RP (non-canon) Inside the Aether (Trapped in a fantasy)

"You stay up above, and give us another vantage point, if possible," Kai stated to Yoshida, following behind Datenshi with his rifle upright, ready for action. As Datenshi moved, so did he, but he kept a roughly ten meter distance away from her, roughly to her 8 o'clock, and they advanced toward the noise. With everything made from Aether now,there was some sensor distortion, and the heat signatures of everything around seemed to blend in from this distance, but as they approached, they would note there was, indeed a large heat signature ahead of them, but what it was, they couldn't tell, not from this distance, anyway.

Before too long, Datenshi made her way to the edge of the clearing caused by the crash, debris crunching slightly undefoot before she made it to the wall of dead foliage and other detritus, which itself was made mostly of trees- branches and trunks and the like- all stacked haphazardly but making a pretty formidable wall nonetheless. Beyond the wall it was still hard to see anything on the sensors, just the large heat signature ahead, which seemed to have stopped moving for the time being.

The small fireteam came to a point where they had to choose- there appeared to be a gap just small enough for an armor to fit through in the wall of tree trunks, or, they could fly over the top of it. It wasn't like they had the element of surprise, anyway, Yoshida's position in the sky was making use of her fusion thrusters which, while not the loudedst things i the universe, were certainly not stealthy.

"Datenshi-Heisho, Choose a path, I'll follow you wherever, but, whatever that thing is, let's try to observe it without disturbing it too much, if possible."

Datenshi nodded, keeping her eyes open as best she could as she watched the large heat signature. She kept her rifle ready, the safety off, and ready to fire at a moments notice as she heard Kai talk to her, telling her to pick a path. She nodded a little and began to advance through the gap in the trees. She figured if worst came to worst she could light her suit up with power and force her way out, the wall of debris hopefully wouldn't pose to much of an issue compared to her daisy's strength.

"Going through the gap sir, I guess it's time for some fun?" She said a little nervously through the comms.

Yoshida followed along in the air from a distance, watching her new squadmate's backs in more ways than one, ensuring she kept her volumetric camoflauge active. She was fairly certain anyone that could use aether to see in this environment, or heat for that matter would spot her without issue, but she was comforted by the fact her falling out of the sky would most certainly alert her comrades to danger.

With a grumble as she clambered around the mess that was the halls of the ship, Elenor arrived to the armor bay, and saw that there was some armors already missing. Daisies. Ground ops? Okay, that she could definitely do. Now to just find... Her's. Well bugger all. Her's was one of the armors that'd been knocked off its rack. Just lovely.

Climbing through the mess, Elenor started working on getting the other armors off hers and getting the help of a few technicians to mount it up so she could climb in. Peeling off her Type 37 uniform (and stashing it in the ruck mounted on the back of her Daisy), she made sure her bodysuit was smooth as possible while climbing in. Once the HUD came on, she checked active suit comms. "Hei Herrick reporting. Requesting TACCOM ping of position relative to the ship for link-up."

She wasn't idle while sending the message out, grabbing a LASR and checking over the various systems of it, and grabbing some extra ammo to be sure. Afterwards, she was moving to the exit hatch, and waiting on it to cycle the doors. No point rushing out blindly without some idea of direction others went, and linking up meant more chances to survive.

Mark sighed as he pulled himself from the pile of crates that had toppled on top of him. With his chitin covered right arm, he pushed some off of him, his claw scratching their casings. After arising from the pile and putting his jacket back on, he dusted his uniform off.

"Guess this is what I get for not staying aware.", Mark grouched to himself, adjusting the eyepatch over his left eye.

With a short annoying trip through messy corridors he came upon the armor bay. Getting the message sent by Herrick before entering.

"Santo-Hei, What in the void is going on? The ship shook and I got buried under crates. What is the situation?", He shouted to the Daisy equipped figure at the exit hatch.

"Keep moving, Datenshi Heisho, it looks like we have backup arriving soon," Nakamura Juni told the point woman. Simultaneously he sent a laser transmission to the Daisy armor standing at the opening to the hangar bay, giving her an update on the location and condition of the current away team.

"We are currently investigating a large heat signature, I advise that you head toward our position but hold back until we have assessed the situation," the Juni let the Santo Hei know, also pinging Yoshida to follow Datenshi's position from above but to remain higher than the treetops for now, before he too crouched into the small gap that Akamaru had entered moments before.

