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RP: YSS Kaiyō Mission 31: Wakusei

"Those two Mishhu mecha are certainly built sturdy if anything." Rio thought to herself as she saw the less than expected damage her shoulder cannon had done to the machine's leg. It was the only good shot she would get as the fight became a close quarters one in the red lit bay. From the front of the bay Rio quickly found she could not fire on the two mecha without risking striking her teammates. "Taisho, I no longer have a clear line of fire but the second machine has damage to the frontal armor on one of the legs. I'm repositioning." said Rio as her maneuvered her mecha through the crossfire farther into the bay.

Being mindful of William's own line of fire as she moved into the back of the bay, Rio also began to fire with her rifle from the side and slightly behind the two enemy mecha, targeting the armpit area in an attempt at scoring some critical damage.
 
Molli's streamlined form was a ghostly apparition that was at once at the enemy's feet like a fog, then to their sides before absconding above. The teleporting visage of the Yamataian powered mecha was difficult for her enemies to track and if she had been aiming to keep their attention on her, she had failed. Sif, on the other hand, was quite the opposite of the elusive Molli Byrne. The Nekovalkyrja with her garish shield projecting all kinds of falsities was like some vibrant deep sea fish with its light show and spear dance meant to lure in prey. With the enemy perfectly distracted by Sif, the cone of aether that erupted from Molli's hulking shotgun had no path of resistance. The aether buckshot made chunks out of the joints they targeted. With a heavy thud, one arm landed on the launch bay's port tracks, tearing into the metal as the heavy piece of mecha was felled.

The firing on enemies did not stop at Sif and Molli as from behind, Rio's own rifle and William's rotary cannons fired onto the same areas of the other mecha which had already suffered some kind of static malfunction. To add to the assault on all sides, Aiko's funnels targeted from all sides as well. With the continued fire, the whole chest area crackled with an electric pulse. The lightning-like discharge was short lived, though, as it gave way to a bubble of reddish orange heat as it burst into flames. The whole middle of the armor became subsumed in flames and it bent down, falling not out of the pain a humanoid would bend down in, but because its internal systems could no longer power it to even stand.

"We don't know the safety limitations of their aether generators," Hoshi thought to herself as her fingers dug into her own knees within the confines of her pod. She could imagine the explosion in her mind's eye that would emanate from that mecha and the casualties of her crewmen in this narrow, confined space that was dug in deep in the Urtullan ground. But as she had her mecha look towards the elevator, she saw relief. William's swords had rent open the metal of the cargo doors at the bottom of the launch bay.

"Everyone into the elevator at William's position!" Hoshi ordered, jetting herself forward as she said as much. Bringing up the tail of the group, she made sure everyone made it in. The cargo elevator was made only for a couple mecha to be moved down to the launch bay at one time, but it didn't have controls like a regular passenger elevator, nor a ceiling. The shaft above them was dark and unlit, but with sensors Hoshi could make out that there were other doors that the elevator could open into and she anticipated that is where the rest of the mecha the Urtullan had been building were stored in.

"In pairs or alone, take up positions at those doors above and open them up," Hoshi again ordered. "That's likely where they're storing the mecha they've built for the Mishhuvurthyar. Destroy them before they can be manned!"

Hoshi herself had thrusted a bit above the elevator itself and made sure the others did, unwilling to linger in the blast radius of the aether generator of the mecha on fire should it explode.
 
William roared in trimpuh as he pried the massive doors to the lift apart. Just in time too, as the initial NMX had been destroyed. But the the risk of a generator overload put some pep in their step.

"Aye aye, moving out!" William replied launching himself into the lift shaft with a wicked smile. "Time to do what a Berserker does best. Break things!" The ID-SOL's mech repeated the same process and pried the next door open to reveal 50 NMX mechs. "Now this is a target rich environment. Autonomous mode! Prioritize critical systems." William ordered his ACE.

With that, William's mech began to pump round after round from the heavy cannons into the surrounding NMX mechs. Both guns swiveling and targeting different suits. When a sufficient amount of damage was done, the gun would swivel to the next target. That wasn't to say William was idle while this took place. Using his swords, he began hacking away at the mechs. The first several took time to do sufficient damage, but after some time he worked out a system. Once a mech was softened up by cannon rounds, he would use his swords to punch through the weakened armor. With a good system worked out, the Nepleslian marine went to work.
 
