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

Torture Facility Wreckage

That was exactly what Mio didn't need. As Tsuguka was a bit too rough in the handling of a corpse, breaking off an arm and a piece of ribcage, as if that wasn't gruesome enough, the young Neko with the insect phobia was subjected to the horror of watching countless little bugs spill out of the corpse they had planned on bringing onto the Eucharis. Where said bugs might well have woken up from some form of deep space hibernation. It wasn't unheard of for insectoid creatures, especially ones engineered by the SMX/NMX to lie dormant in space for years, before coming back to life when exposed to the heat and oxygen of a ship.

But that wasn't Mio's immediate concern. No, she was struggling, very hard, with the fact that her entire body wanted to empty her stomach contents into the confines of her helmet. The infantry soldier closed her eyes and dropped the bag, taking several slow, deep, breaths to calm herself and her stomach. Tankyusha would most likely be able to watch the snow-white Neko's heartbeat and adrenaline spike through the roof. Mio could feel her stomach roil. She could feel the bitter, acidic, taste of vomit rising up from her stomach towards her throat, and she forced her mouth shut. She forced herself to swallow. It was that or drown in her own vomit.

The soldier staggered a few steps as she struggled to bring her uncooperative stomach under control, even going so far as to bang her Mindy's armoured fist as hard as she could into the bulkhead of the Mishu wreckage. Tears ran down her cheeks, an involuntary response from gagging on her own vomit, and she struggled for breath. But eventually she calmed down. Eventually she managed to bring her body back under control. Then there was bringing her mind back into reign.

"What?" Mio asked. She genuinely hadn't caught what Tsuguka said. She'd been far too occupied trying not to commit suicide by vomit. "Oh... uh. Yeah, just... give me a sec," she managed to croak, her voice hoarse and ragged, another side effect of her near fatal bodily function. "A-... Akiashiro-Hei, t-this is Nunagawa-Hei," she transmits, using both the laser-directed communication as well as the military broadband radio signal in an attempt to contact their team member. "Please report in. Tsuguka-Hei has been unable to establish contact. Please explain why you have approached the scout ship." This time, the Neko's voice was hardly the cold professionalism that she'd displayed so far.

"Eucharis actual, Nunagawa-Hei reporting. The... uh. The first body Tsuguka-Hei and I attempted to bag proved to be..." Mio was forced to pause and swallow heavily, before taking a deep breath, fighting down a new wave of revulsion. "Infested. Accidental damage proved that the deceased's chest cavity was filled with some form of insectoid creature. Requesting information on how proceed, given the probability that any other intact corpse may also be... infested."

Space/Scout

Akikiko jerked which caused her Mindy to jerk at the voice of Mio. Listening to the transmission. She took note it was on radio, not laser and the way it was spoken. "I'm fine. And by orders of team leader Tsuguka. Are you Hei's okay? Broke ope..." She suddenly begin to laugh over the open radio transmission.

Suddenly the laughing stops when she quit transmitting on broadband. She smiled as she knew what just happened by the tone of Mio's voice. She still had her receiver on to both, Laser and Broadband, going back to gathering usable componets that trans-send time and take up very little space when stored properly. She was laughing softly as she remembers her first experience with dealing with dead bodies and it wasn't a pretty sight. She spent the rest of the shift and way into her rest period to clean her suit up.

Torture Facility Wreckage

Tsuguka finished off inserting the corpse into the body bag whilst Mio was talking. Her arms were utterly sapped of strength, but letting the individual pieces just float off on their own didn't seem right... Even through she was touching it as little as possible, the task didn't take all that long to complete.

With that finished, she took a determined step towards the other armored neko, wafted a grizzly hand to motion something vague, and then firmly planted her helmet directly against the side of Nunagawa's. Whatever she was doing, she waited for Mio to finish talking to the Eucharis before carrying on with it.

"Sorry for the intrusion, Nunagawa-Hei, but I'm worried somebody may be accessing our communications." Toyoe's distant, muffled voice... With their helmets together, and the nekovalkyrja sense of hearing, it seemed they could hear one another through the passing vibrations. "Did you manage to get through to Santo Hei Akiashiro?"

