RP: NSS Acadia [Mission 2]: Brotherhood and Sisterly Love

Anselm opened a private channel to Talbain "Hey, wingman, did the MC just say this is a mission we can afford to fail?" the hint of a smart aleck grin was in his words, as he nudged the ID-SOL's elbow.

The Chief walked fast into the room, trailing a long smoke trail behind him as he attempted to finish a cigarette in the short amount of time allotted. "Gamma, I want everyone suited up in under 3 minutes." Was all he said to whomever was already assembled. Bitterly flicking the cigarette aside, the Chief soon climbed into a waiting Hostile.

Running a systems check, the Chief sighed as the HUD lit up in front of him, showing his PA was structurally fine, with the weaponry loaded and ready. "Master Chief, any info on where those hostages might be held? I'd sure like to avoid getting some civvie blood on my new suit. That I bought." Ran was still extremely bitter that his bank account had practically been emptied, which meant less spending money for alcohol and cigarettes.

The Chief looked to the side at the FIRE's weapon cases being filled, mostly with spare ammunition for Gamma squad. Other Marines started to file into the hangar, gathering around the Chief. Most of them, he had never met before. However, those he did know, like Phaedra, were still rather new to him. "Volkov, Morrison, get into your suits. Henry, get into an Aggressor. I need you to carry these big fucking purses." Ran kicked the weapon case as he said it, forming up behind the Master Chief.

Kingston smirked to himself and nodded. "Yes sir." He brought the VOID up alongside Fian, mimicking the Master Chief's procedure. Magnetic boots were activated and his boosters prepared to launch him out of the bay. He prepared to activate the "Emden Protocol." Thinking of it somehow reminded the Third-Class Private of his apocalyptic contemplations the day before and a shiver crawled down his spine. Something bad was going to happen. He could just feel it, but he knew he couldn't dwell on it. So he tried to focus on the launch and impending landing that would follow.

Henry had gotten up early that morning, probably earlier than the other marines around. He'd taken the time to pack up his Muur armour, his clothing, his datapad and Styrling Dart, ready to be neatly stored in whatever he was told to put them in.

He waited in the hangar bay, trying to pick which armour to ride in. The choices baffled him momentarily. Hostile, or Aggresor? He'd done quick bits of research on each, and was pleasantly surprised to see that the Aggressor was a limited production model as a very heavy assault suit.

As the other marines came in to suit up, he was having a bit of trouble focussing. Then Ran told him to take the Aggressor which would serve as the pack mule for the group.
"Carrier, huh?" He said with a wry smile as he walked over to it, put his gear into its carry pouches, and got into the suit with ease.
The suit powered up slowly, as the HUD became visible to Henry. He made a quick radio check, and diagnostic on the suit. All systems were working fine, and the weight it was under barely stressed it.

"Consider it done, sir." That minor twinge of armour-induced madness entering his voice as he smiled somewhat, but remembered not to get too comfortable. He'd have to get out eventually.
With this in mind, walked the massive armour towards a launch station, but remembered something.

"Any other bags - to carry?" He asked.

Cy83r K0rp53 said:

"Hey, wingman, did the MC just say this is a mission we can afford to fail?"

Click to expand...

Anselm's question got an immediate reply out of Talbain. He shot back with "There's no such thing as a mission you can afford to fail." and accompanied it with a hard glare behind the armor of his suit. "An attitude like that get's people killed for no purpose." Followed a few seconds later. After taking a few breaths to calm down the ID-SOL marched his suit into position to be the next to launch after the Chief and Viktor launched.

The WATER that held Amelia had been still the entire time, making it seem empty. That is, until Gamma was called to form up. Carrying the optional Type 1 rifle instead of the LBR, and carrying ARROWs this time. She strode on over to the rest of the group, pausing next to Phaedra. She opened up a com to her newest (and possibly only) friend, "Are you ready for this?"

I know that. Anselm thought, not voicing his resent at the scolding; now was not the time to have an argument.

"Sorry, just a stupid joke," he apologized "if the Master Chief doesn't give us specifics, what say you and I personally make sure the boarding party makes it in safe and sound?"

Anselm paused, not sure if he was about to make another joke and piss his comrade off even more (which was something he definately wanted to avoid at all costs, what with them about to launch into combat and all) it was generally a good thing to go into a fight with a level head. With split-seconds of deliberation, Anselm decided to not say anything more, just in case he might've said something stupid again.

