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RP: YSS Kaiyō Mission 21: Yuimaru

Ametheliana

Head in the Stars
Staff Member
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🌸 FM of Yamatai
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((OOC: Joint Post between members of Kaiyō crew posted in segments. Thread title translates to a friendly, cooperated effort.))

15日 3月 YE 42
Forward Planetary Outpost
Base 1B

POM 4

Teien Eden’s black head glinted in the soft light of the the significantly expanded POM Qonset Hut ((https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?id=stararmy:buildings:type_33_prefab_outpost:quonset_hut)) that she, her crew and a thousand or so others were in. Above her, the convex walls of the outpost module were made of recycled starship hulls. Though they were seamlessly integrated into one another, she still wondered if she would be able to see a distinctive piece of the original YSS Kaiyō. Her amber eyes searched before a tug at her jacket’s hem prompted her to look down at the tugger, Taiyou Hoshi.

Hoshi eyes prompted Eden to look back to the line of Nekovalkyrja Type 33 Eihei and 33A on an elevated stage before her. They were situated in the front row of a group of a thousand Rikugun and Third Fleet soldiers detached to the Kuvexian front line with them. Taiyou Hoshi was among many captains assembled, listening to the briefing happening before them. The 200 centurions were all being briefed in waves amongst other large Qonset Huts by command leaders and there had been many briefings like this from the same command leaders, so Hoshi had offered to deliver the briefing herself to reprieve them. The Legion 777 ((https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?id=stararmy:units:legion_777)) Commander, Shôshô Uzume herself, had been slotted to give this briefing and the Kaiyō captain’s request had been denied. She listened intently now, hoping Eden would too.

The mission was strategic but straightforward; a lot of which was made possible by the Kaiyō crew’s independent operations in the area.

Intelligence reports showed that a number of Kuvexian corporations had recently moved a majority of their operations out of a sector’s core planets and into a nearby military sector. The ships of the Third Fleet would be creating a blockade around where the corporations had moved to while also taking their military base there. YSS Kaiyō II did have a good amount of ground missions behind it, so was being deployed as a ground force. False data had been given to the Kuvexians about an attack planned to be tomorrow, the 16th, so the majority of Kuvexian space forces in this area of their domain had been moved out of certain strategic locations- this military sector, the surrounding passageway of space, and a few others nearby that the Yamataian strike force would be deploying to take.

The sector they were striking had four main systems that formed a grid network. Once one went down, the other three would be easier to capture. This group would be one of others to whose objective would be to de-establish the system's whole network by neutralizing the orbital installations and defensive ground forces of one planet in order to sabotage the system's network.

Eden looked towards where Wulf was, hoping to shoot him a message about Penny being the messenger of that data, but she thought better of it. She knew finding the Neko they had given away to the enemy wasn’t a priority at the time and she only wanted to remind him of that when there was good news. As her gaze was scanning back up to the speaking Shôshô, she caught sight of Wyatt. Painfully aware that yesterday had been Saya’s due date, she had gone to see him. It was still hard for her to think of her own lost daughter and wife, but her resolve to be sure the missing crew weren’t loss forever like them steamed in her as she clenched her fists and looked ahead. She knew the mission to get them was only just out of their grasp, though, and that the duty to keep on with their barrage against the Kuvexians was all they could do until they knew the position of Saya, Aiko, and William. With renewed interest, she listened more intently to the Shôshô.

"And so centuries sixty nine, seventy, and seventy one will assault the final orbital platform while remaining Taii lead their troops in a direct assault on Planet Borlel's defensive hardpoints," Uzume said while a volumetric map animated the target world, its Kuvexian garrisons, and the Star Army's formations on their attack routes. She had a gentle voice that managed to deliver its message in very officious order, and wore an ankle-length pleated skirt with her 30C uniform that recalled her old samurai's hakama.

"One of the legion's Plumeria — the YSS Kusa, and her armor team — plus the YSS Kaiyō II's armor team are assigned to spearhead our planetary attack and strike these two relay installations while the bulk of our centuries secure related infrastructure and ground around them," the admiral continued while the map zoomed in on planet Borlel and their targets. She said no more for some time, then, until some of the soldiers assembled before her began to murmur.

"That is your mission," Uzume said at last, before any conversations could really take off. "Go, now, and ensure your centuries and crews are ready to launch within the hour."


1 Hour Later
Kuvexian Space
YSS Honne- Kagai class

Power Armor Launch Bay

The short section of space had been overtaken by the three centuries that the Kaiyō crew was a part of. The Kaiyō ship itself was operating with only some of its normal crew while most of its forces were aboard a Kaiga, ready to deploy via the rectangular doors in the launch bay. For now, they were closed as the Kagai moved through the sector, prowling near Planet Borlel, its destination.

Eden tapped her knuckles together as she walked from the ready armory with Rei, passing other units of powered armor warriors prepping within the huge launch bay. There were 100 other power armors here beisdes her own, a joyful sight for lonely eyes such as hers.