Torture Facility Wreckage

Mio blinked a bit as Toyoe moved over to her, and pressed her helmet next to her's as if about to give her a hug. She wondered what the hell was going on with the soldier whom up until they'd discovered that the corpse was full of Mishu bugs had acted like the consummate professional soldier with ice water in her veins. Was she more affected than she let on? Thoughts like that bounced around in the white neko's mind, until she picked up Toyoe's voice echoing in her helmet. Mio had to give her some credit. The woman had figured out a way to whisper in space without the use of comm systems.

"Hai," she replied. "She stated she approached the derelict Yui scout ship on your orders, Tsuguka-Hei, and then asked, and I quote 'if we Hei's are okay', and then began to laugh. All on the open military broadband." Mio continued to explain, while her gaze locked onto the now sealed body-bag. "I think we should stop handling these bodies until we hear back from the Shosho... we don't want to bring an infestation on board."

Eucharis Medical Bay

“All crew members on the ship, excluding night shift, please call the bridge and report your status.” It took Ayame a moment to pull herself out of the drawer she had been examining the contents of, carefully clambering out in order to avoid disturbing the contents with her usual levitation. Opening a direct line to the bridge took another moment of time as she tried to avoid interfering with anyone else’s lines, but she took a deep breath to steady her nerves.


“This is Medical, Santo Hei Umeki Ayame, reporting. My status is optimal, medical is ready to receive.” There. Steady and not a hint of the usual first mission jitters she had been told to anticipate. She could do this.


“Prepare to receive corpses.”


Ayame resisted the urge to salute the captain’s voice, if only because it would serve her little good at them moment. Instead she opened a comm line to the bridge. “Medical reporting to the cargo bay to assist in the receiving of unknown biological deceased. Over and out.” A quick dart to a closet later and she efficiently stuffed her arms through the straps of the bag, her small size demanding she deal with the usual hauling of medical supplies in an unconventional manner. In her case, the usual side duffel bag became her backpack and she made her way as quickly to the cargo bay as she could.


She reported to the cargo bay exactly as she had told her captain, zipping to where she could see Murakami. “Ma’am. I’ve been told there are corpses for me?”

Cargo Bay

Mitsuko paused for a moment, considering some sort of polite apology or clarification, but the communication had already ended. She shrugged. It didn't really matter, in the long run. She had just about caught up with her scans, the team's careful handling of the frozen torture module giving her enough time to inspect the large assembly device just as methodically. The Logistics Neko looked up from her work as the Mini bobbed her way over, even that small pack seeming gigantic in comparison. "Corpses?" She paled a bit, noticeable even through the visor of the AMES she had on. A quick check of the partial list of what was floating outside did reveal many opportunities for dead bodies. "Victory-Hei is receiving incoming cargo by the air lock." She gestured towards the area of her Cargo Bay opening directly into space, and the other AMES-clad Neko standing near it. "She can assist you, once you're sure you're...um...properly prepared." Muakami didn't want to tell the new medic how to do her job, but she wasn't sure how she would handle this without mechanical assistance, or at least a tiny AMES to protect her.

Bridge

To Tankyusha, Hanako grinned. "That is excellent! Those are just the sort of things I have been looking for out here on the frontier. We will investigate both of them more as soon as we can." She hopped up out of her chair and began touring around the small command center.

"Vonderbrink, this is Eucharis," Hanako transmitted from the mission operations station. "I think you mean the Mishhuvurthyar. Shlarvasseroth is a type of starship. Scanning the corpses for signs of parasite is absolutely necessary. I do not anticipate them being in the bodies because the bodies used as zombies would be left intact, not tortured. Nevertheless, we need to exercise caution to avoid bringing parasites aboard our ship as we recover the bodies." On the team channel, Hanako asked, "How are things going, Tsuguka? Is everyone alright?"

Meanwhile Natsumi's station replied to her. "According to my records, this ship was part of Emperor Uesu's fleet during his exodus," Charisma informed the starship operator.

