RP: YSS Miharu Mission 3: The sound of machina

Kai joined the nekomachina-Yoroko duo and there was a comical - if brief - tug-of-war between Kai and Yoroko as the former tried to pry off the fake-neko off his friend, and the woman tried to hug it against her to prevent it from dodging her fist.

Things ended up being that the nekomachina was held taught by a leg with Kai, with Yoroko holdings its upper-torso fast against her. Kai failed to get a clear shot for Yoroko acted first, her shield arm came up and she smashed the bottom of her shield in its side, the Daisy's physical strength sufficient in these circumstances tear it in two.

Kai's souvenir was the legs and hips. Yoroko got the rest, and somehow, it seemed what she had left didn't have much in the way of anti-gravity control which allowed to regain control of her half-hazard tumbling about. It was about then that the nekomachina succeeded in ripping her helmet off from over Yoroko's head - an alarm squawk from the helmet's audio cut off as it was forcefully removed, and then Yoroko had to keep her eyes closed to avoid getting sand into them.

Blindly, Yoroko jammed her forearm cannon within the nekomachina's chest cavity and her Daisy - despite no longer having the helmet interface that would pick up on her mental commands - intuitively started firing on its own. Nearly unbearable heat crackled as she fired, and suddenly the nekomachina was off her, its broken body falling back down with its trophy: her helmet (not that she could see it with eyes squinted shut, though).

Nimura, whom had been flying up to them then, snatched the helmet out of the nekomachina's grasp as the latter fell and rose to Yoroko's side, one hand grabbing her by the waist and lifting her clear of the descending dust cloud before she replaced the lost helmet back to cover Yorkoko's dirt-smudged face. The M6's muscular insert rebonded with the helm, resealing it, and came back online.

When Yoroko's eyes blinked open, her HUD display was restored, showing her as not much worse for the wear except for her head armor being light green.

Nimura, for her part, reported to Nyton:

Nimura said:

The damage sustained by Bishop 3 is insufficient to warrant changing the suit completely.

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* * *

Hinoto obeyed Nyton's order. "Scanning... Things look clean from here though I can't be absolutely sure, seeing the amounts of explosives probably held in there. I would advice leaving the armory be in favor of completing our primary objectives. The more time we take, the more chances we have no Miharu to come back to."

* * *

Still held in Nyton's arms, Mara grouchily replied: "Details details... Daisy, Mindy - all the same: they end with 'y'." The sprite pushed off Nyton and floated on her own despite her missing legs. The sandy-haired grumbled some as the cloud of sand fell upon them, then flinched the nekomachina's ruined upper torso and then once Yoroko seemed fine after all, added: "You know what? I'll just float back up by myself. I should be - oww, dammit - be able to get back just fine on my own."

When the Nekomachina broke in half, Kai reeled back slightly, but kept the legs with him. Untangling them from his own, he held them in one hand and looked them over, wondering if he could use them somehow, or if they'd let him keep them. figuring they probably would, he put them around his neck as if they were riding his shoulders, and pulled out his LASR, which he busily began reloading while he floated in midair.

He caught a bit of the conversation between Mara and Nyton, and added Jokingly "Y'know, Mara, I've got an extra pair of legs for you to borrow if you need some help," Indicating the Nekomachina legs atop his shoulders with his rifle. It almost felt weird to joke, but with Yoroko coming out fine, Mara being mostly fine despite her injuries, and Ichigo having been quickly helped, he figured it might be a good idea to ease the tension.

Nyton put his hands to his hips and shook his head at the sprite's rather spirited response. "You're so grumpy after losing limbs, you know that? It's only a pair of legs, just walk it off." he joked while cracking the barest hint of a grin. Then with a more serious demeanor though he looked directly at Mara again. "Don't push yourself too hard, Mara-san. We'll be alright so you hang back and let the medics fix you up." he finished before closing the screen and focusing back on the forces he had left. Currently it appeared there were eight members remaining capable of combat. "Rook Leader, you and Rooks Two and Four will rendezvous with us on the seventh level." he comm'd to Tom, sending him along with Aoiko and Rin a map so they could see where they were at. Along with that were the new callsign rosters as everyone was getting merged into the Assault Team.