“You really should try going without a handheld,” she said to the samurai, clad in her own Sarah M7. The second officer, Eden, was in her Mindy but had only the shoulder aetheric pulse cannons and nodal support bits as leg mounted mini missiles as weaponry. Otherwise, she had a leader support pack on her chest and standard Mindy 4 bits and bobs.

Rei was steadfastly silent as she walked, before she took a position near Gravity and spoke.

“I will retain my sword, Chusa,” Rei said, referring to the aether beam rifle of her Sarah M7.

Kiyo was silent as she listened to the briefing, no word of locating Saya, William, and Aiko, which pissed her off. She knew her duty, and she knew things would be fine; she can take her anger out on some Kuvexians no problems. She hoped they got lucky and found the location on their teammates, maybe they will find that in this mission. During the briefing she gently clutched Wulf’s hand in her own as she listened, her face expressionless as she kept herself calm as much as she could.

Hours later, she was in her Mindy, with her personal standard armament, and her aether katana, Silverlight, as well her aether blaster saber in both hands. “Chusa, I also wish to retain my swords, besides my personal standard armament.” She replied, though realizing since she hadn’t been spoken to, she might get into trouble for speaking out of turn.

Valkyr sat on top of the Power armor bay, as the havoc drake waited for action. She chirped as if to say that she was ready to kill too.

Kikios would be taking her usual (unusual) Mindy loadout with Kalamari arms, NSBs, a missile pod, scalar machine gun, and Saber-Rifle. Though she'd taken this loadout a few times before, she hadn't actually gotten to test it that much since she wasn't in real combat that often.

Ever the social butterfly, Gravity had managed to break through the cultural barriers that separated the navy from the ground-pounders during their short time together. As a result, the nice infantry neko had loaned her some of their warpaint. As she inspected herself on her communicator's selfie-cam, she had to admit that while she'd never really been a makeup girl, she really loved the two navy-blue stripes leading from the bottom of her eyelids to mid-cheek.

She could get used to this. As Nepleslian death metal softly played from her speaker, Gravity took a moment to inspect what she dubbed her "stealth build". A 50mm gauss cannon, with back-mounted extended magazine. An aether machine gun on the other shoulder, and mini-missiles on both legs. Starlight, meanwhile, stayed behind. No use taking him into an armor fight.

Eden gave a short burst of laughter at Kiyo's request, "Don't worry, Weeyico-hei. I know it's a matter of personal preference. Keep your swords and I'll keep my arms, though neither is match for warpaint like Gravity's."

Narumi had a very standard loadout for her Mindy with mini-missiles, nodal bits, and a coherent aether weapon. The last bit a popular weapon with the Giretsu. And also like a Giretsu, she didn't really have much to say, instead focusing on the task at hand.

The faceplate of Wyatt's TARSA was currently open, resting steadfast on his forehead and exposing the Operative's unshaven face, casting oppressive shadows down over the Minkan's usually bright eyes. He... was going through a lot, understandably, but wouldn't be able to call himself SAINT if he wasn't able to push his emotions and personal biases back into their bottle.

So instead his mind was focused solely on the mission and ensuring his gear was good to go, the man's sleek suit of dark-blue armour currently being kitted out for the overwatch role he'd be providing. The coppery, clearly affected man had saved this particular loadout under the name "Displacer", a creature from Saya's much beloved tabletop game.

He watched the other mill around, AHAMR rifle slung across one shoulder with a LATR currently resting in the crook of his arms, finding a little solace in the fact some of the others were able to maintain high spirits at least before the Minkan sealed his helmet's face plate.

Having caught sight of the stubbled and shadowed face of their SAINT operative, Eden quipped, "Next time, Gravity, share that warpaint, would you? You're not the only-" as Eden was speaking, the KAMI of the ship spoke over the ship's comms.

"Condition One," the KAMI reported to the launch bay. "Prepare to deploy."

As the launch bay's doors rose, replaced with only a force field between the armors and the blue and green world below them. It was ringed with hazy blue and white layers of the atmosphere on the peripherals of their vision, which became obfuscated as the Kami class shuddered through the exosphere. Within several seconds of anticipation and wait in the bay, the Kagai reached its destination, the stratosphere.

The grouping of Nekovalkyrja in armors nearest the large rectangular doors ballooned up and then down, beyond view as they launched. The next line of power armored soldiers unmoored themselves and moved out, quickly dropping into the layers of atmosphere hugging the planet below. Next up to launch were the row the Kaiyō crew were within.

"Yamatai Banzai!!!" Narumi screamed out as she was launched to bring death to those below.

The team's half-Elven Minkan would simply step out of the ship when it was his turn to drop, arching his back and letting gravity tumble his armour into the correct orientation before moving along his assigned flight path.

Kiyo stepped into place as Narumi screamed, not wanting to be outdone, she also shouted. “Come and die Kuvexians!” She shouted as she jumped out of the ship and headed down hard and fast towards the planet.

Wincing slightly beneath his helmet and sensing there would be more yelling Wyatt momentarily dialled down the volume of the team's comms system a few notches.


