RP: 4th Fleet (NSN) [Mision 5.1] Operation Roundhouse

In close combat, using whatever you could to disorient and confuse your enemy would work. Henry had been easy on saving the DARTS, mostly fighting against the trio using his Push/Pull device, chainsword and the occasional DART to disrupt the Mindies further.

It wasn't dawning on him how foolish it was to go alone against three mindies, let alone ones piloted by smart NMX, who were a contradiction in terms to most Nepleslians. That is, until you saw their eyes - sensing their tumultuous minds brimming with infinite capacity for cruelty and violence, staring into you as though you were a canvas to be painted upon, or a meal.

And Henry could stare back without flinching. He knew he had to step up his game, even with the push made by the other marines to cover him from the other attackers. His tactics changed from offensive to stonewalling, using the Push/Pull device to keep each of the Mindies at a respectable distance, and countering their strikes.

He'd seen one of them somersault over him and nick him, and now he was prepared to intercept that fancifulness by keeping his Push Pull device aimed upwards, and his chainsword to handle down below. Sweat was starting to roll down his face as the concentration, analysis and exertion were interplaying into a concert of controlled violence.

Sawyer kept taking well aimed shots at the Mindies that were not in the command group, trying to keep them distracted from Henry and Phaedra's assault on their leadership.

The Most Brilliant Medic in the Universe worked feverishly. Using her skills and equipment to save the Chief's life was easy. Using them while she had to deal with incoming fire was the annoying part. But then, it was all part of the challenge of being the best. Lives depended on her cool analytical head, precise fingers and snap decisions.

Seconds meant the difference between life and death. Laura was keenly aware of that. It was her entire purpose to life. She had been born and bred for this. Laura Romero was proud to be the best damned medic in the NSMC.

But treating Chief Santiago was tricky. His wounds had cauterized from the heat but that didn't change the fact that he had a charred hole in his gut. Burn cream was useless. The medical nano was a more efficient solution to the problem. But even liberal amounts of it couldn't make up for the amount of flesh vaporized by that one strike.

The Chief needed a hospital. Laura became acutely aware of the sailors crowded by the blast doors, waiting with weapons ready. She didn't blame them or consider them cowards. They were smart enough to know that it was suicide to enter the fight without power armor. Their purpose had to secure ground already taken by the Marines, evacuate the wounded and ensure lines of communications weren't severed. Not engage NMX mecha.

"Get him back to the shuttles. Nothing more I can do. Hurry!" Laura said, popping the Chief's Hostile open and pulling him out gently. The sailors unfolded a stretcher and Laura lay him on there. Moments later, a group of eight sailors, four of whom were carrying the stretcher, were off.

Laura picked up her HPAR and rejoined her squad, hoping that her best was still good enough.

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Bridge, XSS Momoranth
Four decks above, the elevator opened. Everyone expected it to be a messenger Neko or a Mishhu. So it was with a loud cry of surprise and warning that greeted the bridge crew when they saw a large power armor painted in the colors of the NSMC step out.

Izmarhk'resh was first to react. He slid off his command seat and maneuvered sideways, out of the Hostile's direct line of fire. Which was lucky for him as the Hostile began firing indiscriminately. A trio of bridge Nekos and a Mishhu, who Izmarhk'resh had never liked, were killed instantly. Others dove for cover and began shooting back with their sidearms.

The fleet commander, however, was no fool. Sidearms wouldn't harm the Hostile. While his minions distracted the Hostile, Izmarhk'resh sent a telepathic message to Helszepont and Gahze. It was short and simple. Abandon ship.

He saw Gahze slink her way over to him, using consoles and fellow crewmembers to shield herself from the Nepleslian's fire. The pair of them hurried down the length of the bridge, hoping not to attract attention. They were lucky. Both entered a side corridor which led to Izmarhk'resh's personal shuttle. The power up sequence went smoothly amidst the dull sounds of battle behind them.

Behind them, a blast door closed, sealing off the shuttle's docking bay.

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Below, Helszepont and her considerably fewer troops continued to fight the NSMC Marines. The sudden message from Izmarhk'resh surprised her. But then, he was also the one with the eye on the strategic situation. If he said it was time to retreat, she could either comply or die. But extricating herself was a little difficult at the moment.

