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RP: YSS Miharu Mission 3: The sound of machina

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Nyton could feel the impact of the rounds grinding into his armor although the actual shock was completely absorbed. The collision of bullets on his body was always such a fascinating sensation. The machine was putting up a good fight despite it's weakened state and had managed to hamper their 'coup de grace' by snatching Yoroko. He didn't have time to berate her sense for trying to go high and expose herself like that. Instead he knew they had to move fast.

"Nakamura! Grab the saber and finish it off!" Nyton radioed to Kai. Meanwhile he continued his avoidance of the gattling guns and used the maneuver to twist about and fire his bazooka again, this time with two rounds. One was aimed at the monster's body in such a trajectory that to avoid it it would have to swing the damaged point that had been hit earlier. The other was basically at the same spot the first shot had scored a hit in the hopes of fully collapsing into the armor and blowing through it. Once his maneuver was completed he would continue to swerve about and finish emptying his SLAG rounds at the behemoth. Either way it would hopefully keep the mishhumachina busy enough to give Kai the opening he needed.
 
Wazu didn't have much to say at this point other than, "Well, that doesn't look good."
 
"Sir." Kai replied quickly, knowing what he had to do. He fired one last SLAG round at one of the three groupings of tentacles, before boosting towards Yoroko, all the while firing his LASR at the tentacles to Yoroko's right. He would drop his LASR once he was in range of grabbing the saber rifle, before cutting out his boosters and letting gravity drive himself and the saber into the Mishhumachina.

Hopefully.
 
"H- hai!" Rin exclaimed over the comm, before fiddling with the Canceler again to reduce the area of effect back to where it once was.

Did she really just help save them all? That one sentence from Tom was like praise from a higher being, or something like that. It was something that others would likely not take as highly regarded as Rin, but still it was something that made her quite happy. Happiness... was this what Tom was refering to before on the Sekkou?
 
Nimura flew over to the first row of valve she would need to deal with on her side of the reservoir tanks and clenched both armored gauntlets around the circular rung of metal, waiting.

Steam was already jetting out of different segments of the surrounding tubing. Even if they started turning them 'before schedule', it was all too obvious that death was only four minutes away.

The sprite had 32 valves to turn on her side, while Tom would have 32 on his. Assuming that a valve could be turned in 3 seconds and a 2 second required to move to the next one, she estimated it would take 3 minutes to turn them all. Before with only a minute left, she had expected they would have a chance to slow down the process... but done this much ahead, they had a real chance of stopping it cold.

Contact with the rest of the team fizzled. The sprite tensed for a second, and then strained against the wheel that turned the valve. With three strong, quick turns it was open and she jumped to the next one.

* * *

Kai's SLAG grenade was enough to eliminate what little protection the Mishhumachina's barrier had restored to itself, leaving it without that protection for Nyton's attack.

Twice the bazooka belched flames - the first went a little offmark and slammed itself on the mishhumachina's right flank, blowing part of the ear-shaped sensor cluster off; not what he had aimed for, but not bad. The second shot struck on the weakened armor of the right tentacle cluster and blew it off in a fiery explosion.

The ruined chunk of metal fell to the metal flooring with a clamor, the tentacles that had stemmed from it growing limp and also falling to join it. That afforded Yoroko a small reprieve - she was still being attacked, but the frequency had lowered enough so that her recovering barrier managed to compensate slightly. Her torso armor status worsened to orange, though that was better than being having it torn open as the mishhumachina could probably have had.

Nyton made to fire his SLAG grenade afterwards, but their opponent anti-gravity unit allowed it to tip a bit to the side. No longer impaired by a curtain of tentacles, the undermaw swiveled toward the Nepleslia and a torrent of plasma gushed out.

The Nepleslian was stuck choosing at the last second between accuracy and life, and life he choose - his SLAG shot went askew when it made a desperate jump to the side. For two seconds plasma roared in like mythical dragonbreath only to suddenly stop... showing a heat-reddened depression in the floor that went as far as 30 centimeters deep. Blistering heat had filtered from the slit in Nyton's helmet, slightly singing the exposed part of his face.

His SLAG grenade unfortunately went Kai and Yoroko's way and detonated just as the Yamataian man was making ready to slice through the mishhumachina. The shockwave stalled Kai a moment, allowing the monstrous mechanical abobination time to counter with a volley of 10 mini-missiles on that side.