Yells of the excitement before battle clung behind them as they descended fast and far from the ship. The cloud layer that seemed far flung in its pillowy depth was soon being broken through by the armors in front of them, swallowing them from sight, before Eden and the line of armors were through and past it, too.

"Engaging enemy vessels!" came a quick reply from a group lower than them.

Below them, their route was clearly marked through a pass between snow-clad mountain, but the Kuvexians had employed the time between the alerts of the approaching vessels and now to deploy their own defensive measures. Small and large gunships skittered through the path that the armors were taking. Other enemy ships appeared within visual range around the nearby enemy base- the Yamataian's destination.

There were a few dozen in total, one of which suddenly burst into flame and careened out of the sky and in the path of Eden and some of those around her, forcing her to teleport quickly in front of the ship to avoid being knocked down and out of the air. The Chusa was still flying forward towards the base, but with the enemy's ground forces surprising stock of gunships they had no doubt shaken out of storage, she wasn't sure their entrance to the base would be as simple as the front door.

"Gekichin!" came another voice over comms, establishing an attacked starship had been sunk.

"Lucky shot!" came a sharp reply.

Eden shot into her team's comms, "Create a doorway! Take out as many ships as you can!"

A large cyan beam of aether energy sang out from Narumi as she fired her coherent aether rifle. In short controlled bursts, she focused on an incoming gunship that dared declare its intention to target her.

Swapping to his other rifle Wyatt began slowly and methodically unloading his AHAMR into the engines and missile pods of approaching gunships whenever the opportunity arose, sending slug after caustic slug screaming out his rifle's barrel at supersonic speeds.

Though Wyatt's slugs needed to pierce before delivering payloads, his repeated shots into a gunship trying to close the distance between the base and the descending waves of infantry Nekovalkyrja destabilized the ship enough for its missile bays to ignite in a small plume of fire that ate at the shredded hull before the gunship's own payloads blossomed in a glowing explosion that inflated outwards.

The end result was likely a bitter fall to the snowy precipice below like the ship that had fallen before it, but the team was moving past that ship as well as the one that had targeted Narumi and not taken any outwardly apparent damage from her.

Anti-Mecha power mode not putting a dent in the ships, Narumi opts to just focus on dodging weapons fire instead. She holsters the weapon on her shoulder and continues the fall down.

Gravity corkscrewed around Wyatt like a bird. She hadn't ever really been a part of a large scale PA battle, but she had to say that so far this was pretty easy. This was just like a normal space battle, except now she was in a nimble little armor instead of a three hundred meter gunship. Her shoulder-mounted machine gun tracked an incoming armor and lit it up at the same time that her 50mm gauss cannon began dialing in on the powerplant of the next ship in line.

"Oops." she muttered.

“Hai” was the only response Eden would get from the Azure Sword Kat as the Neko came down. She saw her comrades even her sister acting spectacularly. She gripped her Silverlight tightly, activating its secondary mode as she came down soon bringing herself at Gravity’s side. “Excellent work sis!” she said before she went on the attack as she got an idea and aimed for the cockpit of the nearest enemy gunship she saw.

Eden's voice splashed in over comms, "Target sensitive areas of their gunships, like engines!" The kinetic energy damage from Gravity's four foot gauss cannon had penetrated the reactive engine of the enemy vessel.

"Same goes for you, Yoshinaga-hei!" Eden said, shifting her focus to Narumi.

She directed the clerk's and her team's attention to a comoliment of armors ((https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?id=faction:kuvexia:military:roles:infantry)) that had deployed out of a gunship. It had been an emergency ejection as the ship plummeted into the white and rocky precipice below. Waves of compact snow arched away from the ship, obscuring some of them from view, though the ship had fallen precariously close to their path and now they faced an imminent wall of about forty armors about to ascend.

"Thirty plus hostiles at twelve o'clock low!" Warned Gravity, who opened up on the mass with a combo of machine gun fire and mini missiles before they could gain momentum.

"I see them. They are going to be 30+ dead Kuvexians soon." Narumi said as she went to take hold of her coherent rifle and made her suit ready for evasive maneuvering. Once the weapon was fully hot a few seconds later, she let loose controlled bursts of full powered cyan aether at the golden swarm. She relied on her training back at SAIC to keep her mind, body breathing controlled enough to minimize shots hitting non-vital areas.

Pausing in her pitch forward in her Srah M7, Rei’s raised her forearm. After the aether projector pitched out of her armor, the energy submachine gun began firing at the armors that plumed above the soft churning of snow and ship. The combined shots of her and her comrades near her caught a handful of armors, sending four tumbling back downwards.

Initially, the enemy armors were being piloted to elevate and avoid being swallowed by snow and wreckage, but soon they were negotiating the uncertain battlefield. A few jutted out and away from the Kaiyō team, launching themselves towards the Rikugun soldiers nearer the base as they engaged the gunships there, while half of the initial group turned their attention more towards the approaching groups, including Eden’s team. Some of the armors aimed their own weaponry while others worked to close the distance between them and the groups onslaughting their base.

Narumi continued with her controlled shots at the advancing Kuvexians. She narrowed her profile as much as possible and focused on any trying to flank a teammate.

Kiyo nodded ’hai” she replied as she turned her attack on the gunship’s engines before she spotted the arrival of the enemy power armor. She charged at one, all the while preparing her attack upon them.

"Don't get greedy, Kiyo! We still have plenty of help." Advised the elder sister, referring to the remaining waves of friendlies still streaming in from the rear. With only about 20 armors actively opposing them, it would make sense to allow their superior numbers to do most of the heavy lifting. Staying high, Gravity began laying down a wall of suppressing fire, using her shoulder-mounted MG to autotarget the armors in the back while using the rifle in her hands to keep baddies away from Kiyo.

"Gravity's right," Eden called out. Her momentum hadn't yet dropped as she launched through the cluster of armors.

When she saw a duo of armors approaching, Rei took up a profile like Narumi's to avoid the energy melee weapon one held.. Then, with an armored boot and thrust, the samurai kicked at one armor, pushing it into the other at the right second. Her capacitor whirred as energy built up for a more powerful short range burst at the disoriented pair. She looked to Eden, following her own path away from the advancing armors and towards the six gunships that remained. The gunships weaponry seemed to be next to useless as were the shielding, but Eden called out the real threat.

"Armor troops deploying from two more vessels!" As she said it, racks of armors dropped out of the bottom of two ships and within a second, the first groups of them were being let loose on the battle stage. It looked like the last ship had lost a large fraction of its compliment as each ship had at least a hundred armored soldiers release from the ships. "Target remaining gunship's missile bays." Eden said, remembering how Wyatt had decimated a gunship early on by doing so. Damaging the ship's engines isn't enough, ensure complete vessel destruction before more enemy armors can join the battle!"

"Roger! Firing!" Gravity affirmed and rocketed off, moving away from the main fray to better line up shots with the 50mm on the missile bay of one of the remaining vessels. One of the squids tried to get cute and impale her from behind with his blade. She grabbed the enemy armor by the wrist and with her free hand jammed her weapon up under its chin. After holding down the trigger for a good few seconds, she casually tossed it away like trash and resumed her objective. "Enemy armor Alpha Mike Foxtrot."

Eden gave a quick laugh at Gravity's parting words to her enemy, but the missile bay remained intact. What's more, the time before the four gunships released their payload onto the battlefield was likely diminishing.

Kiki surmised she would have a good chance of hitting a missile if she used her aether beam saber-rifle's beam setting to sweep across the missile bays, unless they were protected it would likely set them off easily. Using her Saber-Rifle's beam mode she allowed the beam to blast by and carefully drift across the missile bay of a gunship for three seconds, before switching targets and repeating the process for two other gunships. Due to her weapon's limitations she needed to give it a moment before she could fire it again after that, but hopefully at least one of the missile bays would detonate.

The first target Kikios had set her sights on was a formidable kill. The ship had likely diverted power to their insubstantial shields. The time it took to puncture them delayed the inevitable: the aetheric energy seeped into the volatile weapons compartments, causing a brilliant fireball that was surrounded by the crackling black web of blown up hull and ship alike.

With how hazardous the battlefield was at the current moment, it made sense that not all of Kikios' three targets were struck and detonated. An armor advanced unwittingly into her line of fire and caught her saber-rifle's beam. The armor's shields were ripped to shreds and the passing beam took off their armor's arm and a portion of their hip. Eden swiveled to deal a final blow with her shoulder's aetheric pulse cannons.

Teien Eden's gaze followed to Kikio's final target and noticed the gunship the engineer had targeted had been beginning to lower its grouping of power armors when its missiles bay nearest Kikio's erupted in a small explosion, shattering the ship.In the next moment, a larger explosion plumed to engulf the whole of the ship, armors included.

The second officer diverted her gaze to the remaining gunships to see that those that were not destroyed had successfully deployed their cache of soldiers. The battlefield was abuzz with the swarm-like activity of Yamataian against Kuvexian armors, engaging in melee and long range fire. Eden's own breastplate was knicked as she took stock.

"Kusa armor team!" Eden flung into comms, "Moving to infiltrate enemy base!"

"Roger Kaiyō team leader," came a snappy reply as Eden relayed the order to move in to the enemy stronghold at the woody base of the snow laden valley. A maelstorm of activity lay between them and it. Shots of all calibers between enemy and ally alike created deadly obstacles and there was no clear path of safety within the valley's battle heavy sky. Even few sparse ground troops had begun engaging one another below.

Eden streamed forward, tracking what she could see and avoiding it while letting her intuition guide her passage. Shots darted, some aimed at her and her team members alike. As she moved further into the fray, a kinetic shot pushed her off her course and the Nekovalkyrja was pushed into the hull of a gunship she had been flying near. Around her right fist, her armor's solid volumetrics hardened into a sturdy blade that she plunged into the ship, slowing her skidding to a stop. She pushed a leg up and thrusted from the gunship, facing it as she jettisoned a missile from her leg mounts, watching it tear through the small hole she had struck into it- one that became a ghastlier, bigger hole of shrapnel. She didn't have the opportunity to complete the downing of the vessel as she turned away, flying towards the base and out of lines of fire once more.

Kiyo heard her sister’s words in her earpiece, and then the confirmation from Eden, that confused her at being thought to be greedy, but they were right, there were a lot of soldiers on their side who can be of help, she needn’t try to take as many soldiers as she wanted but she did want to release her anger. “Sis, your amazing” she commented as she saw her sister attack their enemies as she too went for the attack, not wanting to be outdone by her sister, who she admired.

The finely-calibrated propulsion systems of Wyatt's TARSA continued to make corrections for him as the ginger-haired black panel kept on descending with the team, small bits of shrapnel bending and distorting as they bounced off his suit's unseen hard-light shield. The Operative saw Eden's work and seized the opportunity to finish what the higher-ranking Neko had been unable to, twisting his body in the air to momentarily slow his own fall and take a shot at the compromised armor plating.

"Chusa, I spy a ridge off to the east slightly that looks like it has potential. Do you have anything against me setting up there, when we touch down, to keep the enemies pinned down?" Wyatt's cold, blunt voice echoed through the shared comms system.
 
Eden's vision tracked from the base below to the one of the mountainous ridges in the distance.

"Iie, no. Request denied, Fujiwara-heisho. Ours and the YSS Kusa's armor teams are the only ones infiltrating the base itself. If we don't down this sector's grid network inside then we won't have the sector. Let the rangers and stealth infiltrators like Soban-hei," Eden said, referring to their own crewmember Wulf Soban, "get footholds. We need to go in."

Eden was able to see Rei had already landed on the ground. With her Sarah M7, the samurai began shooting into the ground troops of the Kuvexian's base. Next to her, Peio Muyomi and Teien Eden landed to provide a bit of suppressive fire power. Within the base's barricaded entrance were five gargantuan Kuvexian heavy infantry ((https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?id=faction:kuvexia:military:roles:heavy_infantry)) and a smattering of ten of the enemy infantry that had been attacking from ships previously.

To her team, Eden called out, "Cover Kusa's team at the door!"

With a simultaneous precision, two of the armor team from the YSS Kusa teleported forward, past the enemy armors. Now on top of the base's ten foot wide and tall blast shuttered entrance, the Nekovalkyrja in their Sarah M7 armors began placing C4 onto the structural points of its perimeter.

Eden trained her forearm weapon on an infantry armor that had seen those behind them and begun to shoot but

The distinct fire from a LATR(https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?id=stararmy:weapons:ke-w1-1a_latr) pierced the targets armor the center mass shot giving some indiction of the snipers position.As the Kuvvie dropped from the pin point shot Eden would receive a laser transmission "Ranger Element to Kaiyo Element sorry for the wait ma'am, some delay getting into position". The professional voice from Wulf was calm as he exhaled. In a nearby rock formation Wulf was by himself able to get a solid vantage point. As he waited on the recharge of his teleportation unit (https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?id=stararmy:equipment:ke-m2-p4003. Adding more "Foothold established and ready to regroup on your orders ".

Kiyo heard Wyatt's voice through their communication system making a request, and she glanced down to the ridges that he specified, but Eden denied the request before she took note of the shot from her love that killed the Kuvexian. She grinned with pride before she spoke. “Good shot darling,” was sent to Wulf directly. She saw a Kuvexian in light infantry power armor come near her, and gripping hard on the hilt of her Silverlight, she swung at them, her eyes watching as the Aether enhanced blade cut through the armor, and she watched them fall apart. “Pervert, Kuvexian was too close,” she muttered though they’d heard her as she fired her weapon. “I’m ready to proceed with infiltration.

"...affirmative, ma'am," Wyatt half-growled back into his helmet's mic, the orange Minkan biting into his lower lip with some small, unseen measure of contempt before returning to the mission at hand.

One-handing his rifle for a moment the Operative swung it around into a better position, resting the broad face of the blue thing's magazine in the crook of his arm before resuming firing. Purposefully leading his shots, hoping to catch more than one armour with the volatile ball of aether which coalesced with each impact, and thus cut a bigger hole into the enemy ranks.

"How many are you bringing with you Soban-hei?" Eden said into comms to Wulf, noticing the ranger compliment positioned around the complex on her HUD. "They have taken down the door! We're infiltrating now!" she continued, speaking to him as well as the two teams she would be going in with. Many enemy armors before them were still firing, but behind them descended legionnaires, poised to do what they loved, ground battle, and to backup the infiltration teams.

At the door, one of the Sarah-clad Nekovalkyrja that had opened it lay dead while the other had slid down on the wall next to the doorway.

With a rough tone, Eden said, "Next time I say cover, we cover, Kaiyo!"

"YSS Kusa armor team right behind you, Teien-chusa!" said the other squad leader in comms. "Take point!" she ordered.

The inside of the base's entrance was wide and cavernous with miscellaneous objects and furniture. Importantly, there were three doorways.

"Far right," Eden said to those in front. "Sounds like we'll have company in here shortly, fast!"

Wulf smiled hearing Kiyo's compliment. Though not letting it distract him from Eden's request. Replying earnestly "Just myself, the rest of the rangers are tasked for other operations".Seeing the timer had completed for his teleportation unit. "Be there in a moment" he said as he activated the teleportation unit(https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?id=stararmy:equipment:ke-m2-p4003.). Arriving nearby he switched the LATR(https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?id=stararmy:weapons:ke-w1-1a_latr) to submachinegun mode as he prepared to sweep for targets.

Kiyo stepped into place beside her captain and gasps as she saw the dead Sarah armored Neko, and frowned under her helmet. She silently promised to send those Kuvexians and the bugs to death for the murder of her people. She also decided after they were finished here, she’d like some pickles and chocolate. She gripped her Silverlight and prepared to move in.

“Good, it would be polite to say hello, also goodbye,” Kiyo said, her voice heard on the com units.

Wyatt's dark-blue, reasonably tall figure flared its legs as he approached the entrance, rubberized soles of his suit absorbing most of the impact. In one fluid motion the Minkan transitioned away from his AHAMR, clamping it down to one shoulder in favour of a PAAR loaded up with black-tips.

"Fujiwara, on it," was all the big guy said, racking back his rifle to chamber around before hover-stepping into a better position to face the incoming forces.

Gravity's gauss canon hummed to life from next to Wyatt. The machine gun on her other shoulder whirred to life and began to track the doorway.

"Knock knock..." the blue tigress drawled.

Eden had booked it to the far right doorway. She noticed her team priming an attack on the incoming enemies and set to work disabling the doorway's blast shutter, head down and taking the role of a field engineer at the control panel. Meanwhile, the Kusa armor team had filtered in and their own members were working on securing the entrance.

Through the doorway nearest them came a line of unarmored Kuvexians whose glittering gold and orange uniforms quickly grew dark with their own purple blood as the team made fast work of them. Behind them, though, were a small assortment of heavy and light infantry armors. The heavy armors were greater in number, at least ten of them fanned out, shooting at the Kaiyo and Kusa armors as they drew in close.

A few light rounds pinged off Gravity's shields, and she cursed and ducked behind a sturdy-looking barrier. As sturdy as could be found in an armor fight. She took aim with her gauss cannon and took aim at an armor who appeared to be focusing her.

"Gauss rounds out!" She called and sent a salvo at the heavy armor.

Behind cover near a certain tiger-striped, blue neko Wyatt hit the deck to avoid a wall of incoming fire. The man's armour and the strips of material around his rifle cloaked in unison before a tight roll was executed, putting the sneaky Minkan low and at the edge a barrier, a nice spot he started firing in bursts from.

The rifle barely kicked back at all against the layers of synthetic muscle and machined bone, its flash greatly lessened by a suppressor that'd likely be red hot soon enough.

By dodging to the side, the armor had avoided two of the three gauss rounds from Gravity's salvo. But, they had been too eager to retrain their body towards her and their shoulder was clipped with the kinetic force of the third gauss round. Though it hadn't penetrated the zesuaium, the impact had forced their arm back with the force of the blast. Now with only three appendages and a spray of purple mist from their torn arm socket, the enemy thrusted towards her side and connected their heavy gattling gun with her shoulder's largely protruding gauss cannon like an axe on wood.

Nullifying its utility by pummeling the cannon gun towards the ground in front of her enemy was just behind her now, circling back towards her after having to divert their thrust's trajectory. Gravity's whole body would feel the shock of her shoulder weapon being rendered inept by way of downward bashing.

Wulf moved to take a covering position while Eden worked the panel. He took a knee and positioned his Ellipsoid Shield into the ground while he tried to protect himself and Eden from the incoming fire. A habit from his time in legion he started to provide covering fire. His intent was only to force the incoming enemy to either fall back from a spray of fire or at least focus on him instead of the XO.

Through his nimble movements, Wyatt had evaded the aggressors pinpointing him, though the partial armor damage from his PAAR to the armor nearest him made the armor turn towards his position. The Minkan could see that one of the armor's shoulder mounted weapons glowed with a buildup of power and a great ring of orange aether shot out from it at his position as the enemy raised their handheld rifle and shot in the same area.

"Thanks Soban-hei," Eden huffed, turning for a quick glance at the room as different strobes of weapons fire light jettisoned around them. "But I need to call this one in to our techie friends in orbit. Sjet-hei, come in!"

Wyatt quickly snapped his rifle towards the impending threat and pulled the trigger, two rounds successfully cracking off but there was never a third. The man's hud flashed with a red warning and his armoured features quickly moved to toss the malfunctioning rifle aside, transitioning to Wyatt's iconic purple revolver.

A lot of stress had been mounting on the usually stoic man as of late and while he'd been doing a fairly good job keeping himself together there was one slip-up.

His revolver was full... of empty casings, he'd not remembered to reload it after some recent test-firing.

Wyatt didn't have time to think of his captive wife and the daughter he was yet to meet, just the beginning of a single-syllable word.

"Fu~"

With a feral roar, dampened slightly by the wind being knocked out of her, Kara rolled to the side under the heavy's next downward swing, to the side of the arm she'd blown off. To say she was engraged was an understatement. Coming swiftly back up to her feet, she jammed the barrel of her submachine gun into the torn mess that had used to be an arm socket, now unshielded, as far as it could go, rising just a little off the ground so it pointed down into the chest and torso, then squeezed the trigger in a death grip. She hadn't heard Wyatt's question.

"Try that bullshit again, you fucking squid!" She screamed at it over the gunfire as her SMG rattled in her hands. "Learn your fucking place! Your friends'll be joining you in a moment! Piece of shit!"

Gravity rode the armor down to the floor, where it stayed limp and dead.

When the PAAR's magazine had unloaded its full bearth into the shoulder of the Kuvexian, the bristling orange glow of the weapon had already subsided, having released into Wyatt's position. If he had not been edging at a barrier and more exposed, the shoulder mounted aether shot from his enemy would have incinerated the Mindy in full. As it was, the Mindy's limbs had been torn from the armor and his armor's torso and helm had gaping holes within them.

Wulf nodded back at Eden before he saw the commotion of Gravity in the tumble with the Kuvexian.Cursing at the blue neko's battle rage he switched his rifle back to sniper mode. Calling out to Gravity "Heisho Sifsdottir fall back before you are domed!". Taking aim at the closest target with clear line of sights he pulled the trigger on the rifle.

Sakura was sliding from console to console on the YSS Honne when she got the incoming comm from Eden. Her tail straightened up almost at attention "Yes Chusa how can I be of assistance?" she said calmly. As she got another alarm her tail slammed into the console in response with a little bit of frustration showing on her normally sunny face.

Coupled with the static of the comms and Eden's shakey voice, it was hard to make out her words. Luckily, she had sent a text request alongside it to Sakura's console that read: JAM INTERNAL BLAST DOORS OPEN.

Kiyo moved into position her head turned slightly to Gravity and she smiled. “Aww Big sis Gravity is so awesome, and amazing,” She said to herself as she began powering up her weapons and waited for the enemy to come into her sights. She fired her [[https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?id=stararmy:weapons:ke-m2-w3001_mindy_aetheric_pulse_cannon]]s as the enemies came into sight, all the while saving the sight of her sister riding the armor to the floor to her personal archives.

Unfortunately, the unarmored soldiers would be much more vulnerable to attack, unlike their armored Kuvexian units. Wyatt’s death caused a gasp to be uttered from her mouth. “No!” she screamed out, though she knew they had backups, it didn’t stop her from being anguished that another crew member might be lost. Those Kuvexians who who came too close got a slash attempt via her Silverlight

Sakura blinked a few times at the command then quickly set to work. Thankfully Eden's link would allow the tech to work remotely. As both her hands and tail whirled to work the commands she had to figure out a way to access the commands that she was still trying to fully decrypt. Remembering a previous incursion she looked up the maintenance subroutine and sent a command to lock the blast doors open. Replying back with text and a little emoji of her face smiling it read "All sent Chusa!"

"Arigatou, Sjet!" With the door open, Eden called out to the teams, "All in!" She watched as those still alive filtered through the far right doorway in front of her, while five members of the infiltration teams remained on the ground, one of which was Wyatt. She knew he was being made anew and also knew the pain of being dried in a hemosynth tank while a loved one is too far to be waiting on the other side of the glass.

"Let's make this quick, we should be there for our comrades when they wake up." Eden growled, "The command center is just ahead, through this and another room. Do not stop for enemies, dispatch them quickly and keep moving."

As she said so, the arched halls were eerily devoid of more of the hustle and bustle of enemy troops. No lights were on, making it seem as if the base had been abandoned long before they came.

When they entered the adjoining room to the command center, there was a twenty foot distance between them and the open door to the command center. There were two unarmored technicians at the doorway to it, working to undo Sakura Sjet's work. The three heavy power armored guards that had been looming over their work looked up and to the infiltration team, caught by surprise.

Gravity knew she would feel distraught at Wyatt's death later, when things had calmed down. But she was a soldier- a soldier with a mission. The Revival cards and chocolates could wait until later. With her gauss canon out of commission, she hefted the stolen gattling gun from the fallen heavy, the weapon making a haunting whirring sound as it spun up.

"'Sup?" she asked with a bitter sweet little smile at her new prey.

Okay, so maybe she was just a little angry about Wyatt's death. Just a little. She let loose on the armors. Not really aiming, because she didn't have to, just pointing the weapon in their general direction and sweeping the barrel back and forth, slowly, over the group.

Sakura smiled at the reply and also saw incoming commands override it. Laughing as she switched the maintenance timer into a loop, spamming requests that wouldn't stop unless she did. Pretty much she would do it till she saw the feed showed the crew was clear.

Wulf followed Eden command shield raised as he broke into a sprint. Keeping up with the team he saw the hostile targets. Going for the unarmoured tech's he would fire two quick snap shots, while aiming at their center of mass. In the back of his mind he secretly wished he could unleash a missile to mark a funeral pyre for Wyatt.

Rising up from her forearm, Rei's aether projection weapon started firing while two of the other team combined their firepower to knock out the guards. Thanks to them, Wulf, and Gravity, the way into the command room was clear.

Now in the control room, it was obvious that a script was running on the base's computers. The Kuvexian text glowed a saturated, unhealthy purple in the dim room. Eden's eyes scanned it as she muttered, "I can read a bit of their language..." Her head lifted up suddenly and she asked in a more rapid tone, "Sjet-hei, are you into the base's mainframe yet?"

Sakura was typing away when she got another request. So far she had been focusing on door controls and she had limited access so far to the mainframe. Hearing Eden's request though she was focusing on the mainframe "Not yet Chusa still at limited access but if you can plug into one of their consoles i'll have an easier time breaking in".

Wulf was double checking the control room to make sure it was clear. What had surprised him the most was how clear it was as he thought there would be more forces positioned. Despite his uneasiness of the setting he went out about double checking the other entrances that might lead in.

"I'm getting some really bad vibes here..." muttered Gravity, who posted up at the door to cover their six with the gattling gun. Self destruct feature. She was calling it now.

"Plug in with what?!" Eden asked, "This is bad. We don't have much time here, but they've run a self destruct script on the entire base." She kept reading then hunched over the terminal, beginning to type. "I'd say we seconds. I'm going to try to run the network disabling program now."

"Understood, chusa," replied the YSS Kusa commander.

"Someone pick up that phone..." muttered Gravity quietly off to the side.

Rei's helmet turned to Gravity and inquired of her, "Is this stress preferable to piloting a starship?"

Meanwhile, the rooms that Wulf looked into seemed clear enough. The sound of the battle outside became the only din of noise, hearable even over Eden's voice jutting in and out of legion-wide comms.

"This is Teien-chusa of the infiltration team! Evacuate the area! Repeat-" She spoke and sent the textual messages as her fingers typed into a black window of the console. The purple code she created was foreign to even her and a few times she cursed and had to reach on the console's interface to delete her own typography.

After a few long moments, Eden looked up to those around her, "What are you still doing here? You can still escape. Someone has to!"

Gravity was about to answer Rei, when the reality of what Eden was saying truly kicked in, and while she thought she'd be mortified, she just felt kinda tired at this point. Just another revival. Just another card to write. Another warm welcome with hugs and smiles while the survivors try to pretend nothing had happened. That they hadn't watched their friends die.

"Roger, Chusa." said Gravity before rocketing off down the halls, out the way they'd come.

Sakura cursed since no one brought Signal wire ((https://wiki.stararmy.com/doku.php?id=stararmy:equipment:signal_wire)). As she was frantically trying to remotely asset as best as she could. Her focus was decoding the part of the mainframe with the self destruct and then force into stopping. She could attempt a reset of the timer to buy time once she was through or just force the shut down but that tended to be under more security. "Ah not good not good" she said outloud. Focusing on a reset to buy time since it could buy them minutes or seconds depending on a timer reset.

Wulf looked around seeing the room was clear. Hearing the command he knew he couldn't disobey even if he didn't want to leave Eden to her fate. "Copy that Chusa, I got teleportation coordinates for us". He quickly sent it to the team before facing Eden and giving a brief salute before teleporting.

"Wait, no!" Eden yelled. She looked around to see who was still with her.

Kiyo heard the order to evacuate, and fired her thrusters making her shoot out just as the co ordinates appeared on her hub, she punched that in and disappeared from view, not before saying "love you all!"

"Ketsurui-sama!" Eden said to Rei's armored form. "ISS Eve is still inside of me. If I die, she regains control of herself and her empire I have been restructuring. We can not risk that before the time is right, even now I can feel her readying herself to regain control. I can force control over to you, you mus-"

Rei cut her off with a short, "Iie, carry your burden. I will continue your code. We don't have the time."

Eden agreed and acquiesced the area in front of the console, sending Rei the rest of the code to be written. There were only a few seconds left, but Eden said before she went, "Thank you." From her teleported position in the distant sky, she watched as 2 seconds after her departure, the base imploded. The stone walls had been turned to a fiery rackling black husk that jettisoned out, dissipating in the snowy surroundings. Soot and ash rained down on the now showing husk of the base.

"Did we do it?" Eden breathed out, asking anyone on comms. "Is the network down?"

Sakura watched the feed of the explosion and with it she hoped the crew and the teams escaped in time. As she watched she was almost shocked to hear Eden's voice. Snapping back to it she replied, "One moment checking the feed and other". Smiling and with excitement in her voice "Network is DOWN! I repeat Network is down!". Spinning in her chair "WAHOOO BABY WE DID IT!"
 
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