RP: YSS Ryūjō Mission 2 - Ambush at Home

[Rhysis]

Outside HX - 20

The Raccoon Shuttle remained under constant fire from the cloaked enemies. Fyodor and the shuttle's pilot stood on the top of the shuttle, firing back at a minimum of three different stationary cloaked ships, and a number of other, smaller vessels which could only be seen when the energy blasts were traced back to their sources.

One obvious conclusion that could be drawn, was that the attackers were either terrible shots, or they weren't aiming for the personnel, at all.

The shuttle, itself, had taken considerable damage, including the engines which were, obviously, out of commission. If something wasn't done soon, there would be nothing left of the craft.

 

[SmokeEmpress]

Inside the Ryujo - Armory

Sebastian Wells had just received her promotion. She was still reeling from that when she had heard the announcement of their new mission already happening. She grumbled, slightly, to herself, when she realized that they wouldn't have much in the way of downtime. But that was to be expected when it came to life in the military. She had heard the question from the Gargantuan, and had given as best of an answer as she could give. She knew next to nothing about what it was that they faced. And now, it seemed, they were up against even more.

During the transfer from one position to another, Sebastian worked on ensuring the flights were ready for their jumps before the Ryujo made its own jump into hyperspace. She was able to move just as fast as a crew of two or three on her own, thanks to her mechanic arm. She had no problem working by herself, for that's how she preferred it.

 

[Navian]

The Raccoon Shuttle... and Beyond!

As wild as Fyodor's suggestion had been, Navian wasn't getting much use out of emptying her borrowed gauss rifle through the shuttle's rear doors, as an alternative. She spent the magazine and made a token effort to secure the weapon back in storage, in the hope it wouldn't all become a debris field, soon afterward. That wasn't even the worst case scenario. If they hit the jackpot, it would all become a cloud of expanding vapor...

Navian ran through a number of dreadfully embarrassing scenarios in her head, and decided that if all her options were foolish, near-suicide, or, worst of all, would show hesitation and cowardice, she might as well try the most blunt and honest one. "Not practical, Zima-Hei. I shall unpack our positron beam launcher, jettison from the shuttle with it, and attempt to expend its charge on the enemy."

Using the edge of her Aspis, she slashed the straps away from the weapon, used one to tie her shield to her back, dragged out the PBL--just in time, as a gout of plasma reached through a breach to scorch the case not a foot from where the antimatter power supply had been--and, crouching under the mass of the weapon against the front end of the shuttle, she leapt with all the force she could gather, pushing off the walls, chairs, and stacks of supplies with the strength of her wings, to clear the rear doors.

In absolute terms, she was not travelling fast, and was not a much harder target than those standing on the roof of the disabled shuttle. Still, it seemed the crew weren't the targets, so far. At a few meters per second, she wouldn't be quick to reach the safe distance for them, so the threat was still present. That was a good enough reason to grab a hold of the weapon case--larger than she was, and fire her air shooters to set the PBL into a position from which she could straddle it and aim at a cloaked ship, like an artillery piece. She launch her first shot, a torrent of positrons streaming toward the foe.

BWOOSH!

It was seen as a bright white light in a beam, lancing out to the vanishing point. Though the kick was less than a kinetic weapon of equivalent size, it was more than Navian expected. She found herself slowly rotating, and flying away from her former trajectory. Would this be a problem? She had nowhere to go in range, nothing to do but to fire on the enemy. Though, it seemed she would be working to control her orientation, for at least as much time as she'd be firing the weapon...

 

[Samanthia]

::Ryujo / Space Battle ::

Hellcat and her wingman shot down the launch tube and out into space to see the lone damaged Shuttle drifting in space with its doors and hatches open to space. Seeing the lance of light stab out into the void of space. She and her wingman picked out the variances of distortion that a cloaked ship couldn't not hide and zeroed in on that.

When they got into firing range, they let loose a devastating lances of Aether cannon fire into the distortion that hid the Cloaked Ships that were firing on the Raccoon Shuttle and those that were defending it. She and her wingman zipped over the Shuttle to let the occupants know that help had arrived.

=/= "We have three semi-cloaked ships. Look for distortion in space and the source of weapons fire. Them is your target. Good hunting. Noc-Noc! I need your team to pick one of the remaining ships to take out. Jack! I need your team to take the remaining enemy ship. Hellcat out!" =/= Errowyn transmitted on the Fighter Wing tactical frequency. She sent the Enemies approximate positions in relation to the Raccoon being attacked. She gave Nocnimura her callsign which she'll be known for the rest of her military career. At least while under Errowyn's Command.

Then Errowyn switched frequency to the Ryujo's. =/= "We need a rescue shuttle out here. Alert them it's going to very hot out here. Hellcat out." =/=

She and her wingman got down to business in either to destroy the enemy ships or to cause it to retreat away from area.

