RP: YSS Kaiyō Mission 32: Uchū Kaubōi

[Gles]

Caldera Base, Level 15

Luckily for Myga, her legs had stopped shaking when Sahty asked how she was doing. "Could be worse," she said, which wasn't a complete lie, but it didn't convey how much a cracked rib truly hurt. "I can push this body a little farther." That was the answer she presumed her superiors wanted to hear -- loyalty to the person Myga used to be, and she had to admit that it helped steel her nerves significantly.

Myga pressed the rifle against her chest and grimaced on her way to the server room door with Aiko, where a keypad-locked door sat closed in defiance to their gun-toting infiltration. "Hihja and I started out on this level," she explained, reaching out to tap the pad in a sequence she'd memorized. "If they haven't changed the code..." Thinking of Hihja made Myga recall how she'd left her to the carnage on the top level. Knowing how efficient William was at killing, she could only hope her friend could find a way to survive without endangering anyone she knew.

 

[Ametheliana]

Caldera Base, Level 1
Abandoned Hallway

The injured arm fell and Charbon’s hand went to her face, massaging her temples as her bright eyes closed and she sighed in a way that sounded more like a long-winded scoff.

“I’ve worked ceaselessly to avoid suspicion and your crew continues to shoot me down rather than accept mutual aid. Where is your captain? I came to ask that simple question and have answered yours.”

Level 15

“Last time I got into a close quarter with a Mishhu, I had to take a hemo bath after. This time was better. Couldn’t have made that shot without you, Momo,” Hoshi said in a clipped but not impassive tone as she hurried to to appraise where the Mishhu had gripped Rio’s neck. Her dark blue eyes lingered but then looked up at Sahty’s unfamiliar violet eyes and she looked momentarily shaken before she spoke with more certainty than her lingering gaze had displayed.

“Good to hear, Rio. Very few Nitô Hei live to tell the tale after something like that.”

Molli’s comment about hurting in the morning caught the captain’s attention as she pushed past and floated above the dead Mishhu to regroup on Aiko’s position.

“You’re going to be in your old body in the morning.” Hoshi looked to the Nepleslian inhabiting the NMX Neko’s skin and added, “Let the nanomachines work while you hang back; your hemosynthesis is a powerful thing. Make use of it while you’re still with it.”

Hoshi caught Aiko’s words as well as Molli’s and furrowed her brow while taking them both in.

“You were started out on the command level? As an enlisted?” Hoshi questioned as Myga pushed in the numbers to the keypad.

The meaty orifice puckered in a rippling motion that started at its center. Hoshi’s hand flung up as the door unlocked, closing in on Myga’s wrist. She pulled the NMX Neko with her as she fell back to the side of the doorway. Her other hand tucked into Sahty’s waist, pushing her back against the wall next to the door as it opened, too, keeping the three out of sight to whomever was in the CCC. The captain’s eyes looked to the other side of the door where Aiko and Morgana were stacked and through the telepathic link, asked Aiko what was on the other side of the now opened door. In an instant, Aiko relayed her memory into Hoshi’s brain.

What Aiko had seen was a large cavernous room with wires and pulley systems that swung from the ceiling. Some of them connected to what were obviously terminals, but the electronics hung suspended rather than attached to anything below. Volumetric displays floated on their own and glowed bright fuchsia with schematics and readouts creating pink gradients of color, their holograms projected from some unseen source. The terminals and volumetric displays were laid out in a hexagonal pattern close to the center of the room while the wires were fed from the ceiling a bit further towards the wall and the slightly ovular room was likely 150 feet in circumference. A slide edged one corner of the room in a half circle around the sinewy walls, looping around oddly like an MC Escher staircase. Aiko had seen that the combat command center’s floor was nonexistent and instead there was a carpet of lava beneath the Mishhu that worked at the terminals, their tentacles flopping fluidly as they easily held themselves in the air at their workspaces. All of the CCC was underlaid by a broiling pool of dark crimson lava and black magma that cast a red glow to the Mishhuvurthyar workspace above it.

