RP: NSS Acadia [Mission 1] A Side: "High and Dry over Golding"

Fian activated his reverse thrusters just as he neared the corner. Peeking around cautiously he saw the Crooked Demon crouched, and staring at the trench walls in the general direction of the Dust Devil. Taking advantage of being unnoticed, he carefully aimed down the Tube's sights, let it off and then immediately taking cover at the other corner of the T-Junction just in case Viktor had anything to contribute.

He didn't bother to manually guide the rocket in because there wasn't anywhere the large Crooked Demon could move. The antimatter missile struck the armor on the left shoulder, a bright white blast almost toppled the PA but when the suit came back into focus the shield generators on the arms were very dim but not out completely. It turned around and let off a blind shot, missing both DDs but the all consuming Aether beams turned the T-junction into a cross junction. This done, it raised it's arms to shield itself to this new threat, and charged towards the pair.

From Henry's side, he could see one clawed arm poking above the trench. The head unit was also periodically visible as the CD bobbed up and down as it ran towards Fian and Viktor. With the CD's long strides, the P2C will only have time for one burst of fire.

Harrison's shields were down to zero and apparently the enemy knows about it. He successfully attracted the attention of both hostile DDs who regarded him as a reckless pilot and an easy kill. Unlike Trey however, the former mercenary's snapshots were ill aimed but performed in less than half the time. His two bolts travelled over the Dark Demons, one hit a telecommunication's pylon and knocked it over, the second one flew into space. Return fire from the DD's mostly missed in the limited window of opportunity but the few bolts that hit drained the little shield energy that Harrison managed to regenerate and one left a nasty scorch on the faceplate. The residual heat passing through the protective outer layer of the armor felt like a hot fever on Harrison's forehead.

The M3 FIRE1 was in the process of relocating closer to the action when an M2 WATER2's Monoeyes peered over the edge of a trench followed closely by the barrel of an LBR. Trey's well aimed and guided bolt found no difficulty hitting the FIRE1 dead centre where it's spherical shield was weakest in the deflecting department, draining it to near zero. It hobbled backwards in recoil before making a desperate dash for a nearby trench, sending random but intense double Forearm Plasma Chaingun fire and about 30 ARROWs towards the P1C.

Up and down the massive Crooked Demon strode through the trenches, but a hit could still be easily made. Henry kept focused on its motions and waited for when it was highest, so he could inflict the most damage to the head and sensors.

"You better hang onto your head..." Henry mumbled to himself with a malicious grin.
Then that moment came and Henry let loose the continuous stream on the head of the Crooked Demon and kept his weapon focused on the head as it moved. If the blast was able to penetrate the shields, it'd rip through most of the head, eat through some of the armour and play hell to the sensors, hopefully rendering it blind.

"Okay," Harrison dropped to the floor of the trench network and stayed there, waiting for his shields to recharge and facing in the direction of the DDs, "Ow, ow, ow..."

Trey ducked as quickly as he could, boosting to one side and shutting off the monoeye. Trey tracked around, headed toward the last known location of the FIRE armor, hoping it was still in said trench. LBR always at the front, Trey snuck around, his own ARROWS and his PLA's at the ready in case he needed them. The last thing they needed was someone in a powerful NAM armor working against them.

Even after taking into account cover, Trey's shields took a grazing from the plasma chaingun shots, dropping his shields down to yellow. A more dangerous threat would be the 30-something ARROWs descending onto him from above, about 8 crashed into his previous position after he boosted away, a pair of reddish beams from his PLA intercepted another 7 in mid-air. The last 14 rained right on the P1C, one or two may have been misled by the Mass Mesher system and a few more prematurely detonated from the M2's Flash Shields but the damage was done.

His shields took heavy damage and was completely dissipated, even the Damper System could not suppress the shockwaves of the impact, a lesser trained soldier would have been thrown around the trench. When the bombardment subsided a residual blackish cloud surrounded the M2... Only to be penetrated by the red glow of a pair of Monoeyes appearing just next to Trey around the corner. Lacking melee weapons to finish the job, the FIRE1 spun up it's chainguns. It would be difficult to fire first with the LBR at this range and in these close packed conditions.

Harrison's shields regenerated back to around 25%, good enough to sprint a short distance between cover under enemy fire if he wanted to. It felt like the DDs were planning something, but it was hard to tell without active monoeyes or a supporting teammate.

Henry's LBR recoiled backwards like an antimatter-spewing fire hose but the sniper's strong grip, aim and determination held it firm. The tight stream positrons broke through the shields and connected with the head. On the first bob it took out one half of the head unit, on the second bob it was gone. Target destroyed, the stream wandered to bite through the Crooked Demon's arm armor damaging the tender nanomuscles within before running out of steam.

