwalk, aiming her sword strike at the fore legs of the creature where it balances on the vats, attempting to knock it off balance and into the vat of molten metal. She growls fiercely, throwing herself into the attack, sweat pouring off of her from the heat of the surrounding factory.

Aillen hops down off the back of the dog as more goblins are rushing around, his legs compacting with the landing, kicking up soot and dust bits. "Get up there and get that crane working! Move it!" As the Faeries zip through the air with the whirring of insect wings. Still he needed to get that thing off balance faster if the crane was going to do its work, and kicking a metal box over to where he needs to be, he slammed gae bolga under the mecha dogs foot and sweating profusely between the steam and exertion he grunted and pushed down on the sufficiently large lever as he tried to move the world, or at least the dog.

Let's take some things into consideration, shall we? Dog's aren't climbing creatures and since the schematics for such a mechanical monstrosity is based on the real thing, it stands to reason it has the same lack of balance that most dogs have. Struck in the nose by the microphone the creatures initial reaction is to attack, however it can't. Something about it….what is this feeling? Spike's eyes start to flicker and strobe as Euphoria for the first enters into a creature that has never had any sort of feeling or emotions. They are new and they are over powering. Feeling the *PING* of the sword against his knees, they go soft and weak. The gremlins get into place and the crane starts to lift and pull. The feeling of pushing at his paw causes it to go wobbly and the reaction is one that is desired, at least in the most part. The animal slips and since the top half of his body is the higher weighted, it slams into the catwalk, knocking it down completely as the entire dog goes into the molten liquid, it's hind legs sticking up and twitching as the front half starts to heat and melt.

Dion is hurting, off-balance, pissed off, and worst of all - sweaty. This is not the most fun he's ever had. At least he did manage to bap Robo Hellhound, but then with everything else going on the whole catwalk collapses. Below it? Molten Death. At least he has the presence of mind to realize he has to move really fast. He races a few steps in Jo's direction before he runs out of footing, then hurls himself up and away from that molten death. Of course, they're also way up high, so he screams out "Jo!" and holds his hands up for her to hopefully catch. She's the one that flies, after all. Hopefully with Perfect Partner he's spaced and timed it well enough to be caught.

Jocelyn watches with horror at the unfolding scene, frozen in place for a brief moment at the horror of it all, favoring her bloodied ankle despite not actually standing on it, as she's hovering motionless in the sweltering air. She lets her sword drop from her hand, the weapon vanishing with a fluttering of wings, as it is rather obviously of no use now. When Dion calls for her, she snaps out of it, shaking her head and starting to move in Dion’s direction as he runs towards her. Watching as he soars into the air, Jo launches herself off of the collapsing catwalk, wincing as she does so, soaring into the air and meeting Dion midair, avoiding catching his injured arm as best she could.

Aillen sees the wave of molten metal start coming his way, "Indiana Jones never had to deal with this crap!" and with that expression he runs towards the opposite side of the hall, leaping over boxes and barrels, and as he starts running out of space he leaps onto a small containing tank and flings himself at the wall as he flips his spear forward impaling the spear into it as he clings for dear life, glad he'd managed to do pretty well on those presidential fitness tests for chin ups as he watches the molten metal melt and burn everything beneath him.

Dion is relieved when he's caught. Not the he doubted her. Not at all. Really. Honest. He is relieved, though. Then though, there's wet. So he's now hurting, sweaty, pissed off AND wet. Okay, so the wet isn't as bad, except for his wardrobe. Water stains can be a pain in the ass. And then there's steam rocketing up, and steam tends to hurt unless you're applying it via steam room. "Dodge the steam! Dodge the steam!" He shrieks suddenly, realizing how much that could suck if it hits them wrong.

Aillen stands in the torrential downpour of cooling water, pulling himself up to stand on the spear, leaning against the wall as steam rises up, obscuring things for a bit. With the world hidden in the fog he calls out, "Everyone alright?" He waits there on his perch, sighing softly and wincing at the occasional bit of discomfort, more grumbling than owwie.

Hopper comes tearing down the stairs, stopping at the last of them, as part of it is missing and fused with still smoldering metal. He repeats the words exactly as Aillen does. "Everyone alright?" he calls, looking frantic and worried. Above him coming down the stairs is the rather large chief of the gremlins who looks between Hopper and the others and the mess that is made. Hopper turns back and mutters something in German, the Gremlin nods cryptically and calls over the other Gremlins, who climb up chains, bandy themselves across the rafters like monkeys and then drop into place on the stairs as well.

Jocelyn winces slightly as Dion shrieks, his high-pitched voice rather piercing when that loud that close, "Ouch, ok, ok. No need to scream. Please." Jo works her way to solid ground, or at least a not damaged catwalk, whimpering slightly as several of the steam jets catch her injured leg and bare back. But she doesn't let the steam hit Dion - the shrieking hurts almost more than the steam - really don't need a headache on top of the burns and bites. Eventually, she sets Dion down on one of the catwalks, although she just continues to hover, preferring not to put weight on the hurt leg.

