Disc I: Still Alive

Darian flicked his cigarette into a waste bin and leaned back more, "So much for that one..." He punched a few buttons on his display and looked a radar screen rather than the picture. "So when are we taking this thing?" He said into the radio.

((OOC: DB, try not to control other characters.))

Jerry let out a sigh of relief as the last missile was destroyed by Dante. Now he wouldn't have to worry about paying expenses for a funeral. Jerry turned to the radio.

"Alright, now that we're missile free, let's give this man hell!" Jerry said over the radio. "Everyone, get to your spacecrafts and get out there! We're going to pound this bastard with everything! Dante and Viktor, wait until we're all out there and ready so we can launch a full scale assault!"

As he finished giving out orders, the now familiar calling code appeared on the screen, wishing to relay another live message. Jerry pressed the button to confirm approval, sighing. The fat count appeared on the screen.

"I see you are smarter than I first thought," the fat man said, laughing. "But do not feel so full of yourself. I have plenty of other means to take care of your and your miserable crew!"

"You're really starting to get on my nerves," Jerry said, glaring at the screen. "Give up now and I might let you go without a severe beating."

"Ha!" the Count said into the camera. "I will not give up so easily! Do you think me a coward?"

"Considering you are relying on missiles instead of showing yourself.... Yes."

"I won't listen to a word from a peasant! Send all you want at me! I'll destroy you all!"

The fat man cut off the transmission, leaving Jerry only with a crooked grin. Jerry cursed.

"I can't wait to turn this bastard in..." he said, standing up from his chair. "I hope he's worth something, because this guy is becoming one hell of a problem."

Jerry opened the door leading to the hangar and ran over to his ship, jumping into the cockpit and turning on the ignition after closing the cockpit, making it airtight. He flipped a few switches on the dashboard, turning on all weapon systems and maximum boost for his thrusters. It'd cost a lot of fuel, but it would be worth it. Jerry turned in his seat to see the other people from the ship getting into their own ships and preparing to take off.

"Time to rock and roll," Jerry said to himself. He turned to see Dimitri coming close up. "Dimitri! Hurry up and get in the backseat! We've got a bastard to take care of!"

Demetrio watched from the piloting room of the ship all that was going down untill it was time for a little pay back. He saw Jerry running for his ship and ran closly after him. Demetrio heard Jerry yelling after him as he closed in, and jumped into the back seat closing the door behind him "alright alright im in" he said leaning back in to the seat.

"ABOUT TIME!" Darian yelled.

"System Ignition" the computerized voice said as the ship came to life and lifted into a hover. Darian sealed the cockpit and put the thrusters on full, flying out of the hanger. When he was out into space he opened it up completely and closed the gap between him and the large ship quickly.

"I'm going to see if the hanger's open for possible boarding and raiding, cause I'm damn hungry!"

He made a quick circle around the large ship, relying on the fact that his ship was nearly invisible to radar.

"Alright, let's give 'em hell," Jerry said as Dimitri entered the ship. He sealed the cockpit shut and pushed the throttle forward, sending his ship forward in a small burst of speed, rolling out of the hangar and into the vast expanse of space. Jerry formed up with Viktor and the others as they prepared for their assault.

Unfortunately, Darian seemed to zoom ahead to scout out the ship for any openings. Jerry turned on the radio, cursing.

"Dammit, Darian, get back here!" Jerry yelled. "He could show whatever he's hiding any minute now and you'd be right in front of him!"

The fact that Darian was invisible to the radar could be his downfall. The Count had something up his sleeve he would release, and if Darian wasn't ready for it, it'd probably hit him head on when he least expected it. Plus, if the Count was even taking a look at his outside cameras he'd probably at least get a glimpse of the stealth craft.

"Alright, let's get going and attack so that he isn't out there alone!" Jerry said, pushing the throttle forward as far as it would go. "He has an energy shield generator on his ship, so we won't be able to board his hangar until we take it out. Fire everything you've got at that ship so we can deactivate it!"

As Jerry and the others zoomed forward towards the craft, something strange happened. A large piece of scrap metal on the Count's craft seemed to lift upwards like a door. It was definitely the entrance to the hangar.

"Dammit..." Jerry said, realizing what was about to follow up. The hangar door opened and fifteen fighters flew out of the ship. Each craft was exactly identical, painted silver and shaped very small, having wings that jutted out like knives. They were fast, but they were bound to have weak armor, so they would just have to outwit them to win. By a quick glance Jerry could tell those weren't ordinary fighters. They weren't piloted by people. They were piloted by AI.

