RP: YSS Kaiyō Mission 31: Wakusei

[raz]

An orange Mishhu aether bolt from one of the Killthyar caught Aiko's mecha in its left side skirt, shattering a hole in the zesuaium armor that hung there at its waist. Though she'd seen the enemy's attack coming and heard Hoshi's warning, there was little the princess could do but follow through with her slicing attack to fell the enemy mech she'd caught and take the oncoming volley where it landed. Just as the Killthyar protected their pilots within, Aiko's mobile suit had done its job just then. But the enemy had a vast advantage in number, so she knew their luck could only last so long.

Jettisoning the clutch of drone funnels from her backpack once again, Aiko did her best to evade the enemy's fire as she darted through the air. If nothing else, those gun pods would hopefully make more target signatures to confuse and draw the attention of her enemies' sensors. So she fanned them out and ordered them to return fire, tracking the Killthyar flanker while moving fast and low across the dunes to intercept it. From the distant domed metropolis, Aiko called upon the mammoth aether shock cannon she'd left there to soar high above Urtullan and prepare to fire.

"Steer yourself to land closer to the city if you are able, but bail out and regroup on Hoshi if you have lost control," Aiko advised to Rio. Part of the team's training had included dismounting in the event of catastrophic damage, and they'd even practiced continuing to fight with small arms or SLAM launchers in the event of an ejection. "You should be afforded some measure of safety when you clear your machine. One Nekovalkyrja flying away from them will not even register on their scanners."

With the flanking Killthyar closing in her sights, Aiko thrust her mecha's aether katana again. She aimed to drive it through the enemy's chest to knock out the pilot there quickly. Far in the skies over Urtullan, her cannon ascended quietly into the twilight atmosphere and trained on where the Mishhuvthyar robots had congregated. It would only get one shot before needing to cool down—and was required to return to Aiko's grasp for more power on top of that—so the princess didn't fire it just yet.

"Byrne-hei, are you able to disengage?" Aiko asked as she attempted to take care of the flanker. It was no matter if the Nepleslian soldier could not, it simply meant the princess would meet up with her next. "Incoming fire will be danger close to your position, and we may need to retrieve Yoshida-hei should she go down near the fighting."

 

[Ametheliana]

"Finally!" Koizumi Aratani's cracked into comms. "Took you long enough to need me help! Coming down from the Kaiyo to your position now! Hope you're okay, though, Yoshida-hei! Aiko-chusa's right, you're a sitting duck now!" As she spoke, the Shoi was swan-diving out of the Kaiyo's power armor bay with a hefty duffel bag in arm, honing in on the battlefield in order to repair Rio's mecha enough to at least withdraw it.

Whatever tumultuous places Molli had gone underground, it brought new life to the sandy dunes. Shooting out of the ground behind her was a four segmented beak followed by a ruddy cylinder of mevar core worm. It hadn't caught at her, but it did snap into a low-flying Killthyar nearby. The worm dragged the mecha back underground the moment a second one popped from the sand in an attack. The species on Urtullan had been fighting mecha so long in their city-destroying undertaking that seeing so many was like seeing a great banquet in their honor. Molli's similar ambush attack struck out at the enemy mecha, slicing into its leg like butter.

At William's position, before he could get to the side of any Killthyar mecha, another core worm popped up from the sandy ground at the edge of the dome meters from him. Laying its tubular body into the street, goo spurted from its beak and a stench-filled steam rose from the buildings it covered as they melted under the acidic ooze.

The Killthyar mecha that had positioned themselves at the end of their line of mecha struck out at Aiko with their own sword. It was a last ditch effort, though, as the Killthyar's arm fell mid-swing at the moment Aiko's blade had left the torso. Momentarily, nothing happened. Then a gush of torrent of orange fluid burst from the incision, spraying out dozens of meters in front of the decimated mecha.

The rest of the Killthyar kept shooting, either with their aether or with secondary guns that took less time to charge. Molli and Aiko remained their main targets, but as Hoshi shot out from her position, so too did they target at the Kaiyo shooters on the buildings.