Dion also winces when steam touches him, but on the whole he's not nearly as bad off as he was when Robo Hellhound tried to chew him into mulch. As soon as she puts him down he clings to whatever it nearest and solid, and shakes. It's hard to tell if it's fear or still the anger that led him to swing at the Hound a second time. He does manage to call to the others "I'm alright."

Aillen shouts up again, "Bit of chain or a rope would be nice, I think the metal might not be too comfortable to walk on for abit still, ya know." He gives a wave up to the catwalk, occasionally glancing back to the cooled mechadog in metal, still only vaguely sure it is deceased.

Hopper speaks to the Gremlins quietly explaining the situation in guttural old German, pointing here and there to the various people. The gremlins each run up stairs single file and returns a moment later with a fire extinguisher tucked under their arms. They are copper tubes, with all manner of glass tubes and such, much more elaborate and different on this side of things. "They are gonna send us home," Hopper announces, "I'll be coming back to deal with negotiations, but I'll explain everything once we are someplace safe and sound…" the gremlins all jump/swing towards Aillen, Joc, and Dion, and even the big guy pulls out a smaller version and points it at Hopper. "Everyone give them a thumbs up when you are ready for the trip home?"

Jocelyn rolls her eyes and calls out into the steam, "I'm fine, generally," she looks Dion over, making sure he's safe and secure on the platform, "You going to be ok?" She looks rather concerned, especially when the Gremlins approach, still not quite trusting them. She offers a rather weak thumbs up, glancing around to see if the others were doing the same, not really wanting to spend the night in the dark steamy, creepy factory.

Dion stares at the gremlins, as though trying to work through his brain how they got to this particular place in life. And now they're going to spray them with fire extinguishers to send them home. "I'll be okay… I… really need a drink." He takes out his flask and has a swig, though he is nice enough to also offer to the gremlin coming to take him home. In that case it's Jolt again, though.

Hearing that homeward bound was the order of the moment, Aillen lets out a whistle, the faeries zipping towards him to take up residence in his clothing again. Aillen crouches on the spear, hand holding tight to it. "Alright gremlin, guess ya don't understand me. But take me home." He raises up his other hand and gives a thumbs up, bracing for the sudden change of state into gaseous nature again, looking to the mecha dog over his shoulder.

Dion's Gremlin takes the jolt and downs it, getting more on the outside of his mouth than on the inside. But he smiles a vicious smile and gives him a thumbs up before spraying him down, as do all of them. Hopper makes sure everyone is good to go before he gives his own thumbs up. The sensation of being vaporized and rocketing through dimensions once again gives your lunch a reason to come up. Then *FWAM* The 4 of you hit the floor of the lab, roughly at the same time. Hopper manages to knock over bout a billion things in his decent.

Immediately after giving the thumbs up to the Gremlin, Jo closes her eyes and flinches slightly, prepping herself for the vaporized sensation. And then, moments later, finds herself landing rather forcibly on the tile floor back at the school. On her injured leg. She yelps slightly, and bounces back into the air, hovering just off the floor. She looks around, making sure that she's actually back in the room they'd left from, checking on the others as they land too, not bothering to walk and instead just sort of gliding along the floor between the others. When Hopper arrives, she turns her gaze to him, crossing her arms over her chest, "So, explanation, please?"

As Aillen impacts the floor, he rolls up to his knees, supporting himself with his spear as he looks about the lab. His eyes go around the room, paranoia already checking for threats that might be present, though he is looking at the rats. As angry Jo made demands, he looked between Jo and Hopper, kinda wanting answers as well. "Yeah, and that dog? Was that something the gremlins made? Wasn't anything like the oven or sparrows, or heck the rats." As Dion offers the flask, he takes a swig, holding it up in praise to the provider before he downs a deep swig.

Looking -extremely- guilty and concerned, Jack looks between the group, frowning softly to himself. "I'm so so sorry that got out of hand." He scratches his head and props himself up on one of the broken bookcases that has toppled in his landing. "Well, first, Gremlin's aren't exactly what we thought they were. I think they are more a safety measure. Like a carrying capacity for technology." he puts up his hands and realizes that he's going a little geeky in the brain, and his neurons are firing so quickly that it's hard to explain. "Ok…. so. They've always been around. Their integral function is to keep humans from reaching a critical mass with technology, that is…. We create sometimes to create, we don't realize that sometimes what we create is something that maybe we shouldn't have or it's something that maybe we can't deal with yet….Take the Hadron reactor. We have -no- clue what would have happened, should it have not malfunctioned. Could have been a black hole on earth, anti-matter particles, time travel…things we aren't ready for. World War II, Atom Bombs, technology used for war, that was their heyday. It's when they were the strongest. Then I came along and caused them to appear because of my experiments and technological progress…. but then Atlantis came and caused them to go into over drive, hence why they are here and why they suddenly went violent….." That said, he wiggles his fingers around his temples as if he is changing gears physically. "They work for me now. I told them I created them, and I'm their boss. And…. ya know… since I did sort of bring them here with all this…. I'm responsible…. so I just convinced them. And yeah… there are blueprints for and entire army of mechanical creatures that they are working on…. but I've convinced them to stop for the time being, at least stop causing issues for the human world and concentrate on the Atlanteans since they are the ones that brought all the new untested tech into the human world."

