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RP: YSS Miharu Mission 3: The sound of machina

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The rush down the hall felt surreal and somewhat dissapointing to Yoroko. She had expected something, anything, but it was just an empty hallway. Like Nyton, Yoroko felt like something bad was going to happen, something very very bad. We're defending a stationary point. Yoroko tried to think of all of the tactical things she could do at this point but not many were coming to mind. Nervously Yoroko raised her LASR and checked the ammunition count for her SLAG.

"Kosuka-" Yoroko paused unsure of how to refer to the samurai, "Sama, what should we do?" Yoroko asked. Better safe than sorry. Yoroko thought as she still tried to pin down what honorific to use for the Samurai. After all, it could be some military rank perhaps, or san which probably just wouldn't do. Focus. Yoroko snapped at herself. This isn't time to be worried about that, a Samurai won't kill you for something as trivial as the wrong honorific. Well...not right now anyway.
 
Nyton couldn't help but grin at the doctor's sudden burst of aggression. Medical work was Sanjuro's specialty, or rather obsession, and it was this dedicated single-mindedness that Nyton had been counting on. As for complying with his demands there really wasn't much room to work with. This detention center was not built to offer luxury accomadations to it's guests. The monitor room was not much larger than a cell, maybe 10x10 square feet, and the hallway only allowed perhaps a two person shoulder-width passage. The DAISY Armors tended to take an extra half-shoulder which meant only one DAISY could traverse the hall at a time.

"Doors open, let loose!"
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The doors burst open and a few groans could be heard along with a few calls for help while others were quiet. A few nekovalkyrja poked their heads out in curious fear, hopeful but suspicious that their captors merely meant to toy with them one last time before slaughtering them. Their movements were sluggish and some even collapsed onto the floor.

“Hello?” Wazu said in the Yamataian language.
Click to expand...

Soon Tom and Aoiko arrived carrying their loads and this would reduce space even further.

"Sir, weapons delivery as ordered."
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Quickly scanning the layout of the cell block there was one more room with a lot more space. It was located across from the first cell and was large enough to fit several people at one time along with several tables and chairs. "Freeman, Murasaki, follow me. The rest of you start moving the prisoners over here so Sanjuro can work." Nyton said, opening the door. Upon opening it he saw the full contents of this room. There were tables and chairs with straps, classic manacles attached to the walls, sharp instruments on tables, electrical machinery with connectors, various chemicals, and other painful looking devices. The room had an open vent that led to the next cell over which allowed sound to travel through thus allowing the prisoner in the next cell to hear the sounds coming from the torture room.

"Drop the weapons in that corner." Nyton said, pointing to the corner on the left side of the entrance. He then pushed a table over closer while shoving aside anything that might get in the way. "Alright, let's start bringing them over here and let the doctor get to work." he said. Meanwhile the signs coming from the enemy were slowly drawing closer.

Takuma's attempts at hacking into the base's main hard drive were unsuccessful. Further inquiry revealed that the terminal simply did not have access to the MEGAMI's main data base. He would need to access from it from somewhere else. The computer gave him no help with determining where.
 
She had been trapped there for longer then she liked. Toyed with, threatened, beaten and even partly eaten by mishhu bugs. Nekovalkyrja wouldn't be too nonplussed by that, but she wasn't a neko. Though it has been several hours since the last time one of the neko-knockoffs had come by to torment her with the same questions and then beat her and leave another mass of hemo-flesh.

Though she was fatigued from the random interrogations and blood loss, Camellia looked up at the opened door through bleary eyes. She would say something, but she was too tired, staying awake was sapping what she had left.
 
The sight before Tom was disgusting, but his professionalism barely constrained both his indignation.

He placed the weapons on the floor and slowly moved towards the prone figure (Camellia).

"Ma'am, we're here to rescue you. Please remain calm."

Being unversed in the medical field, the engineer didn't really know the best way to carry the patient, or if that would be the most advisable thing at the moment. He chose the safer approach.

"Sir," he said to Sanjuro, a mark of respect to his expertise in this matter, "a prisoner has been located. She is alive, but injured and weakened severely. Shall I move her to your location?"
 