"Crap, those are drones!" Jerry said through the radio. "Take them all out!"

The drones flew straight at the team, firing blasters like crazy. Jerry maneuvered the ship downwards and turned left, two of the drones chasing him on his tail. Jerry flew left and right trying to get them off him, but it was no use. Sooner or later they would shoot him down. Jerry turned in his seat to Demetrio.

"Demetrio!" he said to his co-pilot. "Shoot those two down with your gun before it's too late!"

Demetrio sat back as they left the hanger, He saw Darian up scouting the other ship and heard Jerry call him back. He noticed a door open up on the side letting out tons of little fighters. "wow" he thought to himself and the charged towards there ships. He heard Jerrys order "right away" He responded loading up his gun and and aiming at the little drones. He let out a few bursts from the gun before one recived damage and exploded. Demetrio aimed at the the last drone and let lose as the last one exploded in a fireball. "target destroyed" He said reloading and leaning back.

Darian smiled when he realized they were drones, "Computers don't have eyes, except radar." He spun himself around half way before he finished scouting.

When he lined himself up with the drone he flipped a switch and two heat seekers dropped out of his wings. He looked down at his targeting computer and waited till he had a lock on the drone then clicked the firing switch. Once the heat seekers were off he broke off onto another target and switched on his lasers, letting loose a few blasts at a drone.

Dante looks at all of the drones leaving the junker with a sign of disappointment. "Really this fat bastard is making us shoot down a bunch of computer turkeys" he says over the radio. He flips his gatling gun on and zooms straight into the drones.

"I so am going to make this fat guy cry" saying over the radio. The gatling gun fires the rounds hitting three of the drones. He spins his ship like a top creating a 360 degree shooting spree hitting the drones.

Several drones speed to Dante's zipcraft. "Here we go" saying to himself. He speeds his ship towards the drones. When one of the drones fires he dives under it forcing the drones to take a u-turn into each other. "Two down, to many to go".

Viktor merely smirked as the last missile was destroyed behind him. Casually falling back with his comrades, he went in of the approach, that is, until he noted the drones. "Seems the man has a real hard on for the ship, throwing all this at us." He dodged and swerved to avoid the small AI controlled craft, firing upon them when he had the chance. The ship is quite large, he has more, I can tell. This is only the beginning...

As he U-turned his Zipcraft, he noticed two targets and opened fire; the slow, clockwork-like Machine Guns pumped out heavy rounds, shredding the drones to pieces from the sheer mass of the shells. He repeated this a few times, out-maneuvering his adversaries so that he could open fire. The heavy rounds ensured the drones lay decimated, as their light armor was no match for even a few shells, it seemed. Then again, the machine gun was Military-grade and was literally meant for taking out a good 12 inches of steel or so...

The drones were being defeated easily by the crew of the Atlas IV, the ships torn to shreads by their various weapons. Jerry grinned as he viewed another ship get taken out, exploding into pieces. Catching two drones off guard, Jerry flew from behind and fired at them with his blasters, taking them both out in rapid bursts, flying through the scraps when he was finished.

"Almost too easy," Jerry laughed. "This fatso is done for."

In the next few minutes the last of the drones were destroyed. Jerry turned the radio on to communicate with the others.

"Nicely done," Jerry laughed. "We beat the hell out of them. Now... let's take out this shield."

Jerry switched his plasma cannon's controls on, preparing a powerful shot. After a few seconds, the plasma cannon was ready and Jerry fired, a strong bolt of energy flying out of the gun and slamming into the ship, the shield taking the damage, a see through grid appearing, a shield of pure energy. Once the others started firing, the shield would eventually weaken.

"Fire everything you got!" Jerry yelled through the radio. "Let's take those shields out so we can dock and raid the hell out of this junk ship!"

Darian lined his ship up just above the bay and began to fire his own plasma cannon as well as a few missiles.

After almost a minute of constant fire form everyone on the crew, the shield finally gave in and their projectiles actually started to damage the surface of the rotten ship.

"Stop all fire!" Jerry said through the radio, everyone stopping eventually. "Now that that's finished, let's get inside that ship and take that bastard down. Follow my lead!"

