RP: YSS Mikomi Mission 3: Part 2-The Caves of Bowhordia

Finishing with the request forum on his data pad Kato turned it off not sending it at this moment. Carrying the data pad at his side his eyes drifted off down the port side passageway then turned his head back to look where the bridge would be. "Why did I sign up for the army anyways?...." Kato's voice was low as he spoke to himself ears finally not twitching erratically. Turning back around to face the passage leading in front of the med-bay and toward the mens bunk door Kato's boot kicked the floor as if trying to knock something out of his way yet nothing was there. He began walking to the bunk once more crossing in front of the girls bunk room entrance.

"I'm more of a research and development person... The reason I joined the army was to make my dad some what proud, but... Sassy's taken up power armor piloting.. there really is no reason for me to stay here I can't get a descent lab set up like this. If I can get a decent job I can help Sassy maybe supply her with better gear so the family don't have to worry so much about her..." Kato was passing by the med-bay now still thinking out loud. The next door would be the mens bunk.

"It's my fault she even joined the army. She wanted to show me up since I treated her so hard as a child. Even if she was a trouble maker she didn't deserve some of the talking downs she had gotten. Hell she may not even except any help from me but I'll at least leave it open to her..." The mens bunk door open and he stood between the portal with a blank stare on his face as his thoughts stopped projecting outward and just kept in his head.

Eve was picked up on four guns radar. Automatically they turned their attention on her, as she was the only moving object in sight. They began realising their beams, one after another.

Kestral looked over a Saeki who manoeuvred herself to his side. That's three "One more guys..." He was cut short as he heard the chatter of gunfire. It must have been eve they where firing at, as it wasn't at them. "Is everything ok?"

Daduar glanced over his shoulder to see the rest of the group gathered around him and began to formulate a plan of action in his mind of what to do. The eruption of gunfire around him began took his attention for a moment until he was able to stabilize the movement out in his mind, down to the last pebble moved, or so he thought.

"Squad, on meâ€

What can detect me that easily? the teen thought in annoyance as she skimmed closer to the ground. Her speed increased as she weaved around boulders. Her time modulated radar picked up the metallic emplacements as shots flew from their origin points. With a quick command, the CFS switched over to stealth. The Geshrin hovered behind a large boulder sitting on the planet's dirt, near the closest source of fire. Yamazaki waited calmly for the weapons to resume, or aquire a new target. She fired a burst transmission of her targetting data and transmission back towards the position of the rest of the crew. Orders? was the only word attached to it.

Kusati and come aboard the ship a while ago, but had kept mostly to himself. He talked to no-one but his superiors, doing nothing for himself, only following orders and sleeping. Now the battle was raging around him, all he could hear was guns.

Suddenly everything went deadly silent, something inside his brain just took over, he was oblivious to everything but achieving his new found goal, why it was his goal he did not know, and he did not care. All that mattered was acheiving his goal.

Kusati jumped wildly into the air and began pumping off shots at Kestral, laughing insanely, the fighting happening closest to him stopped and no one knew what was happening.

Eve took one last deep breath before she sprung her assault. She blipped on long enough to launch her missles into the air at the other three positions. Their intent not being to destroy (not that they could have anyway.) Flipping backwards and over the rock, she came down hard with her forearm projector, slicing into the main housing of the first cannon, and darting away quickly to the next as it fired on her missle. She hit her speed up below that of sound, crusing above the rockline and diving away from the direction of fire as she opened on it with both of her aether projectors.

Plotting the final two vectors, she moved erratically in case there was a random fire program built in for stealth. She moved in backwards on one, landing on the housing backwards, cutting with one arm and firing with the other, flipping off and managing her inertia and vector to the final cannon, B4: 1137m the indicator read as it overlayed her other views, including that of outside as the Geshrin readied herself. Landing to the side of the gun with a crunch, she pushed her CFS out of stealth to indicate her position as she surged both forearm projectors into the cannon, blasting for two seconds as she did so. Retracting the 'sword mode' of the weapons, the First Sergeant re-engaged her CFS to stealth and backed to the edge of the clearing made for the automated defenses. What exactly are they defending? she thought as she blinked curiously from her readouts.

Kestral gave a simple reply. " Engage at your discretion..." Suddenly Kusati jumped in to the air. He had only spoken to the man once. He had come from the Confidence with the others. He was in a slight bit of shock when he started off loading round after round at him, but it only took one hit for him to realise what was going on. He wanted to kill him. Kestral was hit in the left shoulder and shouted out in pain. On his fall behind one of the boulder's he managed to pull up his gun and fire back. The shot he fired connected with Kusati's stomach, and sent him further in to the air. At this level he was about five metres of ground just high enough for eight drones to see him. They where plotted around the area the group where in and where ready to fire.