Fortunately, the homing system of those missiles were considerably impaired due to the interference, but four still managed to connect with Kai's torso. Without the benefit of his barrier shielding, the composite yamataium breastplate was shattered through - his armor diagram over the region showing red.

Even worse: Kai felt something pierce through his ribcage. He was flung back to land in a skidding crouch, almost immediately after he hunched forward by reflex and coughed blood inside his helmet. The image of Yoroko trashing against her weakened bonds to try and break free blurred in his sight, and with an awful clarity he understood that a sliver of armor had probably punched through one of his lungs. He could still fight, but if he wasn't treated soon, he'd probably end up drowning in his own blood.

AUTO-DESTRUCT SEQUENCE INITIATED
GEOTHERMAL REACTOR OVERLOAD IN PROGRESS: 4 minutes 3 seconds remaining
(Alarm silenced, evacuation protocols disabled)

 
Once communications were disrupted, Tom went quickly, following his predetermined route for opening the valves. In the mean time, he sent his drones out, one to scout the room for any inconsistencies in the generator or missed valves, the other to monitor the computer and sealed door.
 
Hacking up some more Blood, Kai knew there was really no choice. it was either sit here and definitely die, or attack the Machina and Probably die. Seeing as Probably was less than Definitely in terms of likelihood, the Yamataian chose that route.

Utilizing a combination of the suit's antigravity and the heavy fusion thrusters, Kai once more launched himself at the Mishhumachina, this time prepared with his remaining countermeasure missiles ready to go, and his forearm weapons deployed to track any missiles that might be launched towards him.

Kai activated the Aether Saber rifle once more, lunging for the center of the Mishhumachina, hoping to cleave it in two.
 
As soon as Yoroko was captured by the Misshumachina's tentacles she started to freak out and try to escape. Wildly she thrashed but it's tentacles held her firm. After struggling blindly for some time Yoroko's brain finally kicked in and she ordered her wrist blaster's to open fire on the tentacles holding her in place using their last configuration, heavy pulse.
 
Nyton felt pain as the heat seared at his skin, nearly damaging his eye and it's circuitry. He ignored it though as he dodged away from the flames that attempted to claim his life. A small siren alerted Nyton to Kai's critical condition and he saw a window highlight the Yamataian's armor and health status. Off on the side, in his peripherals, the status windows detailing Yoroko and Kai were present and showing him their deteriorating conditions. Then again his own condition had nearly come to an end after narrowly avoiding the flames.

Kai was again charging the monster while Yoroko struggled to get out of her bindings. Much as he may regret it there was little he could do now but press on the attack even if it meant Kai might die from his injuries. They could not fall back and Kai was certainly not about to quit. Nyton silently commended Kai's resolve to continue fighting. Kai was apparently going for a full frontal assault which meant the mishhumachina would have to deal with him since the aether saber was still a serious danger. Nyton determined that he would use Kai as a distraction and focus on attacking the weakened section of armor.

Twisting with his evasion, Nyton angled himself to land near the right flank of the mishhumachina. While it was still able to defend itself, with the tentacle cluster there disabled the machina would have a harder time defending itself there. Determined to finish it off he fired off both shots aimed right into the area where the armor had been weakened. With both shots fired off Nyton moved again to dodge any counter attacks while getting ready for another move should either the bazooka or saber fail to destroy the enemy.
 
Amidst Yoroko's thrashing and the explosive surges of her forearm weapons against the Mishhumachina's tentacles, the beastly machine raised her eyelevel with intent of cutting 'the gnat' apart with its eyebeam lasers where its pulse cannons had failed.

Yoroko - sick of being so handled - shoved the forearm she had free since Nyton destroyed the right tentacle cluster into the mishhumachina's face and fired for all she was worth.

Two explosive pulses blazed at each of the mishhumachina's double-eye sockets, ruining all its optics and weapons there.

The mishhumachina was soon sent reeling from Nyton's ensuing shot, smoke billowing from its damaged side, with broken cabling dripping out and swaying in a macabre pendulum display. The damaged machine's anti-gravity balance seemed askew, more and more tentacles being devoted to holding it upright... enough so that the mishhumachina dipped down and avoided Nyton's next bazooka shot before turning to meet Kai's charge.