Cargo Bay

Victory looked back at Mitsuko and Ayame, making a perturbed, then mildly disgusted face faintly visible through the gold-covered reflective polarized faceplate of her AMES spacesuit. "A corpse is my least favorite type of cargo," she grumbled. "Do we have a place to put them?"

Torture Chamber

Frozen bugs bounced off Tsuguka and Mio's bodies. A pair of bone saws also rapidly tumbled past, close enough to touch.

Bridge

Tankyusha watched with some amusement as the captain came alive. So this is what gets her interested? While she spoke, he non-obtrusively transmitted some basic information on Mishhu parasites over to the away team. He wasn't sure if they needed it or not, but it shouldn't hurt to provide it. It would at least help to separate the dangerous parasites from the run-of-the-mill dead body variety.

Glancing back to team's vitals, he frowned. He'd been watching with interest for a while. Partially due to his own need to understand how organics handled situations, partially out of concern. For morale's sake, he kept his next recommendation contained to the bridge. "Shosho, I'm concerned about the team's mental state. It should be possible to coax the Mindy units to dampen the shock response via the pilots' SPINEs." Tankyusha's voice was calm and steady as usual - if he thought he'd suggested something inappropriate, it didn't show. "On your command, of course."

The android appreciated emotions in the same way he appreciated anything else - useful until they got in the way.

Space-Outside Eucharis​

“Not in this instance Captain, according to my database the term Shlarvasseroth is a name given not only to their flagships but also their Anti-Nekovalkyrja species that was the result of combining their genes with those of your kind. The latter of which is the one that I was referring to for this conversation, since having one loose on this ship seems like one of the worse scenarios. Even more so with the number of new transfers on board and the amount of hiding places on the ship, thus making it easier for one of them to pose as one of us and mature or spawn more children. With the lack of knowledge of one another's personalities it would be relatively easy to slide under the radar, over.” Sheila responded politely as the android continued to make its way towards the facility, still a small handful of minutes out from it.

Torture Facility

Tsuguka jolted backwards at the moving objects, accidentally getting frozen gore on the front of Mio's armor by putting a hand out to push her away. Had she caused a chain reaction by accident, or was something else moving out there?... Shield raised, she just waited for a minute whilst she tried to wrap her head around the situation again.

"Nunagawa-Hei, turn your shoulder weapons back on." The voice was agitated, but in control. "It didn't sound like the Shosho heard your transmission. We need to back out of this place and get a handle on this..."

"Eucharis Actual..." The red neko wasn't at all sure if the transmission would work this time, but took the opposite approach and transmitted it across the entire team channel, with the hope that at least one person would receive it. At the same time, she slowly began to back out of the facility, rifle raised. Regardless of her disgust, the bodybag was still slung over her left shoulder. "Shosho, Akiashiro-Hei has gone to the scout ship's vector in her own. I do not no why, no orders were given. I'd like to believe that it's just combat stress, but communication is very problematic..."

"Additionally, the first body I recovered is infected with some kind of parasites. I have it bagged for examination, but I highly recommend isolating it in the recovered shuttle."

The recovered shuttle... Was that when Akikio began to act strange?... With the confrontation that they had just prior to launch, it was too hard to tell.

"Request orders on how to proceed, ma'am."

Bridge

"I am against manipulating people without their consent," Hanako told Tankyusha. "I feel like our new soldiers have to confront these emotions on their own so they can grow. If you are talking about some sort of sedative treatment, I want to avoid it. If a soldier panics, we can let them know the option for is available and leave the decision up to them."

Next, Hanako replied to Vonderbrink. "Thank you for the clarification. We actually have one of them on board already, in status in the medical lab. But I am less worried about them and more worried about the smaller parasites that can take over bodies, including dead ones." Hanako returned to her seat in the center of the bridge, running her hands through her aquamarine hair for a moment.