"There's another still in there!" Mara pointed toward Wazu's cell while Ichigo went to help carry some of the more battered nekovalkyrja to Sanjuro. The sandy haired sprite's blue and gray power armor came into Wazu's view, it's footsteps muted metallic 'clumps' and she bent down. "Hello. Need any help?" Came out of the Daisy armor's loudspeaker.

There were a total of 25 captives for Sanjuro to check up on in the detention center, the hardier ones helping their weakened counterparts get to the medical officer. Ichigo brought back a nastily bruised neko wearing a yellow uniform, only to have another bark a fierce "No! The Chui first!" The 'Chui' had a gray-paneled which was mostly reduced to hanging rags and her skin was covered by an alarmingly impressive collection of scabs.

At the egress leading back to the gravity elevator, the assault team kept watch, occasionally using a drone to watch for the incoming advance of the metallic nekos. After a flare of light down below Kôsuka called out a "Incoming!" and tried to back away only to bump into Kei whom had been less cautious and eager to get into her second 'real fight'. The rocket-propelled grenade streaked from above and exploded in an odd absence of any pyrotechnics, sending the two samurai to smash themselves against a bulkhead and then both crumpled to the floor.

As Yuri yelled a "Kôsuka-Sensei!" and pounced over the two to shield them with her own unit, shield at the ready; Nimura stepped closer to the hole and countered the next incoming explosives with two of her own, filling the vertical passageway with flames that crackled against her energy barrier. The sprite braved a look below as the flames dissipated and was forced back by several shots that plinked hard against her shield.

"The humanoid drones have anti-armor weapons and psychic grenades," Nimura broke her usual silence in a telepathic warning to Nyton.

Hinoto, apparently also privy to Nimura's words, in turn quickly supplied the Taii with: "Kôsuka-Juni's and Kei-Hei's units report their pilots have been knocked out, Taii. Whatever those grenades are, the PSC wasn't too effective against them."

* * *

Back on Miharu, Kotori nodded to Yukari's recitation of the damage report and of Yuzuki's request. The Taisa narrowed her eyes as she pondered the issue and gave the Shosa a nod. "Granted, tell her to form up a team and see what they can be done."

Just after Yukari sent that response to Yuzuki, Kotori said: "Shosa, I want you to turn navigation over to me and go down to supervise the rest of our damage control." When Yukari gave her an incredulous look Kotori gave a shrug. "Who else do I have?"

Green eyes locked with amber ones and Yukari finally gave a resolute nod before heading out. New holographic control interfaces sprang up before Kotori and the black-haired nekovalkyra took a bracing breath before taking those over.

"Saito-Heisho, we are going to proceed to dropping off our probes," Kotori said as she slowly had Miharu break orbit. "The drop off is manual, but I need you to calculate how to effectively position 5 of our chibi-MEGAMI probes over the 2.8 Astronomical Unit distance between Bowhordia Prime's orbit and the asteroid ring of the second planet."

"Probe settings are to be," the Taisa paused a moment before resuming with: "On active sensors to pose as possible starships, stationary and ready to close in a point of your choosing in the asteroid ring - the place where we will lay our improvised minefield - once ships emerging from hyperspace start moving further into the star system. We'll be in silent running at the time, so, the probes are to communicate their findings back to us via point-to-point tachyon communication."
 
Seeing as the prisoners seemed to be taken care of for the moment, Kai decided to Garrison the Gravity elevator from the approaching contacts, only to find Kosuka and Kei knocked out by something "Shit" he muttered, standing back a bit in case something similar happened again. He held his LASR aloft, ready to use the heavier weapon on whatever was there, as opposed to the forearm mounted NSP's he had been using previously. Seeing as others had noted the danger, Kai didn't feel like muddling the airwaves with more unnecessary communications, and held his ground, waiting for something he could react to.
 
These monsters are finally getting their fair share, it seems. Sayuri thought to herself, letting out a half-chuckle, but failing to force enough air out of her lungs to create a proper laugh. The wounds from interrogation and those... those bugs they released into the room, were all healed, but she felt exhausted.

She ate the hemosynth flesh cubes presented only when she felt that she could not feasibly go on any further without it, and slept only a few minutes of every hour, spending the rest of it meditating or attempting to sort out what had happened. She knew that these Neko were traitors, and using technologies that had been disowned by the Imperial orthodxy, likely a black operations splinter. She almost felt in denial about who she thought it was, realizing that she was likely in the 'care' of the Daughters of Eve, terrorists under the command of one of the monsters of the previous era.