Yoroko noticed the mishhumachina missile port open and its guass cannon swivel to aim Kai as he was blurring in; it's grasp on her had grown slack in light of the threat it somehow could still sense from Kai. She saw her chance to help out and instead of trying to tear free of the tentacles instead grabbed them and like Kai, she used her anti-gravity and fusion thrusters to yank away from the machine, pulling the tentacles taut.

With its inertial control weakened from Nyton's last shot, the fake-mishhu robot was sent reeling to one side off-balance. Gauss slugs and missiles sprayed around wildy, ramming themselves ineffectually into the ceiling, before Kai landed atop the mishhumachina's armored shell.

The aether sword flared alight and cut. The undamaged ear was lopped off, completely blinding the machine. Adjusting his anti-gravity to use the mishhumachina's head as his 'floor', Kai yelled and plunged the weapon in the shell, carving in deeply before yanking the saber out and then making another curving cut on another part of the head. There was no surgical precision involved, no conscious attempt to somehow lobotomize the machine - just brutal efficiency.

The aether-saber jammed in the mishhumachina in the middle of its sixth cut when its battery power went out, but by then, the mishhumachina had crashed down to the floor, tentacles twitching weakly, with the pincers around Yoroko loosely sliding off to fall on the floor. The center of the combat drone had been cored and exposed on top by Kai's attacks, showing slagged, ruined innards.

The beast had been slain.

Kai coughed more blood.

AUTO-DESTRUCT SEQUENCE INITIATED
GEOTHERMAL REACTOR OVERLOAD IN PROGRESS: 3 minutes 48 seconds remaining
(Alarm silenced, evacuation protocols disabled)

 
He could feel the blood on his chin; there was enough in his helmet that if he shook his head it would almost begin sloshing around. Kai decided this was a bad thing, and radioed Nyton about it, coughing for a moment before he could speak again "I'd love to celebrate this-*cough* victory and all but I-*ahem* might need medical attention." despite the coughing, Kai tried to sound nonchalant. He was still very much riding the high of adrenaline from the combat, and reality hadn't quite caught up with his brain.

The Yamataian knew he was messed up, and knew much more effort on his part would result in probable loss of consciousness and/or death, so he politely asked his suit's AIES to float him gently around, avoiding jostling him, and if he did lose consciousness, to fly him as quickly to the Hoshi's med bay as was safely possible.

Turning from the results of the fight, Kai let go of the Aether saber rifle, which clattered to the floor, expended, and idly asked the AIES to help him pick up his pair of souvenir Nekomachina legs when he passed them.
 
Nyton ditched the now empty bazooka and retracts his VAW. With a glance at a window he saw Kai's condition steadily worsening. "Mizuno, escort Nakamura back to the ship. Don't remove that chunk of metal in your chest Nakamura, that will only aggravate the bleeding. Get out of here before you bleed to death!" he ordered before looking at the doorway leading to the computer room. Just beyond this door was their goal but it had been sealed shut and was inaccessible. Checking the substance Nyton's sensors confirmed it was made of zesuaium. None of his weapons on hand would be able to cut or blast through it. He ran back to the aether saber Kai had used but the battery was zeroed out. With an annoyed 'Tch' he flew back out at maximum speed. There could still be salvageable batteries back where they had fought Eve plus he realized he would need Rin if he were to properly remove the data banks.

Nyton arrived at the catwalk and spotted the destroyed saber rifles from the battle. With a quick motion he snatched a working battery and replaced it in his weapon as he flew out to where Rin was. "Rin! Let's go! I need you over here now!" he ordered with little time to explain before he was already flying back to the door at full speed.
 
Tom opened valves. Despite the blaring horns all around him, the simple act of doing something so familiar brought a sense of peace to his mind. He wasn't shooting at anything, frantically dodging something or yelling at someone.

He allowed his mind a brief respite of thought as he followed his AIES's route. He thought of the ones fighting above: Rin, Yoroko, Kai and Nyton.

Rin, she was so innocent, but had done well in the face of adversity. He briefly recalled the horrific sight on the Sekkou and how she almost cracked, but was able to pull herself out of it. Her resolve was powerful, and it showed in how she handled herself as the pressure built on her shoulders. She would be fine.

Yoroko. She followed orders without hesitation and did all that was asked of her. She was skilled and dedicated. She would be fine.

Kai. He was a tough cookie, at least he HAD to be after he went all out burning himself to get that mishu off of him. He was gutsy, reflexive, strong. He would be fine.

