RP: YSS Eucharis [Mission 23.1] A Distant Threat (YE 37)

Forest

The Mindy dashed through the lush woodlands like a windy gale, rustling every tree it whizzed past. Though his target had tried to conceal a lot of the tracks and didn't seem to be moving in a straight line, there was still enough left for the AIES to recognize and highlight. Moving at high speeds and with the canopy casting a good deal of shadows, Candon almost missed the thin, humanoid figure clad in an all-black flight suit and an opaque helmet that obscured its face darting through the trees.

As he went back into stealth and released his first volley of stun rounds from above, the operative noticed a split-second of hesitation in the enemy pilot's motion that was the telltale sign that his surprise attack was not unnoticed. Through whatever means, the black-clad figure was able to lunge out of the way of the shots from his SMG and roll behind a stand of trees for cover. This was followed with a well-timed shot of aether energy similar to an NSP's discharge striking the Mindy's shields. It did minimal damage but forced the armored Candon to flinch for a critical second before unloading the triple salvo follow-up, long enough for his quarry to move enough out of the way of the blast to keep running, albeit staggered, into a more muddy area of the woods.

Forest
The shield absorbed most of the pilot's shot but the remaining force found it's way into his injured right shoulder. Pain surged through his nerves as he landed roughly on his feet with the SMG held one handed, spraying in the pilot's general direction while the pain subsided. The AIES began automatically tracking the enemy pilot, the military grade radar easily saw through the trees to pinpoint the pilot. As he took his first steps of pursuit Candon telepathically set limiters for his AIES to keep him from accidentally killing his prey.

He chased the pilot on foot at first but began hovering when he found the ground to be unstable, all the while he fired stun rounds through the gaps in the trees that gave him a view of his target.
The firing window was too small and he could not get a hit on the pilots whilst dodging trees.
Time to introduce a little chaos...
The railgun on his back swiveled around to sit on his right shoulder. There were too many trees blocking his shot anyway.

He slowed down a bit and set his CFD to focus more on stability while he aimed the cannon. He targeted the base of a tree five meters ahead of the pilot that was no thicker than a Gartagen and let a hyper velocity slug fly. His goal was to intimidate the pilot into cooperation with the site of a tree exploding into a shower of splinters without showering him in the shrapnel.

Rixxikor Village

Once the shuttle settled Tony gave Natsumi a wink and raced off with her Rifle. She made directly for the nearest Large building that gave a good over look of the area. She wanted to have a good view of the events, and hopefully some off the BBQ would make it up to her posistion.

Tony was immediately surrounded by a squad of Rixxikor, who were armed, but it was unlcear if they were civilians or just really shabby military forces. "Hey!" one of them shouted at her, waving its spindly arms wildly.

"Hellos!" Tony hollored back. "How's you,fuckers!"

"Uh...okay?" the same Rixxikor responded. "Why are you here?!" it questioned Tony. "This is our planet. We claimed it!" The other Rixxikor chimed in, each affirming this with a "Yeah!"

"Sure.... I bet you have." Tony responded, "Came to have a tour, Figured I could see everything from up here. Seems you guys are becomeing quite popular cross the 'verse... I wanted to see what everyone was talking about."

"But why are you assholes attacking our people?" another Rixxikor demanded to know, pointing some sort of particle gun at her.

Tony looked around at the Rixxikor around her and then out to the rest of her party, "I don't know about any one attacking you, but I know we are about to put on the ceremony of planet hand off..." She pointed to the bbq and the cooks prepping the foods.

Umeshu noticed Tony being quickly surrounded by the legitimately angered residents of the village and stepped forward closer to them with her hands open and unarmed. Her Neko ears picked up on the last words the gunner spoke and decided that this might be the perfect opening of dialogue. "Yes, Yes... let's not be hasty. We do not come to cause more harm, but to actually celebrate your successful colonization of the planet known to us as Higaflan. I believe what happened before between us was all a grave misunderstanding, since this ceremony was not properly performed, you see..."