Upstairs.
Captain Peters was a wiry, thin man ill befitting a Power Armor pilot, which was why he was not but rather the temporary captain of the NSS Acadia. Though he shared a few similarities to the young men and women downstairs in the Hangar Bay, his shore leave was cancelled by virtue of him being a 'S1 Expert'. The bridge crew which he brought with him knows, but it would be best if the marines didn't, that his expertise in dealing effective damage to Hray-Types came from RECEIVING IT. Case in point, his very own NSS Shooting Star was serving drydock time for the sixth time, hence the shore leave.

"Target acquired, EMP cannon fully charged and ready to fire." His Weapons Officer voiced, the talented non-com was probably who High Command really wanted.

Peters merely rubber stamped. "FIRE!"

The various lights and consoles in the bridge briefly dimmed as one last burst of energy was needed to send the EMP bolt of blue on its way. "Increase jamming and turn hard to port, its all up to them now."

Downstairs.
"Ready...!" Fian cranked up his thrusters higher, up to the maximum threshold bearable by the magnetic boots. As the Acadia turned, the purplish cloud they had for a backdrop changed to that of empty space, save for three HUD-highlighted circles. One about 30 kilometers away was the pirate transport, in the process of launching suits and shuttles. Directly above it was the NSS Alder, ready to lay the smackdown as soon as its deadly Aether Cannon finishes charging. Between these two and the Acadia was the Emden about 10 kilometers away. Blue energy danced around its systems as Power Armors streamed out of the hangar bay, perhaps to escape the disabled ship.

"LAUNCH!" The Master Chief hit his overboost, racing over the edge of the bay and into the propelling field. His end speed matched that of an anti-starship mass driver projectile, the similarity in purpose is coincidental.

Anselm stepped onto the launch platform, activating his gravity booster, ion thrusters lighting up a cherry red as they warmed to maximum launching thrust "Alright, let's do this" he said, crouching into launch position and waiting for the green light and G-surge that meant he had been hurled towards the Emden. The Albino looked back at his first comrade "You with me, wingman?"

"Of course I'm coming. I didn't get suited up for nothing."

Moving his Aggressor onto the launcher he took the same position as Anselm and hit the thrusters.

"Let's see if we can keep you from needing pry bars to get you out of your armor this time Anselm."

Anselm laughed "Hah, good, I thought I'd pissed you off back there-" the marine quickly went through launch protocol, "let's bag us a starship" the marine whooped as the two Aggressors launched out of the hangar, turning into blurs the moment they hit the accelerator field. Catching up to the Master Chief and Kingston, Anselm produced his usual forward bravado, ignoring the axiom 'never volunteer for anything' he opened a channel to Fian, "MC, anything specific you need us to do?"

Trey grabbed the edge of the bay roof with his PPP, activating his thrusters at the same time and launching at full speed out of the bay, switching the PPP from pull to push as he crossed the precipice, just to give himself that extra boost. As he sped along, Trey had the Savtech start picking out targets and categorizing enemies for him, while he brought the LBR up and got ready to begin making his first few shots.

As soon as the marine reached a certain velocity, he turned his thrusters off and let momentum carry him, hopefully reducing the suit's sensor signature. as the rest of the marines brashly rushed past, the Sniper lined up for his first shot.

As Trey popped off the ship like a hunk of railgun ammo, Lilly was charging the field as well. Her thrusters quickly accelerated to max, and she shot off like a meteor, hurtling past Trey, nothing but a flash of light. With the speed she was going she would quickly overtake the Master Chief and the others, so she banked downward, separating herself from the rest of the PAs, and hopefully avoiding the initial barrage of pot shots the waiting pirates would be taking at the launching armors. The plates on her skirt popped open to reveal her DART missile launchers, and her pulse laser arrays charged up in anticipation of incoming fire. She held her lance rod behind her, waiting to activate it until she was within range. She didn't want to scare the poor pirates with her big KillyLance. Best to just leave them thinking she was just a regular AIR2 with a suicidal pilot... and best to hope they were wrong in their assumption...