There were no walkways or catwalks or places to stand, but to the left of the wide room was a door that opened (the door that the Kaiyo crewmen would have come through had they entered straight out of the elevator). The Mishhuvurthyar that entered was yelling in Umbral to those other four Advanced Mishhuvurthyar already there. The situation in the room hadn’t felt tense until that moment—no doubt he had just found his dead kin in the elevator nearby—and when he floated in, he took control of the room by directing everyone in that foul psionic language of the enemy. He took a place far from where they were on the other side of the room, close to the door he had come through and near two Mishhu who came to his terminal, as well. The last two held places at terminals near the server room door and stayed there, though one grisly green Mishhu seemed slightly distracted by the server door opening. Half of the eyes on one side of his face directed themselves to the door while the others stayed on his work.



The command center’s heat was already emanating into the server room as the door opened. There was no time to form a plan, now. Instead Hoshi responded to Aiko to make the first move, whatever the Ketsurui believed best.

 

[raz]

Caldera Base, Level 15

On Hoshi's order, Aiko nodded and closed her eyes. Her right hand moved back down to her revolver and hovered over its pistol grip while the princess' digital mind raced, assessing a handful of possibilities to their conclusions in the blink of an eye.

First one Mishhuvurthyar, then two, and now five of Yamatai's archenemy stood in the way of Aiko and her comrades. Subterfuge had only carried them so far today, but hadn't helped them avoid a fight when enemy forces actually confronted them. And despite the worsening odds before them now, their wits as soldiers and focused firepower till now allowed the beleaguered Star Army infiltrators to force their way toward the objective—access to terminals here on the command level now occupied by the roaring Mishhu leader—which lay only a few dozen meters away.

So Aiko gripped her gun and hefted out of its holster once again, her decision made.

"I saw five," she said, relaying the information to the others verbally. Constant sound from the roiling lava pit's turbulent churn left her unconcerned that the few words she had would be heard. "Advanced Types again. Two close, three long. Take the green one with me first. And then the one next to it. No floor; stay airborne. Keep your distance and engage the closest after that."

Hesitating no longer, the princess rounded the corner to aim into the tangle of wires and connections above the Mishhuvurthyar she'd chosen to attack first. She traced up from the hanging computer console into the mess of machinery and bio-organic conduits, following one particular cable that had stood out in her memory to where it terminated somewhere higher. It was a frosty, ribbed tube that ran alongside all the other cords, doubtlessly some type of coolant that kept all of these electronics running despite the lava's overwhelming heat. Two quick shots barked out from her revolver, the bright teal bolts looking purple in the room's reddish glow, and slammed on-target.

With any luck, a fountain of refrigerant would soon flow out all over the green monster. Even if the stuff didn't hurt the Mishhu, it would at least provide some concealment to the rest of the room while the Kaiyō squad stormed out.

Then Aiko corrected her firing vector and blasted the viridescent Advanced Type in its face as she kicked off and through the threshold. Taking to the air, she moved herself up toward the ceiling where most of this wickedly designed command center's sparse cover seemed to be.

 

[Gunhand4171]

Caldera Base, Level 1
Abandoned Hallway

William's blue eyes slowly began to glow gold in the darkness. Charbon wasn't the only one who was starting to get exasperated. "Can you exactly blame us, me, for not trusting you? The young ones may be inclined to believe you out of the goodness of their hearts, but it will take a hell of a lot more for me." The ID-SOL replied. "The fact I haven't finished blasting you full of holes should be proof enough that I am willing to listen, though you are making it rather difficult." Taking a calming breath, he lowered the revolver a little further. "I can't tell you where she is now, nor would I. However, I will divulge this. I am to rendezvous with her and the other team. Take me to where I need to go, and you will get your chance to speak with her."