Bishop 1: Nyton
Bishop 2: Tom
Bishop 3: Sumaru
Bishop 4: Aoiko
Bishop 5: Kai
Bishop 6: Yoroko
Bishop 7: Rin
Bishop 8: Nimura

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Opening a channel to the remaining Assault Team members he then relayed orders. "Assault Team, regroup at my position and hold until Support Team members arrive."

He then turned away, switching his LASR back to his VAW hand in the process, looking down the hallway that Nimura had travelled down earlier and began to think. While he thought he took stock of his ammunition and swapped the nearly expended HE round magazine to another AP round magazine. His missles were almost gone, only six being left with three in each leg pod.

"Queen, this is Bishop Leader. It looks like the only way further down is that stairwell Nimura was headed for earlier. Run scans there and see what you can find. Its looked somewhat narrow and easy to get ambushed in." Nyton said, studying the glimpses from Nimura's AIES recordings before she had turned around. "You said the aether signature was only strong enough to power a shuttle. Could it be a group of Black Mindys?" he inquired.

Rin blinked at Tom's message, the implications of it not quite hitting her for a moment. Then, she gasped. She didn't want to go down there, where people were being shot and vaporized. The place where her sisters and Takuma lost limbs. The residence of nightmares.

She sent a short message in response.

And then, the order to head down. Rin gulped, before her DAISY lifted off the ground and, reluctantly, descended down into the depths, LASR in hand.

Tom confirmed the new callsigns before joining Rin on her way down.

"Rin," he began, his voice steely cold. "You need to keep your wits about you. Breaking under pressure is unacceptable... we cannot afford it."

The engineer was a different person altogether, it seemed.

"On my right."

He sent a message to Aoiko to form on his left.

"Hai, Juni. Gomenasai...." Rin cringed slightly at Tom's reproach, as she fell into position to Tom's right. She wondered if it was that obvious she was having some serious issues with the traumatizing scenes she's seen in only the short while past. Regardless, she needed to listen to Tom. She needed to be strong, at least for now and while it mattered. She took a deep breath and a long, slow exhale. "Gomenasai," she repeated.

Mara snorted. "You two just wait. Next time you lose limbs, I'll be sure to get a rise out of it!" She challenged them and started rising. As she reached Kai, she idly removed her AP round magazine from the LASR hanging in one of her shoulderblade weapon racks and tossed it over to Kai.

"Here. You'll need it more than me," Mara told him.

Then came Hinoto's reply. "The arrangement looks a lot like a eight-level fire escape to me, with the open stairs and catwalk assembly hugging one side of a larger rectangular chamber. The room's exit will be to your left, about forty meters down and fifty meters north, and cable railing will prevent you from dropping down or flying about. I still can't pick up the nekomachina that survived Nimura, so I'd conclude its running silent."

The snow-haired sprite added: "I'll confirm that the aether signature I've detected is generated one scalar pulse, rather than multiple ones, so that should rule out any Black Mindy power armors. I'd caution that it doesn't mean there wouldn't be any; they are more than capable of running silent and using thermo-optic camouflage as well."

"Finally, mind Bishop 7. She's green, Sir."

Tom gave Mara a nod as she flew past the remnants of his team making their way to Nyton.

"You did well... thank you for everything."

A few moments later and his armor landed and approached Nyton.

"Reporting, sir."

Kel said:

Miyoko briefly considered this, then nodded. "Well, I don't see that making our communications more efficient could be a bad thing... and you might be able to make decisions more quickly if you're not having to translate them from what you're familiar with." The sensor specialist rose a little from her relaxed position to get a better angle on her console. "Perhaps abbreviated commands for the weapons systems would be useful, too. It's a bit quicker to say one of those than 'Load one aether torpedo and target the bridge.'"

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Yukari's smile showed how much she agreed with Miyoko's idea. "We can mentally compile our lists and share when they are complete. Communication on an abbreviated level will certainly help us be more efficient for the crew."