Akamaru and Kai would find themselves heading through a bit of a jumbled mess of a tunnel, which took a few turns and forced them to move branches and even logs out of the way on occasion to move forward. the depth of the debris ring was much thicker than expected, but very soon Akamaru found herself at the other side of it- and in the presence of something almost as large as an NMX Mecha.

More than twice her height, it was a dark green and brown creature with a mottled appearance, and thick, leathery looking hide. it was roughly humanoid in form, bipedal, with two stumpy legs and two long, thick arms. Its head was placed well below its shoulders, and sported bony plates on the forehead which protected beady little eyes. Akamaru could tell that the creature had noticed her, but was rather slow to react to her presence. Its head tilted toward her, and it made an otherworldly groaning noise as it slowly turned its enormous body toward her.

She could see, that it was covered in scars, lots of cuts and slashes that had healed over, as well as piercing wonds, even a number of wooden arrows were lodged in its hide. down its front were stains that her suit could tell was made of Iron and organic substances- dried blood, that was. Likewise, its bony plated fists were also covered in dried blood. below the beady eyes was a rather large mouth for the relatively small head, lined with rows of jagged teeth.

It contemplated this newcomer, as if almost surprised that it wasn't immediately set upon or otherwise disturbed, and began to slowly trundle the hundred yards or so through the forest to Akamaru's location.

'Tenshi grunted and huffed as she continued to force herself through the small tight passageway. It was tougj, but somehow rewarding and even comforting as she strove to reach the end and get her reward....

And what a reward it was.

The sudden release of the tight passage let 'Tenshi take a breath before she focused on the creature before her but as she did she couldn't help the words that escaped her lips.

"What the fuck...."

She said into the open comms line. She tilted her head, not taking aim just uet with how slow the creature was lumbering toward her, but her gun did find her hands as she waited for Nakamura to make it out of the passgeway.

"Uhh...hey, what should I do with big boy over here?" 'Tenshi asked, finally drawing on the creature.

"All I know currently sir is that we're not in space anymore. The ping I just got says that... We're on a planet of some kind." Elenor states as she approaches the fields that weren't operating, and stepping through. "Ping came from Itto Juni Nakamura." She explained on comms as the phrase came over the channel.

Not wanting to waste more time, she exited the ship and worked her way towards the location in question. She wasn't sure what was happening, but something probably was wrong, and getting to the problem now was likely the best move to be making.

Mark rubbed the back if his head with his normal hand, "Just my luck. First possesion, now marooned. What next, have to fight gods?"

Orias stirred in his mind, "Shut up you sniveling fool. Grow a pair and get moving, I'm perishing of boredom here."

Mark gave a slight growl as he set about getting his gear.....except he hit a snag.

His Mindy 4 had no power at all, so he needed a backup. One he just happened to have, and it brought a grin to his face.

Pulling a crate out if the corner, he opened the box to reveal his Revenant Power Armor. He quickly stripped and suited up, putting on the undersuit, and finally the armor and helmet.

"Itto Hei, Mark Oaklen enroute to rendezvous. Using non standard PA, Mindy has no power. Updating IFF.", He said picking up his LATR, magazines, grenades, plasma katana, and his personal pistols as backup. Mark quickly sprinted to catch up to Eleanor, the sunlight highlighting the deep blue power armor with white markings.

Nakamura Juni came up through the debris tunnel a few moments after Akamaru, just in time to see her finally bringing her weapon to bear on that immense heat signature. He was rather awestruck by the thing. For one, it was nearly the size of a Mecha, despite being organic, and it was lumbering toward them at a ponderous pace, before stopping suddenly. It seemed to have come close enough to figure out what shape those things that just came out of the broken trees were- humanoid. Suddenly the demeanor changed from slow and curious to aggressive defensiveness, stopping in front of a short, but stout little tree. And then, with practiced speed that seemed anachronistic to the way it had moved before, the creature suddenly de-limbed the tree, and with great force, snapped the trunk from the roots, holding the thing up like a massive club, easily twice the size of each of their armors.

"I would say we stay out of its way and hope it doesn't get more agitated. Datenshi-Heisho, you move to the left, and I'll move to the right. everyone else, stay back until we get a better reading on the situation, but I'll send you all the feed of what we're seeing!" Soon, just as promised, a video feed as well as dynamic sensor data from the two frontline armors was sent to the others nearby, showing them exactly what the creature looked like and what it was doing.

"Just try not to piss it off any more, I don't think it likes the fact that we are armored humanoids."

