S3VEN - IC

The Velu panther was only struck with one of Flank's bullets, in its forward right shoulder. As a result, a large chunk of flesh was ripped out from that area, causing the panther to roar in complete rage. With extreme agility that no one present could hope to emulate, the panther twisted on its back heals and leaped into the air, making contact with the wall before launching itself off, heading airborne towards Flank at remarkable speeds.

Fem'Nyla was doing everything she could to keep from being noticed. She was currently positioned behind Flank, but as the panther pounced, she dove out of the way, showing much more acute reflexes than were normal for her.

The Akol-D5 is ready to pummel that panther. As the creature momentary distracted by Flank and Fem'Nyla, the mech charged while keeping it's fists lowered. Slurp's forehead started to sweat and her heart was beating faster then normal. She thought in her head: "If I miss and die, well at least I tried and lived a nice life." As her mech suit came closer to the Velu Panther the Akol-D5 raised a fist readying and aimed at the panther's foot.

Flank uttered a most vulgar word as the Panther alighted on the wall. Abandoning the idea of crippling it only minutes into the round, he flapped his wings and broke immediately into a headlong dash to the right, away from the Panther as it jumped from the wall toward him.

He committed to his run to the point where he made a 45 degree angle with the ground in front of him. Knowing that the Panther would want reprimands in blood for its crippled shoulder, Flank raised his assault rifle above his head and aimed both it and his cannon at the creature. Using his scope to take aim with the rifle, he fired another burst. Seven bullets, by Flank's count.

Micaneil cursed when the panther showed up.

"Why now? Just, why?"
If he had a higher caliber weapon, like a sniper rifle, or any gun that used either a bigger or armor piercing bullet for that matter, he could probably stand a bit of a chance, but the smaller .556 would probably make the raging panther even more peeved off than it already was. Standing far away from the panthers current position, he aimed very carefully at the Velu Panther's eye, hoping to blind it.

The combined efforts of Slurp, Flank, and Micaneil caused the panther to stagger back a few meters to its left. Micaneil's bullet had lodged itself directly above it's eye, blurring its vision slightly.

When the panther looked up, there was only one thing its sights: Vandore. The unsuspecting Zeteron looked up just as the Velu panther pounced. A horrible ripping noise could be heard as the panther locked its jaws around Vandore's middle and pulled up, separating his legs from his torso. Crunching bones could be heard as vicious beast threw the torso into the air and caught it around the midsection, snapping several spine segments and dislodging bits of the Zeteron's entrails.

The panther subsided eventually, leaving two large bits of the now deceased Vandore, as well as several smaller chunks, all strewn across a large streak of blood. This gruesome demonstration of the panther's power provided an opportunity for the other mercs to attack.

((Sorry if I went overboard on the gore, part of it was Tala's doing. He requested that I tear Vandore's legs off and have his entrails eaten. ))

As the Velu Panther's jaws closed around his waist, his last thoughts were of home, and that he would finally join his parents, where he could apologize for murdering them. The Panther tore his legs off, and felt a floating sensation. His spirit was leaving his body. But he never found out what, or who had caused him to kill his parents.

"GOOD F***ING GOD!"
Flank was close to adding to the mess by way of vomiting, even though he'd seen worse things on his home planet of Cortyax. Every creature born there was carnivorous, including himself.

That could have been me... he thought. He looked down at his assault rifle. Such a tiny tool, and with only twenty seven of those precious bullets left.
Twenty seven vacuum bullets...

An epiphany occurred. He chambered a bullet and pulled the clip out of the rifle.

"Hey!" he shouted at the panther, flaring his wings, "Over here!"

What he was planning was downright stupid, but if it pulled off, a lot of pain could be saved. The plan was nothing more than a hit and run, and being so heavy, running wasn't his area of expertise. He hoped he could save himself.

"Get your ass over here!"

Vandore's mutilation, though gruesome, actually cleared Micaneil's mind and reminded him of the true danger that's at stake. He had previously been treating this contest as if it were a game, but now would be the point where he started taking the S3VEN challenge seriously.

The ringing that came close to cutting off his sense of hearing seemed to simply disappear in an instant, probably due to an adrenaline rush. In this rush, he fired 2 bullets toward the panther; one toward the jaw, one to the hind legs.

Reeq clappered with his pincers at the bloody scene. Seemed it was only him that was getting hungry, because of the scene.
He ran towards the Velu, the dagger in his grasp. Reeq jumped up as he closed towards the Velu panther and made a striking move towards its bloated throat.

The panther looked up at Flank's taunt, growling at his cocky new target. It coiled up and was about to spring forwards when Reeq's attack struck its neck. It howled and attempted to lock the Sectrix in its jaws, or at the least dislodge him from its neck.

Micaneil's bullets met with mixed results, one grazed the panther's thigh, the other barely missed its throat.

"Thanks!" Flank called out to his saviour, Reeq. The distraction he provided was more than enough for Flank to devise a plan with considerably less occupational health and safety issues than his original. If worst came to worst, he would still have to go along with it, however.

He began running toward the panther, the clip from his assault rifle in his right hand, rather than his left. He stopped about two metres from the titan. It was swinging its head to the side and howling, trying to catch Reeq in its teeth. Flank had to time his attack carefully.

The panther twisted its head to the side and tried to close its jaws around the Sectrix, and missed. It howled again, baring all three rows of teeth. That was it. Flank threw the clip at the monster's open maw.