Had there been an expressive face on the Shield Maiden, it'd have a wide grin as Sif was quite proud of herself with keeping the enemy distracted enough for the rest of the team to snuff them out. But there was little time to celebrate as the warnings of a generator meltdown may be imminent, and there were more mechas to destroy. With thrusters engaged, Sif cut open a hole with her plasma spear and bashed a door into one of the hangars. "I got this one, stay safe everyone," she said as she entered.

While the spear was not meant for as much destruction as a blade or an array of explosives, it allowed her to pierce straight through the mecha cores and other important and sensitive systems while leaving minimal outer damage to give their enemies false hope. With the shield, Sif would also bash the mechs over once she was done just for good measure.
 
Sharing the same small and confined space with a potentially overloading aether generator was not Rio's definition of fun. She didn't need to be told twice to get into the elevator shaft, rushing into and up the elevator shaft along with everyone else. "That wasn't our only exit point was it?" Rio softly asked over comms, the question an escaped intrusive thought.

Taking to one of the various doors as ordered, Rio stowed her rifle on the rear waist armor of her mecha before she deployed the wristblade on the right arm. Once the door was pried open, Rio would begin her own work of destruction. Her mecha lacked the close combat power of her squamates, so instead Rio focused on efficiency. She moved from one enemy mecha to the next, her wristblade being used to pry at the bottom of the chest armor before effectively gutting each enemy machine. Cockpits and cores were her primary targets for destruction, but she also gave whatever wires, hoses and other components she could reach a quick yank before moving on.
 
Once her part in dispatching their initial targets had been played, Molli stowed her blade and shotgun away with a showy flourish and a cocky grin that more for her own ego than anything else. It was a dance with danger, given her close proximity to a smoldering bomb in the making, but Molli's frame was swift enough to barrel into the elevator shaft in the blink of an eye, where it clung to the wall and scanned its surroundings with a glowing red visor on its "head." Panning up to the door, the mecha's wings folded down as Molli made it leap from wall to wall, both to conserve power, and to stagger her approach so that the entire squad didn't burst out at once.

Once she dove through the opening William and the others made, the Nepleslian's metal eyes widened with glee at the rows of targets before her. Though late to the party, Molli deployed pods from her mecha, set to autonomous fire, and was soon speeding through the area in a whir of green that sliced, stabbed, and blasted anything in her path. "If it were, weh kin makanother!" Molli's coarse, excitable voice responded to Rio, more to keep her focused than to offer an actual answer.
 
Aiko's weapon bits zipped back toward her towering mecha and docked in their hangar on the suit's backpack once the pair of Mishhuvurthyar machines fighting them had been felled. The particle gun pods would only get a few moments to recharge, though, after the princess strode her machine into the elevator shaft and peered up into its murky darkness. Her mech's visual sensors zoomed in and darted between the blast doors her comrades had opened, filtering out the black and enhancing a clear picture of the gallery of enemy robots that lay dormant beyond.

Swiftly, the towering red Yamataian mecha began levitating up through the vertical passageway. Its aether shock cannon followed beside her, the weapon itself an oversized gun drone, still holding its unspeakable power in reserve for some target that wouldn't present itself here. And as Aiko's mecha rose up through the dark tunnel, she released the oversized aether katana held in its right hand. Rather than crashing to the floor, the sword joined her ascent, motivated aloft by the same anti-gravity fields that kept her mech airborne.

With a wordless command through her robot's Immersion System, Aiko sent her blade tearing into another one of the shutters that shielded a set of sleeping Mishhu mechs. The weapon rent a gnarly gash easily into the armored doors and then disappeared within, followed by a stream of gun pods that re-launched from the princess' backpack to flow directly into the abyss on the other side.

Aiko continued to rise upward toward the highest level while her weapons did their work behind the door she'd chosen, the aether powered zesuaium katana slicing through rows and rows of inert enemy mobile suits while her gun pods fired on others. Pink and orange fire flashed behind the little opening she'd created in the blast shutter, sending out irregular strobes into the elevator shaft as her particle guns fired and destroyed the enemy tech they'd been sent to stop. Once Aiko was confident she'd cleared that first chamber, she ordered her sword to slice through and move on to search for a similar chamber above—watching and perceiving the scene through the Immersion System simultaneously with the view from her mecha's body far-off with the squad—and then continued destroying whatever Mishhu robots she found there.