Yoshida took a sitting position mid air, checking out the suroundings while observing the video feed of the slightly far off team, watching their backs for additional hostiles. The monster almost certainly wouldn't be a problem for them, the trained soldiers on the ground. Especially as it looked like it had been having trouble with primitive arrows, of all things. Any one of them could probably beat it in a melee, it would just take some finesse. But of course... "You know if you don't want to agitate it, why are you moving to surround it? Its clearly at least a little intelligent. Also, why not fly and stay out of its reach? It doesn't look like it can throw something without knocking itself off balance, yanno? Or at the very least, makign it obvious and easy to avoid. C'mon we dodge rockets for a living!"

As she talked, she ran through in her mind how she would fight such a thing. Dodging the tree would be fairly simple if she had a good grasp of how it moved in a fight. It seemed like the kind of creature that would swing it along the ground, just a bit above the surface if it was a veteran at fighting human sized targets, not leaving room to duck under it, and not enough room to jump over it unless you were truly skilled... Or a neko. Other than that, it would probably try and keep them at a distance, probably thinking we have shiny pokey metal swords to use. But of course, why bother, when shooting at it would be so much easier? Afterall, a single hit just might prove lethal... But, an active CFS would likely kill it just as well, as well as providing quite a bit of protection from the initial impact. Maybe a broken arm would be all a fast to react pilot had to worry about, and not even that if they just threw themselves backwards to suck the wind out of the impact.

"Oh yea sure, Lemme just hop out so he can see I'm nice and squishy inside." 'Tenshi snapped back somewhat at Nakamura, weapon still trained on the beast. It had moved FAR to quick for her liking as she began to try and circle to the left best she could. All the while she had her scanners checking to see if there were any more. Suddenly, she had an absolutely terrible idea, and rather then ask for permission she decided forgiveness would be easier. Clicking on her suit's external speakers, she called out to the creature.

"All yo-... Nah... Hey there big guy, can you understand me? The pretty shiny lady comes in peace. Now why doncha put down the big log and we can talk huh?"

Datenshi had to bite her tongue at the start to keep her from making an ass of herself and actually try to make a halfway decent first contact.

Datenshi's decision... was not exactly a great one. The creature started when the Neko began speaking through her suit's loudspeakers, her electronically augmented voice reaching the beast quite clearly. And her voice apparently angered it. It grunted and growled, suddenly moving toward her, picking up quite a bit of speed as its mostly hidden muscular legs propelled it forward, the club reaching back wide for a solid swing straight at the armored figure, it roared loudly as it swung the branch, giving Akamaru mere moments to react.

"Heisho you probably shouldn't-" Kai began, but it was futile, as the beast had already begun "We could probably use some backup, or at least somebody to get the loudmouth out of trouble!" the Juni called to the others, as he watched the beast move forward. He simultaneously raised his rifle and fired a burst at the beast, if for no other reason than to distract it.

"I've almost reached your position." Elenor reported, moving with some speed in the armor, weapon held at the low ready while she sprinted, watching for any potential ambushes as she hurried to where Kai and Datenshi were reported to be. Goal right now was reach them and be ready to provide fire support as needed. Time to prove herself worthy of her Recon patch.

"Ohfuckohfuckohfuck!" Datenshj continuedover her speakers. She was wide eyed in her helmet, but opted to do something a little crazy. Her suits systems flared to life as she slammed toward the tree that was swinging at her, hoping to catch and burst through the tree if she could before it picked up enough speed.

"Light this fucker up!" Datenshi called into an open comms channel as she held the rifle away from the tree so it didn't break in the impact.

"Really? Its just a... Oh allright." Yoshida stopped sitting in her crosslegged position- and in an instant accelerated. She couldn't beleive this, It was basically a Mech without guns. Couldn't somone just shoot it in the head? Though she supposed she coulnd't voice that complaint, as she brought no gun herself aside form those built into the Daisy.

Now wasn't the time to chastise others for their perceived lack of skill- afterall she was sure she didn't leave a good first impression either. Everyone had off days like these. Instead, she was heading in, plasma blade at the ready. The beast seemed focused on Datensh, so it should be easy to burn right through its skull- but the crazed neko on the ground seemed to have intentions of busting through the tree trunk for some reason. While it was just a tree trunk, no match for Zesurium and other Yamataian metals, even if it broke it would transfer the destructive force of a Mecha's melee attacks. She hadn't experienced that in the field, but she had plenty of VR combat sequences against such things- just not one that was purely biological, which meant it would be capable of slightly less predictable movements.