"Misunderstanding?" yet another Rixxikor chimed in, poking around and waving his gun at things for no good reason.

"Yup, just like your friend here pointing his weapon at me, thinking I was attacking you guys... I came to see how awesome you guys are and to be able to go out and tell the 'verse all about ya'll. Plus I have to babysit her and the rest of her people to make sure they don't mess up the ceromoney." Tony nodded giving a good bullshit reason she had to be up on the building beyond just looking about.

"Oh snap, is that a grill?!" one of the insectoid dudes said, getting distracted by the activity in the nearby field.

"All part of the ceremony! You see the opening parts are all about making sure both groups see and hear each other well. And seeing how oyu and I are talking quite well here!"

Umeshu raised an eyebrow at Tony's reasoning, but she let it slide since this was about doing whatever they had to convince them they were not a threat. "That's correct. We're here to offer you food and drink as part of the ceremony, and open a dialogue between our people."

"They brought food! I'm starving! How long before we can eat?" one of the bug-like men shoving through and knocking one of the others down.

"We will get to that part once the Cooks finish prepping the foods and getting them cooked." Tony responded with a smile.

"Get off my house!" shouted some bugman.

As the cooks continued to set up, a growing crowd of curious civilian Rixxikor began to form around the Star Army's culinary encampment.

"Can I rent your roof for a bit?" Tony asked.

"Fuck you," the homeowner Rixxikor responded, shooting a single unguided missile at Tony from a low-tech bazooka. A handful of other Rixxikor took potshots with ineffective bullet weapons, but the majority of Rixxikor either just stood there spectating or ran and hid, or wandered towards the food. There was no unified response from the horde.

"Yeah, you tell him, Tixx!" somebody encouraged the bazooka-wielding Rixxikor as he tried to make Tony leave.

"Hey! We're up here too!" Called one of the Rixxikor from the roof. "Don't make me come down there and kick your ass."

"You get off my house too!" Tixx warned them. "Go fuck yourself!" Tixx's gang started shooting at the Rixxikor on the roof.

"Fuck me? No! Fuck you! Don't you tell me to FUCK!!" He would take cover and start raining shots down on the gang from the rooftop.

"Fuck the Fucking fuckers." Tony muttered under her breath, thinking back to an comedian she had heard years before. Or it might have been her cuz. She stepped back out of the way of the gunfire and watched the show.

The purple-haired officer nearly jumped back at the sound of gunfire, raising her previously gentle voice to the level of a true commanding officer, not wanting the random Rixxikor on Rixxikor violence to get out of hand. "Stop the violence, please, or else there will be no food or drink for anyone. You wouldn't want that, would you?"

"They have no right shooting at us! I'll light them all... Wait, no food? Boys stop firing!" At least one of the Rixxikor could be reasoned with.

"I'll stop shooting when you get away from my house!" Tixx shouted. "YO! Alien fuckface, push them off my house and you'll have my support!"

Tony opened a radio link with Umeshu and spoke softly and quietly, "I can pull back to the shuttle and just ride at the door to help cover."

She radioed back. "Join Murakami-heisho for now, they are very touchy still. This could blow the whole thing before we get any actionable information." After sending the message, she nodded to the one called Tixx and then took an anti-gravity leap and made a for-show attempt at pushing Tony off the offending rooftop and thankfully out of harm's way from some more gunfire.

More shots in sesession would be fired miserably from the roof top followed by more cussing and bickering. "I want food damnit! Stop getting in my way fuckers!"

Tony allowed herself bepushed off the roof. As she fell she twisted so that she hit feet first. And tumbled. A low but audible, "Bitch," was heard, no evidence of if this was play acted or real. She got up and dusted herself off before returning to the shuttle, where Murakami was stationed withthat machine gun.

Umeshu mumbled a quiet "Sumimasen," to Tony, making sure she was alright and out of immediate danger, before gracefully landing near the home and glacing back towards Tixx.

"Just immersing myself in the local customs.." Tony responded and continued jogging.