The CD however continued charging headless, damaged but still hell bent on ripping his targets a new one. While Henry's gun was in cooling down, it dropped into a crouch and pounced on the last 10 meters, hoping to catch one Dark Demon in each of it's clawed-outstretched arms.

Knowing he only had a fraction of a second to act, Trey raised his arm, hoping to grab the FIRE with a PPG, only to remember he didn't have that. Lucky for him, the WATER PA had the Arrestor guard, so Trey used that instead, shooting the prongs at his enemy, hoping the short range would make up for the bit of disorientation caused by taking the hits he had. Trey held as still as he could, knowing that if he missed he was close to dead, and if he moved he could potentially avoid death temporarily.

While Fian had crossed to the other side of the junction, Viktor had held back, having nothing to contribute. Peeking around the corner, he saw that the Crooked Demon was coming charging down the trench and dropped back a couple meters from the corner. When it came flying by without a head, Kingston knew that there were no sensors to detect him, nor even a HUD for the pilot to see through. He was blind, and Viktor took full advantage of that fact, boosting after the CD and driving the chainsword toward its unprotected backside.

Harrison decided to make the move first on the DDs. Bringing up his LBR and raising to a crouched position, Harrison activated his monoeyes, scanned the surrounding area and proceeded to arm one of his RALs. When the first DD poked its head up, Harrison would launch his first volley of ARROWs and hope to cover a bit of ground in the chaos, keeping his EAG and LBR ready just in case.

A short hiss of vented gasses later the dual prongs ejected themselves from their slots. A loud crackling noise with bright electric lights signalled its confrontation with what's left of the FIRE1s shields. There was a brief pause as they successfully passed through the shield bubble. The noise and lights returned as the prongs violently attached themselves to the waist area of the support suit. Trey's own HUD dimmed as his UFCu generator transferred an excess of power to his opponent. A few antagonizing moments later the zapping stopped and his WATER2 keeled temporarily from short term power loss to the legs, the other person's FIRE1 also keeled, permanently, from a complete OS failure.

Just as Harrison peeked his monoeyes over the top and launched his ARROW swarm, two soda can sized objects were sailing across where the DDs were towards him. His suit later identified these as anti-PA grenades and activated his PAL, immediately blowing one apart in a reddish explosion (a basic HE 'nade) but the second one detonated in a bright yellowish flash closer to home (an anti-sensor subspace 'nade). When the former merc's HUD cleared and his monoeyes stopped twitching, he saw his lock-less ARROWs crashing into the former location of the DDs and the DDs themselves nowhere to be seen. Sensors pintpointed them to the edge of the map and retreating.

The Crooked Demon slammed onto the ground harmlessly as both Fian and Viktor had already moved aside. Viktor's chainblade first screeched across the surface of the CD's back finding no purchase, but later snagged on a thin indentation of the armor around the pilot's hatch. The blade dived and dug deep, making a two-inch wide chasm as it was pulled down the back, metal gibs and pieces violently ejected rearwards. The CD twitched violently and then abruptly ceased, defeated.

After surveying Viktor's handiwork, Fian consulted his tactical map. It appeared that all enemies had left the area... For now. Thinking that it was a harder than expected fight, and noting Sanroma's team making slower than expected progress, he thought this would be a great opportunity to take a break. He broadcasted on the team-wide frequency, smugly: "Good job people, we win this round. Return to the Dust Devil to repair and reload, bring back anything useful you can find."

Turning off the radio, he faced the remains of the Crooked Demon. He felt that there was something amiss, just like the AIR1 before. What he saw after yanking off the hatch confirmed his suspicions.

Meanwhile, Harrison was glad to get his ass out of the trenches and into the Dust Devil; he still didn't like the WATER2 no matter how useful some of its functions were. He quickly stood the rest of the way, sprinted out of the trench and headed for the Dust Devil's loading ramp.

"anything useful" Trey muttered to himself, waiting for his legs to regain power. "I Suppose a FIRE PA would be useful, Harrison, think you could get a deactivated FIRE running again quickly? we might have to do something about the pilot though. Vel Steyr, contact the Dust Devil and get a security team ready for us, I've got some loot." As soon as the Yamataian-bodied Nepleslian sniper's legs began working again, he dragged the FIRE PA to the Dust Devil to see if it could be useful. and maybe the pilot could give them some useful info, if her was still alive.

"If it's still a FIRE1, I can probably get it to work," Harrison said as he climbed out of his WATER2 and looked around the hangar. "But I'd prefer it sooner than later."