 

[Multiverse Weaver]

Ryujo / Space Battle

Nocnimura watched Errowyn and her wingman launch. Right away, she and her own wingman loaded up and were fired out of the ship like two rockets. She saw the distortions, similar to the ones they'd seen during their last battle. She caught the name and a smile came to her face before she responded. =/= "Who's there, Hellcat? I read you." =/=

She was quick to locate a target and go after it. She focused hard on the enemy ship. So hard, in fact, she nearly missed to smaller distortions moving in a defensive pattern around the larger one. She noticed them just in time to barrel roll out of the way of one of their plasma blasts.

=/="Noc-Noc to Hellcat. They've got escorts in a delta pattern. There's likely others hiding behind the larger ships."

 

[Centurion0507]

Inside the Ryujo - Armory

Dies was staying inside the ship, he was specialized more for close combat and the other situations. However he had made his way to the Armory and was getting himself back into his Edjia powered armor and loading and preparing his M-SAR for combat just in case they got involved into boarding actions.

 

[Acewing13]

HX-20 Space

Fyodor growled as he kept missing the stupid smaller ships. Come on out and fight you stupid pieces of filth! Tired of that, he turned his attention to the larger shadows that were twisting the starscape. Charging up his aether shock arrays, he started firing at the shadows, walking his fire so to cover the entire area that the enemy craft might be.

“Our crewmates better get here soon,” he said to Kyo, then was answered when the Yamataian fighters flew by. Smiling, he then blinked at Navian’s actions. “Why didn’t anyone tell me we had that?”

 

[Samanthia]

::Ryujo / Space battle::

Errowyn laughed at the response from Nocnimura and quickly sobered up at the next piece of news as one of the larger ships lost it cloaking field becoming a target for the Ryujo. She began to pick up the smaller crafts that were hidden. She dodged incoming fire from them as she began to jink all over space.

She kept in tight on the bigger enemy ship and taking her time to line up shots for her wingman as they fought with the smaller crafts of the enemy. She kept up on her other teams of fighters. Seeing that they was outnumbered, Errowyn growled as she maneuvered and fired upon the enemy ships, reducing them to expanding glowing particle soon to become space dust.

She could feel the grazing burns of destructive energy from the enemy across her metallic skin of her fighter as she dodged, twisted and turned in space. Her Aether Cannons blazing, sending destructive energy pounding into the enemy fighters.

Working as a team with her wingman they began to reduce the numbers of the fighters, just enough for dart across space to join up with the others. She sent her wingman to join up with Nocnimura as she joined up 'Jack o Spades' and his wing man giving them more fire power.

 

[SmokeEmpress]

Ryujo - Armory

Sebastian made her way back into the armory, now that her duties had been fulfilled with ensuring the fighters were equipped. She nodded to Dies as she made her way to her own power armor and went through the preparations of getting herself geared up and ready to go. Though she wasn't a fighter pilot, she was damned if she wasn't going to get into the fight should ground troopers be needed.

After ensuring her gear was ready to go at a moments notice, she got to work getting everyone else's weapons and armor ready that would need it, or repairing those that still needed it until the call would come that would send her into battle. The dark-skinned Nepleslian appeared to have little to no emotion as far as what was coming.

 

[Multiverse Weaver]

Space Battle

Nocnimura fired, rolled and dodged, making the most of her additional appendages. Enemy blasts grazed the skin of her craft. Without the SPINE interface, she didn't feel it directly, but the reaction of the craft was enough to let her know.

Her skills were put to more of a test than ever before. One of Jack's shots, thankfully, hit one of the larger craft and disabled its cloaking field. The following result was even better. The smaller fighter craft became visible. Unfortunately, the number that appeared was outrageous, and they were none too happy about losing their element of surprise. When they started converging on the shuttle, she let loose with a round of aether blasts on the leader to draw some away.

="Jack, stay and protect the Ryujo. I'm breaking off. Hellcat, I've got an enemy wing incoming."=

Nocnimura banked hard and rolled, taking a group of visible fighters with her to meet up with her superior.

 

[Rhysis]

Space Battle

The other enemy ships dropped their stealth cover, revealing half a dozen other host ships, all similar in size to the Ryujo. Each one of the larger ships supported a wing of at least a dozen fighters.

Two wings formed up to take staffing runs at the shuttle. Two wings split up to engage the Ryujo's fighters, and the other two made runs for the Ryujo.

Ryujo

"All personnel with flight capable power armor are to deploy immediately.". Came the order over the ship's comm. "Combat orders will be given by Hellcat."