Natsumi, in the shuttle, had been listening in on the comm channel, as well as obsurving the goings on via her small ship's external cameras and sensors. She had been required to remain on the ground long enough for all of the hardware, supplies and food to be offloaded and delayed her lift off when she caught word that Tony was falling back to the shuttle.

As soon as the Nepleslian soldier was aboard, Natsumi called out "Shuttle lifting off" Over the comm link to Umeshu and went to work. The shuttle rose on the invisble cushion of her gravity control system, climbing up and away from the small BBQ camp about fifty feet before she kicked in the thrusters and started the shuttle on a lazy circle above the area. She continued to gain altitude, bringing them up to around 500 feet before leveling off and continuing the slow orbit.

"Not very friendly, are they?" She asked Tony, glad the one member of their team who did not have a backup reletivly safe aboard the shuttle.

"No... they are pretty much the shittiest things in the 'verse, and I would love to bag a few." She called back to Natsumi as she laid down just inside the opened door. She had her rifle set up, panning the crowd, Tony watched for the first sign of trouble.

"just keep her steddy and level... If we need to I'll be able to work with this a a platform..." She told Nats.

"Tixx, if I get my hands on you, you're fucking dead! Hey shithead over in the corner... go down there and blast that asshole." Called one of the "militant" Rixxikor to another.

By now several Rixxikor had been injured by gunfire as the two groups continued to fight over Tixx's property. It was clear Tixx was getting upset and wasn't backing down. He ducked into the house and emerged from the roof with his rocket launcher, and fired at close range into the group of trespassers, causing a large explosion on the now-mangled roof.

It was all Umeshu could do for the next few moments to get out of the line of fire ensuing on Tixx's property. She was also a bit glad for her ignorance of some of the more colorful curses being slung her way in Trade, though it was apparent she really couldn't negotiate with the chaotic bugs in the way she was doing so before.

Meanwhile, back at the grills, Mango and Lime had the burgers started. The first batch unleashed a cloud of gray, beefy smoke over the area. Local Rixxikor began to creep closer and clamor for food. At this point the ground forces of the Rikugun had to form a sort of wall of people to hold them back.

"Woo! I'm so hungry I could eat someone's arm off..." One of the Rixxikor exclaimed from behind the wall of people, pushing to try and get closer. "Those burgers sure do smell damn good!" Called another before getting shoved out the way.

Once she smelled the salvation in the air of cooked meat, the purple skinned Neko tried to once again speak over the clamour of gunfire. "If you keep shooting at each other, then you will be the last in line for the celebration!"

This seemed to work for most, but not all, of the Rixxikor, and there seemed to be trouble in getting them to form an actual line, but now the first of them were being served with burgers and other foods and the team seemed to be getting a positive response.

"It's not poison!" one Rixxikor declared as he stuffed his face. "THIS IS DELICIOUS!"

"Yay!"

"I can't beli.. ugk!" One Rixxikor was trying to speak of how good the food was, then another slammed into him from behind causing the food to lodge in his throat. Frantically he'd pound on his chest, finally erupting bits of chewed food all over someone that had just got a burger themselves.

Though she had to suppress a wince at the Rixxikor's mannerisms, Umeshu was happy to have some breathing room for a minute to think. "The Star Army of Yamatai does not wish to harm your people. In fact, sharing a meal is a welcoming custom. It is better than exchanging bullets, ne?"

"What's the Star Army of Yamatai?" one of the crowd asked Umeshu, tilting its head.

"Star's have armies now too?" another asked, scratching its head.

Keep it simple and direct, Umeshu told herself as she spoke with honey in her mouth to those with fuller stomachs. "We are a peacekeeping force that oversees this area of space, and guards it from those who would do harm." She pointed up into the heavens for emphasis.

Forest

In an instant, the railgun's bullet fired into the tree a good distance ahead of his prey and shattered the wood of the trunk into a thousand splinters. The enemy pilot, who seemed to actually able to move better in the muck, skidded to a halt and brought its hands up reflexively for protection from the spray of shrapnel and pieces of the foliage that crashed down around them. Sharp pieces of the former tree started to cut into the protective black suit in spots, exposing the pale blue skin underneath. Forced to one knee from the lacerations, the cloudy helm that obscured the alien's facial features from Candon turned in his direction quickly, though it definitely seemed his shot at intimidation was not going to stop the pilot from what could be a futile escape attempt. Either this foe was very brave, or perhaps a fate worse than death awaited them should they be captured...