The subject came in to sight and all of them began firing. The drones released one shot after another, until the subject disappeared or blew up. This subject however wasn't going to blow up, it wasn't even facing six of the drones. It had no idea that they where there, or going to fire at it. Kusati wasn't thinking about the drones, his mind was actually focused on his weapon and the man he was firing at. Then suddenly he was hit eight times, six in the back, and two on his chest, along with Kestral's shot. He wounded badly, then suddenly another eight shots hit in, and he was dead. There was no hope for him.

Kestral lay behind the rock in shock. "What the fuck just happened? Why did he do that." All his mind could think about was the mans face.... what had he done to deserve that? "Well, no we know there are twp drones behind us, and six in front." He lay there for a minute and felt his shoulder. He would be fine.

"Captain!!, are you alright?!" Natalie asked resoundingly over the radio. "I tried to cover you sir, but i was being overwhelmed by the drones!... until that thing came shooting to you, that's when i turned to shoot, but you already took it down...". But that thing, whatever it was, is as good as dead, hopefully!." She moved to cover the boulder where the captain was taking shelter, shooting at the remaining enemies that now were firing at her, taking them down but losing 3 of the LOTUS drones.

"Phew... That makes the last one of those... Sir?!, you look injured!.... I know this is a bit hasty..., but i recommend a retreat if you're incapable to go. We barely made it... thru this one." She said to Kestral while still breathing fast after the battle, taking a closer look to him.

"Target down" roken said after taking out a drone using the deadeye system, there must be something in this area that is important or they wouldnt waist the effort. Roken activated his map and marked where the guns were placed to see if there was an outpost close buy they were missing. "Looks like they might be holding us back from the main target.... UH OH" Before roken could react a bolt of light flashed across his view and struck the shoulder armor sizziling the protective plating and the paint throwing him off his balance, roken turned and fired at the threat making his way to cover.

Kestral looked up at Natalie. "I am fine, just a scratch. Nothing to worry about." He smiled and stood up slowly. "Have they all been hit then? All eight down? I want to get moving now. Let's fan out. My group follow me, the rest with Daduar. We will head towards the ridge, and take a look and see what is over there. Make sure there is at least a metre gap between everyone. We don't want to be bunched." Kestral waved his right hand forward in the motion, which meant head out. He began to walk, staying low and keeping behind boulders. He wasn't sure who was following him, but he would stop as soon as he had parted company with Daduar's group and find out. He turned round so that he could talk to him. "Daduar make sure we can still see each other, even from a distance."

"Yes sir. But even though they´re quite sneaky, they are not so hard to kill. Yet it seems if we continue this way, we´re going to be ripped apart in seconds. Specially when the target is supposedly a friendly AIES... so you can see, we cannot trust in computers that much, and that´s something the first sergeant overlooked."

Now with the last incident, Natalie got closer to the captain. If something shoots at him again, she wanted to be the first to reply fire.

"I am going whenever you go cap´n. I just hope we find out what´s wrong with this damned enemy of ours quickly"

Saeki stayed impassive and raised her rifle to snap off a few quick shots at Kusati as he assaulted their captain, but found him dead before she could get anything off. She simply stood by Kestral, moving out alongside him and staying low as he moved, seemingly a far cry from grapefruit girl.

"Four gun enplacements, sir. All destroyed." Eve called back, stealthed a hop away from the smoldering wreckage of the last cannon. She felt the "pleasurable" high from her Kylie's system kick in as she squirmed around, waiting for a response. While she did, she engaged another topographical map produced from their armors, trying to identify what the defenses could have been guarding.

"Well done Eve. We are coming up behind you. We are moving in on the ridge." He looked towards the people that where following him, and then at the other group of over the other side. "Alright group...this is the case. Silent as a mouse.... we do not want to be shot at...well I know I don't, again." He smiled and turned round, keeping his gun parallel to the ground. There was a smell on this planet, which Kestral couldn't quite make out. He wasn't sure what it was. He moved on getting closer and closer to the ridge.

A late-running replenishment shuttle made its lonely way through the emptiness of space. The shell of the shuttle was roasting in the direct, unblinking gaze of Bowhordia's sun. Soon, though, it came out of the void, and alongside the YSS Mikomi in low orbit.

