Mastermind E-war

[dinoman666]

When the "rockets" hit, they didn't explode, instead crashing violently into the ground, throwing up chunks of concrete. Anyone unlucky enough to be under the pods were crushed by the sheer force of their landing. Immediately after landfall, pipes stuck out from their tops, followed by the hiss of released, pressurized air. Moments later, clusters of strange, four-legged creatures crawled and scuttled out of the rockets. With aggressive screeches, they pounced at nearby citizens, engulfing their entire heads with their fanged mouths...

Satisfied that the overwhelming Headcrab infestation was providing a useful distraction, the Combine attack force met its opponents halfway, the Striders and Gunships bombarding the first wave of Maulers with deadly pulse fire, followed by missiles and gunfire from the stationary APCs, and then the infantry's own, lighter weapons, as well as the Hunters' flechette launchers...

[Godzilla Forever]

The maulers' thick, heavy armor provides protection from anything smaller than the flechette guns, rockets and the pulse weaponry. The brutish warriors swing their weapons, the force of the blows ripping lesser soldiers apart, while bigger ones, such as hunters, take large dents to their metal carapaces....

Seeing that the citizens were safe underground, the Sheekh soldiers whirl around and open fire with thier plasma weaponry, scorching the headcrabs that get too close and only losing a few naive Sheekhs to the abominations.......

"MOTHER" climbs over the city walls and sees the carnage unfolding. Honingi n her instncts, the cybernetic Ghru'lok fires her dual laser cannons at a couple hunters.......

[UndeadRaptor]

Soon, all the dropships and other transports were on the ground, unloading people and supplies they had with them to help out. The scientists began studying wildlife and plants, while engineers and drones began building up a forward base. In the mean time, snipers and others prepared in rocks, their weapons aimed at the two forces fighting in case they themselfs were attacked at any point at all...

[dinoman666]

Hunters, more vulnerable to blunt force trauma than gunfire, were easily destroyed by the Maulers, but the Striders' Warp Cannons made quick work of the massive creatures, whose armor was of little use. Any smaller foes who got too close were either eviscerated by the Hunters' pointed forearms or impaled by the Strider's equally sharp legs. One Strider turned its attention on MOTHER, firing its Warp Cannon at her.

The Headcrab horde continued to spread throughout the city itself, attacking any defenders inside the city walls indiscriminately, very quickly beginning a full-blown infestation as they overwhelmed the soldiers, taking control of their motor functions and turning them into what could only be described as clawed, zombified horrors. Other Headcrab variants, the Fast Headcrabs and Poision Headcrabs, were far more effective at taking hosts for their own...

[Godzilla Forever]

MOTHER turns her laser towards the warp cannon, locking beams with it while locking her eye mounted plasma mortars onto some other soldiers and firing at will, screeching in pain whilst doing so........

The soldiers continue firing, knowing they cannot compromise the citizens' defenses by entering the underground bunkers.......

The majority of the Maulers are killedin the ensuing fight, but the remainders keep fighting to tie up the soldiers as long as they can.......

[UndeadRaptor]

Ryan and Amanda, now on the ground with their group after some time, go ad monitor each soldier, keeping their heads low to keep from getting shot by either of the sides fighting at the moment, watching those that were winning with little interest. The engineers and drones continued building and setting up, placing some tents in a safe area while building a metallic building at the same time. The scientists aboard continued classifying wildlif and plants, so far declaring the planet itself was habitable...

[dinoman666]

The Strider's Warp Cannon shot suddenly dissipates, but the tall synth sidesteps MOTHER's blast, charging the cannon to fire again, while the rest of the Striders focus their Warp Cannons on the remaining Maulers. The Headcrabs, while individually weak, practically absorb the bullets and plasma as they swarm over the city's defenses, swiftly overwhelming them in a tidal wave of the fearsome parasites...

[Godzilla Forever]

As the sheekhs fight back the hordes, the commander having run out of his plasma blaster's battery and being forced to lower his helmet's hazardous environment mask, hacking away at headcrabs and infected with his plasma blade, he says, "This is Commander Phyrra! We need you to activate prototype 0676!" "No!" the radioer replies. "That will destroy the whole city! There'll be no point!" "I'd rather have all of us die than have the citizens' defenses be breached and infected! DO IT! That's an order!" The radieor sighs and says, "Roger. Over and out." he turns to a scientist and says, "go prepare the vaporizer bomb. Detonate it as soon as you can." The sheekhan sceintist shivers at the thought of what the deadly device will do and heads towards his lab.......