Instead of firing an energy pistol in response, the enemy ace silently reached for two globe-shaped canisters attached to the front of their chest straps and pulled them off hard to separate them from the links that held it there. Candon's AIES system did not identify this as an explosive or energy grenade, though, but something distinctly different and biological in origin. Before he could analyze it more, the two spheres were in the air heading right towards him. Their thin shells disintegrated from the friction with the air, disgorging a cloud of an inky black liquid that spread out and splattered against a large portion of his Mindy power armor, being unaffected by energy shielding.

One of the globs hit his camera dead on, and then Yamataian soldier suddenly knew exactly where he had seen this before -- on the science station right before it was occupied by the Rixxikor. Upon contact with the oxygen-rich air, the liquid however hardened quickly into a viscous rubbery net that now seriously impaired Candon's mobility. The nasty stuff was jammed into his joints, thruster exhausts and a large portion of his sensors, and it was going to take a few moments to burn away or otherwise cast the stuff off of the Mindy. This was exactly what his prey had in mind of course, as the injured pilot had those precious few moments to get to their feet and once again take flight from the frustrated Star Army pursuer.

As Suites-hei struggled, he did however catch a glimpse of a torn, discarded black glove on the floor with little suction cup marks left where the fingertips were.

Forest
Seeing the pilot on his knees Candon slid the SMG onto its mount figuring the demonstration of force would convince his enemy to surrender.
‘Bitch, please,’ he thought to himself as the pilot lobbed what Candon could easily recognize as grenades. He raised his hands toward the incoming ordinance, the wrist mounted weapons exposed themselves intercept the grenades with automatic gunfire the moment the targeting computer acquired a lock.

‘Of course…’
The computer never acquired a lock on the targets, for some unknown reason it didn't classify them as a threat. Candon retracted his wrist weapons and closed his fresh air intake as he braced for the impact he no longer had time to evade, an impact that was much more gentle than he expected. As he opened his eyes he found he could only see his HUD being displayed across total darkness. His left arm was completely stuck while his right could still move with effort. Tuning the power output on his right forearm weapon way down he ignited his plasma melee blade and made a quick pass over his helmet, particularly where the cameras were. His vision returned almost immediately while raising the temperature in his helmet slightly as the adhesive like substance burnt away along with much of his paint. His AIES analyzed the substance and reviewed his current status.

"WARNING: foreign substance detected in joints, mobility severely restricted-"
“No SHIT!” he spat back harshly as he watched the pilot limp away. He attempted to keep moving using his CFD but found he had no control. He felt like he had been dipped in rubber cement. Using his plasma blade like a blowtorch he began attacking the sensors on the side of his helmet, clearing it of the goop while making it uncomfortably hot inside. With his radar tracking the pilot accurately again he worked to free up his left arm, leaving 1st degree burns around the joints of his hand, arm, and armpit. With both arms free clearing his legs and torso became much easier and left only minor burns around his joints while he telepathically retuned his AIES to target ANY object coming his way regardless of whether it is a threat or not.

With his armor mostly freed from the confines of the unknown substance resumed pursuit, stopping only to retrieve and pocket the enemy's abandoned glove. With the substance still sticking up his torso and knees he resorted to flight until…
“Computer, override SHUTDOWN protocols!”
“Command confirmed.”

He pressed on, amazed at how quickly this pilot could put distance between himself and his pursuer. Despite the efficiency of his CFD it was still a system with high energy demands. With all but the immediately needed systems shut down the reactor temperature still increased steadily, its uncomfortable warmth was fully present beween Candon's shoulder blades.