A short while later, a brown haired Nepleslian man stepped out of the hatchway with his meagre belongings in a bag slung over his shoulder. His rank pin was that of a Technician, with a lonely red patch.

"So this is what a Nozomi is like on the inside?" mused Lachlan Henessey to himself. "Hmph, not bad. Alright, where to report in ... well, bridge seems to be a logical first port of call," he decided. Thinking back to his studies of the floorplan of the Nozomi-Class, he made his way down the hallway.

Ghi finished checking the bay, and found nothing wrong. Which annoyed her. That would at least have given her something to do. However from outside she heard Kato's voice, mumbling to himself. Someone else! On the ship! Not lonely when talking!

She ran out of the room and caught up with him,

"Hey Kato, good to see you. I know I've been away for a bit, but can you tell me what's going on around here? Megami-sama tried to tell me but wasn't amazingly clear on the details. Some things need the human touch you know?". It occurred to her that she wasn't really human anymore, but it wasn't the voice, and so was easy to ignore.

.....

The female voice pulled Kato out of his deep thinking and turned to face her. His own neko ears tilted back as if afraid of the loud tone she carried while he worked on putting together an answer to a question with no details.

"Uhh what's going on.... Umm we dropped off a mobile squad in power armor along with the captain on this planets surface. Some energy signal is coming off somewhere down there and an earlier squad disappeared... That's why we are here. We were shot at and communications with the team below has been cut off so to be honest your guess is as good as mine. I can't get anything useful out of scans on the planet." He brushed his hair back out of his face keeping the hand with his data pad out of sight.

.......

"Now that's what I wanted from Megami-sama. Well I suppose she has a lot on her mind." Ghi sighed, "And so we're just stuck up here ... with nothing to do really. Maybe there will be a little be of excitement and someone will get injured! Bit of a bad thing to say perhaps, but life gets a little boring if you have no-one to treat. Might start experimenting on some bacteria or something, combining a few genes here and there. That's my favourite area myself." She paused, God if felt good to not have a malignant presence in her head. Oh ho. Maybe she just jinxed it.

"Anyway, I heard you talking before in the hall. Don't think I was trying to eavesdrop, but ..." She pointed to her ears, "It's hard with these things. Would you like to talk about it?" Her voice changed from fast and excited to caring in the twitch of an eye.

.....

"What's there to talk about? Just a brother blaming himself for his little sisters line of work. Not to mention a scientist foolishly joining the army so he can make it up to his father."

Kato leaned on the door frame not allowing it to close. Those stone gray eyes locked onto the furry woman's and then tapped under his eyes.

"Uhh your furs a little matted here... you wanna sit down somewhere and talk about that?"

His arms were crossed over his chest still holding his data pad while he watched her not offering a sympathetic smile since that was probably the most cliché thing a person could do.


......

"Uhm ... oh ... it's nothing. But sure we can sit down if you like. I have nothing better to do right now. Got any place in mind? Also, tell me about this sister of yours, and the profession you seem to disprove of." Ghi smiled. Damn, he'd noticed. She did not want to talk about her own problems, only others.

.........

"Well I don't think ladies... no matter how well they pass off as cute cats can come into males bunk, yet I'm sure it's happened plenty of times." He pushed off the door though and looked down at her. "Yet if you like I'll sit in the med bay and you can stick me with needles and do blood work on me to keep your mind off things." He really didn't want to talk about his life either but maybe while she was doing god knows what to his blood she might loosen up or the other way around.

........


"I can experiment on you in a variety of inhumane ways? Excellent!" Ghi said, half seriously, "Well come right this way Mr. Kato, and I'll do my best. Actually I could do with some fresh cells." She said more thoughtfully. The 4'7" woman walked off to the med-bay. She ignored the cat comment for now. "And a good thing to. I know how men keep there rooms, and know it is paramount to biological warfare."


......


Stepping away from the men's bunk the door shut behind him. Kato followed Ghi while he though over the idea of letting her stick him with needles.

"Alright two rules before you stick me with needles. First rule: No cloning. I don't wanna think there is another me running around. Second rule: No substance is to inter my body besides the needle. So no injections or consumption of pills or so on. Everything else is fine if you see fit to it... I just hope you don't like casing pain to others heh.." The last statement was said almost in a questioning manner to see if she'd comment on it.


....