"Mission complete." Henry said, fairly clearly, over radio to the group as he began to head back to the NSS Dust Devil. His WATER2's heavy frame kept on moving back to a hopefully deserved rest. Although, something in the back of his mind lingered: How come only so few were sent to take out such a big ship?

As he got into the hangar and unsuited from his Powered Armour, his feeble fleshy frame becoming more and more visible. He picked up his uniform and got it back on, including the glasses.
"Harrison -" Henry asked his squadmate in his jaunty tone, "Why, were there - so few foes?"

Trey followed Henry in, dragging the FIRE1 with him. The P1C removed his helmet and answered Henry "you remember playing video games as a kid, right? that was level one. We get to reload and upgrade or whatever and get ready for level two." Trey soon dismounted his armor and went about searching for something to reload his LBR, as well as get an attachment (which he had forgotten the first time) And see what he could do about the shield generator, if it had broken from the strain.

The FIRE1 PA lay there in the hangar near the three marines, mostly forgotten. If Harrison wanted to do something with it, it was his problem now.

Harrison climbed down from the remains of the WATER2 he was climbing out of and looked at the FIRE1 with the dual-prong holes in its waistline where Kai shot it with the EAG. He sighed as he looked towards the pilot's compartment and responded to Henry's query.

"They may have just been a guard detail assigned to that hangar- perhaps they were only expecting light resistance."

He then turned to Kai, massaging his temples lightly.

"Great job. You overloaded the FIRE1's electronics; the whole suit's been fried. I couldn't use this even if it could run with out power."

Fian Vel Steyr's Super Dark Demon landed with a thud in the cargo bay. He removed his helmet and another helmet shaped thing which he tossed across the bay in disgust.

"TELE-FUCKING-OPERATION!" He snarled as the disembodied head of a Jimmy droid bounced off the opposing wall and landed somewhat near the center of the bay. While they were out there risking life and limb, the enemy were probably sitting comfy in simulators somewhere remotely controlling the suits. Inside, Fian was glad his men suffered no casualties this round, he wouldn't trade a single soldier for a thousand Jimmies.

"The number of units they can have active is fixed to the number of teleoperators. But they can reinforce all they like because they are in possession of most of the Shipyard's armories." The Master Chief removed an armored glove to brush away his black hair. "We can keep gunning them down, but I'm going to have to find a more permament solution."

He snapped his fingers towards a newly bought out crate with the NAM stamp. "I had the Quartermaster bring out their stock of ELEMENT components, see if you need anything."

"Trey, Henry. Excellent shooting." He pointed to the both of them in succession. His finger then swung towards Harrison. "...Terrible, but I should have known. Get that FIRE1 fixed, I need you in your 'ELEMENT'."

"Fifteen minutes!" He dismissed them, and turned his attention to the tactical map to formulate a new plan.

"I'm telling you, Trey fried th-" And the topic shut just as Fian finished his statement.

"Ah, dammit... Whatever." Harrison turned around and pulled the Jimmy chassis out of the FIRE1, then stomped it to pieces. He quickly crawled into the pilot's compartment and pressed a few buttons to attempt a manual activation of the PA when- to his surprise- a few readouts popped up in the area, and the armor shook lightly.

"Well, huh. It's a miracle; something that wasn't destroyed entirely in this place," He mused to himself as he went about examining the interior of the armor.

Trey attached the continuous stream attachment to his LBR after reloading it's ammunition, then checked the Shield unit again. Satisfied that it would work, he looked over Harrison's FIRE PA. "It looks like the electronics are intact, I must've just fried the organic components of the SAVTECH. Go get a new one from the box, and find something to patch up the holes, re-arm, and you should be good" the ex-tech sentry stated after a minute or so of watching the merc's progress.

Harrison rubbed his temples, climbing out of the FIRE1's cockpit and moving over to the box, pulling the necessary components out of the box and replacing the fried bits before climbing in. Much to his surprise, when manually activating the armor, the FIRE1 stood up under its own power, and all lights read green. So Harrison climbed out again and quickly patched up the pieces before entering the cockpit.

"I guess I'm ready to go."

"I... was never - interested, in those games," Henry replied to Trey as he searched his beret for a cigar. He had one left and it had previously been smoked, but was only halfway finished and extinguished, "Fuck-sticks..." He mumbled to himself as he inspected his WATER2 once more. He knew he had to get some of the things replaced for the next fight.

He re-lit the cigar and took a puff with a frown. In Henry's mind, it didn't taste right half-baked.
"Someone - prime my suit for - next launch, thankyou." He requisitioned to the armourers in the bay.