Closing in on the pilot quickly he had no time to give a full report of his current status but he knew if he didn't get help soon he would have to eject. He activated his emergency beacon with a looped, automated message:
Assuming he had his enemy's luck Taharial would be arriving in a fully equipped medical shuttle within the next 30 seconds. Of course he knew the luck of others never replied to him.

He knew he didn't have long to end this chase, and he couldn't afford for his enemy to commit suicide either. As he drew near he flew fast and low, weaving between trees as he closed the gap, using them as cover for whatever counter the pilot may have. His railgun swiveled to sit level with the horizon as Candon's body did the same. This time there would be no weapons involved nor fancy gadgets to slow things down.
Candon planned to grab the pilot at breakneck speed and take him airborne with nothing more then the ‘less-lethal’ limiters he set for his AIES.

Forest

Candon's last ditch dash through the trees closed the gap between him and the enemy pilot on the run quickly. His quarry heard the approaching sound of the propulsion system on the Mindy as it ran rougher and hotter, and tried to turn to fire another aether blast from their sidearm to stop him but it was already too late to get a clear shot. The blast went way wide and hit a tree instead of the armor, and before they could turn tail and run yet again the black-suited figure got rammed right in the upper torso, knocking both the wind and the aether powered pistol right out of his hand to the forest floor.

Candon now found his armored hands had the wiry male humanoid in their clutches at long last, like a cat with a mouse. Thankfully, the AIES was stopping short of completely crushing the lightly-armored foe. But in the struggle that ensued he did notice that the helmet that had obscured the downed pilots face with a foggy matrix had become cracked and lost a chunk in the impact and now he could see right through it unimpeded. What met his camera's gaze was a pale face that was definitely human-like but also very alien, sporting glowing, bioluminescent markings in many places. They had creamy colored hair, along with a slit type nose and small, batlike ears. The eyes caught his attention, as they were almost completely dark greenish pupils with little white to be seen, likely adapted to low-light conditions. The blue lips they had were curled in a mix of fear and anger, as a slightly forked tongue poked out menacingly at him and was yelling something unable to be translated.

Suites and his acquired target continued to grapple, as both now zoomed into the air above the forest canopy, the Mindy's rapidly overheating thrusters leaving a trail of smoke behind it.

Rixxikor Village

The encounter with the insectoids went just as quiet as Sigurd had expected it to. Not at all. He was just making notes about his observations of Rixxikor 'architecture' when he heard the first weapons being fired. He turned towards the gunfire in alarm and had his sidearm produced half way before he realized that the bugmen close to Umeshu and Tony were shooting at each other rather then his comrades, so he holster it again quickly. Still it didn't help to ease his tension at all, but he forced himself not to allow his uneasiness to get in the way of his work, so he had his FAR recording the whole scene in detail for later analysis.

When the burgers were finally served he began making notes about the Rixxikor's organization, or lack of it, in forming a line and their waiting behavior. He especially marked their reaction to Umeshu's announcement that those still shooting would be last in line for food.
Then he set his communicator on record mode, put it back on his belt and brought himself to approach one of the Rixxikor that already had a meal.
"Yo, buddy!", he addressed the insectoid. "Tastes good, doesn't it? Mind me asking ya some questions? I'd like to know who of you's calling the shots here."

"Rixx Jixa," the Rixxikor introduced himself to Sigurd. "What kinda question is that?" he asked. "You must be hierarchical," the bugman scowled at Sigurd, blowing a mist of reproductive fluid into the air for emphasis. "Nobody commands here, although Tixx may try because he's an elder. But we do what we want. You gave us food. So what do you want in return? Nothing in this universe is given freely, especially by humans, and rarely is anything freely taken."

Eucharis

Aikiko finished up her tasks in the refurbished PA Bay. Looking around after making the newest Mindy her own. She had free time and looking out a viewport, hoping that Candon and the others were doing okay as they did their thing on the planet below.

She left the Power Armor Bay and moved through the ship. Pausing at her quarters. She went though her collection of manuals. Finding the one she was currently reading, grabbed it and headed on up to the lounge.

