As everyone waited for someone else to say something, Augur bounced a bit on his toes and grinned gleefully. "You don't want to surrender any display of nerve to the judges. Take presumably valued territory if the potential is there, regardless of its difficulties." He suddenly turned to the others and thrust up a finger. "Why is this a viable consideration? No cheating with Mini, either!"

Highfive was actually the first to react, snapping his fingers and fingergunning Augur. "Because we have to challenge ourselves!"

Augur made a face and did a 'kinda' gesture with his hand. "I mean, that's better than doing jack sh- uh, doing nothing. Anyone else besides Jack?" A pause, and he finally pointed directly at Bo. "You! Any guesses?"

Bo had pulled out her phone moments before, ignoring Augur. "Nope. Stumped." The tone was anemic and soulless.

"Really?" Augur's brows drew down, perturbed and confused. "But you seem very together and sharp in battle…"

"It's just an act. When the curtains fall?" She stuck out her tongue and raspberry'd faintly.

Augur's face got even more confused.

Inkblot crossed his arms as he shrugged and said, "Displaying what we can do is the entire point of every exercise. Regardless of this lesson, I agree with Jack. Best to act decisively."

"Mmnnn," Augur murmured as his eyes went upward and he bobbed his head side to side, in a general expression of consideration, "that's definitely part of it, obviously… but I was looking for a more strategic outlook…"

"It has tactical value because some targets need quick defense and preservation even if they aren't ideal, and are under fire," Ira answered. "This remains true, and was perpetually true in our territory throughout our history, when the holding of strongholds was critical to the Memorial agenda, even sometimes with them entrenched in enemy territory. Though not explicitly stated, perhaps occupation of the wall is a hidden, bonus objective. After all, the merits for these scenarios are also hidden from us."

Augur looked up at Ira in starry-eyed wonder. "You are such an incredible woman."

Ira blinked, obviously pleasantly surprised, though she managed to avoid too much of a smile. "I appreciate that, Junior Agent."

I bet she doesn't realize he has a crush.

Augur suddenly looked away and cleared his throat. "Yes! Ira is correct. It may be the case that the judges in leadership are looking for those who will take the wall, assuming it a stand-in for an asset. Why wouldn't they make holding the wall an explicit goal, like some stronghold seizure scenarios?" Augur shrugged. "Not sure. But the wall is there for us to guess at."

Jack spoke up at this. "Well, I can't read their minds, but maybe it has something to do with psychology. Determining a team's subconscious instincts, namely, the leader or leaders. It could also be that we're supposed to read between the lines. Or maybe they just want the go-getter teams that tactically want to hit the wall before others. Maybe a little of all of the above."

Not looking up from her phone, Bo said, "It's risky for us, though. We're not perfectly suited to taking the wall, despite that we've made decent strides from our first attempts. We're not suited to holding the wall with two melee guys. Half the team has to leave it to engage the enemy."

Augur was downright flummoxed, throwing his hands at her in exasperation. "See?! I knew you weren't dull!"

"I'm just acting like I'm not."

"Huh?!"

Jack chuckled. "Best not to think about it too hard, Augur. Anyway, she's right: it is riskier. But we've already proven we can use it to our advantage. If the enemy team hangs back and seems to be waiting to spring on a wall taker, I can try and bait them with metal moving around while we come up at a different spot."

"Nerves," Highfive said, nodding slowly to himself before looking up. "Most teams will be nervous this early. Itchy trigger fingers, ready to try and unleash at the first sign. Get a quick advantage and prove themselves."

Bo actually looked up, turning her head around nearly behind her to stare at Fiver incredulously. "Good point." She turned back around to glance at Jack and Augur, taking a deep breath. "Let's take the damn wall, then."

"Yeah, let's do it," Highfive said, uncommonly sober.

"Agreed," Inkblot added.

The four teammates nodded rather soberly, knowing the gravity of the choice. The need to execute and win, and thus the counterpressure telling them to do what was more obviously pragmatic and safer tactically. It was part of why Jack rejected it after Augur's revelation. There was something to be said for making an impression. But to do so, they also couldn't proceed to screw it up and lose.