 

[Navian]

Space Battle

It seemed the enemy didn't consider infantry units worth targeting during a space battle. While that was keeping them alive, it wasn't going to do them any good if their ships couldn't recover them. Navian was still a long way from being at risk of capture, drifting erratically from the shots she had fired so far, to rake the first of the slow-moving enemy vessels she'd detected. Her weapon, still mostly charged, would surely annihilate her if its containment was breached.

Now that the enemy craft were fully visible, and could easily be identified as fighter carriers, she took a few extra seconds to aim carefully at a hangar while the fighters were launching. There was no better way to ruin an air power's day than to wedge their fighter craft cross-ways in the airlock machinery. She remembered the panicked crews, frustrated pilots, and incredulous officers distinctly, though she could not recall from where.

The positron beam launcher was not a precision weapon, but so long as she didn't miss the opening completely, it didn't need to be. If she could shear off a wing, disrupt their formation, or cause an explosion inside their hangar at a critical point, it could start a cascade failure, perhaps enough to take out a few fighters, or keep several more grounded for minutes. The beam of antiparticles sliding around had some chance of doing all three at once, so long as it wasn't deflected by their shields.

Sustained fire was accelerating her away from the enemy, though at this rate, she'd still be less than a kilometer from the shuttle for minutes, at least. She kept the weapon aimed toward the foes as much as possible, her head and feet lined up to it, to give them as narrow a target profile as she could, yet it would all be for naught if they decided she was worth a missile. Navian wondered how much chance she'd have to brush up on what happened if revived from backup, after this fight.

Recording a log seemed indulgent, however. Instead, she transmitted to Fyodor and the shuttle crew, "Recommend focusing on point defense, not the carriers. The fighters will soon be on an attack vector." To the Ryujo, she said, "Inform, they prioritize destroying the shuttle higher than defeating us in battle." She'd let someone else figure that out. Navian couldn't imagine what was stored in the supplies that was worth more than victory to them.

 

[Centurion0507]

Inside the Ryujo - Armory

Dies would shrug inside his armor, a slight chuckle coming out through his communications system as he muttered mostly to himself. "Guess I'm sitting this one out then. This suit doesn't have flight or much in the way of exo-atmospheric capabilities, it's designed for dropping from high up and slowing before impacting the ground but not for fighting in space for sustained durations, they are primarily suited to boarding actions inside a vessel."

 

[SmokeEmpress]

Inside the Ryujo - Armory

Sebastian looked over at Dies and then back to her ongoing task at hand. She said softly, "Our time will come. In the meantime, keeping those who are able to join in the fight in space well equipped is just as good as us going in and fighting alongside them." She hefted a whole armor suit with her mechanical hand and set it aside once she was done working on it, placing it where the one assigned to it could easily grab it. She then got another one that was needing some repairs and started to work on it.

 

[Samanthia]

Ryujo / Space Battle

Space was lit up the strobe of light from crafts exploding in their death throes and lances of destructive energy probing for the fast moving targets of fighters. Errowyn spun and turned and jinked. The unexpected call from one of the two helping to defend the shuttle came as a surprise and then realized that the fighters were going for the newly arrived Star Army Shuttle. They was trying to drive the fighters away from the Shuttle that carried the newcomers.

"Ryujo, A little help would be nice." Hellcat spoke with a growl that was laced with mechanical duality due to her SPINE integration with her Fighter AI.

A friendly blip on her tactical screen flared and died as her wingman got hit dead on by an enemy blast. She returned fire, letting loose several missiles into a group of enemy fighters. The ensuing explosions took out several of the enemy fighters, crippling several more to light dings the farther from the main exploding enemy crafts that were hit.

"Enemy fighters have no shields." Errowyn alerted her fighter wing of now five pilots. Seeing the wave of PA's leaving the Ryujo, "PA Commander, Assist in protecting the two shuttles. And help take the heat off us. Hellcat."

The newly launched Armed Raccoon T7 shuttle darted into the fray and snagged the wounded shuttle by tractor beam and began to drag the wounded shuttle back to the Ryujo.

Those in Power Armor that was capable of space maneuvering joined in the fight by helping to provide cover for the rescuing T7 and the wounded shuttle. Power Armor Commander took charge of the two newcomers and began long range assaults on the enemy capitol ships and enemy fighters that came in range of them.

With the Power Armor Commandoes in the fray taking the heat off the fighters and help protect the Recover mission, Errowyn settled in and began mounting up a kill count as fast as she could line up her shots as she dodges enemy fire.

With a fresh wave of fighters heading her way being led by Noc-Noc, she lined up her shots as she zipped over the top of Nocnimura's craft and let loose the fury of her craft into the pack of enemy fighters.