Rixxikor Village

Now what?, Sigurd thought. Actually the food was for free, but he got this hunch that it wouldn't be the best idea to tell that bug that the Star Army gives away food for free. The concerns he voiced in the wardroom earlier came to his mind. Give them an inch and they'll take the yard. At least that's how Sigurd judged the Rixxikor to act.
But then: Not every price has to be tangible and especially he as a scientist knew about the worth of knowledge.

"I'm Sigurd", he introduced himself likewise. "We want nothing physical in return, but we do value knowledge a lot. So in return for our food we'd like to get to know you and you kind, Rixx Jixa. So why don't you just tell me 'bout you Rixxikor. Where you come from, how you live, how many of you there are... whatever comes to your mind."

Rixxikor Village

Rixx Jixa took a random dump as he replied to Sigurd. "We dunno know where we're from. Originally, I mean," he explained as the stinking pellet landed on the ground with a sound like punching an overripe melon. "As for numbers, we stopped counting after the first few quadrillion. We need food to sustain us and our growth. That is why we came to this planet. We are...peaceful farmers. And we love freedom."

Rixxikor Village

Umeshu continued to oversee the operation, counting her Neko warrior ancestors blessings that the plan was holding together more or less so far and a dialogue was opened with the bug men, if however rocky. The purple-skinned officer thought it rather strange indeed that she found herself worrying more about the Rixxikor shooting at each other to get at the freshly cooked food first in line than at her small away team, as the smell of the cooks at work was tempting even to her.

With her sensitive ears, the operator overheard Sigurd's interaction with Rixx Jixa and was beginning to piece together the story a bit more from what the reasonably calm Rixxikor said. They still needed one critical piece, though, namely how the self-proclaimed 'peaceful farmers' got to this planet in the first place. Umeshu spoke to Lime and Mango about preparing to serve the Lorath wines to certain key targets in the queue that they could identify as influential individuals while possibly serving a heavily diluted mixed cocktail to the rest with their burgers. She herself took two cups of the rare vintage into custody directly.

Hashimoto-shoi then headed over to Sigurd, giving him an approving nod and managing a friendly look towards his guest despite the fact the Rixxikor had just went to the bathroom right in front of them without a care in the world. It was like the polar opposite of Yamatai's highly sanitized lifestyle, and the proper samurai had to try not to look directly over there. "This is for you, a special drink," she spoke in Trade to Rixx Jixa, "The Star Army encourages farming on all of the worlds we watch over. This one was ravaged by a great war in the past, so we welcome you to cultivate it. Please tell my friend more." The scientist noticed the aroma coming from the beverage and knew right away what his commanding officer was trying in order to give him more openings to collect information.

Umeshu held more tightly onto the remaining cup, and then waded back into the melee, using her anti-gravity manipulation to aid her in making openings for herself. She was starting to loosen up better now, and tried to mimic some more of the mannerisms of the Rixxikor as Tony had done before as it was likely the only way to impress the touchy elder. "Hey, where is Tixx?" she called into the crowd in her heavily accented Trade, "I've got some really good stuff here only for big shot elders like yourself!" If this didn't get his attention, at least it may draw out another bigwig instead she could reason with.

Forest
Candon was almost surprised to see the alien in his hands. It was probably the ugliest thing he'd ever seen and he could only assume the alien vocabulary being thrown at him was intended to be offensive. He returned in kind by displaying the holographic image of a skull on his helmet, a sight that was easily more terrifying with the charred paint as a background.

He cut his CFD mid flight and landed on his heels, sliding to a stop as he turned to face the opposite direction. Due to the Mindy's absence of conventional thrusters Candon's CFD was his only system for propulsion, a system that could no longer be used defensively to avoid cooking the pilot. The system's high energy demands made it dangerous for him as well, with no where to vent the heat generated by the reactor the temperature of the suit was steadily increasing and accelerated every time he took flight.

Candon knew that if the pilot got free again he wouldn't be able to begin another pursuit. As the armor slid to a stop he dropped the pilot on his back. with his armored right foot he crushed the pilot's right ankle. The fact that the pilot's helmet was broken did not concern him considering the fact that the pilot had already removed it for a drink. The atmosphere was obviously agreeable with him.