"Finding and eliminating all of them may take some time," Aiko admitted, scanning the area ahead of her as she proceeded upward to the elevator shaft's terminus. Everything here sort of reminded her of the millions of Mishhu-enthralled Neko they'd found in stasis on Nebel; at least these Urtullan mechs were easier to take care of than a horde of slumbering Neko. "Do not let your guard down. The enemy may interrupt our work yet."
 
Ketsurui Aiko was right—destroying the six hundred odd mecha would take time spread between the small infiltrating group of Yamataian and Nepleslian fighters.

From her vantage point in the elevator shaft, Hoshi could see the cannon fire from William began lighting up the row he had entered, interspersed with the stillness from his blade work. After Sif bashed open a hole she had cut, the captain didn't see the same bright flashes coming from the cubby, nor did she with Rio who had stowed her rifle. She did see the flashes of intensive weapon fire coming from Molli's. Seeing all the crew taking to the task, Hoshi jetted towards Aiko with her bits and blades. The captain wrenched open a door then, from the shaft, set her own rifle onto her shoulder wing slot. She was shooting into the row of mecha with precision strikes, targeting the same cockpits and core centers that Rio below her was, unbeknownst to both.

From her position, suddenly, Hoshi again and now Aiko could see something happening in the shaft above. Streams of orange aether plumed out of one of the last rows. She swiveled her rifle upwards, shooting into the enemy formation. One was hit, then another. But with shields activated, the mecha were no longer as susceptible as the powered down ones in their inert rows. They had risen from their sleep and were fleeing the death trap that her team had worked so hard to create.

"We have movement!" Hoshi called. "They're going where we want them, so continue shooting on designated targets until there are no more inactive enemy units."

The captain was closer to the enemy than the most of her team. It was a position she rarely put herself in, but she kept shooting the mecha meters above her as they fled their stasis chamber. The pilots of the mecha seemed to be ignoring her, though, set on some other course away from the destruction of the Kaiyo's small force. They were flying to the city center still under construction above them. The singular door that had opened at the top of the shaft was heavier duty, meant to create a seal between this undeveloped dome and Urtullan's enterprising creation below. Now opened, the soon-to-be NMX mecha flew into it, seeking refuge behind the mid-rise buildings and the airspace above. This section of Urtullan lacked all of the mystique and ethereal beauty of that which the crew had traipsed about undercover in months before. It was a small city's worth of residential and industrial buildings, all uninhabited and in some state close to completion. Overhead and past the blue static of Urtullan's quintessential domed force fields was the twinkling sky of a new twilight.

Hoshi knew her team would likely be finished taking out their much easier targets below and ready to move up top.

"We'll follow them with frontliners going in first. Ketsurui-chusa will command from there and I'll provide tactical support from behind," Hoshi said, despite being from the behind of the group.
 
As entertaining as it was to see rows and rows of enemy equipment go up in a hail of fire and explosions, Molli's heart began to beat fast from the excitement of their response. Months of training and anticipation gave the young soldier an appetite for battle that their surprise attack hadn't yet sated. Though ordered to dispatch the remaining inactive units, Molli's mecha flew toward a row, pivoted in the air, and kicked the nearest one hard enough to topple into the rest like falling holonimos. That was good enough, in her eyes, and so she swiftly turned her attention elsewhere, soaring onwards and upwards like a neon star, toward the next battle.

As part of the frontline, Molli occupied a role unique among William's overwhelming power and Sif's stalwart defense. The litheness and relatively smaller frame of Molli's mech was well well-suited for the urban landscape, and she firmly established herself as a terror by weaving into tight alleyways and dilapidated buildings that the bulkier NMX mecha couldn't hope to fit through, all while harassing them with high-powered aether-fire from her pods and shotgun. It was incredibly taxing to switch between the standard bipedal and more lithe starship-esque forms as the situation demanded, but Molli was mentally and physically prepared, even as beads of sweat dripped from her forehead.
 