This was quite the gamble on his part. He wouldn't go so far as to say Sif's words had changed his mind, far from it. However, if Charbon genuinely did want to meet Hoshi and was willing to act as his guide through the rest of the facility, then it was a risk he would have to take. Otherwise, he and the others could easily get lost in these labyrinthian halls. "Do we have a deal?" He asked.

 

[Ametheliana]

Caldera Base, Level 1

Charbon breathed in deeply, making her whole chest rise even as her second arm fell. There was a disagreeable look to her, but she seemed to relax as William cut her a deal, though deep lines of worry still cut from the corners of her eyes into her cheeks.

"I would only find your captain to help her with her mission, anyway. I'm not sure what you're doing at the base but I can be I'll assist your part, instead. In a fractured capacity to your expectations, though, as I prefer to aid you in an obvious capacity outside of NUCLEON sensors. Where do you need to go?"

She reflected, then added, "Before you leave these halls, do you have a secure mental contact with her? I'll relay a message through you, if so."

Level 15

Lodged high amongst the chains and wires, the Mishhuvurthyar hadn't followed Aiko's movements up there. Instead their eyes were trained on their comrade whose ornery psionic calls were not able to be muffled by the spewing of frothy sludge that cascaded down from the swaying tube. Aiko's shot had landed on the singular tube and sent a swiveling waterfall onto its intended target. The Mishhu itself had been eyeing the door but the sudden stream of coolant meant for its terminal was unexpected. Now its tentacles were flying up to its chitinous face to wipe away the coolant from its rows of inset eyes. It was then Aiko shot at it, chipping cracks and then holes into its chitinous armor, that its demeanor changed from aggravated to erratic. Flailing now as its tentacles cleaned up blood and coolant from its face, the green beast screamed in Umbral and called to the other Mishhuvurthyar for assistance.

The four others that had been in the room with it originally all moved towards it, but the newest Mishhuvurthyar arrival put a stopping tentacle on one of the Advanced closest to it so that only two muddy Mishhuvurthyar advanced towards their stricken green comrade and the server room beyond.

Hoshi piped up, "Morgana and I will shoot from here. Rio-hei and Molli, move in. The one Aiko hit won't see you coming if you get in close for an underside kill shot."

Her pink hands raised with the NMX Type 45 and began taking shots into one of the muddy Mishhu's tentacles, striking those specific appendages that had deadly blades with precision. She wasn't going to let Rio take on the two alone and wanted to neuter their ability to fight the young enlisted before they had a chance to strike with those knifed ends.

 

[Gles]

Caldera Base, Level 15
Hoshi's disbelief at her assignment prompted a response from Myga, "Overseer Charbon hand-picked us for this level," she explained, "Because of our aptitude. Her words." At the time, she'd considered it a lucky break in her infiltration. But looking at the mission now, it seemed obvious that Charbon must have had some inkling about her purpose here. Myga wasn't sure what to think of being assisted by the enemy, but it seemed like further proof that there could be more to this war than outright conflict.

As she was pulled to the side of the unfurling door, Myga yanked her wrist free of Hoshi's grip and nodded curtly to silently signal that she was fine. The injury she'd received had begun to mend as the captain implied, and Myga patiently awaited the call to action with both hands gripping her rifle tightly. Whatever was on the other side, Myga felt the air around her grow hot and stuffy; it was as if they'd cornered a furnace. Soon enough, Hoshi and Aiko had communicated their plan, and it was time to execute. With Aiko taking the van, Myga was next in line with orders to boot. The neko nodded, rounded the corner, and dove through the threshold.

In this body, Myga's powerful legs carried her a fair distance into the massive, 150-foot room before the stabilizing flight element kept her from tumbling into the molten lava below. She briefly wondered what could possess the mishhu to build so close to something so volatile as lava, but pushed that split-second rumination to the back of her mind as the target drew nearer. Aiko's surprise attack, the dizzying heat fumes of the lava, then the misty coolant that rained above all (hopefully) provided Myga with enough cover to fly beneath the green mishhu.