They moved on to begin training some more on rushing the wall, inevitably to get their two very different melee guys down to engage the enemy on the other side, with support coming from on high. This was no huge detriment to Bo, who didn't care much about range, but she did need some line of sight. Jack functioned at long range, though there was no question he was debuffed. But this was a reasonable trade for being inaccessible to most enemy powersets. If Jack had time to turtle up, it was hard to pot-shot them from range, especially with ostensibly weaker AoE that would need to be utilized to bypass the wall's crenulations. It also paid to make the numbers on the wall unclear, so no one suspected Inkblot when he came for them.

In a blind match, their Stalker became many times more deadly, as he wouldn't be expected. They suspected and planned for the worst, though, especially with the instruction language about 'evenly matched teams.' In other words, they expected a damn Sentinel, Scout, or other counter. It was just best to do so. If they were lucky, the lack of expectation might still allow him to slip by unnoticed.

Especially with a Sandy from Bo slapped on them.

Things went well match after match, even testing against Sentinels and Scouts, their successful detections in time being a toss-up. Things may have gone too well. But then again, they had to take it easy and not challenge themselves too much. That was the rub when you needed to save your strength for the real thing.

Control: Cord has improved to 2.1!

Control: Throw has improved to 2.7!

Control: Collect/Collect (Sphere) has improved to 1.9/2.9!

Create: Lift has improved to 0.6!

Transmute: Fluidity has improved to 0.9!

Evasion has improved to 3.5!

Inner Energy has improved to 0.7!

🌑 🌒 🌓 🌔 🌕

The time for the match snuck up on them all too quickly. The hours preceding it, they mostly rested to keep their energy — particularly Bo's — entirely topped up. When they stepped up to the doors minutes before they'd open, everyone was stacked with metal to carry. Why not more raw material to work with, after all? If Jack established a turtled position and continued to need it, he could layer it. He had three 40x30cm transparent armored plates he could use as viewports inside a relative metal tank, if it proved useful in the match, and he was practiced at morphing them around by manipulation of the metal they'd be lodged within.

Wonder if I'll ever be able to see through metal? That would be great.

In addition to the utilization of the panels, Jack had trained on occasion to try to do so, to forcefully 'look through,' not to any success, but it was worth a shot to jiggle reality toward the desire, he figured. Maybe that would jar loose the capability one day.

Oh snap. That would be a 'perception' sort of mutation. That's yet another reason to take Interpret, isn't it? Oh, you tantalizing minx, you'll soon be mine!

Aside from the huge extra burden of steel and some lead, Jack had bundles of pre-made crap to save time. Steel cables, darts, pre-sharpened blades, and so on. A few… special goodies, too. Getting metal down-range was a priority at some point, especially scattering it everywhere to get angles for blindsides. There were various means, but he had volleys on hand to catapult himself as the likeliest outlet. At longer ranges, gunfire wasn't particularly useful, as the smaller the object, the worse his perception of it, on top of the fact that the mass over a few seconds wasn't comparable to sending a volley of darts with Throw.

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His SMG was mostly an afterthought. He had it hard-mounted to his back on his armor, where it wouldn't impede his mobility much by flopping around. It wasn't his preference for a second hand item, which had become a bundle of cord to quickly toss in emergencies. It was just a more fluid and relevant segue into his power usage than unloading a gun.

Perhaps it wouldn't be the case if he could guarantee a piece of mushrooming lead expanding in flesh to follow up with — and very nastily — but he literally couldn't. They'd bounce off of armor, barriers, or the System-born protections banning internal wounds, or they'd bury deep in the earth, or they'd get dodged by a damned Acrobat. The actual tracking was a pain. Flicking a nice, solid hunk of metal, with powerful inherent mass and strength to it, and knowing exactly where it was at all times, was far better for his average chances. It was the difference between unrolling out your own little tentacle or shooting out spines.

Hmm. Maybe a… cord launcher? Or a net launcher! But metal. That might improve speed across the two meters a bit, throwing shit being relatively mechanically inefficient. An unfurling giant net won't have any tracking issues. In the field, I'll have my Jackette as the ideal close-range tool, but it doesn't help me in the PACCs. Anyway. Thoughts for another day.

