"Looks like iron, from what I can tell, fairly high quality at that weapons grade I would call it." He says before looking back to the internal machinations "look like the insides of this stuff would be pretty simple to fix, but the outside's just scrap now"
"...What kind of idiot makes a shield that just acts as a beacon to your position?" Hecate asked, blinking. Make everlasting lights like a flashlight with the ability to flick a cover on and off, maybe attach to your clothes somewhere if you needed it to... not this nonsense. If you went for a night battle with something like that, you were just asking to get targeted by literally every opponent who could see you. The tech equipment, on the other hand, was excellent - they could probably let Damian carry that.
As people begin pulling heavy metal bits out of the machines and stacking them up, Scath realizes just how heavy they are when they clang against the ground. Looking at the weakling two legs, he sighs, and reaches around and catches at a couple of rings on his armor, causing a pair of saddlebags to flop open, revealing they are all but empty.
As the group works at removing the valuable 'musculature' of the clockwork creatures, everything is silent for a time, save for their work.
The mechanics within the wall are made from bronze, which makes them far less valuable as components, if the party opts to take them. Plus, they operate the door at least... And something else, probably. Several minutes pass, before a sound like a gargantuan gong rings throughout the room. Almost at the same time, the lever that had been 'guarded' by the two suits grinds downward with a series of clicks, as clockwork within its wall begins to turn.
The twin doors begin to rotate aside, revealing interlocking internals that would have made laying siege to the doors particularly difficult, before being dragged into the walls.
There is a tiny whirring noise as what can best be described as a brass-colored beetle (the approximate shape of a ladybug) sweeps into the room along a groove in the wall, flanked by another in the opposite wall. The two are about the size of housemate, and seem entirely set on sticking to their designated pathways. If not immediately destroyed in another hail of bullets, it will become readily apparent that the things are simply cleaning and polishing the walls and gears.
The now-open doors reveal a corridor extending a little over a hundred feet with a slight downward slope, before leveling off. The pathway is lit by small ruby discs every twenty feet (meaning the descent, if twenty feet is the proper number, is one hundred and twenty feet long.), which have an internal white glow that leaves the bronze-colored walls looking more of a sunset hue, once the light has reflected off of the slightly convex discs.
The inverted railing that the beetles are attached to continues here, criss-crossing over the walls, ceiling, and floor, in addition to dozens of irregularly spaced holes about a quarter inch wide and two inches tall all over the walls along the descent.
Once the hallway is opened, everything goes quiet, except for the whirring of the beetles and your companions.
What do you do?
The secret agent man whips out his gun, but pauses, noting that they didn't attack, and holsters the gun.
He then looks to the lever by what he assumes is the entrance, and pulls it.
Hecate held off on firing her weapon - she had limited bullets, and the beetles hadn't yet revealed themselves to be threats. Instead, she loaded the cat's bags with mechanical equipment before scratching him behind the ears. "...Not sure I like the look of those holes in the wall." she said, looking closer to see if there was some kind of trap here.
As Pierce pulls the other lever, the same process repeats as in the first, save that the gong sound comes with what sounds like a Carillon playing from somewhere above them. At the same time, clockwork can be heard actuating throughout the walls, and into the ceiling. The beetles immediately stop what they're doing, and disappear back into the hallway, following the rails.
A rush of air flies in through the now-open door with a slight hiss, replacing the taste of metal with the taste of breathable air. The overall taste and scent is off, though. Damian's blade blazes a little stronger and larger. It's rather dark, but anyone in clear view can see the makings of a skyline (it looks like a city with exceptionally tall buildings. Nothing like the arcologies of Hecate's time, but more like those that were built a few decades before Pierce's) in the distance, silhouetted by an off-green twilight sky.
But long before the skyline... And much nearer, is another of those clockwork creatures, facing away, and towards a gate. This one looks as though it would barely fit through the door, and is carrying a massive greatsword that holds a dull glow along several symbols carved into the flat of the blade, which it holds in a vigil stance, both hands resting on the hilt, blade pointed down. Neither the blade, nor it, are made of bronze. All around it are small plates in the ground. The foliage outside seems to have grown out of control, leaving the plates difficult to spot without leaving the room.
The holes look remarkably like arrow slits (not that Hecate would have those), and as Pierce pulls the lever, they -become- arrow slits, small iron discs flying through the space between the holes at regular intervals, all along the ramp.