And then there was Nyton. Tom's brow furrowed, conflicted emotions boiling within. Nyton... wasn't he supposed to be a cold, uncaring tactician? A man who almost let Mara die, who would sacrifice anyone in a heartbeat for the sake of the mission?

No. Something changed in the Nepleslian. Nyton had focused on all the right things this mission, even when he had not. The engineer grimaced, remembering how he wanted to repair the Sekkou when Nyton was more concerned with prisoners. Nyton spared Nimura, almost sacrificed himself for her. Had he not mentioned to the Taii, in a roundabout way, that the sprite was expendable? And... had he not almost ordered Nimura to her death???

Tom reached the last valve and stared at the reflection of his armored helmet. The reflection of him, covered in charred Mishu blood. A crash of emotion hit him. The feeling of elation at slaying his foes. It made him shiver.

And just like that, a firestorm of guilt consumed him.

I... I am him... and he is me. What have I done?

"Nimura," he said over the radio. "I am sorry... about earlier."
 
Nimura's reply was scratchy from static: "You are forgiven," Tom heard her say softly amidst her panting for breath as she twisted the last of the wheels that would seal most of the valves.

* * *

Nyton collected the batteries, took Rin in tow and then returned to the main operation room while Yoroko escorted Kai back to Hoshi.

Facing the zesuaium door, Nyton activated his aether saber, using the batteries he had collected, and eventually cut a square hole in the armored bulkhead. After sweeping the inside for dangers or traps, he allowed Rin through to do her part of the work.

The sprite looked around hesitantly at first, but then managed to make out the details of the interior workings of the KAMI - they weren't that different from Miharu's MEGAMI electronic suite, just more expansive. After twenty seconds or so of reconnoitering, she located the computer databanks.

Her Daisy's gauntleted snipped off cabling and connections before she took out the toolkit she had kept at the small of the Daisy's back to work in freeing the memory drives from the computer's metal framework.

After a minute, she was stowing back her tool and Rin picked up the pilfered memory drives and emerged from the computer room. Outside were a few volumetric displays, those of note saying:


SYSTEM ERROR!
MEMORY CAPACITY EXCEEDED. CONTACT KESSAKU-CERTIFIED TECHNICIAN FOR SYSTEM MAINTENANCE.

AUTO-DESTRUCT SEQUENCE ABORTED
SYSTEM FAILURE.
 
The job done, Tom placed his hands on his hips.

"You know," he said sharply. "You take things pretty well. I ought to take some lessons from you!"

It seemed Nimura had done well in distracting the Raltean from his guilt.

"When we get out of this, I'm going to order you to write a damn book on the topic."

Then the steam suddenly stopped erupting from the pipes. Tom let out a single, high laugh.

"Maybe we won't be blowing up, after all, so there's no reason for confessionals!"
 
Nimura gave a shrug and returned to the power plant's control room. She briefly checked the gauges and dials on the console and then wandered to the door she had fused shut.

To Tom's horror, the sprite quickly brought out her plasma rifle and fired upon the door, blasting it off its hinges and into the swarm of half-complete nekomachina beyond, those in the path of the flying door toppled down in a fashion reminiscent of how a bowling ball smashed through pins.

A moment later, everything seemed at a standstill. The nekomachina whom had collapsed remained supine. The others stood, silently, unmoving. the sprite cautiously approached and poked one on what passed for its forehead, only to send it clattering down to the floor on its back.

"Area secure," she reported to Tom.
 
"Wha-?"

Tom could only blurt out that much when the sprite blew open the door. But when he noticed that the nekomachina were inactive, he took a few moments to slow down his racing heart.

"How did you know they weren't operational?!"
 
"I did not." Nimura simply replied as she stowed back her plasma rifle and turned to Tom. "However, seeing their state of completion, I supposed they were either running on short-lived test batteries, or were directly operated by the outpost's main computer. Without contact with the main computer, like the remote valve system, they would not receive instructions."
 
Tom groaned, realizing how badly he wanted to argue with Nimura, but noting with dismay the solid logic behind her decision.

"...Good work," he said as he marched up and past her. "Let's get out of here..."

He stopped a few steps ahead of her, looking forward.

"I'll cook you something special... as a thank you. Move out."
 
Nimura pointed back to the auxiliary power capacitors. "What about the base's auxiliary power. Do we put it out of commission?"
 
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