The four participants stood around the airlock door, still with a red 'NO ACCESS' sign above it. The three that actually wore helmets had them on, but had yet to secure their faceplates into them. Jack could see that Bo and Highfive were looking pretty tight in the shoulders and grave in the faces.

"Just apologizing in advance for any screaming and cursing," Jack said, "if a fraggin' goo-type tank shows up."

Bo gave a faint sniff, and Inkblot nodded in understanding.

Highfive grinned. "That would be too unlucky, dude, but I'll handle 'em up, if so. Promise." He froze suddenly, eyes widening. "Oh shit."

"What is it?" Jack asked.

"I… gotta piss."

Bo scoffed in annoyance. "Unbelievable. Hurry up and go do it, you massive ass!"

Highfive nodded and quickly ran off to the bathroom, which was through the gear room.

Bo glanced at the other two accusatively. "Anyone else?"

Jack, chuckling, displayed his hands and shook his head.

Inkblot raised his brows slightly, crossed his bare arms, and shifted his eyes, not deigning to reply. He had on a stuffed backpack, while two huge duffel bags full of metal and other crap were waiting to either side of him, that he would drop soon after meeting whatever barrier edge would be waiting for them beyond the airlock.

Bo rolled her neck and took a deep breath. "We're gonna dominate out there, guys."

"Damn right," Jack agreed. "The world is our oyster."

"We will adapt to any situation," Inkblot declared placidly, "and execute swiftly."

"Dual meaning, there?"

Inkblot nodded sagely.

Bo glanced at Jack. "Do you know where that quote comes from, Ferro?"

"What Inkblot said? Wait. You mean about the oyster?" Bo nodded to him in answer. "Nope."

"Shakespeare. 'The world's my oyster, which I open with my sword.' Something like that."

Jack grinned. "How forceful. More appropriate than I knew."

Bo nodded as she gained a glint in her eyes. "We'll crack their skulls open like swords against oysters; take the pearls inside."

"Allllright, maybe that's going just a teensy bit overboard about it, don't you think?"

Bo grinned in her very predatory way and slotted her faceplate in, turning toward the airlock.

I think this is how we want her, though.

Highfive came jogging back with a minute to spare. "Whad' I miss?"

"The world is our oyster," Jack replied, nodding sagely.

Highfive frowned. "What the hell is an oyster?"

Laughing, Jack shook his head as he secured his faceplate on. "We're going to give the enemy the what-for, that's the gist."

Highfive gave a thumbs up. "Sounds good to me!"

The time for the doors to open was on a countdown. Everyone got ready to move, picking up any hand-carried items and just waiting for the clock to tick. Jack summoned memorite, holding it poised around him.

"Good luck!" Ira called. Jack turned to see her waving, with a faint smile. He waved back.

"Destroy them!" Augur called. Highfive turned to give him yet another thumbs-up.

And then the airlock began to open.

You have three minutes before the match begins. Powers and senses will not work through the temporary barrier. Communication in or out of the arena will be blocked.

The group of four hurried through, into a natural-looking area of erratically forested, rolling hills. Immediately around them, out to ten meters in a box, was a glowing blue, semi-transparent forcefield. The high and formidable wall could be seen beyond, looming over everything.

The group moved up to the edge before unloading their extra burdens, which were mostly dumping out backpacks full of metal material. Of the three, Bo kept the most gear still on her, which was just a smaller backpack of materials as a time-saving means. Her being so much lighter, a little add-on wasn't much of a problem for getting her lifted to the wall.

Having prepared metal copiously before even getting there, Jack primarily worked on setting up the decoys, assembling two condensed metal puppets that rather strongly looked like a typical kitted-out contestant, complete with wrapped-on fitted clothing and — of particular note — having a helmet and false faceplate. Popping up an authentic helmet, while arms and hands legit appeared to fire a rifle, was the primary thing they were depending on. Getting it right was an art form, so he spent the time needed and locked them into a reasonably believable body position, in case the enemy could get a sight picture from the other side, somehow. He didn't want inhuman, puppet-like movements. Stiffness was okay when the presumption was that levitation was being used in the first place.