 

[Rhysis]

Space Battle

Navian's positron blast struck the ceiling of the enemy ship's bay, ripping off a huge chunk of the material from which the ship was constructed and depositing it right in the middle of the bay floor, crushing one of the fighters in the process. A wing of fighters circled around to intercept her, flying in a concentric circle pattern, making it nearly impossible to hit them. As they twisted in flight, all six of them let loose with a volley of fire. When the energy blasts hit, they flashed a brilliant light and sent out a shock wave that would feel like a powerful kick and, ultimately, cause her to lose consciousness.

Three wings of enemy fighters teamed up and began to go after the rescue shuttle. One wing formed up into another concentric circle and fired the same types of blasts at Fyodor and Kyo. Kyo lost consciousness immediately. Fyodor wouldn't be as quickly effected, but all of his PA's systems would immediately start to malfunction. Both of them would be knocked off the top of the shuttle from the shock wave. Within a matter of moments, the rescue shuttle's tractor beam was quickly disabled.

Out of Errowyn's fighters, several took hits on their craft that disabled their engines and weapons. Some had entire sections torn off of the vehicles. As Nocnimura was leading the enemy wing, her craft sustained heavy damage. The enemies switched their fire to Errowyn when she did her fly-over, successfully diabling one of her engines.

The two groups of enemy fighters that had been flying in concentric circles started to go after the PA units that came to support the fighters. Two MINDY pilots soon experienced the same problem as Fyodor.

Open Comm

="Illustrious to Ryujo. Looks like you could use some help. Give us twenty seconds."=

 

[Samanthia]

'5' : Space Battle

Errowyn yowled at the damages her ship had taken and the feedback surge through the connection she had with her Kawarime. She added more shielding to her craft, hopefully to survive as she struggled to adapt to her wounded craft maneuverability. She growled at the damage reports she was overhearing. It wasn't pretty.

 

[Navian]

Space Battle

To the last, Navian concentrated on the carriers--the only targets she could hit--striking them with her positron beam every time she could have its beam cross a target, while still using its recoil to propel her away from the crippled shuttle. "They're on me," she informed the others, as the fighter wing moved in around her. As difficult as it was to maneuver without any powered propulsion, her air shooters served better for helping her aim than they would for taking evasive action, at just a few meters per second.

All she had left to deal with the fighters was the pistol at her side. It might have helped, if their pilots came out to challenge her to a wrestling match, but they remained cautious, as if concerned she had more surprises just waiting for them. That gave just a few extra seconds, but it was no great surprise when she once again raked an enemy ship with a stream of hot antiparticles travelling at relativistic speeds.

The enemy's retributive fire was sudden. If she'd had time to reflect, she would have been surprised that the enemy fire did not completely annihilate her, directly or from the secondary explosion of the PBL. She separated from it during the burst, and the Nepleslian heavy weapon, still mostly charged, became a very dangerous piece of debris.

 

[Multiverse Weaver]

Space Battle

Every time her fighter was hit with enemy fire, it rocked the small craft, and she had to adjust. She was bigger than the intended pilots for a Kawarime style fighter. And while the tentacles she kept out did help her to reach controls, making up some of the difference for not having a SPINE interface, they took up even more room. As a result, she was cramped in the small compartment. Still, she hadn't complained. It would be something she'd just have to deal with. However, when the final blow from the enemy weapons hit her ship, and she lost all control of her fighter, the cramped feeling of the space in which she was seated suddenly hit her.

="Noc Noc to Hellcat. I'm adrift..."=

The response that cut her off was immediate, and surprising. ="Hodako to Noc Noc. I'm en route to your location."=

Nocnimura's reaction was equally quick, and her tone was filled with fire and ferocity...quite natural for someone in the body of a Nightmare Mishhu. ="Don't you dare! You leave the Ryujo to come get me and I'll tear you apart myself!"=

She continued her broadcast to the others ="Repeat, I'm adrift. Recommend you focus attention on protecting the Ryujo and shuttles until the area is secured."=

 

[Acewing13]

Space Battle

Fyodor felt helpless as the battle developed around him, fighters on both sides outgunning his PA scale weapons and the larger ships not even caring about his efforts. He thought that he was being ignored until their shuttle was destroyed, sending both him and Kyo flying into space. Her alarms went off before they cut out, which was a problem. And of course, it was around this time that his propulsion systems decided to quit. So not my day, he thought, thinking about what to do now. Well, my missiles are still working…

Waiting to point in the right direction, the Kodian targeted a passing enemy fighter and fired a quartet of SOOW missiles, which of course sent him spinning faster. Holding onto his cookies, stupid Yamataian phrase, he twisted and fired another pair of missiles, which slowed his rotation enough that he didn’t barf into his helmet. Never doing this again.

Thankfully, he had aimed well enough to be able to grab the unconscious Neko, holding her close as he let the other twenty two missiles fly off after a couple of targets, hoping they’d be more useful than his nauseated self.