Lastly, she replied to Tsuguka on the team channel via subspace and laser. "Eucharis away team, this is Eucharis; laser communications are getting blocked by objects too much. Laser users, switch communications to secure subspace channel 13 if you are not on here already. Break." Hanako waited a moment for the team to switch before continuing and contemplated the situation. "Akiashiro-Hei, wait outside the scout ship until the others are ready to explore it with you. Tsuguka, if the body is contaminated, take a sample for genetic identification and then dispose of the body," she ordered. "Can you see the parasites? What do they look like? Over."

Torture Facility Wreckage

As she was pushed back and the bone saw came flying between them, Mio blinked rapidly, and activated her own forearm shield just in case. It was a prudent decision, even if no more medical/torture equipment came flying at them. At Tsuguka's comment about reactivating her shoulder weapons, Mio gave a light nod. She drew the plasma rifle from its mount, though her gauss cannon had never been deactivated. As Tsuguka mentioned them getting out of the wreckage, Mio couldn't agree more, and gave a firm nod, raising her own rifle to the ready and following closely behind the other soldier.

Though as Hanako responded to Tsuguka's question, Mio paused and turned back to the corpse stuffed into the bag. With an inward curse, she swallowed heavily before switching to the secure channel indicated by the Shosho, and floated back into the room they'd just left. There, she carefully plucked one of the still intact parasites from it's aimless trajectory. "Eucharis actual, Nunagawa-Hei. The..." A pause with a heavy swallow, fighting down another wave of revulsion. She really hated bugs. "The parasites resemble beetles, with a rubbery carapace and strong mandibles. A little over palm sized. The other bugs here look like giant... ugh. Giant centipedes, ma'am." She transmitted, before returning to the body bag, which she opens, and reaches in to pry loose a hunk of frozen flesh. Then, she aims her plasma rifle down at the corpse and opens fire. "Sample obtained, body disposed."

With that done, she turns back to rejoin Tsuguka.

Torture Facility Wreckage

"Nunagawa, I'm not sure that thawing th-" Holding a hand out to slow Mio down for a second, Tsuguka was a little slow in activating her shield, and was sprayed with a geyser of evaporating blood-gas as it ejected from the exploding corpse. Seeing as there was also a sizable hole in the floor now, she had predicted that result.

A shake of her still-outstretched hands, followed by a shrug. The armored helmet held back a defeated-looking scowl. Too late now... And, well, examining her own anti-starship aether sabre, it wasn't like she could think of an alternative course of action anyway. This wasn't exactly the type of thing she was planning on cutting when they had set out.

"...Hands. Cut a hand off of every corpse, Nunagawa-Hei." She swallowed back the acidic taste in her mouth, and tried not to think about how exactly she was going to get out of her mindy when this was done. Even through it couldn't have possibly seeped through the airtight seals, her entire body felt tainted. "We can nudge the entire damn complex into the gas giant when we are done. We'll split up, but give each other conformation for each item bagged. No long silences. Let's go."

The carbine on her sabre made a bit less of a mess when she used it to sever the arm of the corpse in the adjacent cell, but not by much.

Bridge

Inefficient. "Yes, Shosho." Tankyusha tucked the captain's response away for later review. Many of Yamatai's devices relied on similar concepts- some Mindy's even stimulate their user's pleasure centers when they scored a kill. What's the difference? he puzzled to himself. Social contract? His fingers tapped a few times. He'd pay attention to see how the team developed after this experience, then revisit the concept later.

The hybrid in stasis was more interesting for the moment. His data on that particular creature was very limited - hardly more than the textbook answers any other trainee got. Tankyusha made a note to stop by for a closer look.

He returned his comms to standard operation, allowing him to speak with the away team once more. "Those sound like first-generation Mishhuvurthyar parasites. I don't believe they could have stayed dormant for this long, but remain careful. They're flesh eaters."