(I'm not really sure if this would be an in-between thing or before ^^')

Slurp forced herself to look away from seeing a merc being eaten alive. She didn't want to know which merc it is but two things are clear. The rest are still here and that Velu Panther is going to sorely pay. The Akol-D5 slammed it's left fist at the right foot so hard, the suit shook. In doing so it caused the speech box to work allowing Slurp to finally speak to the others and saving the trouble of having to use more gestures. Slurp yelled/taunted at the creature: "Hey ugly! I'm the one you should be chasing! Come 'er you son of a giant b***h!" Slurp prepared herself to run, should the brute go after her.

Reeq fell, but not before the Velu panther closed its jaw around his left arm.
Reeq jerked, as the teeth penetrated the natural exoskeleton. Ichor sprouted out, draining the ground below him.

Flank's clip hit the panther's jaw and subsequently bounced off, several of the bullets falling out of the clip. The panther took no notice and it grabbed a hold of Reeq's arm.

However, before it went in for the kill, Slurp's mech suit distracted it. Leaving Reeq to bleed out, the panther picked itself up and charged towards yet another new target.

((@Potato, I'm not sure what you were trying to accomplish. Clip with bullets =/= instant grenade. ))

((@Isak, by my count, this should be two brushes with death for Reeq, assuming this latest injure was serious.))

Only one thing was going through Slurp's mind and that is..:"Ayieeh! This is going too well here!!!" The Akol-D5 didn't come with thrusters so it had no chance of outspeeding the Velu Panther meaning it only ran at an average runner's speed. Not only Slurp distracted the brute, it gave the others the oppertunity to hit hard on the creature's sides. She silently prayed that they won't miss and hoped to live.

"Damn it..." muttered Flank as he collected the bullets and put them back into the clip. It was a good idea, he admitted, but at the same time he could have been the creature's next kill. Twenty-six vacuum bullets going off at the same time while occupying a relatively small space made for a fantastic weapon, it was just a matter of putting it in the right place before they were set off.

And now Reeq was losing an arm. Perhaps if he had neglected to draw the Panther's attention Flank would have succeeded in popping the clip into its mouth. But he didn't, and he didn't. Time to move on.

"Hey guys? I don't want to rush any of you but would you be kind to oh I dunno..SHOOT THIS THING ALREADY!!" Slurp is very unsure if she's unable to keep buying the rest of the mercs more time. She didn't want to die in an arena (Slurp dislikes the idea) at the mercy of the Velu Panther. To make things much worse, the Akol-D5 was starting to run slower which did not help. Panicking and swearing Slurp tried to attend, to the running engines to try get it back up to fast. The creature is nearing her, bellowing with such rage. "Anytime would be nice right now!!", Slurp yelled to the others.

The panther kept up its chase with Slurp's mech, taking a swipe at one of the mechanical legs. Things would certainly begin going south for Slurp if someone didn't take a shot at the beast soon.

Fem'Nyla was confused in her emotions. She was rejoicing that this first room was almost done, panicking at the prospect of the panther ripping her to shreds, and also hoping that the panther would rip the "little bug" to pieces. At that point, she had little to do, as a melee weapon wouldn't be very helpful against a beast of that size.

((EDIT: 900th post.)

(I seriously don't want Slurp to die so please somebody post lol. )

Akol-D5 avoided the swipe but that alone still didn't save it or the master. It kept on running allowing more time for someone to go all hellfire on the damn brute. Slurp didn't mind who saves her as long she's out of that Velu Panther's reach. If she died, her last words would be: "I gave it my best shot and I'm proud of being among my fellow gi-mercs including...the demented but brave Fem'Nyla. Also I'll never invent the solar powered toaster that I've always dreamed of."

Flank looked back at the clip in his hand and decided that now was not the time to pull off stunts. He rammed it back into his assault rifle and gave chase after the panther.

When he was close enough to say that the majority of anything he fired would hit its mark, he raised the rifle to a position by his chest where he could see down the iron sight and fired a short burst at the creatures rump.

Reeq had survived the panther, but at the loss of an arm. The ichor had already started to dry, but he felt izzy. The knife he had was still secure in his right hand.

One bullet Flank had fired hit the panther in its hip, subsequently causing a large chunk of its skin to be ripped off, as well as producing a fracture in its femur bone. This slowed it down, but only by a little, and it wheeled around, Flank's mammoth-esque frame in its sights. The beast charged forwards, swiping multiple times at him.

As the creature charged towards him, Flank back-pedalled away from it as fast as his legs and wings could carry him. Since its leg was wounded, and it occasionally paused to swipe, Flank found it significantly easier to evade it.

He had twenty-two bullets left, and he decided that now more than ever was the best time to use them. The creature's head was very close and it didn't stray from his line of sight. As he ran backwards, Flank fired burst after burst of the implosive rounds at the panther's head, hoping to hit any part of the head, because if he did, the combined detonations would result in a much larger implosion radius, wide enough to engulf the creature's head.

Flank has saved Slurp from a possible end more then the one time during the arena. By shooting rapidly at the Velu Panther, he has taken out a large chunk of flesh at the hip. The creature is now slower but still alive and now going after the Ravis. While Flank distracted the Velu Panther a sudden thought came to her. Since the hip is now clearly exposed, it's bound to suffer more un-bearable pain if more bullets or something sharp like...
"My plasma dagger..of course! If I can get to that thing's exposed hip!, I can thrust the dagger so deep it'll be howling like there's no tomorrow and there's no way it'll see the weapon now that Flank's shooting at it's head." Slurp looked around inside the Akol-D5. Though it didn't suffer a lot of damage but Slurp knows it's bound to be useless. However she does have one more task for the Akol-D5.
"I'm coming Flank!" The Akol-D5 does it's best to catch up to the creature. For such a small odd but a dangerous smart alien, Slurp is certainly not to be trifield with.