The Shosa's thoughts turned on "communication." No words had come back from the Hoshi for some time; transmission silence had to be maintained. Her eyes went to the main screen, where a zoomed photo showed Bowhordia and the occasional peek at its rust-red surface. The planet's thick cloud cover and elevated surface temperatures prevented the Miharu from getting any kind of appreciable picture of the scene through most of its passive sensors. The lightning storms punctuated any effort as futile.

Active scans would only give the ship away.

"I hope they are successful," she said as she looked at the planet, not totally to Miyoko.

Kai grinned at Mara, though she couldn't see it, quickly catching the AP magazine and looking it over for a moment before deciding to switch out the ball rounds. "Thanks, Mara" The Yamataian called after the sprite, Readying himself for whatever they would do next. He kept an eye on his regenerating shield as he floated down towards the bottom to meet up with the rest of the squad.

Nyton watched Tom, Rin, and Aoiko arrive and nodded to them.

"Good work topside everyone. Sorry to drag you down here but we still have a bit more business here." Nyton said to the newly arrived former Rook members.

His LASR was still out and pointed down the hallway in readiness. Just because there was no signs of the enemy didn't mean they weren't getting ready for another counter assault. As Mara was passing by Kai he then remembered something.

Pass off your bazooka and extra rounds to Kai. We may need the extra firepower.

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Nyton messaged to Mara quickly.

"The arrangement looks a lot like a eight-level fire escape to me, with the open stairs and catwalk assembly hugging one side of a larger rectangular chamber. The room's exit will be to your left, about forty meters down and fifty meters north, and cable railing will prevent you from dropping down or flying about. I still can't pick up the nekomachina that survived Nimura, so I'd conclude its running silent. I'll confirm that the aether signature I've detected is generated one scalar pulse, rather than multiple ones, so that should rule out any Black Mindy power armors. I'd caution that it doesn't mean there wouldn't be any; they are more than capable of running silent and using thermo-optic camouflage as well. Finally, mind Bishop 7. She's green, Sir."

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Nyton listened to the report and wondered about the limitations of the battlespace. Not one to just accept the situation he pondered on ways to change things.

"Queen, I do not like the lay out of that chamber. What is the terrain made of? Can it sustain a decent bit of demolition without losing structural integrity? We could just use some explosives to open things up since we don't need to use the stairs."

As Nyton thought over this and how they could even achieve such a feat he reviewed AIES recordings of Rin's performance and biological readings during high stress events. She was definately below average but she was an engineer, not a combatant. Nyton mentally suggested to AIES that Rin's suit work a little more towards helping her calm down. He would note this and keep more of an alert in AIES on her in case she panics during combat.

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Meanwhile Sumaru's deposit of the heavily injured Ichigo brought a little more stress to the medbay. Some of the patients "Eek"'d in horror as they saw her injuries. Sanjuro dropped his current check on a patient and immediately shot over to her. "This patient needs to be placed inside one of the chambers immediately! Your highness, please analyze which of them has been stabilized enough to be removed and healed intravenously while I prepare Ichigo for insertion." Sanjuro announced with subdued but noticeable alarm. "Azumi, help me remove her Armor and bring some muscle relaxant." he ordered while grabbing a unit of hemosynth from the table. The doctor got to work inserting the regenerative blood into Ichigo at an exposed area by her arm before working on removing the heavily damaged armor. The single pint was nothing more than a bucket of water tossed into a raging inferno but something had to be done just to help her survive long enough to get INTO the chamber.

Fred said:

"Medical, you have up to three wounded power armor pilots incoming and all include limb loss. Stand ready to receive."

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Sora inwardly cursed and took several deep breaths at the announcement. But the appearence of the heavily wounded Ichigo made her pulse quicken as she ran over to the hemosynth tanks. She didn't have time to wonder who the blood covering Wish belonged to.

"Roger that!" She yelled back to Sanjuro as she quickly appraised the status of the patient in the tank she had come to stand before. It was the tank furthest from the door, remembering the order that the patients were placed into the tanks. The most injured were closet to the door but... they weren't ready for extraction yet. "Sorry, sweetie, need to get someone else in here," she whispered to the person in the tube.