Jerry thrusted forward towards the now open hangar, going straight inside through the oxygen shield, much like the one on their own ship. It was really a standard issue device, as it rendered oxygen masks and space suits almost useless.

The interior of the ship was just as bad as it seemed on the outside. There was signs of rust almost everywhere and lots of spare pieces of sheet metal bolted over areas that were once probably holes in the ship.

"This thing is a trash heap," Jerry said in disgust as he landed his ship in the hangar. He opened the cockpit, allowing him and his co-pilot to exit onto the ground. Before jumping on the ground, Jerry turned on the radio.

"Alright, fellas," he said through it. "Get your ships in here and prepare for some ground fighting. I'm betting this bastard has plenty of minions for us to blast through. I hope you all brought your guns. Now, hurry up and get in here so we can catch this 'Count.'"

Jerry jumped down onto the rusted metal floor and waited for the rest of his team to get inside the hangar. He looked around for the next point of interest, only spotting a single door. From there on it was quite obvious where they would have to go next. Hopefully this ship was as linear as it seemed.

As Jerry was surveying the hangar, the door suddenly slid open, obviously an automatic. What came after the sound of the grating door opening was a volley of blasts from machine guns, held by robots that resembled the structure of a normal human. They were rust colored, with most of their paint chipping off from age and wear. They guns they were carrying were automatic machine guns; standard issue, but they still shot bullets. There were at least ten of these battle droids, each almost exactly the same in appearance, though some seemed to even be missing arms, wielding the guns with one arm almost comically.

Jerry quickly dived to the side as the bullets started pelting the ground before him. He took cover behind his ship, its armor strong enough to take on the guns.

"Dammit," Jerry said to himself, taking his magnum revolver out of its holster at his side. "Those guys better hurry up so we don't have to take all these on alone..."

Jerry popped out from cover, firing a few blind shots in the direction of the droids, managing to destroy one after three shots, turning it into scrap metal. He fired off a few more to no avail, emptying the cylinder of his revolver, popping back down into cover to reload. Clearly this Count had more up his sleeve than they had first thought...

((OOC: Here's a link to what the droids look like for your convenience, players!))

Demetrio exited the ship looking around, the ship realy seemed just to be a flying scrapyard as everything was rusted and in disrepair. He took out his gun checked it and loaded it ready for anything. Demetrio turned at the sound of machine gun fire from coming through a door. He hid behind cover and while Jerry reloaded he came out to let off a few rounds from his shotgun. His bullets riped threw the robot but it took a few shots and he new he wasent close enough to be effective. He took cover and reloaded looking for some cover to advance to.

Darian flew his ship in and landed near them all, as he opened his cockpit he jumped out and flicked his wrist, flinging two daggers down the hall into two adjacent robots. As he slid behind his own ship he said, "Oh come on its not that hard..." He heard a bullet his his ships thin energy shield sand said, "These damn bots better not hurt my baby!" He scanned the room looking for another door or air vents that he could use to find the controller of the robots.

Viktor gracefully landed his ship into the hanger, turning off the VTOL; leaving his zipcraft, he grabbed his now dangling SCAR-FX and ducked to the ground, using the ships and scrap metal on the flooring as cover from the machine gun fire from the droids, as he fired in control bursts at the new adversaries. "This man, although not entirely defenseless, has got to have the worst ship of all time. Has he ever heard of maintenance?" This 'Count' probably melted down any sort of craft he got his pudgy hands on, instead of the initial collection he thought he would have going, as well as marble walls and floors.

Jerry let out a sigh of relief as the others pulled in, each taking shots at the droids. Their bullets knocked down most of the droids with ease.

"These things are pushovers..." Jerry said, pushing the cylinder of his magnum back in place after reloading another seven shots. He popped out of cover and blasted the gun arm and head off of one droid with two consecutive shots, shooting the rest at the last one, managing to take it down with a critical hit to the torso. All the droids were now scattered across the floor, nothing but scrap metal.

"Alright, fellas," Jerry said, reloading his gun quickly. "Let's gain some ground. I don't care how you guys progress, I'm going straight on through. There are two air vents that I'm betting go through the whole ship, so you could probably use those for surprise. I'll head straight in through the door."

Jerry walked forward and opened the hangar door, entering a the dimly lit hallway. There were only a few doors on the sides and a few random crates laying about, some plated with metal. So far there had been no sign of the fat man. He was probably sitting tight in the piloting room, waiting for his imminent doom. Jerry grinned.