Torture Facility Wreckage

If Tsuguka was splattered with blood and gore, Mio, whom had been standing over the corpse, looked absolutely horrific. Even her visor was smeared with... gunk. The white nekovalkyrja knelt down and grabbed one of the empty body bags, and wiped her visor with that, getting it as clean as she possibly could. Then she grabbed a clean one and nodded. "Hai, Tsuguka-Hei. Hands only," she replied as the soldier in charge gave the order to gather only the hands of each corpse. Nunagawa's voice was cold and hard, like ice. She was doing her best to just not feel anything. It was better just shut out all emotions than to succumb to the horror and revulsion that was surging through her body.

As Tsuguka went right, Mio went left. She checked each cell in turn, giving a constant feedback to Toyoe, mostly consisting of "New room. Clear." and "Sample obtained." And each sample went into that body bag she'd brought. Each body was vaporized by Mio's plasma rifle after each hand had been obtained. The monotony continued, until the white nekovalkyrja ran into an unpleasant surprise...

Moving into a new room, Mio slowly scanned the confines, until she saw something. Several somethings. Several long, sinuous, somethings, floating out of the shadows... Not surprisingly, the actions of the young soldier, whom was high on adrenaline, and a disturbingly high heart rate, opened fire upon the wriggling mass. "Contact!" She cried, simply due to the fact that it had been drilled into her practically since her creation. Plasma fire erupted from Mio's rifle, and fifty milimeter rounds from the shoulder mounted gauss cannon flew towards Mio's target.

A second later, which to Mio felt like an eternity, she ceased fire. There were plenty of new holes in the wrecked facility. And Mio could see what she'd opened fire upon. A mutilated corpse. The sinuous lengths she'd assumed to be Mishu tentacles had been entrails. "Scratch that. False contact..." Mio muttered over the team channel, feeling like a complete and utter idiot, as she grabbed freely floating foot.

She couldn't find a hand...

The word contact immediately gained Sheila's attention as the android powered its Mindy to full power, sending it racing towards the facility in an attempt to lend its assistance as soon as possible. “Numbers?!” The android called out in the secure channel as cut of its propulsion power to keep not only its body but its weapon and repair kit all flying towards the facility at the same speed. Releasing the kit the construct's hands started to attach the Saber Rifle to its Mindy in preparation for the battle, stopping just after the first cable was secured upon hearing the false alarm. “Well that shaved some time off of my transition time.” Sheila thought to itself while disconnecting the cable and grabbing the kit, slowing its speed down to a safer level as it estimated roughly another minute until she reached them. “ETA one minute.” She responded in the secure channel.

While Sheila didn't know what had caused the false contact, based on the earlier transmissions she had been hearing from the facility team it sounded as if they were having a small.... issue with the bagging process. One that despite apart of her wished to ease and help from its time in the exploration team, Sheila's recent retraining in the military had given it a different perspective. Taking a few moments to prepare the file, Sheila send a text based message to only Hanako's computer so that it wouldn't have to be seen by the rest of the crew. At the bottom of the message were three dim buttons, only requiring an idle press of the finger to send a confirmation of her taking up a solely guard and scouting position if Yes was pressed, having her actively assisting in eliminating and examining the bodies if No was pressed and an option for a text message or channel to be opened if Reply was pressed.

Body Bagging said:

“Forgive me if I may be overstepping my bounds as such a low ranking technician Shosho, but perhaps it would be to the benefit of developing the other new recruits if they were the sole ones bagging the corpses while I scouted and secured the area? Mainly so that they can get as much exposure and experience to such unsavory tasks so that in the future their mentalities are stronger and false contacts avoided.”

Yes.

No.​

Reply​

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Click to expand...

Bridge

To Sheila, Hanako replied, "follow the chain of command. I placed Tsuguka in charge of the away team and I do not appreciate you attempting to bypass her."

Akiashiro listened to the Shosho orders over the open channel as she moved along the hull of the Scout ship. She switched to tact channel 13 as requested. She collected the good useable stuff and sent the garbage directy towards the Gas Giant. She cleared out the area for rest of the teams operations in the area.

She paused as she came to the ship's registery hull numbers on a plaque near the main docking port. Sending the information back to the Eucharis to be researched when it became necessary to use the information.