She was shielded from the waterfall of coolant for the most part, thanks to the mishhu who so generously shielded her, but getting under it had left a thin layer covering her uniform. Myga was slow to raise her rifle as a result, and as she unloaded thunderous rounds at near-point blank range, she gave her limbs a vigorous shake to keep the coolant from completely freezing her solid.

 

[Sunny D]

Caldera Base, Level 1

Kasa pulled back from her rummaging to look back at William and Cynea, her lips were incredibly thin. “I have a secure connection with a member of her retinue.” She said after a moment “Is that sufficient to relay your message?” The operative said, her thoughts transmitted with an ambivalent inflection.

Level 15

The science officer looked at the situation beyond the door with eyes wide. She gulped and took a big breath before pressing her back against the wall, steeling herself for the moment of contact. She nodded at Hoshi’s command and stacked up on the opposite side of the door from Hoshi. Morgana removed the Cryo mag from the gun and slotted it into a holster, then installed the one with penetrator rounds she’d taken from Kasa with a click. She lifted the railgun in her hands level with her target and pressed it into the alcove to stabilise it. There was nothing fancy from her end, she fired center mass around its face, hoping to hit its eyes. The penetrators streaked through the room trailing bright orange, forcing through the cascade of coolant towards their target.

 

[Nameless]

Caldera Base, Level 1
Abandoned Hallway, Equipment Lockers

After pocketing the NSP, Cynea headed back to the Aether rifle, inspecting the weapon more closely. While she hadn't "earned the right" to work on these weapons back in the armory, Nari had talked her ear off about it during a time when she was in a good mood and working on one in the shop. It was just her doing some routine maintenance, but that moment did let her glean some important aspects of the device. At least she hoped it was enough to get the weapon to overload and become an IED if they really needed it, but at the moment, she didn't want to fiddle around with it just yet. Because although she'd light herself on fire if she tried to use it without the Reaper armor, a few burns may be worth taking down something important. And not to mention...

"We'll just need a power source of some kind, and we can put this to work..." she mused aloud.

After making sure the weapon wasn't actually just camouflaged junk, broken or missing any key components, she brought it along, figuring that she could strap it onto one of the horses to carry around until they needed it. "Well, looks like that's all we can take from this place. Let's head out." Coming out of the lockers, she was surprised to see Charbon there with William, both of them still breathing but neither seeming to be in the process of killing each other.

"... You two sure made up fast," she said, slightly suspicious of the situation. But she saw the opportunity for a little interrogation, but doing it through the only place where they could speak freely. Cynea beamed a simple message to the Overseer before her. "Kohana, is it?"

 

[Megabirb]

Caldera Base, Level 15

"Lucky me. That's twice now." Sahty said dryly as she looked tiredly down at Hoshi. She had nothing else to say on the matter. Mentally Sahty couldn't help but think to herself that her next close encounter might not end so well. There was a limit to luck after all and Sahty felt she had already used up all of hers.

Standing in the doorway as it opened, Sahty felt the even more intense heat of the next room hit her like a solid wall before Hoshi pushed her to the side of the doorway. The situation through the doorway was terrible. No cover and five mishhu was not an ideal mix but at least there was plenty of space to keep her distance. No use in testing her lucky with mishhu tentacles a third time.

Aiko had once more fired the opening shots of their encounter. With her own orders Sahty nodded her understanding to Hoshi before she threw herself through the doorway right behind Myga. With rifle at the ready she kicked off the threshold much like her squad leader had done, propelling herself into the cavernous room. Allowing herself to freefall slightly before her inertials kicked in Sahty began to engage the two brown mishhu from an even lower elevation than Myga, specifically targeting the one that Hoshi fired upon first. Once more her opening shots were aimed at Mishhuvurthyar's eyes.