“Candyman to all SAOY assets, this is Ittô Hei Candon Suites. I need immediate medevac and prisoner transport to YSS Eucharis. Over.”

Picking the crippled pilot he carried him in the crook of his arm as he headed back to retrieve the alien's pistol for examination later.

Rixxikor Village

Peaceful farmers... right... with missile launchers to plow their fields. And Sigurd seriously hoped he misheard the population numbers. Quadrillions?!? He had to swallow hard.

When Umeshu approached, Sigurd sort of snapped to attention as much as one could snap to attention without actually snapping to attention. In other words: He stiffened when he returned his superior officers nod.
While she offered his dialog partner some of the Lorath wine Sigurd had a short moment to think how to get more information out of the Rixxikor. So when Umeshu left he relaxed a bit on the one hand, at least as much as he could relax talking to a bug of one and a half meters height, and on the other hand continued:
"Enjoy the wine, Rixx Jixa. It's quite good." Not to mention, wickedly expensive. "What I wonder: Until recently this planet was rather uninhabited. Still, here you are and not to few either. How did so many of you get here in that short amount of time?"

Forest

The pale-skinned pilot tried in vain to scramble to his feet when Candon dropped him roughly to the ground, but then the armored foot of the Mindy came crashing down on his ankle with a squishy sort of crack. The protective flight suit and boots material buckled in one spot and he saw more of the suction-cup pieces visible near the alien's ankle, in much the same way as his now glove-less hand seemed to have aspects of a squid as it pounded away at the crushing hulk.

Suddenly, instead of cursing in his indistinguishable home tongue, the alien switched to a form of harsh and biting Trade that sounded a bit like the Rixxikor's way of speaking. "Arghhh... Let Go! You Skull faced Yamatai bastard! I won't submit to your torture techniques!"

Eucharis

Aikiko settled down on one of the lounge seats, getting comfortable. She opened the manual to read. Soon she was on her feet with the manual forgotten on the seat she just vacated. She moved over to get another drink, only to realize she had one all ready, untouched. She had this itch she couldn't scratch. So she paced back and forth, pasing to read a few words that ended up being reread over and over. The glass that held her drink was empty and forgotten on the nearby table, laying on it side.

Shuttle

Natsumi frowned as she listened in over all the comm chatter and watched everything going on below. "Hows everything going down there?" she asked as she brought the shuttle around for another pass, continuing to orbit the BBQ site at a moderate altitude.

Shuttle

Eyes in the sky Tony had kept her bright lime green eyes mounted to the scope, watching for anything that might be dangerous for the ground team. "Looks like a bit of fun down there... I hope they safe some 'Q' for us up here in the sky." She added to the comm channel.

The mussel of her rifle drifted from one group of Rixxikor to the next. Eying them and judging each of their motions before moving on to the next. She was sweating mildly under her suit, but not from the temp, it was from the fact she was the only gun in place to help keep though foreigners alive, ones that had let her join their ship and learn how they fought. Would be a piss poor exchange if she let them get killed under her watch.

Engineering

In the Engineering department, all was well... sort of. The air was hot, the machines were loud, everything seemed normal. But something was missing...

Oh, right, the engineer.

"*Cough* Air! Need- *cough*- air!" Jax wheezed from inside the cramped maintenance conduit. A FAR, flashlight ablaze, was first out of the conduit. It spun around and shined its light back into the crawlspace, where shortly after two blonde, perky ears poked out, then the burned, cut, and bruised face of a very disgruntled techie. His hair was a mess, and his face was significantly darker, probably from the thick, black smoke which followed him out of the tunnel.

No need to worry! It had a very minor repair! Just a little something to get the meters to read a little higher. The smoke probably made things look a little worse than they really were, but everything was under control... sort of.