A short distance behind Lilly, and charging like a stung bull, Harrison hit his overboost control and leapt off the ground, air-braking to his right as he entered the magnetic launcher and was shot out of the Acadia like a gauss round. Flicking his PLA to life, he immediately headed slightly downward, separating himself from the rest of the group and hovering slightly below Lilly and Trey, his Type 02 up and ready to fire.

Viktor shot out of the hangar in a synchronized launch with Master Chief Vel Steyr with a big grin on his face. As the fleeting seconds whizzed by like distant stars, Fian's AIR2 began to put distance between itself and Kingston's VOID. As they hit the peak of their launch, he brought his GAFM to bear with an EMP round already in the chamber. When his SAVTECH began acquiring targets, he spoke to Gamma Squad, "If you're going to launch missiles, do it soon. I'm deploying dummies in 60 seconds."

"Roger that, arming BOLTs, you've got the fire-order, Viktor" Anselm confirmed, ready to launch 120 missiles, half his payload, just behind Viktor's dummy spread.

"Don't slow down, the less time we spend out here the better!" Fian instructed over the comms, his manoeuvrability based thrusters putting out as much as they could. While the marines were in a hurry to get to the Emden, the PA clad pirates were also eager to leave it. Like Lilly and the rest, he readied his DART launchers and bought his FMD/RAPTOR combination to firing position. The suits of the marines were shaking madly from the velocity they were travelling, scoring a hit with anything other than guided, automatic or explosive-based weaponry would be difficult at best.

Three Dark Demons floating just outside the Emden's hangar bay spotted the boarding party approaching at top speed. Perhaps to provide cover to their contemporaries, they opened up with their laser-based Type 1.5. At this distance the reddish beams had a good spread, hitting almost every armor but doing nothing but fazing the shields thanks to the Type 1.5's weak individual strength.

"Gah, we're spotted. Let them have it!" The MC ran off about one-thirds of his DARTs, a single RED charge from his FMD and a litany of shots from the RAPTOR. Just as he did this, a large brilliant pillar of yellow light crossed the screens of the the suits, originating from the Alder and spearing through the Transport beyond the Emden. The fleeing Pirates stopped to gawk, but the light also illuminated two bulbous armors taking cover on the other side of the Emden with two pairs of cannons ready to repeat the spectacle fourfold.

Harrison was the first to call out the arrival of his sworn foes on the scene. "Fuck!" He shouted. "Two Crooked Demons; just went over the other side of the Emden!"

The merc engaged full forward thrust and activated his ARROW racks, searching his screen for the form of the CDs he had spotted. They had only briefly been illuminated on his screen, shortly after the Alder had fired its main gun, and Harrison hadn't had time to lock them as targets before they dissappeared. He visually scanned the Emden, searching for the bulbous PAs that had been there and gone in a flash. Just as he was about to give up looking, he spotted one of their bulbous forms ever-so-briefly- as it turned towards the group and then back again, its monoeye flashing briefly against the ebon backdrop. Locking in the target and making sure the tag stuck, Harrison launched his first ARROW rack in the beastly armor's path.

Trey's suit, with no active thrusters to joggle it around, hung behind the main group. Knowing the weakness of the Type 1.5's shots, he didn't even bother to dodge the stray blasts that came his way, desiring rather to have a pristine shot than pristine shields. The sniper lined up a shot with one of the DD's, waiting for his momentum to bring him a lot closer before trying anything with the much more formidable CD's. Trey took aim at the center enemy, Using both his Savtech and his own innate ability, He popped off a shot of Positrons aimed straight for the suit's center of mass, aided by a stabler suit, a steady hand, and computer technology.

When 60 seconds were up, Private Viktor Kingston launched 24 TRACERs in a horizontal fan, each transmitting a dummy signal as they made their journeys away from the calf rack. Then he targeted the forward-most Powered Armor opponents and launched his first EMP round into their masses. The idea was to strike as many targets on the forefront of the assault as possible, killing shields and possibly frying systems. The next round wouldn't be ready for another 17 seconds, so he switched to his SGL and emptied a chamber of EMP shells across the line of pirates, each set to detonate fifteen seconds from launch, which was an inference made with the aid of Viktor's SAVTECH; hopefully he was correct in inferring that's how long it would take his shells and the enemy to meet each other.

Having been focused on weakening the large mass of opponents, he hadn't noticed the Crooked Demons, and only made a footnote of the DDs that had begun a premature assault.