That... demon is little more than one of the most tragic mistakes of the early empire. And yet, an examplar for all of our current mistakes. I can only hope that...

The Neko paused, making a small puff from her mouth, vectored by the tiniest shift in her lip position, to push a lock of dirty pink hair out of her eyes. She could hear the sounds of battle coming closer, and if she was lucky and not caught by an 'unfortunate friendly fire' incident, she might even live long enough piece her mind back together.

The Chusa stood perfectly still, eyes gently shut, awaiting for whatever fate had in store for her to rear its head. It'll be nice to know what happened to Cam-san, too, even if it was something terrible.
 
Things were starting to get a little more tense. Psychic grenades? How the hell did they pull that off? And how is it bypassing our psionic defenses? Nyton thought. The fact that Nimura even messaged him directly signaled the gravity of the situation. His mind raced to meet the new development and he quickly sent off a message.

Hinoto, download all data from Kosuka and Kei's Armors. Try to analyze how this device managed to defeat the suit's defenses to knock them out. Do this fast!
Click to expand...

Nyton looked at the data himself quickly and noted that there was a very small radius of effect for this grenade since only Kosuka and Kei had been affected and they were in close proximity to each other at the time. Their Armors remained undamaged so Nyton slaved the AI system to the Hoshi via AIES. "Yuri, move away from them, now!" he warned as he activated their suits and commanded them to move away from the elevator and down the hallway towards the cellblock. Slowly at first, the formerly limp bodies of the two neko stood up and began to float over just as commanded. Their arms hung limp since they had no orders but they soon became more lifelike as the AIES used the personalized data from each individual to move more like they would normally. Not quite as fast but a semi-autonomous version of the pilot was soon moving the suit towards the commanded goal.

On the shared net between both teams he then began to communicate his orders. "Murasaki, you and I are changing over to the Assault Team. Freeman, you're in charge of the Support Team. Kosuka and Kei's suits are still functional and I've activated their AIES to move for them. They'll only be functional for carrying personnel, not combat. Freeman, oversee the evacuation and get everyone back up topside. We'll cover you just as we planned. Be careful though, they've upgraded their weapons and can harm us now. As soon as medical needs are met then see about working on any damage to the Hoshi and Sekkou. Move out!" he ordered before shuffling around out of the torture room and back out into the main hallway. Aoiko followed him out as they flew back to reinforce the line of the Assault Team.

This time on the Assault Team's net Nyton began to give out orders. "Let's keep those androids pinned down but be alert to your ammunition. Watch for those psychic grenades they're using. Any more of those hit us and we won't have much of an Assault Team left." he said as he switched out his magazine from regular to HE rounds. "We just need to give the Support Team a chance to get the prisoners out of here. Once they do prepare to rain hell." Using the scanners, Nyton tried to pinpoint more closely where the androids were firing from. Were they on the next level below? The fifth level? Sixth? Maybe there was an indirect route that lead to them even if it was only big enough to guide a missle towards them. Along with all the previous combat data he added this to his internal targeting system along with the AIES to better assist him in firing. He then distributed this data to the others to hopefully help them in their firing patterns.

Cautiously, Nyton approached the elevator while waving the others to back away so as not to get caught in any blasts. Waiting for a pause from the enemy's fire he then fired off three missles, each with pre-designated detonation orders. Two were set to explode at the sixth level while one was set to explode at the fifth. They can't be too close to us yet. Nyton guessed.
 
This would make a good example for proper hostage rescue techniques. Wazu thought to himself as he wiggled around on the ground, using his legs to roll himself over so that his face was looking up at the armor clad woman. His mind started to wander towards that particular subject. Judging how much freedom one should allow captives to have when being rescued, the risk of double agents among the prisoner population, and the likelihood of kill switches or other devices having been implanted. Though after a short pause he decided now was not the optimal time to be considering such things.

“Help would be much appreciated. I can not seem to move my arms right now” Wazu replied, trying to smile up at the armor clad woman by his head. Of course he also had his own goals to carry out, and it couldn’t hurt to ask.

“And if possible can you explain what is going on here? You seem to have me at a disadvantage in information."
 