The destruction Sif had caused was not impressive in magnitude, as compared to what she had imagined the others were capable of, but with the most important pieces of equipment melted into slag, this batch was as good as trashed. Thinking on it now, she wished she knew how to activate the dormant cores of these machines so she could use them as bombs. They could sink this whole facility and leave a nice crater in its place. Though perhaps that was more dangerous for the civilians who knew nothing about what was under them.

Perhaps that'll have to be an upgrade for next time. Right now, a new order was issued, and just as the last unit was shoved to the ground and gutted by the tip of her spear. "On my way!" she'd respond to Hoshi, her boosters taking her to the hole she made and straight up in pursuit of the enemy mecha. As she left the shaft, Sif did a full rotation to orient herself and tag the enemy mechs that she'd see, as well as to make sure they saw her. Facing the majority, she presented her shield, and held the spear pointing to her side, its plasma tip glowing brightly. And with one swift motion, she'd strike the flat part of the tip against the shield, creating a bright spark and a loud explosion noise like a firework to pull attention towards her as the shield projected the same faux energy barrier layer.

With a burst of speed she charged towards a mech positioned at the center, keeping above the skyline as she charged for a joust, and firing off a burst of lasers at her target as she did so.
 
The stacks that William was tearing through were being lit with muzzle flashes. His movements were methodical as he hacked through the inactive mechs, sword swings resembling his own in the bulky mech. William's HUD updated from their shared data link at Hoshi's warning of movement. He did as he was told and mopped up the last operational mechs.

Once he stabbed his sword through the final mech on his level, he received his new marching orders. "Aye aye. Taking up flanker position. Tell me where you want me, Aiko." He replied, launching himself upwards to follow behind Sif and Molli. Inside the suit, the monoeye of William's Disrupter flight suit slid back and forth rapidly, tracking targets and calculating the best attack angles.

"Time for a real challenge. Let's go!" He called to the other frontline members as his suit rocketed forward.
 
"I'll have to personally thank Mollie when things calm down." Rio thought regarding Mollie's words. Falling into a rhythm as she worked her way through her chosen bay of inactive mechs had allowed Rio a moment to think. The young neko was anxious about her first combat mission and performing up to expectations. Mollie's words had helped alleviate the feeling, at least a little.

Hearing Hoshi's callout caused Rio to break from her thoughts and pick up her pace to finish off the last few units in her bay before racing to catch up . As her mecha exited back into the elevator shaft and began it's rapid ascent towards the surface, Rio acknowledged Hoshi's newest orders as she passed by "Understood Taisa." Upon exiting the mouth of the elevator shaft Rio took up a position in cover before she began firing on any airborne enemies with her mecha's shoulder cannon.
 
Unseen from the service tunnel, Aiko's titanic sword and swarm of particle gun pods continued to wreak havoc on the dormant Mishhuvurthyar mechs hidden away behind bulkheads and blast shutters in their tiered hangars. By the time Hoshi had announced movement ahead, the princess' own mecha was only a few levels beneath the cohort of activated enemy robots now moving to escape into the city above, having never ceased her forward momentum even as her remote controlled weapons dismantled everything they could.

The captain's volleys spat past Aiko through the dim elevator shaft, suddenly brightening the wide passage from below to meet the fiery aether plumes burning in the wake of those Mishhu robots. Aiko held her crimson mecha's right arm straight out, slowly continuing to ascend ahead of the others, but only for a few seconds. As she passed one of the highest mech storage bays, the princess' sword pierced through its shut hatch and whipped its hilt around to land in her grip. With the katana back in her hand, Aiko activated her suit's oversized turbo aether wings and jetted off on the heels of her foes with the teal-white of her thrusters trailing behind.

Aiko burst into Urtullan's habitation dome soon thereafter. She'd left her gun pods behind to mop up more of the inactive enemy mechs, just as Hoshi ordered, but had not delayed even a moment in following her prey. Only armed with her mammoth blade and the plasma rotary cannons in her mecha's head, Aiko nonetheless soared high above the city's buildings—and the enemies she now pursued—to gain the best vantage she could in those few moments the Mishhu pilots would be distracted.

"Divide their attention and keep them from regrouping in number," Aiko advised, finding her own target in the closest skyborne Mishhu mech. She pushed her thrusters even harder, diving down through the air like a red comet drawn to its inevitable impact. "And attempt to stay in pairs. They may be scared for now, and we mighty, but these Mishhuvurthyar still outman us. Be ready to regroup near the elevator shaft."