Yoshida shot down, and intended to slice the thing's arms off at its hands after landing on the tree as it swung, so the trunk would fly off instead of hitting her dear comrade, followed by a Coup De Grace, to decapitate the unfortunate beast before it had too much time to suffer. Given that she was coming in from above, and it was focused on a very different target, she felt sure this plan would succeed, but she kept ready to propel herself away should it take notice of her instead.

Unfortunately for Yoshida, as well as Datenshi, the troll (And Datenshi's boosted lunge) was faster than expected; Datenshi made solid contact with the very green and not so brittle tree trunk, which smashed into her armor, her outstretched gun arm being whipped around the very large and still not entirely deceased plant, snapping the rifle from her grip and causing some loud crunching noises as the limb was moved beyond what it normally should have been capable of. The tree trunk continued forward, propelling Datenshi backwards despite her boost, and flinging her off into the trees, finally shattering into hundreds of pieces as it was spent in the blow. Yoshidals timing being completely off, she missed her first mark, impacting instead on the ground, and finding herself suddenly beneath the branch, which the troll dropped, while howling in pain from the feedback caused by hitting the tough armor of the Daisy, as well as from the shots from Nakamura-Juni's rifle digging into his thick hide.

Yoshida found herself temporarily pinned, the remains of the log weighing a lot more than the Neko had expected- She would be able to extricate herself just fine, but it would take much longer than what she had been trying to do, and now the Troll-like beast was trampling around in anger, swatting at anything and everything within its reach, causing Kai to launch himself backward and out of reach, firing another burst. The beast howled, but it became clear to Kai that, despite the awesome power of the Gauss rifle he wielded, there was something about the creature's hide that prevented the darts from doing more than superficial damage.

"Everyone, if you can, switch to some sort of explosive round; Armor piercing doesn't seem to do much!" he suggested to the hastily put together team, before also calling out to those farther away "And please get here soon with help- Somebody go find Datenshi and make sure she's okay!"

"Roger! I'll recover Datenshi! I'm only armed with a LASR. Not sure it'll do much since I didn't grab any other ammo beyond standard." Elenor reported, shifting her angle of approach as she was now close enough to have active tactical positioning pings relative to her position. Weaving around the woodland surrounding the situation, she moved towards the downed PA, her movements slowing as she got closer.

Rifle up and ready, she was scanning around her as she finally reached Dataenshi. "Hei Herrick here, reached Dataenshi." She reported, kneeling down, and offering one hand towards the other armor while her gaze and weapon continued to watch for any possible additional hostiles.

Failure. Typical! Yoshida almost snarled at herself as she used her plasma blade once again- this time to remove the tree trunk attatched to her. How unlucky could she get?! It wasn't even aware of her position! Oh well. At least the troll was heading towards Kai it seemed. It wasn't going to be quite as spactacular as she had intended initially, but she was going to put that troll down. Bullets wouldn't do anything- but surely a plasma blade that could slice through power armor would cut it down.

Yoshida took her time this time, analyzing the movement pattern of the troll once more. It was certainly true as she initially thought, that its pattern of movement would be a lot more unpredictable than that of a Mech of equal size- but that didn't mean she was going to give up on this. Between her training as a soldier, and her experience in combat, she was sure she would get it this time... It would just take a minute. With the log that once pinned her up in flames and sliced in half thanks to her sword, she took a stand and flicked her wrist, readying her sheild arm and sword arm both. At the very least- it wasn't an opponent to be taken lightly, but where to strike?

Its arms were constantly moving, and very long. Going after the ends of those wouldn't yeild good results- the shoulder would be best. But maybe it was better to take out its mobility? Afterall, its legs were short and stumpy. "Could always try hitting it in the eyes... Keep it distracted for at least a few more seconds." She took a stance- and with a shove off of the ground, and her thrusters coming to life with a roar, she dashed across the ground, keeping low, intending on taking out its legs this time. A stab wouldn't be enough to hinder such a beast, a limb would be the minimal price for its death. Yoshida just hoped it wasn't one of her limbs- she had enough of losing her legs to lasers, she didn't need a troll taking a chunk out of her too. If she would have her way, the legs of that beast would look very much like the large branch she left behind- if only the others could assist in drawing its attention.

Mark reached the fringe of the group and stopped to brace against a tree, resting his LATR on a low branch, "Note ma'am. Taking aim for eyes now."

He synched to the rifle's scope and linked the feed to his right eye. Using his armor to brace he drew in a breath as he had practiced. With a concentrated focus, He squeezed off two rounds.