"Testing team gestalt," came Highfive's nearly instant, mem-text-like thought in the currently four-person group. Nonetheless, it felt and 'sounded' like a slightly tinny voice. This was something one could only achieve with some practiced familiarity. Fortunately, the long-time familiarity between Highfive and Bo provided a keen base for the others to leverage. Jack had taken to it fairly quickly.

It was ultimately worth the feather of speed loss because the human brain just tended to focus on an outside voice better. It reduced the chances of ignoring comms in the heat of battle. Sometimes, even this would get filtered out, but it remained the best policy if you could swing it.

"Roger," came Bo's voice. "Just reminding you boys to sound off here with developments. No silent treatment."

"Roger," Jack said. "Ferronaut ready and waiting. But also working."

"Here," Inkblot said, his voice a little hollow from awkwardness with the format. "A bit absurd we're doing a match before we've even synced fully with this. Am I wrong?"

"Nope," Highfive offered.

"Cut the chatter," Bo said. "No junk noise on this channel until we're done."

"Yeah, let's stay focused, team," Jack said.

After their final preparations, they were left poised at the edge of the barrier, ready to charge. The countdown commenced in their head as the forcefield began to dim.

Three… two… one… BZZZZZT!

Jack and Highfive moved forward first, as Jack simultaneously had the decoys move under the semblance of levitation in a wide swing to the weak side-... the left.

Damn Fiver and his stupid sports references infiltrating my brain!

Inkblot remained still initially and went into stealth — it might've been a waste of energy on the other side of the wall, but they didn't know the extent of the enemy team's information-gathering potential.

Meanwhile, Bo remained equally still, and did her thing, reaching out with her powers to detect 'things that could be disrupted,' with a reported, ridiculous Secondary stat of Interpret 7, which pretty much explained why she was so damned acute and hard to avoid with it, especially very recently. With no line-of-sight, the special blocking of the wall, and the distance, she still would only be able to detect overt power use. Her report was key, as it would be likely impossible to blitz for the wall without a lot of powers going off. Jumping was usually detectable, as was flight — and certainly anything as extensive as what Jack was aiming to do would be blatantly obvious.

Just as Jack was moving his decoys up, Bo's voice crackled in the team gestalt. "Mild power use, low info. One of them did something too subtle and personal to define, and one did something group-wide. Almost positive that it's a buffer. Minimal movement, no apparent sprints. Think they're staying put. Both users might've shifted to our right."

"East," Highfive corrected. Well, he was right — that was the better way to communicate, with them approaching from south to north. "I bet they went for natural cover."

"Perfect," Jack replied. "We take the wall! Let's move swift but smooth. For now, Ink's target is that buffer until we know who their offense is. If that's a damned Medic rather than a Catalyst or some other exotic, they remain the priority target."

Everyone knew the plan from there. The group shifted to the east, with Jack and Highfive aiming for the midpoint between the center and the edge of the wall, and Inkblot aiming further to the edge. Bo hung back, hiding and not moving, just in case the enemy was sensing movement. The amount she could move to shorten the inevitable levitation to the wall was not worth tipping the enemy.

Meanwhile, the decoys were levitating upward and going west. Once they were ready to make the final push to reach the top, Jack slowed so those moving on foot could get closer. Only so long as he dared. On a whim, Jack lifted himself to a nearby tree via his harness, to have a little better initial sight angles. Nestled and crouched on a branch, he paused, took a deep breath, and prepared for perhaps the greatest timing challenge of his life.

No problem. We got this. We will pivot on a dime, we will adapt and conquer. Okay. Alright. Alright, Jack, go. Go, go, go. Now!

And so it began. He swiftly moved the decoys up and over the wall, split between the crenulations on their side, hugging the wall to avoid direct notice. Shifting false body parts to make it convincing…

Nothing immediate happened. This was either very good — the enemy had no special detection of movement and didn't notice them — or very bad — the enemy noticed but knew it was a decoy somehow. With no sudden reports from Bo, there was no way of knowing. Then again, senses tended to be very difficult for her to discern, most of them passive.

Jack didn't hesitate, though. Time for Step Two.

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