With that said, the princess shouldered her mecha into the one she'd been chasing and forced it to the ground. She'd already called out through the mecha's Immersion System for her gun bits to return, but they wouldn't arrive for a few moments yet and she could not wait for them now. The two tangled up mechs slammed earthward into some sort of industrial area, wrecking a wide swathe of flimsy prefab factory buildings when they landed and slid for a few dozen meters. Aiko's sword aimed to skewer through some part of her adversary's structure and pin it to the floor, but whether she achieved that particular goal was secondary to simply grounding it.
 
Whatever mecha had been allowed to leave the elevator shaft had filtered out erratically. With their haphazard intent to simply pilot the mecha out of the stasis pod area that had quickly turned into a kill zone completed, they seemed to be momentarily convening, likely speaking in their own comms in order to tactically address the Kaiyō team. The chance to take measure as a team was hindered by those like Molli and Aiko who started picking into the outliers.

Whatever mecha William had targeted quickly dispersed, flying down desolate streets or taking cover behind buildings in order to return fire, primarily one such mecha began targeting Rio's own cover after doing the latter. Rio's airborne targets were clipped and a plume of smoke emitted from one, making the rest of their flight a zig-zaggy, shaky affair.

Even the largest grouping of fifteen mecha was semi-dazed by Sif, whose attempts at first failed to make any of the enemy mecha take heed. But the frenzied show she was putting on made them stance up and prepare for whatever attack was soon to come from the still-green Nekovalkyrja behind her shield and spear. When Sif darted forward, they began firing. Plasma bounced off of the heavy shield, but one or two rounds of aether found their target, scorching it and dinging the edges. Her target was not expecting to be picked out from the crowd, though, and was struck by her spear and lasers on their right side, making their mecha fall towards their left and into a comrade as they were hit. But now Sif was in the middle of a large and hostile enemy group with no immediate backup nor means of escape.

Seconds after the rouged falling star streaked before the blue force field, buildings rumbled and fumbled, toppling in response to the princess' mecha. It had tumbled into the spiked and pink Mishhuvurthyar mecha like a bird of prey bodying and entangling a much weaker sparrow. Primary and secondary goals met, the pink mecha was both grounded and pinned there by the colossal crimson sword. Its hand reached out, towards its rifle that had spun from its grasp twenty meters away. Aiko could read the word "Killthyar" spelled out on the breastplate of the mecha just above where her sword has struck. Its arm stretched as far as it could away from its chest, trying for the rifle rather than shooting its shoulder or leg mounted weaponry. There was little time to notice any more identifying markings, though, as her immersion system identified two enemy Killthyar mecha, zooming in on them as it did so to note their own shoulder mounted weapons firing on the grounded Ketsurui mecha.

The chase Molli was giving to the enemy mecha meant that she was following Aiko's orders accurately, disallowing these mecha to regroup with those closer to the shaft as she brought them through to the empty alleys between the lifeless grey buildings. Flying overhead of them instead of through the narrow passages, the bulkier Killthyar mechas giving chase dodged and returned her fire with aether of their own. Though they aimed for the body of her mecha with their aether fire, their plasma fire focused in on where she was going rather than where she was, breaking up and toppling the building in front of her deter her speedy path and possibly catch her in the rubble.
 
The helmet mounted plasma vulcan guns on Aiko's mecha barked to life as it stood, blasting thick blue bolts of molten energy into the Killthyar robot she'd downed moments before. Standing quickly, the princess commanded her mech to step on the Mishhu machine's outstretched arm that reached for a weapon it could not hope to grab. Then, she gripped her zesuaium aether katana by its hilt and wrenched it out of the enemy metal and ground beneath it, firing her plasma cannons all the while—first at the Killthyar's face and where she assumed its visual sensors were and then down to the gash in its chest once her sword was free—to make sure it was out of action.