Again, simultaneously, what appears to be a console slides upwards out of the center of the floor, save that there are no buttons, levers or dials, only a small spherical basin near the center.
Once all of the other sound from the clockwork and the carillon ceases, the basin plays music highly reminiscent of a music box with notes overlapping.
Damian produces a small notebook from a compartment underneath his jetpack and begins taking notes on the clockwork guardian while muttering under his breath in a language none of you recognize. After his inspection, Damian will say
"These things are mechanical in nature. They have some interesting technology similar to things I have seen before. They are dangerous, but do not have the ability to adapt to new situations very well. They are quite similar to golems, actually, assuming that those exist where you are from."
As the skyline resolves itself, Damian says
"I wonder who lives in such a place, and why it would need such massive guardians. We should go ask them."
Damian is just turning away from the skyline when the hallway is filled with most likely razor-sharp metal disks. Damian shouts out something in Draconic, appearantly not to anyone specific.
"Watch out for the saw blades!"
Hecate stared down the barrel of her gun as she looked at the sword-wielding, looking to estimate the distance to it before looking at the sharp objects that were turning the hall into a deathtrap. "Well, we do have those shields... easiest to just make sure they're shut off, though." she said, glancing back at the controls.
The huge (technically large) guardian is forty feet from the entrance, the 'gate' which is set into a stone wall, covered in foliage, is over a hundred feet beyond that.
"Ok, question time, do we go into town, see if we can find out were we are and chance the giant robot, or do we explore further into the hide-y hole to see who brought us here?"
Scath watches the insects crawl in, and then suddenly bolts after one, batting at it playfully as it crawls along (not hard enough to damage, just playing with it), until it completes it's (slightly harder) job and continues on.
When the doors open to the outside, the cat takes a deep wiff, it's whiskers working back and forth rapidly. He eyes the giant city askance, but seems to calm down somewhat.
He looks at the hallway with all it's nasty buzzing noises, and then at the overgrown outside, and slips past whoever's in the door and slips into the overgrown brush, nose down, moving slowly and carefully, sniffing out prey, predators, and wierdness.
Scath is able to determine that the humanoid scent is absent out here. There are a lot of vermin and small animal trails, though. They don't smell like things he recognizes, precisely, but they have the same general qualities. He also happens upon a nest for something like quails. They're heavier, and decidedly more colorful, though. Likewise, the area is filled with nuts and berries. The Quails have a stash of berries and nuts in their nesting area, prompting it to be believable that the things are edible. The quails appear to be sleeping.
"Little one appears to have made his choice."
He comments as the cat leaves.
"I'd really rather get out of here. Not sure what the thing at the end is."
"Trouble." Hecate said, reloading her weapon before moving over to the console and examining it more closely to try and figure out what, exactly, it did. With a basin like that, it was probably meant to hold something? She was still trying to place the exact technology age this stuff was at...
The basin didn't seem to have any way to connect anything to it. For all intents and purposes, it may well have been a table designed to hold a small crystal ball with only half of the ball's surface showing. But the slant of it and the height certainly reminded Hecate of a console.
"Keep an eye out for anything that would fit this. Probably useful." Hecate said, carefully moving forward and staying on the lookout for traps and other problems as she advanced.
Damian will sneak forward towards the city.
The large sentinel with articulated plates turns slowly to face the noisy one, and a sound like music boxes trying to play over one another begins to sound from somewhere deep within its chest. It takes one hand off of its sword, and reveals another basin like the one on the console, this time within the palm of its hand, which it holds outstretched to the 'offender'.
What do you do?
The gate is made out of the same off-golden metal, but considerably more worn, having quite a few pieces of blue-green patches, and what would be orange has faded to a dull yellow. There is another basin in the center of the gate, which interlocks like the interiors.
The gate, as well as the stone walls, stretch up to approximately twelve feet. The stone walls are coated in various vegetation with leaves of a deep green color. While there are occasional flowers growing within the confines of the wall, none of the plants along the wall are flowering. The gate itself is completely devoid of plant life, the plants growing away from it rather than towards it, despite it being filled with things vines would just love to cling to.
The species of the vine is unidentifiable.