Aikiko was loving the time on this solo-space walk. None to worry about and definity not incharge of new troops. She worked diligently and effectively, using the manipulators in grabbing the stuff she wanted and making an impromtu cargo net out of the straps she had brought with her. Eyes darting from her work and then back to the scanners. Then around her to look for more goods and danger that her scanners missed due the chaotic fluidic motions of the debri.

With Moi and Tugs first contact with the dead bodies. Their condition in dealing with the shock would make them trigger happy or freeze up at the wrong time. Or shoot her as she had the manipulators arms that made her look similiar to a Mish-Floater or an infected parasitic Neko.

Over the tact radio, "Hey Tugs-Hei, Akishiro. How's you to doing?" Akiko asked letting Tsuguko know she was still alive and operating with free will. "I'm still all green in operation, Big Loui is at 90% operational. Weapons, Munition 100%. Over." She was sounding calm as she went about her business.

Torture Facility Wreckage

"...It's okay Nunagawa-Hei." Tsuguka's tired and sombre voice sounded after a moment. She had turned to move to the other soldier's position, but it was all over by the time she was back in the corridor section. "Just keep going. We can do this."

A gunshot. Another limb removed, another body disintegrated. Tsuguka's body ran on automatic as she quickly continued with the task. Moving in the same exact motion over and over again allowed the lie of it being some disgusting clinical procedure to seep back into her psyche. It didn't get any easier, but disconnecting herself from the reality of her horrifying surroundings allowed her to focus on the light at the end of the tunnel.

"Of course they are flesh eaters, Santo Hei Tankyusha, they're mishhuvurthyar." She automatically laughed to indicate that this was supposed to be a joke, but it was as bleak and dry as physically possible. Tsuguka wasn't normally known for her sense of humor in the first place, and being knee deep in nekovalkyrja remains wasn't helping matters. "But thank you for the input. Data on anything particularly infectious, and actually capable of hibernating from that long ago, would be much appreciated."

"Akiashiro-Hei, please report back to the Eucharis with the items you have recovered." The calm, almost bored-sounding tone of voice was pure fatigue. She didn't know what was going on with the woman, but was too tired to divert all of her attentions to it just yet.

"Eucharis Actual." A transmission directly following. It was not on the team channel, but a direct link. "Please question Santo Hei Akiashiro when she makes contact. She's been acting a little odd, but I can't tell if the com traffic is being manipulated, or if she is just being her usual self." The red neko could think of even worse options, but wasn't about to jump the gun so easily.

Whilst she had been talking, she had already gathered two arms in one bag, and the ragged one-armed torso of a torture victim in the other. The word 'efficient' didn't seem right at all. Not for something like this.

"Three in the bag." The tall angular-faced woman still felt a bit guilty ordering Mio to go off on her own, but in the end, she had no illusions over the fact that this was what they were both created for. And it was the only way they could get this over and done with as quickly as possible. "Continuing search."

Torture Facility Wreckage

Mio held no ill will or grudges towards Toyoe for her choice of them splitting up to cover more ground, for much like the red neko, the white one also held no illusions as to her nature. Since her creation, she'd known she was a soldier. A weapon, one created for the Star Army of Yamatai, to serve, live, and die repeatedly for Yamatai and the Empress. And she knew that there was a chance, though she sent a silent prayer to whomever or whatever would listen that it would never happen, that she could end up just like any one of these corpses she was hacking apart and destroying. Captured by the mishhuvurthyar, tortured, raped, infested.

But she did her utmost to keep that thought far away. All she focused on was the task at hand. Which, like Tsuguka, she tried to keep as clinical as absolutely possible. Move between cells. Get a hand. Bag the hand. Destroy the corpse. Move to new cell. Repeat. Just ignore the bugs littering the deck, or hovering around her, ignore the blood. Ignore the horrific features frozen on the corpses. Ignore what the Mishu freaks had done to the soldiers that preceded her.

"Nunagawa-Hei reporting. Five samples retrieved," Samples. Yes. Samples was a far more clinical term. No need to point out they were hands (and one foot) from Nekovalkyrja and Yamataian bodies. "Continuing search."