Aiko's particle gun bits closed in on her position now, allowing her to see the pair of incoming enemy contacts from a different perspective. Perceiving the different scenes in her Nekovalkyrja brain, she watched from on high as the closing Killthyar shot at her from their shoulder mounted weapons while the rounds impacted around her crimson-and-silver mecha. One of their attacks glanced off her mech's left forearm, scorching the plating there with a dark, sooty streak. The striking blue eyes laid deep beneath the long aerial crest on her mecha's red helmet snapped to regard Aiko's two attackers, angrily staring them down for their slight against her.

Determined not to remain a stationary target any longer, the princess stamped her mecha's free foot down atop the hole she'd made in the Killthyar beneath her and then activated the thruster in her heel. Using the view from her gun pods, she triangulated her position and where here enemies were shooting from with her position and began attempting to evade the incoming shots, washing the interior of the Mishhu robot underneath her with turbo aether plasma when she kicked off. With a good idea of where her current pursuers were, Aiko dipped and dodged behind buildings and industrial equipment while advancing on her foes with sword in hand.
 
The Shield Maiden's sensors registered two hits on her chassis; a small portion on her right shoulder armor got blasted off, but the hit to her outer thigh on the same side was basically surface-level. Damage consistent in theory and trials as the right side of the mech was often exposed when operating the spear. But this was damage Sif could shrug off. She could take a whole lot more. It wasn't like she ever expected to come out unscathed or even in one piece. Her job was to take the heat, keep enemy eyes on her and be nuisance that can't be ignored.

"I count 15 dancing with me," Sif would report, a clear smile behind the words. "I'll keep them out of the way while the stragglers are being taken care of."

Fifteen-to-one was a good number to be sure, but a nightmare for maneuvering. That is if she was planning on keeping them at a distance. No, she was going to fulfill that third objective by getting up close and personal to the mechs. She kept to the same target, and its buddy it had fallen towards, adjusting her relative position to them to minimize the number of Killthyar flanking her. She thrust the spear forward thrice while advancing, aiming to pierce the enemies' cores, with the third thrust being followed through with the spear drawn across her shield before it was swiped from left to right for a wide slash, its plasma crackling through the air. The shield readjusted to the center as Sif made a quick backwards maneuver to re-orient herself and prevent the enemy from drawing a bead too easily.

She fired off a volley towards the Killthyars on her right flank to keep them engaged, but she would make a wide, circular flightpath towards the mechs to her left, gaining altitude as she did so, which would ultimately circle back towards the shaft they exited from. She had to try and group them up more tightly and separate them from other groups if she could, pull them away so they'd forget about the rest of the crew until it was too late. The shield changed its projection to a circular display with ten hollow segments. As she began leading the group up a winding spiral, one segment lit up in red.

And as she began this maneuver, she contacted the crew. "Send me a ping and I'll bring them by you. I'll keep them looking up in the meantime."
 
Molli's high-velocity chase worked as intended; her pursuers were bulky frames ill-suited for agile maneuvers and tight spaces. The Nepleslian woman tried to keep thoughts of what they'd do to her spindly machine if it was caught in the open out of her mind as she continually evaded their fire and returned it in kind with the help of an integrated aiming system flashing over her frame's screen. She'd come to notice, however, that they weren't necessarily aiming for her, and only once the collapsing building bore down did Molli realize what they'd lured her into. At the speed she was going, Molli wasn't confident she could pull out without inducing a fatal blackout--there was no avoiding this.

With reflexes honed through countless split-second decisions on a racetrack, Molli's fingers danced across her control panel to rapidly reconfigure her targeting systems. Shifting away from the enemy, the arms gripping her weaponry turned to carve and blast a precise path through the wreckage that would offer the least resistance relative to the flight path she was on. An ancient building was no match for concentrated arcs and bursts of aetherplasma, but it took every ounce of focus to soar through an airspace that was trying to bury her. More than once, a piece of rubble sheared Molli's frame, inducing nominal, but noticeable, damage--inconsequential in isolation, but each mistake was adding up. By the time her mecha burst out of the building as the last of it collapsed into a heap of stone and steel, Molli was covered from head to toe in sweat, and she had the worst migraine that had ever hit her.

But now wasn't the time to rest. This daring path had given her cover from the dust storm it'd kicked up, and so Molli cut a wide arc through the cloud, then followed her targetting sensors up, up, until she shot out, sword in hand, to deliver a surprise slash to the visor of her nearest pursuer.
 