"Rio, I'm falling back to behind this building for you to enter my pilot pod and get safe," Hoshi said to the Santo Hei with a failed mecha. Even as she spoke, she found a defensible position and began the process of opening up the pod and the mecha's chest moorings so that the Kaiyo's newest recruit could find refuge.

 

[Nameless]

Sif followed the killthyar that fell to her spear down to the ground, buying herself a moment to cool her thrusters as it would have been unfortunate if they gave out in the middle of the chase. But the rest was not meant to last so long as her HUD lit up with multiple new targets. She had fallen behind the others, which was a bad look for someone who was supposed to be at the front, soaking up the firepower brought against them. The volley from the killthyars lit up their section of the desert, and while the Shield Maiden was far enough away to not be in danger, she still had her shield hoisted in front of her.

The report that Rio had been hit sent Sif's mind to a slight panic. Given the number of enemy mechs and where they were, the stunt she had pulled before was not likely to work a second time, but looking to the fresh kill at her feet, she recalled the concern they had when they were in the hangars below. "Yamatai, give me strength. I hope this works." Putting her spear in her shield hand, she tore open the gash she put behind the mech and pulled out its core, softly humming with life. Scans say it was stable for now, but she wouldn't want to wait until it said otherwise.

With a burst of speed that kicked up what felt like a few metric tons of sand, the Shield Maiden took to the skies, aiming to get as high as she could all the while looking for the juiciest bunch of Killthyars. Once she felt she was close enough, she would take a breath and go on the comms saying, "Grenade out!" as she threw the humming core towards the center of the Killthyar formation and released her spear to follow its trajectory. She would then strafe down and to the left, her shield's projectors on full power to make her presence known as she shone brightly in the sky like a shooting star just so she could pull eyes towards her, and not the make-shift bomb that may or may not explode like she'd like it to.

Once the core was close enough to the enemy, the spear that followed it fired into it in an attempt to set it off. It was at a presumably safe distance, but Sif had never seen how big a core explosion could be, and she was bracing for the fact that that spear wouldn't be back in her hands if the explosion did happen. It was okay though. A disarmed opponent was a lovely prey.

 

[Gunhand4171]

Leaping backwards out of his cover, William let loose a string of curses that would make the saltiest sailor blush. Changing from air burst to high explosive rounds, his cannons snapped forward and began raking across the worm's body. All the while the marine was trying his damnedest to get away from the goo it was spewing into the streets.

As much as he wanted to help his team, he now had his hands full. There wasn't even time to look at his radar. It took everything in him to avoid the goo.

 

[Megabirb]

It only took a glimpse at a Killthyar getting dragged beneath the sands for Rio to decide she did not want to ditch her machine outside of the dome perimeter. "Understood. I'm fine Koizumi-Shoi and still have some control. I'm going to try and put down inside the dome perimeter ." Rio said as she fought to guide her failing machine in the direction of Hoshi's position in the city.

Rio's mecha made it over the dome perimeter and almost to Hoshi's position before Rio felt she had no choice but to ground it while she still had the machine under control. Landing feet first before the legs buckled and folded underneath it, the mecha came to a skidding halt in a rough kneeling position, it's rifle dropped by it's side. Even before her machine had come to a stop Rio had disconnected herself from the Thought system, removed her rebreather from the pilot pod's storage compartment and punched the manual release with a smoothness born from Aiko's rigorous training.

"I'm down safely and heading to your position now Taisa." Rio called over comms as she yanked her rebreather on while exiting the pod and was on her way. Using her inertial control to propel herself forward, Rio rushed to Hoshi's mecha and safety.

 

[Ametheliana]

The mecha with its oversized shoulder-mounts and exceedingly huge rifle was splitting open at its belly like some strange, horrific beast whose maw was at its core. But the diminutive captain came out of the giant mecha rather than being swallowed up and she floated at the egress, waving as she spotted her ship's newest recruit.