She didn't recognize the voice, or the face, but the fact it was a man ment she wasn't dreaming, and that it wasn't a nekoroid. When the man asked her to remain calm, Camellia let out a wheezing laugh that ended sharply with a strong cough. "Note to self: Laughing hurts when you're near dead." Camellia thought as she swallowed and winched at the feeling.

"I... I'm alw-*cough*-ays calm... S.A.I*cough cough*.N.T wou-cough-ldn't want anything else..." She muttered. While truing to focus her vision on Tom's face.
 
The psychic grenade went off relatively close to Yoroko, but not close enough to knock her unconscious. Yoroko's mind reeled for a little bit as the DAISYs PSC tried to cancel out the psionic attack. Instinctively Yoroko moved away from Kosuka and Yuri, though her movement was more of a drunken stumble. What... Yoroko's mind seemed to be going at far less than a mile a minute. In fact, it felt as if time were speeding up in front of her eyes but she herself wasn't.

What was that? Yoroko thought before stumbling against the wall and slowly glancing back at Kosuka and Kei's bodies. What happened to them? Yoroko's eyes slid over to her teammates status indicators, they all seemed to be okay, What is that noise? Yoroko wondered before she noticed something flashing from red to red-orange and beeping loudly. P...S...C...overloa- Yoroko was working on finishing the thought when something clicked. Suddenly everything slowed back down and the alarm went off before disappearing from the screen completely. Her mind then processed the radio chatter that it had been ignoring while she had been affected by the grenade.

"Understood." Yoroko replied as she regained her composure and tried to position herself so that if a psychic grenade landed at her feet it wouldn't affect anyone else. I just hope that next time they'll miss me. Yoroko thought as she also leveled her LASR at the corridor, awaiting the androids. AIES deploy the wrist mounted arm cannons, those should help increase firepower while conserving ammunition. the Heisho thought as she prepared for the innevitable onslaught of androids.
 
"Acknowledged!" Tom shouted, after receiving the orders from Nyton.

A burst of energy flowed through the engineer's veins as he suddenly was placed in charge of the support team. It was his first time to be in charge of this many people; he wanted to make sure everything flowed smoothly for the prisoners.

"Don't move. We are evacuating you now."

He gently picked up Camellia's body before sending orders to everyone.

"Doctor Sanjuro, we cannot afford treatment here," he said, as he started tossing weapons into the general torture room area. "Pick up that man (Wazu), and take him with you."

"Everyone who is able to walk on their own, take a weapon from the pile, form an orderly line and follow the power armor in front of you. If you can assist in moving others, please do. Move quickly! Everyone who is not able to stand will have to be carried, but we do not have enough armors to move more than 14 people in one go. So move if you can!"

"Doctor Sanjuro, stand at the front and perform a quick scan with your medical equipment to ensure there are no contaminations among the prisoners. Go."

He pointed to Rin, Ichigo and Mara.

"Each of you sling your weapons and take two immobile prisoner's under each arm. Move quickly, but do not compromise their survival."

He motioned to Sumaru.

"Sumaru, take point and lead everyone out of here. Your going to be the only one unburdened in case something runs into us on the way back."

He sent orders to Kosuka's suit and Kei's suit to carry two bodies as well.

"I will cover the extraction from the rear. Move out!"
 
"Hai, Freeman-Juni." At least Rin wasn't the one being shot at... yet. All she had to do was to avoid being shot at while carrying two prisoners, hopefully not something too dangerous. Still, it didn't do much to calm her nerves.

The sprite picked a random cell no one else had gotten to yet, immediately noticing the woman (Sayuri) within. She also noted the rank pin. "Ano... daijoubu, Chusa?" Immediately, she realized that this was a stupid question to ask, considering these people had been tortured and locked up. Rin winced at the realization of her idiocy.
 

"Understood." Miyoko started doing the necessary calculations quickly on a display, comparing the probes' possible locations to likely attack vectors if anybody decided to pursue them into the asteroid field. Since their sensor range was orders of magnitude larger than the solar system, she was more concerned about making the sensor network as redundant and hard to detect as possible than she was about getting optimal sensor coverage.