As the many killthyar scattered through the buildings and streets, William gave chase. His mech skating along the ground at breakneck speed. The constant fire made him look like a mobile CIWS, firing round after round at the retreating killthyar.

It was in the midst of this chase that he noticed it. His HUD updated to show that Sif had 15 enemies swarming her. "It looks like your dance card is full." He called. "I'm approaching from 8'oclock low." He informed her as his mech launched into the air and towards the 15 killthyar attacking his teammate. His goal to fly straight through the middle of them. As he neared, his swords lanced out powered by the momentum of his launch. His cannons, which had briefly paused their fire to give William an element of surprise against the 15, began to spit fire once more. "My turn!" He laughed as he soared through the formation, spinning around to make another pass.
 
With the upper torso of her mecha partially exposed from her own cover and concentrated on her efforts to down her airborne target, the appearance of a killthyar around the corner of the building across the street from her own caught Rio by surprise. As Rio's cover and thus herself came under fire, she felt the Thought System's damage feedback as her mecha caught several rounds before she could fully pull herself back into cover.

Sporting several new gouges across her machines chest armor, Rio was glad she had requested heavier armor. But now was not time to rest as she was still under fire. Refocusing herself, Rio held her rifle over the top of her building as she commanded the Thought system to shift her view to the gunsight camera of her rifle. While Aiko's training had helped the youngest neko of the Kaiyō acclimate to this shifting of senses, it was still an unusual experience. But this was the time to use it as Rio sent several burst of ballistic rounds back across the street towards the enemy killthyar.
 
With her vantage point made all the better by peeking over the top of the building with her weapon's sensors, Rio had obfuscated her form from the enemy while still able to batter them herself. Her ballistic round bursts chunked into the enemy but didn't down the enemy. From her vantage right next to the elevator shaft, Taiyou Hoshi could make out a line of sight on her aggressor and doubled the firepower the Killthyar was taking by shooting into it, as well. With the two marksmen's combined shots, the NMX mecha clutched at its chest. Its shoulder mounted guns whirred a half dozen shots off sporadically, clipping buildings and Rio's previous position.

Like Hoshi assisting Rio, William had gone to assist Sif. Twirling like she was in an aerial ballroom, the young Nekovalkyrja had made herself a hard target to lock on to despite the party about her. That didn't stop them from at least trying to fire onto her and not their own comrades. William tucked into the crowd of the mecha, lancing out at them with his crusader-like longsword in a way that malformed what was before a solid grouping. He was able to get off some damaged the external systems of the mecha he slashed and spat out at with his cannon fire. What was before a thick swarm was now a discombobulated spread trying to flock up again once more, unable to focus on just Sif with William thinning their fray.

Sif was bringing them over Hoshi's position on the elevator shaft. She had wanted to stay near the area Aiko had designated for regrouping, but as a sniper didn't like her position to have too much heat on it. She jumped up and kicked away with her body facing the swarm, jettisoning in a plume of blue aether. With her rifle back on her shoulder, she tracked a shot into the heart of the mecha closest on Sif's tail. This heavy shot needed three seconds charge time, so she kept her CIES-connected sight on the steady aerial Killthyar. First one little arrow showed under the sight, then two. Finally, when the third arrow appeared in her digital mind, Hoshi took the shot. A small pink explosion erupted from the chest and the pursuer tumbled instantly.

Utilizing the element of surprise against them, Molli struck up against those stalking her. It was abrupt and gouged into the visor with a piercing slash. Though this attacker was taken aback, their partner was not. They raised their own gargantuan sword into the air and their legs spread as their pink aether thrusters spat out, aiming to bring it down on Molli just after she had broken their comrade's face plate.

"I am getting a request for an unknown laser communication originating from inside the adjacent dome. By my estimate, from the engineering section you visited previously. Should I accept?" Boss' voice streamed in to Ketsurui Aiko's mecha as she took to the sky, lifting off from the graveyard of the mecha she had destroyed. Her attacker's shots couldn't land on her as she weaved a course between the city, but they could prepare for her incoming assault as she prepared to face them head on with sword in hand. On one of the mechas, both of their thighs popped open to reveal missile launchers. The tubings glowed orange within the pink paneling. The other prepared for a clash of swords, raising one of their own in a ready stance before charging forward, towards the Ketsurui.
 
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