She knew that a proper removal would take several minutes but Ichigo most likely didn't have that much time. She quickly inputed the unlock sequence and helped the patient out of the tank, leaving the door open for Ichigo to get placed inside. "This one, Sanjuro!"

She heard Sumaru's reassurance and smiled softly as she hurried about her duties. There is never enough time for wonder... I'll have to have a talk with Sumaru when this is over.

She had her patient lie down on a bed and quickly wrapped a blanket around them- checking vitals.

"Oh yeah, right," Mara limbered out her bazooka along with her extra ammo and then handed it to Kai. "You'll have to decide if you keep your LASR or the plasma rifle. I'll bring whatever you discard back up with me."

Hinoto's reply to Nyton took a little bit, but she then answered with: "Seems mostly Durandium and it looks sturdy enough for me to advice not wasting any ammunition to take it down. If you use Bishop 3 or 8's energy blades to work, cutting through the cabling itself should be a breeze."

"Get better, Nee-chan," Rin sent to Mara, rather awkwardly. She wasn't entirely sure if that was the right thing to say, but she couldn't think of anything else and she had to say something, didn't she?

The sprite's armor just floated, waiting. Rin was completely unaware that Nyton had mentioned anything to her suit's AIES. Similiarly, the suit's light massage on the her body, in an attempt to help her relax a bit, went largely unnoticed, at least consciously. Along with that, a very light trickle of relaxants went into Rin's system. The combination of the two greatly eased the stress that she had been feeling only a moment ago. Even her mind was able to get off of blood, gore, and corpses for this short reprieve before they went further into the base.

Kai graciously received the Bazooka and ammunition, Unloading the plasma rifle and all his empty magazines to the legless sprite. "Thank you, Mara. I'll keep the LASR, it's served me well so far, and I've got more experience with it." He placed the Bazooka onto the rack on his backpack, and went about loading ammunition containers wherever they went. Finished with that, the tall Yamataian concluded his trip to the bottom, touching down lightly on top of the crumpled mess of Nekomachina bodies, causing a minor cascade of broken electronic parts. Making sure the extra set of legs was still steady around his neck, the blond nodded to Nyton, adding a quick "Ready to go, Sir."

It was a bunch of electrical work.

The whole compartment had depressurized a long time ago. Everything not strapped down had floated out of the gaping recess in the Miharu's hull. Floated - not blown. That was a common misconception about that sort of thing because there was a difference between a compartment being depressurized rapidly, and just being depressurized. The inside of the ship just sort of wanted to get out of the ship, where there weren't as many air particles elbowing into all the other little air particles, making them angry. It was hot in the ship, and there were too many particles, and some of them didn't actually have specified jobs. And there were some nanomachines, too. They were terrible. They came in, and took the jobs that air particles were supposed to be doing. But it was not like they were intruding as-such. Just, many air particles believed, vaguely, that it was a bad thing. It probably was.

The whole point is, there were broader horizons out in space. Out in space, an air particle could roam freely - stake its claim on some bit of cool, uninhabited area, and make its living in eternal peace, freedom, and solitude. Many air particles - all of them actually - had abandoned the confines of their iron prison, loaded everything they owned (which wasn't much) into the communal van of pressure differentials, and had meandered their way outside of the hull through the environmental borders seeking greener pastures in a world that was, unfortunately, quite black. They were much like space hippies, only particle-sized.

Of course, this wasn't the focus. It's all good and well to go on endlessly about the social aspirations of oxygen, but there were more important things to the damage control team. One of these important things was a giant, gaping, smoldering hole that had torn through the cargo bay, ripped through the deck, and left a great many wires floating free in the resulting hole in the floor.

Some of the ends of the wire cables were glowing red. If there had been oxygen in the area, they would probably have been burning brightly, but as it stood they simply smoldered. When the sprite team secured the power feeds to the cables, the glowing stopped altogether and the entire area went dead.

They got to work.

Everybody knew what they were supposed to be doing. Temporary power cables had been dragged out of the damage control lockers, along with a massive pair of cable cutters that could put several military-grade weapons to shame. The ends of the wires had been melted by the blast. They would have to be cut off and the insulation stripped, so that their replacements could be attached properly.

There was talking, but Yuzuki wasn't paying much attention to it.