"Rio-hei! You okay, you fine?" When she could ascertain that Rio was, Hoshi pointed towards the pod within her mecha. "Use mine while Aratani-shoi repairs yours. Stay safe and stick close to Ketsurui-chusa from here on." She turned into the mecha's internals and took a few fast, shallow breaths before jumping out with a small salute to the blue-skinned Neko about to man the machine.

Out of her mecha, now, and with only her fanny pack that carried her SiZi and the hair tie at the nape of her neck, Hoshi felt more exposed than ever. Her button-shaped nose wrinkled as she took in the egg-like smell of the sulphur air. Though a Neko could hold their breath for a good ten minutes and survive in low oxygen levels for double that, the Kaiyo captain found pleasure in being underwater and had trained her lungs to endure much longer.

But she was still exposed beyond that; her body's volumetric projection had quickly created the visage of a Type 35, but the awareness of her truly naked condition in the middle of a large-scale mecha battle was not lost on the captain. With worms eating the city from the ground up and the Killthyar mecha dispersing, she had to get to higher ground and obtain a vantage point.

Flying close to the few buildings that were still standing to avoid detection, she noticed the Kaiyo crew in disarray. William needed backup and Molli couldn't disengage after having taken up her bipedal form. Sif's ploy was head-turning as Hoshi caught the tail end of it, able to see the the shield maiden's spear jettison into a group of Killthyar only to be swallowed up by an intensifying ball of aether that grew and grew for dozens and dozens of meters. Its brightness was a shock against the darkening night, but it died shortly thereafter. Milliseconds later, a second burst of aether shot out like a small aetheric firework. Tendrils of pink light whispered into the sky and towards the city, setting buildings ablaze in small but growing nooks and crannies. Whatever Killthyar had been there before along with the giant Yamataian mecha's spear were dark, burned husks that had fallen to the sand below and ash that still floated idly in the aftermath.

But something that was magnitudes smaller in spectacle and far off in the desert also made Hoshi's head turn. The moon's shine glinted off of something moving only for a second, but Hoshi locked in with her Nekovalkyrja vision to see far in the distance. Someone walking from the battle, deeper into the chokingly sulfurous air of Urtullan.

"Aiko-chusa," Hoshi relayed to the Ketsurui princess. "Work with Boss to strike at designated targets. We need to get William to safety, too. You've got command."

The figure was hard to ignore for Hoshi and she found it trying to pull her eyes away. Unzipping her pack, she pulled out her SiZi and started towards the virtually empty sand dunes.

 

[Gles]

Molli was momentarily stunned by the appearance of the worms -- an event that she should have anticipated -- but quickly regained her senses when their attacks presented an unexpected opening. Given the relatively diminutive size of her frame in comparison to the Killthyar's machines, as well as their rigorous sparring sessions with the beasts of the sand, Molli reasoned that the worms were only registered theirs as an immediate threat for the time being. It was likely the only reason they hadn't killed her the instant she submerged beneath the dunes -- a sobering thought, for sure.

Unfortunately, the barrage of enemy fire didn't give Molli much time to think about anything beyond avoiding being ripped to shreds. Even with her frame's thrusters pushing her across the sand like a skater on ice, the worms providing their own, unintended assistance, and Molli's pods shooting down any artillery that had locked on, the Nepleslian knew she was living on luck that was rapidly running out. More than once, she would believe her time was up, only for an emerging worm to give her a body to hide behind, or distract the pilot that would've punched her ticket. "Can't get away!" Molli shot back over the squad's communications, as she side-eyed the panel that presented a flat image of her mecha's systems. Switching back and forth between bipedal and starship forms was disabled as a means to relieve the frame of stress from repeated inputs.

When another worm emerged between Molli and the Killthyar gunning for her, the Nepleslian was struck with a plan--a crazy plan, but it was all she had. Boosting toward the thrashing beast, Molli drew her blade, dashed around its massive body so that it was her between it and the Killthyar, and brought the aether-coated weapon across the beast's body in a massive horizontal slash. The idea was to spill its highly corrosive body fluids directly onto her assailants, which she hoped she could dodge by shooting straight upwards.