"Drama queen..." his FAR muttered with a sigh. Jax finished his coughing fit shortly after standing. He shook his head violently to get the disheveled hair to fall back into place, then grabbed his tail in one hand, bringing the end before his face. At the very tip, there was a small flame from his little escapade. He licked the thumb and index finger of his free hand and pinched it out.

Now satisfied that he was no longer on fire, he popped his back with a groan and walked back to his work station.

"Hey, a five percent increase in power output. That's something!" His FAR announced with forced enthusiasm in an attempt to cheer up her colleague. Jax sat before the screens and rested his head on his hand, absent-mindedly drumming his fingers.

"Five percent?! I got smoked out, burned, and electrocuted for five percent?!" Jax nearly shouted, raising an eyebrow and gesturing to the charts on his screen. "What the fu-!"

"It's better than nothing!" the FAR interjected, a dark haired woman in a toga appearing next to his chair with a shrug.

"Yeah, but ten if greater than five!"

"You honestly thought you could get ten percent power output increase from something so mi-"

"Yes, I did! That wire went straight to the main line, and once I rerouted that..." Jax started. The mechanic and the hologram began to bicker back and forth over topics way beyond the comprehension of the layman. Finally, they settled down, and each was left to their own devices. And now, with nothing to do, Jax had time to think again, and instead of his usual, crazy antics, Jax found himself going down a more morbid avenue of thought, mostly from his fatigue, hunger, and worry.

Inside, Jax was feeling a little let down after his first day aboard the Eucharis. Here he was, the mechanic, aboard his heavily damaged ship, unable to do his job. Of course, he did what he could, given the circumstances, but he couldn't shake off the uncontrollable feeling of utter uselessness while his friend and the rest of the crew, whom he mostly hadn't met yet, were smack dab in the middle of the enemy's camp.

And what of that Cherry girl? He hadn't seen her since the explosion! Was she even still alive?! At that moment, reality impacted his mind like a nuclear warhead, and he stared aimlessly into the glowing light of the monitor. He'd only known her for a moment, and now she was gone. Boom- like that! D-E-A-D.

He just couldn't get it out of his mind. This wasn't like a video game, or a cartoon, or a comic book. That person was dead-as-a-frikin'-doornail. They weren't coming back. They had been simply extinguished, like a candle. Their life, their memories, their hopes, their dreams... gone.

Of course, being a citizen of Nepleslia for most of his life, Jax was still kind of new to the whole "mind backup" thing. Cherry could very well be alive, but at that moment, it never crossed his mind.

He'd also killed someone- well, multiple people- today. He wasn't quite sure how to feel about that. Yeah, sure, the bugs had attacked first, and he was disgusted by the bugs, but the fact remained, he'd blown them the hell up with a grenade launcher. How many fathers had he stolen from their children? How many sons had he taken from their mothers? It was all just so overwhelming, surreal, and it felt as if a crushing weight were bearing down upon his mind.

"What the hell did I get myself into...?" he sighed, hugging his knees to his chest and wrapping his tail tightly around his legs. He continued to stare aimlessly ahead, the loud machinery around him becoming white noise.

Bridge

Hanako grabbed her console phone and dialed the shipwide intercom. "Taharial, this is the captain. We just received a medical distress call from Suites near the site of the crash! Take the Telemachus V from the barbeque team and use it to go over there. Natsumi is currently flying and can bring you guys there. Bring Samuel as backup and Jax as combat engineering and general support. Eucharis will remain hovering around the barbeque to protect the crew gathering information from the Rixxikor village."

Rixxikor Village

"Enjoy the wine, Rixx Jixa. It's quite good." Not to mention, wickedly expensive. "What I wonder: Until recently this planet was rather uninhabited. Still, here you are and not to few either. How did so many of you get here in that short amount of time?"

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"I...I freaking love alcohol!" Rixx Jixa stared at the bottle for a moment. He gingerly took it and then slowly brought it to his drooling mouth, and the tiny arms on his mouth opened the cork. Rixx Jixa then began to chug the wine for several seconds. "It's nice! What were you saying?? Oh! Well, we came in our colonization ships and some other ships that gave us a ride. The blue-skins from the Kingdom."