MOTHER roars in pain when the warp blast hits her, the wounds inflicted upon her charring the skin, slowing her regeneration. She fires both beams at the soldier now, one locking with his while the other hits him directly......

[dinoman666]

The Strider staggered back from the blast, letting out an animalistic groan, but still on its feet. The rest of the Combine attack force steadily pushed forward, shooting their way through the enemy ranks...

A Fast Headcrab emerged from behind the commander, leaping at his head and latching on with a horrid screech, its fanged mouth quickly cutting its way through his helmet, the protection doing little more than slow the parasite down...

[UndeadRaptor]

One soldier watches from binoculars, seeing the entire battle unfold, before looking back and asking, "lieutenant! Should we help those being destroyed? It may offer us a valuable ally!" Ryan sighed, thinking it through, before saying silently to the man, "kill those trying to destroy these... natives," and soon enough, sniper rounds tore through the sky before colliding into combine soldiers, the shots seeming to come from thin air as snipers hid themselfs soon afterwards, along with others...

[dinoman666]

The sniper rounds did little except attract the attention of the Gunships, which turned and fired on the forest, tearing through the branches with their powerful pulse cannons, hoping to kill the hiding snipers with the sheer number of dark energy rounds...

[Godzilla Forever]

The commander yells from the creature's attack before thrusting his plasma sword through his head, impaling both him and the parasite, killing them both........

The sheekh soldiers keep firing, but becomnig increasingly skittish as the fighting goes on.....

MOTHER fires all her weapons at the combine forces, the prototype showing no remorse to what she views as monsters.....

The scientist works very quickly, prepping the bomb in only a couple minutes, before getting a couple of drones to pick it up and take it out to be exploded........

[UndeadRaptor]

The snipers retreated from the area, not close enough to the slowly-building base itself to get attention put on those at it. A sentinel flew in to protect their retreat, sending blue beams of lasers at the gunships in hopes to bring them down. The engineers and scienists continued on working, making sure nothing was aimed at them at any point during their work...

[dinoman666]

THe Gunships nimbly dodge the Sentinel's attacks, returning fire with their overwhelming numbers. The rest of the Combine focused their fire on MOTHER, including the Striders' Warp Cannons. Another direct hit from one of those would probably kill the prototype...

[UndeadRaptor]

The smaller sentries flew in soon afterwards, using their mass numbers and small stature to tyr and overwhelm the gunships. The sentinel finally fell after the barrage of attacks, falling and crashing into the ground below it...

[Godzilla Forever]

The prototype could no longer take the pain and jumped off of her vantage point, fleeing back form the city. her wounds were too deep to be healed quickly.... she would need to withdraw to avoid further damage.......

The drones open up the vaporizer bomb, a small timer on it winding down from ten.... then to nine... then to eight.....

[UndeadRaptor]

The young man with the binoculars dropped them, before turning towards everyone and screamed at the top of his lungs, "everyone get down!!!" Soon enough, everything was on the ground, covering their heads and other parts of the body as the bomb was nearly ready to detonate. The Savannah was a safe distance from the weapon's range, and didn't move at all as some people spotted it and raised the alarm...

[dinoman666]

The smaller sentries did little to the Gunships' thick carapaces, and were mostly ignored by the far larger Synth craft, who turned their weapons on the infantry below. The Combine forces didn't seem particularly frightened of the incoming bomb. Then again, they barely felt anything at all...

[UndeadRaptor]

The remaining sentinels flew in and distracted the gunships to save the soldiers, scientists, drones and engineers, while the sentries retreated towards the group on the ground. Defensive weapons all on the massive ship hovering far over the planet flew out, before blasting away at the Combine forces to help save the others...

[Godzilla Forever]

After a few moments, a pause of silence is heard, before an enormous eruption of plasma bursts forth from the bomb in a wave. The whole city is literally engulfed in a pulse of superheated plasma, including Sheekhs, Headcrabs, the radieors, and the combine footsoldiers. Only the underground bunkers were safe from the explosion. After the bomb is detonated, only a smoldering crater, plasma occasionally parking form the ground, remained. Everything esle had been vaporized.

MOTHER looks upon the smoldering crater what was once her objective. Saddened, MOTHER radios in of her failure....