 

[Ametheliana]

Caldera Base, Level 15

A flap above the strange vaulting stairway opened and a Neko’s body flopped down out of it, sliding down the curving slide until stopping at the landing. The most recently entered Mishhuvurthyar went to it and stretched out a tentacle, grabbing her. The Neko’s head bobbed upwards then fell back down as she was moved back to the computer terminal, hanging limply beneath the tentacles of the purple beast.

As for the assault on the more verdant Mishhuvurthyar, the positioning Molli had chosen for her attack was superior in all ways but one. When the Mishhu died, which the powerful pistol of the princess and the roaring rifle Myga held meant it did, it lost gravity control and fell down towards the Nepleslian turned NMX in an inelegant pile.

The muddy brown Mishhu had to face Hoshi and Morgana's distant shots and Rio as she closed in. Its squashed face took the brunt of the damage with a smooth grace for a brief moment before it seemed to lose its sight completely and it began groping around with its tentacles. It inched onto and found its brethren and suddenly the slow precision of movement ceased. With hulking strength and speed, it lifted the other Mishhu and closed the distance between it and Rio before throwing the full weight of the beast at the young Nekovalkyrja.

Inadvertently, though, it had lifted the Mishhu off of Molli, freeing her.

 

[Ametheliana]

Caldera Base, Level 1

The NMX's body instinctively changed stances when Kasa and Cynea entered the hallway once more and Charbon looked from the Neko she had worked with for weeks to the one she had never laid eyes on before.

"You didn't come in with the cattle. Is my base really run so lax you've been here all along?" she asked as if an affirmative answer would sting.

Charbon clicked her tongue at Cynea as confusion dwarfed the thoughts in the Overseer’s mind and she looked from the Neko to the Nepleslian, now willing to cut deals with him alone.

“We’ll part ways soon,” the Overseer said quickly to William, backing up with her front and face slightly angled towards the trio to be sure she wouldn’t be shot in the back. “You can go through the equipment lockers to the hangar, but the cattle won’t do so easily. If you’re taking them to the starport, cut through this short hallway here.” She started moving against the wall with no choice but to keep her back to them as she felt around. One of her arms—the hurt shoulder—hung limply while the other hand shoved deep into the recess of the wall like a surgeon of old elbow deep in a patient. She pulled some internal mechanism and the same chunky mechanical sound from before could be heard as a large hangar door raised to reveal much of the same as where they currently were. The end of the tunnel was more metallic, though, like the garage door that had opened in the cargo pen earlier.

“Your help is required on the lowest level. I'm picking up psionic transmissions from there now." She had looked to Kasa as if she were seeing past her, into Erika and the Overseer’s ugly sneer had fallen to show a cold, calculating gaze. "Go back in through to the cargo hold's cow pens. There is a chute with controls to get you there easily in the rightmost processing line where a guard is dropping sedated food. Go down it to get to CCC. I’d bring… heavy weaponry. Tell your captain to look for the YE 47 plans in Elysia from a command terminal. If she doesn’t make it out, you’ll be able to get that information back, hmph.”

That devious expression had returned and her arms popped up over her head again, looking like she had when she had approached William. But Charbon was hovering, in the air and flying backwards down the sickly wet hallway.

 

[Megabirb]

Caldera Base, Level 15

The brown Mishhuvurthyar's sudden charge and toss caught Sahty by surprise. It was not the speed that surprised her. She had seen how quickly the mishhu in the server room had charged her comrades after all. It was the hurling of its own comrade's corpse that surprised her. Such an action had never occurred to the young neko. There was simply not enough time to dodge such a massive object launched at close range.

Sahty had just enough time to let out a shrill yelp and raise her arms and rifle in front of her before she was struck by the hurtled mass of mishhu. Something cracked, loudly, as the body crashed into her. It took her breathe away even as it sent her body into a wildly spinning freefall, her helmet and other loose bits of her gear being slung away in the process.

 

[Gunhand4171]

Caldera Base, