RP: YSS Eucharis [Mission 22] Echoes of the Past

Artifact Passageway

Tsuguka skidded quickly to a halt, sending enlightened pebbles clattering down the hallway like a pinball machine on bonus mode. Damn gravity made everything awkward.

"Hold up." She held a hand out as she contacted the two behind her. Her rifle was ready in an instant, reproducing the firing position she had made in the cargo bay. "Something is here. A light. I'm investigating. All team members, keep your ears out." Slow footsteps. Both from her own feet and... something else. The eerie light continued to flicker as the thing moved, casting a spiraling shadow on the cold blue angled wall.

"I'm only going to say this once." Loudspeaker mode. It sounded pretty strange given the low air density. "This is a full power armor team from the Star Army of Yamatai. Identify yourselves. Any hostile action will not be tolerated."

A sharp clinking noise responded, loud and imposing. It sounded like a series of glass panes being twisted and cracked. More footsteps, moving towards her. A triad of mandibles slowly revealed themselves. Crystalline and sky blue, seemingly chiseled from crystal, much like the walls. It had three legs, matching it's mouth parts. Each and every angle on the mobile thing had a sheer edge like a knife blade. Most of all, it was big, skirting ten feet tall, like the entire storey of a house.

Tsuguka kept her rifle ready as the thing approached. It wasn't exactly moving quickly towards her, but it was moving towards her. And still screaming that strange drawl. Time for a warning shot.

Dialed into stun mode, her SMG thundered a half dozen rounds into the creature's insectoid knees. Nothing. It didn't even slow down. In fact, it was now making even more noise, and speeding up.

No more time for diplomacy now. Tsuguka booted the weapon into the lethal/scalar setting, and aimed towards the center of the shambling angular mass as it marched towards her. Unrestrained, the weapon's muzzle roared and filled the narrow corridor with bright, superheated particles. A dozen bright arcs of light battered the target and ricocheted into the surrounding walls, creating a cacophony of noise, dust, and vicious stone shrapnel.

A pause to let the smoke clear. The soldier backed off slowly... And the creature continued marching through it, unhindered, shrieking as angrily as ever.

"Team, this is Tsuguka. We have contact." The voice was calm but harsh, given extra irony by the fact her weapon fire could be heard erupting in the background of the transmission. "Open fire on all unidentified targets. Repeat, open fire an all unidentified targets. The creatures are not friendly."

Passage

Taharial took the message from Tsuguka as get out of Aikiko arms as fast as possible so they could fight together "um Aikiko can you let me down please I still have a pistol I can use, I want you to be able to fight", she had a hand on her pistol as she waited for her to release her "drop me now, you go help and I'll cover your backs because it seems that they can make tunnels anywhere with the bigger ones", she was interested in these creatures, were they synthetic or biological, was this there nest or something else, she wanted one alive to see if she could find out what was in it.

Taharial gulped as she talked her voice full of interest and wonder more that worry "Team, careful down here, its confined passageways and the bigger creature seem to have crystallite skin, careful when using energy-based weapons as Tsuguka demonstrated it will reflected", she thought for a second "I think the Ke-M2-W2902 Forearm Weapon would be better suited if you don't mind getting in close" she smiled as she talked knowing that this should have a better chance.

Eucharis Starboard Wing

Consulting the relevant technical manuals Kale found that the Dampening units were placed one on the side of the engine block furthest from the ship and two placed on the side that was closer. He crawled past the positron cannon mounts and several minutes later found himself at the hatch into the engine space.

Kale stepped out into s space larger then the crawlspace but not large enough to stand up in. It wasnt hard to find the dampening units. They were each marked with a warning sign "Do not open when engine is in use." Pretty much a no brainer. The feedback generated would likely induce multile harmonised vibrational waves within the unfortunate person whho tried litterally shaking them to pieces. The end result? Not pretty.

There was a faint smokey odor in the air. It could be traced to the vent on the aft dampening unit close to the fuselage. Kale opened the casing of the device to see what the problem was. The root cause of the system error was soon apparent. part of the vibrational smoothing circuitry had seemingly overheated and burned out. Several capacitors had reduced themselves to a molten silicate mass before they had stopped conducting. There was a lot of residue at the bottom of the casing. more then there should have been considering that electrical components melted rather then burning.

Kale analysed the substance with his science scanner.


Kale blinked, this made no sense the scanner was telling him a plant had done this? Shaking his head he saved the results for later reference before starting to remove the damaged circuitry from the module. He would take a sample of the powder when he came back with replacement parts. Maybe the medics aboard could make sense of it.

Volcano/Atrifact Tunnels

Aikiko set Talarial down as requested and extending her manupilator Arms and advance towards the Silicate crytaline being, Once she made contact with the creature with her manupilator arms, she had them vibrated at sonic speeds.

Splorfin 14, Artifact corridor by disabled drone

Ames said:

Splorfin 14, Artifact Passageway

Dirjon arrived first - pieces of the drone were slowly falling out of a vent in the wall, clearly being shoved from within. The bits, spilling to the ground with a sharp ringing noise that echoed through the passage, were being collected by a handful of small, three legged things that seemed to be made of the same stuff as the walls. They let out a shrill noise like glass dragging across glass when the light hit them and quickly disappeared from view.

Click to expand...

"Dirjon-Hei, is everything alright? I heard a strange noise," his android comrade asked as he arrived.
Dirjon dashed forward and shot the three he'd seen run off, the plasma from his rifle cooking them in their crystalline exterior with a hissing squeal.
"It's alright now," he said cockily as he chuckled. Then he got that sinking feeling, the type you get when all hell is breaking loose right in front of you.

Dozens of the dog sized bug things began crawling our the darkness toward him, fast. He instinctively drew his RGL and yelled to Tank, "Run, just run! GO, GO, GO!!!"

He opened fire with his rifle, PEW, and grenade launcher while the three drones began taking shots of their own as he transmitted to Tsuguka, who ironically had a problem better suited for him.
"Tsuguka-Hei, I'm being overrun by the downed drone! I'm holding them back but I'm not kitted for this! I need assistance or permission to-ahh!!!" A bug grappled onto his face. He stumbled back just as a drone blew it off. "I'll have to collapse the tunnel!"

Lower Docking Ring

Mitsuko frowned, quietly studying the data the Science Scanner was feeding her. Everything was fine inside the Eucharis, and the hatch itself seemed fine. The shuttle hadn't been dislodged or anything, that had been easy to confirm. She still had a bad feeling about this. The Neko moved to the nearest emergency station, removing one of the AMES inside. Much like before, in the Cargo Bay, she wasn't taking any chances. Things seemed to go wrong around here too easily.

"Charisma?" She looked up at the ceiling, as she spoke to the ship itself. "Can you seal this area, just in case? I'm going to investigate the connection between the Medea and the Eucharis. And the shuttle itself, if that's necessary." She plopped her helmet on and settled it into place. "Thank you."

A few moments later, she was opening the hatch, wincing slightly as she prepared to be buffeted by the strange moon's atmosphere, the water they were sloshing around in still, or worse.

Artifact Passageway

"Fall back to my location if possible, Dirjon-Hei." Tsuguka's voice was just as urgent and strained. "Collapse the tunnel if you have to, just make sure Tank has a head start-"

The massive thing stabbed at her, its leg cutting through the stone like butter. The red neko didn't have too much of a problem slinking backwards, but with the tiny size of the corridor and the behemoth of a creature before her, she was running out of both room and options.

Akiashiro leaped in, now, with a counter-attack. Some kind of vibrating maneuver with her manipulator limbs. Certainly confused the thing, but it did not seem harmed. Whilst the soldier was right in theory, the creature was probably just too big, and the organic motors on her arms too out of their element, to really make the attack work. It did provide a perfect distraction, however.

Tsuguka jumped forwards herself now, into rapidly opening jaws. The thing was like a vague grey blur for a fraction of a second as it swung around to meet her. What it found was an aether-scalar SMG rammed directly down it's throat. Squeezing the trigger, the armored nekovalkyrja made an audible growl whilst keeping the damn thing's jaws open with her heels. It was like a miniature lightning storm, an unholy ball of noise and flashing lights that scorched and displaced the rocks all around them.

Yet... Still nothing. The red neko abandoned the weapon to the monster's now red-hot jaws. Obviously, this wasn't just about hardness. The accused thing was like a walking laser lens in itself. Anything with a wavelength just went right through it. And now there wasn't much stopping it from going through her.

The oni jolted backwards, avoiding a slash, then peeled open a blade of her own; The forearm switchblade she installed before they left. Zesuaium coated. Time to find out if that was enough.

"Eucharis... Tsuguka here..." A pause and a grunt, as she dodged another attack. The immense alien's reach made her blade look like a toothpick. "We have encountered... H-Hostile life forms... We are... We are attempting withdrawal..."

At battle scene with Tsuguka.

Aikiko sighed as the sonic vibrations didn't wotk, at least it took some of the heat off Tsuguka. With Its attention focused on Tsuguka gain, She TRIED tripping it by entangling its legs with her Manipulator Arms.

Splorfin 14, Artifact Passageway

The android fired off a few shots from his pistol, knocking a few of the small creatures back and giving Dirjon enough space to do his work. The physical weaponry seemed to be the most effective, the tiny constructs acting like prisms for most of their energy fire. Their aggressive retreat left the hall littered with tiny chips of turqouise and aquamarine from the few attacks that had been successful. A break in the swarm left them with a moment of respite, but it lasted only long enough to let the quiet give way to the same heavy tapping noises that Tsuguka had heard not long ago.

Tankyusha turned to run. There was no way he was going to leave Dirjon behind, but that didn't mean he had to be closest to the enemies. "Let's go, Dirjon-Hei! I don't think we're going to be alone for much longer!"

***

The construct tried to run Tsuguka down, slamming its needle-point legs down at her. Each strike left cracks in the floor and sent rubble scattering through the air. The damage left no mystery in what a direct hit would do. Its body shook in frustration, then it lashed out with a powerful horizontal sweep that sent the red neko flying. She slammed into a wall and it charged for her, but a timely grab of its back limb by Aikiko sent it sprawling forward instead. It slid towards Tsuguka with fierce speed, legs scrambling to find purchase on the smooth floor.

For the first time, they could see that it had taken damage from their attacks- its body was chipped and covered in scorch marks. Its motions no longer held the same deadly grace it had started with, made evident by its difficulty getting back to its feet. It screamed a nails-on-chalkboard battle as it dragged itself forward, struggling against Aikiko's grasp. If such a thing could have blood lust, then surely this must be it.

The construct spread its mandibles wide, tugging against Aikiko's hold with all its strength and going for a decisive strike on Tsuguka. It was in that moment that she got a glimpse of a red crystal, well-protected by the mandible's joints, that seemed out of place..

Artifact Passageway

The small red crystal was an odd feature. Through all of the continuing carnage, Tsuguka wasn't even sure if it was simply an area what was still heated up or not. That fireball had pretty much slagged the weapon itself, after all. Regardless, Aikiko was somehow managing to pin the creature down, and there wasn't any telling how long she could hold it up. Legs spread, body side-on and presenting as little target as possible, the red neko opened her eyes and waited for her mark. The ravenous thing would smash her into a bloody pulp with ease if she spent too long close to it, the splintered rocks all around them made that clear.

A distraction. It was beginning to realize that her comrade was the more critical target. Throwing power into the elbow and making her pounce, Tsuguka fired her thrusters at the same time to give the blow extra force. Using all of her body weight into the Zesuaium blade, she sought to imbed it as deep into the small crimson node as possible...

Artifact Passageway - Fight with the Larger Construct

It took everything she had, but the blade pierced the 'skin' of the construct, driving slowly deeper and deeper into the red gem as she pushed. The construct let out a shrill wail in response. It stumbled backwards and away from the two nekos, mandibles snapping at the air, body twisting this way and that. One last surge of effort from the construct and then it was down, twitching but otherwise motionless on the ground. The girls were offered a moment of peace. Even Dirjon and Tankyusha's yells over the radio that more were on the way didn't seem to take away from the moment, given all the two had just gone through.

Around them, the walls slowly beccame brighter, illuminating the passages and chambers with enough light to allow them to leave their flashlights off. A far off groan echoed down the passages, the sound of something massive beginning to move. It seemed that the facility was slowly waking up all around them. The noise almost drowned out the cacophonous cries of more constructs headed their way, but only almost.

Splorfin 14, Artifact corridor

The drones returned to the hanger on Dirjon's armor to recharge for the next wave.
"Aikiko, where's Tahlo- Talla-" he stumbled over the foreign name again, too focused on not dying to remember how to pronounce it, "the medic, where's the medic?"

He followed Tank keeping the rear covered as they backtracked to the rest of the team.

With Tsuguka

"Should be around here, keeping safe," Aikiko looked around for Taharial, hoping to find her near the safe passageway they came in, and didn't wander off in the confusion. She moved to the last known position where Taharial was suppose to be at.

Behind the fighting

Taharial had an idea, it was suicidal but then so was most ideas you come up with in a passageway underground with creature attacking you were suicidal, she would use the leg as a weapon hopefully able to cut the creatures, as she saw Aikiko walking to her she smiled "hey cutie, are you checking up on little old me, its okay I have an idea".

Taharial wanted to help as much as she could but at the moment there wasn't any room to fight, when she heard the groan she gulped she would of loved time to experiment on the creature that the others had seemed to have killed "this is a weird request but could you cut some of the creature maybe some of the leg".

Taharial walked over to the now not moving body "I would love to dissect this thing and find out what these are, but there is no time, that sounds like the mother has awoken" she looked down corridor after corridor "hmm I think that we need to get out of this place soon".

Artifact corridor

Tsuguka answered Taharial's question by brutally hacking down onto one of the leg joints that had been damaged by all the weapons fire. It was true, they really needed to understand this enemy better. Getting even the smallest sample back to the Eucharis would be some kind of victory, at least. Still, even grinding away at the chipped sections with her blade, the harder-than-diamond shell didn't exactly want to come apart.

"Thanks for the assist, Santo Hei Akiashiro. Both me and our newcomer without be a red smear right now without you." The voice was strained, both because of the incoming alien noises, and the sheer force she was putting into each blow. Her muscles burned and her bones rattled away in reverberation with each strike, even with the armor doing half the work. Soon enough, it cracked free, but she was already regretting the decision to waste time on it. The enemy was everywhere. "Taharial-Hei... Take this. And don't touch the edge. If it can do that to stone, I don't want to see what it does to a person's fingers." Hopefully, she'd be able to carry it with the low gravity. With material that dense, even one limb alone probably weighed a quarter of a ton.

"Okay. I'm going after the other two." Dusting her hands off, the red lynx quickly swapped her blade from the left forearm to the right, so that she could use her shield more effectively. "Your original mission stands, Akky. Please protect her."

Without much further explanation, she boosted off down the corridor in search of Tankyusha and Dirjon. Toyoe hoped Aikiko understood the second reason why she left her behind... This was the last place in the universe she wanted to be without an open escape route.

Bridge

Back on the Eucharis, the ship was really being pushed around by the waves, which had picked up in intensity since they had landed, sending it back and forth at steep angles. Having finished her tea, Hanako found herself unable to set the bottle down because it would have just rolled around. She unbuckled herself from her seat and moved to the station at the rear of the small bridge and pulled up a radar display using her free hand and steadying herself with her Nekovalkyrja floating ability. In a moment, the ship's weather-related scanners were working and a color-coded image of the area slowly assembled itself, showing a chain of storms passing through the area, with heavy rain and high winds. She could see the flashes of lightning on the main screen, reflecting off angry waves.

Main Passageway - Deck 6

As the hatch opened, Mitsuko was hit with a spray of foamy water that rushed in, flinging itself around the zero-gravity passage in bubbling globs. A constant spray came rushing in from a break in the seals where the rapid descent had burnt through the rubber-like material between the shuttle hatch and the Eucharis' hatch, and when they opened the shuttle began to flood as well.

Main Passageway - Deck 6

Mitsuko had been ready for it, but she still let out a squeak as the water gushed across her, bubbling into the gravity-free area. Thankfully she had a firm grip on the hatch. After the initial shock passed, the problem was easy to see. The odd, orange water was rapidly pouring in through that ruined seal. Her eyes flickered behind her glasses, as the mousy Neko tried to quickly assess the problem, creating a quick flurry of lists of things that could go wrong. The worst case would be the shuttle detaching from the Eucharis in mid-flight, potentially damaging both vehicles. The seal needed to be repaired, definitely, but their current location was entirely unsuited to that sort of work.

Frowning at the thought of what she had to do in this situation, Murakami steeled herself for a moment. Taking a deep breath, she pushed forward, through the stream of water and into the shuttle. It was awkward, but eventually she managed to shove the hatch closed from this side, leaving her in the partially flooded shuttle. The Eucharis was left similarly damp, although Charisma had locked down the Docking Ring area, ensuring they could just open the hatch into space once they'd left the moon, to clear that out. Which, of course, meant the Medea needed to be detached before then. If it had been flown and docked without incident, she was fairly confident she could safely pilot it.

Moving to the pilot's seat, she began to power up the shuttle and prepare it for flight. She composed a text message to the captain, politely notifying Hanako about the damaged seal, as well as her intention to disengage the shuttle from the Eucharis. Mitsuko had never piloted any type of submersible craft, so she informed Hanako that she would prefer to attempt the procedure after the Eucharis had left the water, but before it took off and put extra stress on the broken seal.

Volcano:: Dead beast area ::

Aikiko waved in acknowledgement to Tsuguka back disappearing down the passage way that the others took. She began setting up the dead creatures body in a manner that would act as a deadfall to block the passage when the other's rejoined them. All she had to do was give it a push and send it crashing in front of the passageway, blocking it.

Artifact Corridor

The science officer caught sight of Tsuguka and felt a sigh of relief. The extra firepower would be a boon when the next swarm of those little things came storming after them. The group pivoted and began to head back, Dirjon maintaining the rear guard as they went. Good thing, too, since he got a chance to start using his guns again soon enough. A mix of the small constructs and their scaled-up brethren turned a corner and began pursuit.

Tankyusha, moving in a mix of run and zero-g gliding, felt the hairs on his head start to stand on end. A brilliant surge of light arced down the passageway, chasing the crystal walls all the way back to the center shaft. It didn't seem to matter much until the entire artifact seemed to shake violently around them. Dust and rubble fell to the floor around the away team as they made their escape.

Artifact, Outside

The storm raged around the 'volcano', lightning striking out in spectacular colors against the tumultuous orange sea. The volcano's side burst open, revealing a wicked looking spire. It pivoted slowly, its point aiming off the brow of the Eucharis. The energy from below coursed up its length, accumulated, and fired off in a brilliant beam of energy.

The blast shook the island, scattering the dirt and vegatation along the volcano's sides and revealing the massive crystalline structure below. This was no mere artifact. It was a facility, an outpost of some kind of some unknown civilization, long dormant but waking back up again.

An iris opened on one crystalline wall, launching a dozen dart-like craft into the air. They looked to be made of the same material that the constructs inside were made of. They moved into a swarm like angry bees, seeking out the source of the facility's infection.

Artifact Corridor

The dead body and its collected parts were strange to behold, even in the short amount of time they had. There was no discernible anatomy to them - the limbs and central body were made entirely of solid crystal. Only the joints worked any differently and even those seemed to be held together by something that looked like thick, high-tensile fiber optic cable. There was bound to be some secrets to how the things worked, but it didn't match any sort of familiar technology or biology.

Eucharis - Bridge

Hanako scrambled off the floor and back to her station, fastening her harness.. The Eucharis has been caught completely off guard but her hull was built like a tank and survived the initial blast with only minor damage (21/25 SP). After confirming it was not a lightning strike, Hanako had to make a split second decision to either dive below the safety of the water, which would absorb shots and possibly allow escape from the 'fighter' units, or to move into the air where the shields would work better and they could shoot back. She choose the air. The ship's anti-gravity field fired up and the dripping, still-smoking gunship rose above the waves. As soon as the water was clear, Hanako raised the shields.

"Natsumi, Tony, shoot down those fighters with AA guns and return fire at the mountain's ship gun using ours," Hanako ordered.