Instead, she was walking on the ceiling, looking up at the five sprites who had volunteered to go into the hole to attach the power bus cables. There was no danger - the lines were dead now anyway and no major hydrolics of pnumatics ran through the damaged portion of the ship - but she felt like watching them just to make sure. The other sprites, who had nothing to do at the moment except wait, were floating right-side-up nearby. The communications channel buzzed.

"I'm looking forward to hearing what Junko-chan says when she wakes up."

"Just what she says, Haya-chan?" The playful voice was Kuni's. Yuzuki remembered her as having an honest smile. It was a little strange hearing the voice saying something sardonic. "You two seemed rather close."

"That's really none of your business," replied Haya in a bit of a huff. "Anyway, what's with you and Ozuno-chan? Her jokes aren't always that funny."

"Oh, that's really none of your business, Haya-hime," parroted Kuni.

"Ooooooooh, I love what you did there." The voice dripped. "Real cute. Real clever."

"Now now," chirped Kuni, "Don't get your pretty princess panties all wadded."

"Shutup."

Yuzuki shifted her attention back to the hole below. Ozuno and Cho were both down there. So were Leiko, and Kichi, if she remembered correctly. Kameko was fetching them tools as they asked for them. She watched the AMES-clad Kameko float out of the hole, fetch a pair of channel-clamps from a toolbox and float back down again.

It seemed to be going rather well.

"Engineering, this is Yuzuki-san. May I have a status report?"

"Yuzuki-san, engineering," crackled the reply, "The power plant is operating at battle efficiency. The reading is now is approximately one hundred and twenty gigawatts of power per..."

"Skip that. Gravimetric Array?"

"The temperature is still rising, but it seems to have peaked and has leveled out at a normal rating. The pressure on the cooling system has dropped, but is still at maintainable levels. I estimate that we can sustain peak operating capacity for several hours before we have to start flushing it with coolant."

"Capacitors?"

There was a pause on the other end of the line. Yuzuki watched as Ozuno began to strip the insulation around one of the cables she had severed near the burnt end. Leiko was standing by with one of the bus cables. The other end had already been attached. Vaguely, Yuzuki wondered how they knew which cables to attach to which ends. She kicked off from the ceiling and began to float down.

"Several of the B-series capacitors are registering a loss in power."

Yuzuki righted herself in the middle of the hole. Beneath her, space extended endlessly. In front of her, Ozuno began connecting the lines. Leiko flashed a thumbs-up. Yuzuki glanced over the extention. It disappeared back into the bulkhead. There were several others floating around, limply disconnected from the system. She knew that right in front of her nose, there had to be many others - electrical lines crisscrossed this ship like a spider's web. There were several power feeds which, on any other starship, could have been considered the 'main'.

The Miharu's power demands, however, were far beyond those of a regular ship. Its systems were beyond their time. That's why it was so dangerous.

Capacitors were important. Yuzuki reached out for a volumetric window with the power grid's flow-path upon it, but nothing happened. The nanomachines which had stolen so many jobs from honest air particles had also skipped town.

Freaking hippie nanomachines.

"Thanks Nimura." Yoroko sent to the sprite before immediately set about looking for her LASR which had been quickly released once the Nekomachina had set about trying to remove her skull. As she did so Yoroko messaged Kai "Thanks for the help." I was probably more of a hindrance to him than a help to myself the Heisho mused after she had picked back up her rifle. "Sorry for the delay, I'm ready." As Yoroko spoke over the team channel she reached up to wipe some of the dirt off of her face, only to be greeted with a light tapping noise as her armored glove hit her helmet. Oh right.

As everyone gathered around, Nyton gave some thought to the advance. With the previous battle data that AIES had gathered he reviewed the battle between Sumaru and the group of nekomachina. Out of all nine he noted that not all of them had had their weapons destroyed. The ones they had fought in the corridor nearby had met such explosive fates that their weapons were no longer functional. Always looking for means to diversify Nyton then messaged to Sumaru.

Hasegawa-Juni, finish your refit and rendezvous with us at the designated location. Along the way though stop by the fourth level and retrieve the last couple functional aether weapons those nekomachina had wielded. Move quickly now, the enemy entrenches themselves deeper with every passing moment.