"You've got no chance, Count," Jerry said to himself. "None."

As he walked down the hall, a couple of the doors suddenly opened and five more droids piled in, firing bullets in every direction with his machine gun. Jerry dived behind one of the crates, bullets pelting the sides of it.

"Dammit," Jerry said to himself, popping up and firing a few shots and managing to destroy one of the droids. "Got to find a way to end this quick..."

He popped up once, more looking at the environment. Before he had to dive back down he noticed a few pipes on the ceiling above where the droids where standing. If he or someone hit those pipes, it had to do something. If Jerry guessed correctly, that pipe was probably connected to the engines. A hole in the pipe would probably leak some high pressure chemical fire. Jerry turned to whoever was following him.

"Try to hit those pipes above those damn droids!" he yelled above the crossfire. "That'll take them out for good and buy us some more time on this junk ship!"

Demetrio watched as the robot guards fell from his groups fire and were reduced to pieces. "well that wasent bad" he said reloading and moving on from his cover to the door.
Demetrio was walking behind Jerry observing the trash of a ship before they were abushed by a couple of droids. A few bullets zip past his head "wow ok" He mutterd snaping to attention and diving behind cover. He heard Jerrys plan over the fire and decided to go for it. He looked for the pipes and checked his gun "alright!" He popped from cover and took aim. A bullet from the droids torrent of fire skimed his arm, Demetrio quickly squeezed the trigger ripping sevral holes in the pipes. Focused jets of fire streamed holes through the group of droids. "haha beautiful!" He said watching them burn.

"I will go through the vents and try and find the Counts..." He ran up and grabbed his daggers and made for one of the vents. He used his dagger to unscrew the vents. He pulled them off and crawled in, making for the bridge. As he crawled through the vents he could see through various holes that there were many more droids. He moved quietly until he looked down another grate in the vent. He could see control panels on the walls. He tried to get a better look around but it was difficult to see.

OOC: Let me know if you have an issue with me just dropping in on the count.

((OOC: Please don't drop in on the Count yet. We will all meet up before we enter the final room with him, most likely.))

Jerry watched as the chemicals flew out of the pipe, knocking the droids back and causing them to cease functioning. Soon after, the chemical blasting died off, probably some sort of mechanism that activated so not too much fuel was wasted if there was a leak. Thankfully, that meant they could get through just fine.

"Nice shot," Jerry said to Demetrio, grinning. "Now let's get going to see if this fat man has anything else to throw at us before we drag him out of this place kicking and screaming."

Jerry walked forward, passing the now destroyed droids and went into the next room, which appeared to be a large meeting area, fit with a large circular table in the center of the room and an enormous monitor up above on one of the walls. If Jerry's calculations were collect, the next room would probably lead to the piloting chamber, where the Count was held. It looked like the only way in would be through the single door. The air vents didn't even seem to go down there.

Jerry walked across the room to the door, pressing the button to enter. As he expected, the door was locked.

"Well, that's annoying," Jerry said, sighing. "I guess I'll have to use some persuasion."

Jerry pulled out his revolved and shot at the button, destroying it but not accomplishing much of anything.

"Dammit..." he said to himself. He picked up his radio from his side and turned it on. The radio had contact with everyone from the crew on one channel.

"Alright, everyone," Jerry said, slightly annoyed. "Get over to what seems to be the meeting room. It's fairly easy to find, just keep moving forward and you'll get there easily. Feel free to destroy any droids we left behind. Once we all meet here we'll discuss some plans on getting this Count out of his little room."

Darian dropped out of the air vent in a ready position to find what he thought were consoles to be stoves. "What the hell..." He looked around him and said, "Damn good luck!" He ran over to the fridge and opened it to find it fully stocked. He reached in and grabbed an apple, biting out of it. He savored the flavor and let the juice run down his throat. His speaker chimed in saying, "Alright, Everyone." He quickly reached down and plugged in his headset. "Shit" he whispered. He heard a clanking behind him and instantly spun around, throwing a dagger. He saw a white chef hat with a mechanical head underneath it, it now had a dagger sticking straight through the forehead. "Well... Chefs out..." He walked over and reclaimed his dagger. After he filled a small pouch with apples and a few other fruits he made his way quietly to the meeting hall. When he entered he took a bite out of his apple again and said, "Having fun yet?"