The Hostile she was engaged with was skilled, very skilled. Finishing him off would take more time than Helszepont had if she were to get out of this ship safely. The trickiest part was the Nepleslian's Push/Pull weapon. It had the ability to alter the fight, no matter what she did.

Helszepont advanced, as if intending to slice at Phaedra. In that second, however, instead of the swift strikes that Phaedra expected, the Mindy's shoulder mounted 50mm cannon swiveled and fired point-blank into Phaedra. The shell exploded against her shields, causing her stumble back but remaining upright. Helszepont used that momentary daze to advance, slashing at Phaedra. Her blades clipped Phaedra's left arm, leaving a deep gash of smoking nerimium, but failed to do any real damage.

Phaedra expected the Neko to charge at her. She did not expect to receive a burst of 50mm rounds at point-blank range, knocking her backward.

She fired her LSP all the while; the magazine was soon empty in an attempt to weaken the Neko's shields. As the Neko slashed at Phaedra's left arm, she dropped the LSP and VBCS and drew her HPAR with her right hand.

Using the PPD, Phaedra pushed her opponent away and into the bulkhead behind. While attempting to keep the Neko pinned with the device, Phaedra fired a 40mm grenade at it. Confident she had finally knocked out her opponent's shields, Phaedra began firing her HPAR in earnest at the Neko's arms and legs to disable it.

Whilst Phaedra was dealing with Helszepont, Henry was still tied up with her two body guards, still keeping them at bay with his Push-Pull device and grinding them down, slowly and steadily. Then one of them tried to make a beeline for Phaedra as she tore into Helszepont, and Henry punished the body guard by making a lateral slice from below and tearing her right leg off.

However, Henry's swing went wide and he didn't pull it back fast enough, and the other body guard took advantage of this by cutting the chainsword in half before Henry could push/pull her away.

Well, this complicates things. Henry deadpanned as he watched the other half of the chainsword fly away in an arc, and the chains themselves spin themselves into his armour before his half-chainsword petered out. It belonged to Rita, but he was certain she wouldn't have been offended, perhaps flattered.

So, he threw what was left at the last body guard Mindy, distracting her as he pulled out something smaller - A VCBS Knife sharp as the Devil's fangs. He pushed the final Bodyguard against the wall, and pinned her aether-sabre wielding right arm to the wall. Henry then moved in close and impaled his VCBS into her armoured neck, and across to decapitate. No flourishes, fanciness or trickery, just a quick kill.

*PING*

The elevator door opened and Lisa stepped out. Her eyes with widened pupils looked around. Nekos. Tens of them. She raised her gun, not sure if she should shoot or not and then she saw it. Misshu. Just few meters from her with all its tentacles and other stuff. The horrible bloated thing levitating few feet for the ground. It turned to her and she could saw what was supposed to be its face and horrible fanged mouth under it.

Lisa did the only thing she could right now. Her mind full of fear and adrenaline snapped. She screamed and pulled the trigger. Round after round started tearing the monster apart, stray shots destroying two nekoes, who were about to take out her NSPs. They were two late as one was torn in half and other lost whatever was above her breast-height.

The Misshu itself being riddled by round was being shredded into pieces, its chitin-like carapace flying everywhere as was its tentacles. In just a few seconds it was just a bloat of dead meat that fell on the ground. Lisa looked up and saw more Squids and Neko's. Her mind did not care about nekoes though. Squids were there, squids were the enemy. THey were dangerous and Lisa was horribly afraid of them. Her sub-conciousness decied that best way to get rid of something you fear is to kill it. Lisa pressed the trigger again.

Helszepont backstepped, absorbing Phaedra's attacks with her shields. The Hostile's relentless fire destroyed her left shoulder's missile launcher and the nodal support launchers on her upper legs. It became clear to the Nightmare that she would not be able to fight her way as her forces crumbled around her.