"Well I don't so much like it, as find it an important part of my being." She said with a completely serious look on her face, before breaking into a smile, "Don't worry, I get no satisfaction out of pain. However I've done considerable research into pressure points, which also included basic acupuncture. And you're being such a spoil sport about cloning. Wouldn't you like to be living in a three year old version of yourself? Or see what you'd be like as a woman? And we have some really good steroids here ... I'm sure I could increase your muscle mass by at least 10% ..." She grinned, "So much fun you can have in a medical bay. Anyway, how does some minor acupuncture sound?"


............


"Acupuncture and maybe incense? I haven't had a session like that since I was 18. Ya know all this tension should be let out I'd find your proposal most comforting." He was smiling again as they stepped into the med bay moving over to one of the tables and sitting up onto it. "Just back and body?"

His eyes cast Ghi's way while he removed the top half of his uniform. He was toned but nothing like a real soldier a few scars scattered about his body maybe from shrapnel cutting through him.

"And I don't need drugs I'm perfectly happy with the body I have now...."


.....


"Unlike me." Ghi thought.

"Well that'll be good. Right, back and body. Megami-sama, please make me a set of acupuncture needles." A box with needles in it appeared on the side, "Thank you Megami-sama." (Sorry, I controlled the AI, but only a little). "And some incense in the air if you please." And so the air was filled with the smell of incense, just weak enough not to make Ghi's sensitive nose contract.

"Alright. I'll start on your back if that's alright." she took one of the small needles out of the box and studied it. It looked right.


......


Kato stretched out on the table laying down on his chest so she could reach his back easily. The smell of jasmine filled his nose and was released back into the air slowly.

"Ya know I kinda feel sorry for the guys below now." He smiled still yet his thoughts were on the fact this wasn't something a soldier should be doing in the current situation.


.....


"You're about to have needles inserted into you back by a cat-girl whose spent most of the last week in her room ill. I wouldn't be that sorry for them if I where you." Ghi said dryly.

She carefully took out the first needles, and began to place them, very very carefully at the right places in his back, making sure not to hurt him. She couldn't remember the names of what she was doing, but she was reasonably sure she was doing it right.

"Tell me if I hit a nerve or cause you more than acceptable pain." She told Kato gently.


.....


"Mehh... all in the eye of the beholder... at least I'm not on an unknown planet with unknown enemy's chancing an unknown signal and not able to contact the ship.... that's if they are still alive down there... Not like they can use communications to get a hold of us."

Kato was melting under her touch the needles were helping to cut all the tension knots in his back with ease. "You couldn't cause to much pain with those little things. I've had chunks of searing hot metal pass clean through me. My own fault too mind you. Just keep the needles away from my neck and we'll be fine."


......

Ghi paused, a needle half an inch from his neck. Mental note: Don't stick in neck.

"Well there's nothing we can do here. Other than make sure we're ready to react at a moments notice." She stuck another needle into his back. He was quickly acquiring the look of a hedgehog.

Suzi appeared in front of the Nepleslian man, along with a map of the Nozomi ship. "Hello there. I'm Suzi, the ships AI. How can I be of service?" She beamed at the man, and looked at his rank pin. Another technician. That brings the total to three; there can never be enough technicians. This made Suzi smile even more.... always someone to look after her.

"Yeah we sure look prepared. Hahah ow heh." Kato felt the needles hurt just some when he laughed. "We'll just have the MEGAMI dissolve the needles if I have to get up in a hurry." He turned his head to the side so he could see part of her body at least. "So what made you interested in joining the army? I would think you would like a nice job out on a nice island or jungle setting that would seem more relaxing."

Ghi inserted another needle carefully, "I suppose I thought that I could help people where suffering is most accute, where there are injuries inflicted through malicious intent. A peaceful island? Where's the fun in that? Nothing unusual, no non-textbook cases, where as out here people could catch all forms of new pathogens, and have all sorts of inventive injury. It just seemed where all the fun was." She smiled, not that she'd had much real action so far.

Ghi placed one last needle and stood back to regard her work. Pretty good if she said so herself. And ... if ancient tradition could be trusted .. it should regulate his life-energy and make him better. Or it would make him look as if he was full of needles. Both where fun of course.

"The fun you say? Think of all the bacterias and such that live in the oceans and jungles along with the plant and animal life. You'd be surprised how many strange things can happen out in the middle of nowhere yet have a comfortable surrounds instead of the coldness of space."

Kato flexed some causing all the needles to shift and form a drop of blood on each entry point. His back felt oddly cool for a moment before relaxing again and getting up into a sitting position.

"But I guess you have your reasons for wanting to isolate yourself out in the darkness of space."