If you touch anything but the basin, take 1 Electric damage. Shocking! (per round that you touch the gate)
The Carillon continues to play above and behind you, seemingly at regular intervals. Ten seconds on, twenty seconds off. Now that you're outside and investigating, it becomes clear that there is another rather large building behind the building you'd just entered. To compare it to contemporary buildings, you were in something like a cellar. The larger building has large, thick glass windows with pictures of an armored angel painted onto them. The sounds of the deep, loud music box are coming from a tower within that building.
Hecate looked up at the iconography, then shrugged slightly. She didn't know exactly where she was, but at least she'd already obtained a critical piece of information about the local inhabitants. She just needed a few more details before she could determine what the best approach would be. "If you see any people, inform the rest of us immediately. We don't know whether or not these people are hostile." Hecate said, keeping her weapon close at hand but not immediately obvious to anyone who was looking. She didn't want to look like an active threat - yet - and quietly continued moving forward. She stopped by the gate a moment later and began carefully examining it. Huh. Either it was unusually well-maintained, or there was something about it that plants didn't like. Probably the latter. With that, she began examining the gate for any signs of technology that she could recognize.
Scath continues to fully investigate every square inch of the area around the yard (staying away from the gate and the statue), looking for anything lost in the overgrowth.
The gate looks very similar to the internal gates, except that it can be seen through, as it doesn't have anything sealing either side, it's simply the internals and the framework. Otherwise it appears identical, save for the basin.
Scath discovers by rooting around that there are several small pillars that have been mostly overgrown surrounding the building. Most of them are about as tall as he is, and they're all relatively equally spaced. Something of his size can comfortably rest between them in any given direction.
After further investigation of the larger building he finds another set of doors, like the 'cellar' door, with yet another sphere-basin resting in the center of the door.
Scath will put a paw against a sappling, and push on it to make the tree hit the small pillar a few times until he draws the two-legs attention to it.
Then he'll move to the other set of doors, and do the same thing until he draws two-legs attention to it.
Then he goes back to snooping and investigating, looking for other things.
"Bear, fella, you're a bit big to sneak past the thing. I'm gonna call you on the other side."
If Roy gets past the guardian, he'll summon Bear again on the other side of the door way, a ways from the automaton.
Once that's done, Roy scampers to the top of a flowered wall, peeking over the edge to see if there's anything on the other side before jumping on top.
As Roy climbs the wall, he can swear the vines give way a little, but they support him, as he clambers up and over. Then he's on top. It's only a twelve foot climb (sorry, I forgot that part earlier! :P). There's a lot of growth all over the place on the other side, much thicker and taller than within the walls. The only trees, though, are saplings. Roy, with his vantage point, can make out distant figures heading in the group's direction. They seem bipedal, at the very least.
They follow a long and winding path from what appears to be a city in the distance. Anything else about them and the path is obscured by the poor lighting.
Pierce gives a whispered shout "do you see anything?"
"People's comin'."
He hops down.
"We need to get ready, may not be friendly. Outside a them, it's all forest n' plants out there."
Pierce loads his guns and nods at the cat "how many, did they appear armed, what is their estimated time of arival "
"Bout half a league out. Two've em. Have bout 20 a'fore they're here. Too far and dark to see what they looked like. S'likely they 'idn't see me on account a how dark I am."
He reports back.
"What's going on?"
The agent nods seriously "Good let's talk strategy, are we going for stealth, diplomacy or a more aggressive option, I am also open to hearing other possibilities, but we need to make this quick."
Pierce translates for Damian.
"...I'm not very good at negotiating. I'll do guard duty." Hecate said quietly, making up her mind and once again checking her weapon to be sure it was ready for immediate use. "Remember, always be cautious when dealing with natives. For all we know, we've desecrated the most sacred temple of their people - I'd rather not have the whole city up in arms and after us."
Scath, hearing that there are others approaching, finds a good hiding spot along the outer wall, so that if they enter via the gate, he can be behind them if they turn hostile and attack the two-legs.
"me personally I'd prefer to combine option two and three, have one of us talk while the others stand behind them giving a subtle display of force to deter them from attacking
"You may be wantin' me on the talkin' side. I got the gift of gab, but I don't strike much of a figure. Bear here is the muscle."
He pats the orange creature's belly.
"you or me either one, talking to people, diffusing hostile situations is part of my job, but if you think you've got this, then have at it"