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Nyton messaged to the samurai.

"As soon as we are all here we'll move in. Nimura and Hasegawa will take point. Mizuno, Nakamura, and Murasaki will form the next rank followed by myself, Freeman, and Rin. Nakamura, try not to let that bazooka obstruct you and have it loaded with a high explosive round. We've picked up a high powered aether signal beneath us of unknown origin." Nyton began. A quick map showed them the layout of the stairwell ahead of them. "This area prevents us from moving effectively due to the structure of the stairwell. Nimura and Sumaru can cut through the cables that suspend the stairs to give us some more room to move about hence they will take point and clear our path. Chances are the enemy are as well armed as the group we recently encountered so stay alert and do not underestimate them. An animal is always most dangerous when cornered." he continued.

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With Azumi's help Sanjuro made quick work of Ichigo's ruined suit. Once she was stripped the suit no longer performed it's function of stabilizing her. The hemosynth unit was all that was giving her the slightest of chances to reach the chamber in time. "Now on two, you will support her weight while I hold the bag and guide her into the chamber." Sanjuro said. "Ready, one TWO." Lifting Ichigo off of the bed they moved the sprite to the chamber Sora had prepared. Sanjuro moved her so as not to aggravate her injuries much further along with keying the chamber for her. Once Azumi was clear he sealed the door and began to flood the chamber with hemosynthetic fluid. The process was quick and effective but it would be up to Ichigo to see whether or not she would pull through now. All she had to do was endure until the regenerative power of the fluid could do it's work to stabilize her. Motioning to the other nurses Sanjuro pointed to the trashed armor. "Get that junk out of here. We don't need it cluttering the medbay." he ordered.

Aoiko delivered Takuma to Sanjuro's and Sora's care shortly after they cleared the medical bed of Ichigo's ruined Daisy; and then Aoiko quickly left to rejoin Nyton's group. Mara, for her part, finally ascended and speedily reached the hangar, where she began weaving her way back inside Hoshi for treatment too.

Nimura stepped off the mound of debris, walked a couple of meters into the corridor to take point, and waited there plasma rifle at the ready. The sprite opened a commline to Nyton.

"Bishop Leader," Nimura said, her voice eeriely sounding like the wounded Ichigo. "If the aether signal we detected is possible opposition, it may be to our group's advantage to reactivate the Aether Canceller Device."

Nyton looked at his AIES chronometer a look to get an idea of how much time it was taking everyone to arrive. While he watched and continuously monitored his scans Nimura's voice rang out on the comm line.

"Bishop Leader," Nimura said, her voice eeriely sounding like the wounded Ichigo. "If the aether signal we detected is possible opposition, it may be to our group's advantage to reactivate the Aether Canceller Device."

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The idea was something Nyton had been pondering but had not really finalized in his mind. Hearing Nimura's chime in on it placed it on the forefront now. "It would seem a sound idea. For the most part we do not suffer much of a disadvantage from operating with the Canceller on so we could run normally. If the task of reconnecting the Canceller is simple enough then we can spare to leave one person behind and running fully silent. Once we reach the signal we can message that person to reactivate the Canceller. The moment it comes back on, whatever we are facing may have to take a few seconds to reconfigure itself for the new situation." Nyton said. He imagined someone holding an aether powered device, aiming it at them only to have to change weapons once the field came up disabling it.

"I would require a volunteer to stay behind and do this though. Any takers?" he continued.

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Sanjuro had just finished inserting Ichigo into the hemosynth chamber when Aoiko delivered Takuma. Seeing the damage and that Takuma was in no serious danger to his life Sanjuro had one of the nurses observe him. "May as well strip him out of that Armor. He isn't going out there anytime soon. And give him some hemosynth fluid along with painkillers to help him relax." he prescribed. Sanjuro was going to be busy with Ichigo while Sora remained by the patient they just removed from the tank.

Azumi, the blue haired nurse walked up to Takuma. "Allow me to assist. Once you have this armor off we can work on getting you all fixed up, neh?" she said cutely to try and take his mind off the damage.