In the end, she settled for a pyramidal dispersal pattern--three probes about halfway between Bowhordia prime and the second planet, spread out widely enough to give them direct line-of-sight to a bit more than a hemisphere, with two more probes closer to the second planet as relays and the Miharu at its apex. For the ship's hiding spot, she chose a slightly less dense patch of the asteroid field. Slightly more care would be needed to hide the torpedoes, but fleeing toward the location would hopefully make the ruse of trying to escape the system more believable. She took a few moments to look over the schematic before finally committing to it, sending it up to the corner of the main display silently for Kotori's approval.
 
Sanjuro, who was in the process of looking over one of the other prisoners in the cell next to Wazu's, turned sharply as Tom Freeman started ordering the stronger prisoners to stand and ready themselves for travel. The doctor raised his palms up in a halting motion towards Tom, his Daisy's hands stained red from the examining he had just preformed on a small handful of other prisoners.

"No! You must no move th-" of course, Sanjuro spoke before noticing that Tom had already picked up the prisoner he had mentioned earlier through the communication links. Sanjuro stood up, having already considered his options and the obvious conflicting priorities between his doctoring and the overall mission. "Freeman-Juni, we cannot move the critical patients without first attending to them," Sanjuro stated firmly, kneeling next to Wazu and starting working on the bonds on the mans' wrist.

"This one is obviously delirious to the point of not knowing where he is," the doctor argued. "The woman in the next cell is fighting for each breath, and the one in your arms has several grave injuries. As a doctor, I cannot move these patients until they are stable." Sanjuro declared in defiance of Tom's order.
 
"Doctor Sanjuro," Tom began, continuing to carry his patient as he overlooked the movement of the prisoners and crew he was thrust in charge of. "We're down 2 on our assault team with more enemies coming. They have weapons capable of damaging armors, and they are swarming to this location."

His helmeted head looked to the doctor.

"I want to help these people as much as you, doctor, but we cannot hold this location for long. WHEN the enemy breaches, casualties suffered will be unacceptable..."

Inwardly, he groaned as the strings of his humanity were pulled.

"...we have very little time left. Stabilize who you can, but you WILL obey orders."
 
The restraints on Wazu’s wrists were sufficient to hold him, but not to hold back a power armor. With a soft ‘pop’ they were torn apart by the metal hands.

“So….” Wazu said, hoping to get some response from the power armors nearby, “Maybe you would be more interested in telling me who you are?” He would think about the situation for a moment. There seemed to be some logic in not giving information to the people being rescued, after all if he was in their position he wouldn’t trust them with weapons or use of their hands either. As he stood up he decided to add,

“Or is this one of those ‘shut up already while we save everyone’ kind of rescues?”
 
Tom's stare down with Sanjuro was interrupted by the words of Wazu.

He flipped on his speaker to reply to the man.

"We are from Yamatai and here to rescue you. I cannot divulge more information at this time, without orders from the Taisa. Please trust us and move quickly, before enemy reinforcements arrive."
 
"What am I supposed to do?" Sanjuro asked in a frustrated voice, choosing to ignore Wazu's query for the moment and instead silently ushering for him to stand up and join the handful of other former prisoners that the Support Team had wrangled near the end of the room. "What do you expect me to do? Leave the severely injured here while we escape? We cannot take them with us because they will not survive the journey back unless I stabilize their condition, and to do that properly I need to work on them here."

While Sanjuro argued his position to Tom, he had hurriedly moved to the previous cell and was in the process of wrapping the injured woman's chest with a strong gauze-like bonding. He knew she had chest trauma, most likely broken ribs, but he was still unsure of whether or not any of the prisoners were carrying foreign or dangerous contamination. Sanjuro quickly set his Daisy's scanners to a more refined analysis, turning back to Tom Freeman another time while the machine did its work.

"I can treat these people. I just need time."
 
"Damn it."

Tom made a snap judgment at that moment and sent his decision via text message to Nyton.


Filled with frustration over the situation, the engineer barked out a new set of orders.

"Sumaru! You're reassigned to defend the doctor and his position while he stabilizes those who cannot make the trip."

He growled at Sanjuro next.

"Doctor, you will not compromise the mission objectives any further," he said. "Everyone who is not critical leaves now. Stabilize those who will die and GET A MOVE ON."

He then turned and took the point for the group, still carrying Camillia under one arm while wielding his LASR in the other.

"We're going. Let's move."
 
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