The elevator was gone, though it was hardly a smart escape route. Helszepont cursed inwardly. That bastard, Izmarhk'resh, had been correct in his cautions. She had, indeed, underestimated the Nepleslians. They were a hardier, tougher breed than the Yamataians, whose tactics rarely resembled the sheer, bloody suicidal charge that the Nepleslians had just made against her superior position and forces. Had she not seen it, Helszepont would never have believed it.

A mistake, then, but to learn from it, Helszepont would need to evacuate right now. She fired all of her remaining mini-missiles from her calf launchers at random and used the resulting confusion and explosions to mask her escape.

She fled down the hall to her back, using her thrusters to get as much distance. A quick mental command shut the blast doors behind her. Helszepont knew that if she took an escape pod, Izmarhk'resh would never pick her up. He stood to gain much from her capture or demise.

No, Helszepont flew towards the officer's hangar in the ship's fore where she knew there were still some battlepods. To her delight, there she found half a dozen battlepods and their attendant crews. She barked orders for them to prepare all of them for launch. Three other Nekos stood, waiting to pilot the pods. The remaining ones would be controlled by an AI.

Within minutes, Helszepont and her new bodyguard were in flight, trailing Izmarhk'resh's shuttle and the retreating NMX fleet. Helszepont sacrificed the two unmanned pods against the pursuing Nepleslian starfighters to allow her and the others to reach the relative safety of the NMX fleet's guns.

Half an hour later, both escaping NMX fleet commanders were aboard and the NMX Fleet, battered and reduced fled the system.

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XSS Momoranth, Bridge

Lisa found the Neko bridge crew rather unwilling to die in a hopeless fight once their Mishhu overlords were dead. They hated the idea but what good were their pistols against the heavy weapons and armor of the Hostile? One by one, they cautiously raised their hands in surrender.

The fleet commander's console started beeping as though there was a notification.

From the viewport, Lisa saw one of the other carriers explode. It was unlike any explosion she had ever seen. It wasn't the orange and black of munitions erupting. It was a bright white, tinged with blues and purples that encompassed the entire vessel in a single ball of light.

Then the ship was buffeted by the terrific shockwave.

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XSS Momoranth, Officer's Mess

The Cavaliers, their prisoners (few of them that there were) and the Navy sailors were thrown across the room as the shockwave hit. Lights flickered and died, armor systems registered damage reports and sailors complained loudly.

"All ... report. ... aether cores... detonated. ...firm ... security." The voice was not that of the Grand Admiral, it was Drei. The AI's transmissions were garbled.

"Holmes... engi... power cores... peat, secured! Volk... what's ...on?"

Phaedra growled in frustration as the Neko leader managed to escape in a cloud of explosions; she had wanted to capture it for the valuable intel it no doubt carried.

Shortly after this the ship lurched to one side, hurling everyone across the room.

"What the hell was that?" she thought.

"Everyone alright? Henry, see if you can find out what just happened from a terminal!" asked Phaedra. She paused, and then continued.
"Simmons! What is your status. I do not see you on my screen."

Then she heard a garbled transmission from Drei which she barely understood.

"All ... report. ... aether cores... detonated. ...firm ... security."
"Holmes... engi... power cores... peat, secured! Volk... what's ...on?"

Switching the channel, Phaedra responded.
"Drei! Say again! Your previous transmission was broken up! What just happened?"

Lisa shivered as much as the neko's, but they luckily cannot see that, since she was in her two-ton armour. Her chaingun stopped spewing bullets with last Misshu dead and she saw no reason to kill those nekoes too. She was not afraid of them and they had little to no way of hurting them.

Then someone shook the whole ship. Lisa fell and quickly raised on her feet again, her gun ready to kill anything. But the nekoes did not seem to be ready for it too. Something exploded in space and shook the whole ship.

"Everyone away from the consoles, throw away your pistols!" She said in Yamataian, making sure that the nekoes will understand her. Lisa then received communication from Phaedra.

"Ma'am," Lisa said and her voice was still not very strong sounding. She still felt the fright. "I got myself on the bridge. Six Misshu's dead, few Nekoes shot. GOt about other twenty neko bridge crew that surrendered to me. The place is a little shot up, but nothing major. I will keep guard till you get here!"