Jocelyn lowers herself onto the floor beside Dion while waiting for Hopper to explain, taking a moment to look herself over, muttering a few rather harsh words in Greek when she looks at her leg, watching as the torn flesh on her leg knits itself back together without so much as a scar or hint that it had been damaged before. As Jackson starts explaining everything that had just gone on, Jo really tries to concentrate and understand what he's saying, but, well, science and tech isn't exactly her forte. About halfway through that explanation, she borrows Dion's flask and takes a drink, although it doesn't actually help with the understanding.

"So, ah, lemme get this straight," she pauses and takes a deep breath, trying to parse through everything Hopper had just sort of rambled at them, "You just marched into another culture, told them you were essentially their Creator, and took over?" She raises an eyebrow at that, but shrugs, "Eh, if they're willing to stand against the Atlanteans, can't see any harm in getting their help."

Dion listens, though he looks like a lot of what Hopper is saying is making his brain ache. Fortunately, there's plenty of alcohol. "So… it's like Jeff Goldblum in Jurassic Park? People being so excited that they can do something that they don't stop to think about whether they should do something?" Yeah, he's way too sober for conversations like this. "Anyway, yeah. The Atlanteans are the ones they should be messing with. They're the ones making way too high tech around here. Maybe they can be gremlins in their machines instead…"

Aillen rises to his feet after the drink, all of the blistering fading from his body as the little pains and annoyances heal. "Well, alls well that ends well I guess. Nobody managed to die, thankfully." He sighs and stretches, and then looks to Dion. "You however, have got to learn how to avoid getting hit, man. And how to swing that mic around. Ah well, basically anything and everything related ta fighting probly. " He propped the spear over his shoulder as he looked back to Hopper. "Course, how much time will that buy us? I mean, what happens when the Atlanteans are gone? Gremlins go back to trying to kill us with mecha dogs and evil tiny animals?"

Hopper grins impishly at Jo's question. "Actually yeah…" he offers scratching the back of his head, his hair sticking up a little. Yeah, he's totally mental, but he's cute right? Right? Anywho, he continues to scratch the back of his head as he listens to the questions. "Exactly," he offers to Dion. "And they will. I'm going to have them build up a mechanical arc if you will. And then while they are helping me understand their tech, I'm going to help them understand new technology and then point them at the Atlanteans." He turns his attention to Aillen. "Time? All of it. They literally think I am their boss, commander and chief, god, president, Caesar. I'm it to them. So, that said. When the Atlantean menace is gone, I assume the will hang around with me. See that I am not pushing the forefronts of technology and even when I do, I'll lay it out so they understand that it's not pushing the constrains of understanding versus knowledge too hard…."

Jocelyn looks up at Hopper and shakes her head, chuckling slightly, "How, ah, colonial of you. But, I suppose it's better than, y'know, full on destroying them all. Genius plan, though, getting them to go after something we're not quite suited to do." She nods and looks over at Dion, "Ah, yeah, I have to agree with Aillen. Little bit more in the way of battle prep may not be a bad idea for you. Or at least a little more in the dodging and getting out of the way." She stretches slightly, realizing she's got the equivalent of a nasty sunburn from the steam, but not really worrying about it overly much, despite looking a bit like a cooked lobster.

Dion looks grumbley. "Hey. No one said *anything* about a huge, rabid Mechadoggy. How on Earth was I expected to handle that? And I hit it eventually, didn't I?" Okay, so he had to completely lose his shit to manage it, but he looks completely recovered now. Apart from being really displeased about his clothing. Oh, and his injuries probably aren't delighting him, either.

Hopper gives a nod and continues prattling about the battle plan for a few moments, dropping in some rather scientific sounding things that don't even sound like English. He then blinks and comes back to the conversation at hand. "Al and Jo are right, D. We are gonna be put up against some nasties, and we need everyone to be able to handle their own. That means you too. Now… if I made you a sword, or a whip, or a gun or something? What kind of weapon do you think you could use?" He asks, reaching over and knocking over a beaker to grab a pen and pad. He looks coked out of his brain, but he gets that way when nerves are firing. "Aillen can handle your training."

"Alright we can have more explanations in the bright of day. For now, I oughta see about getting you guys properly to your homes. Less I gotta worry about you guys being hit on your way home the better." Aillen at least doesn't seem any worse for wear after tonight. The athletic wear he has on only shrunk slightly in the steam bath, which just put him in even more skintight clothing for your viewing pleasure. All in all he was clean, healed, and mostly dry now. "And we can bring our pets too. "


The concluding battle of the Faulty Wiring series, including Hopper's explaining wrap up. Preceded by Faulty Wiring: Glitch, Boss Gremlin.


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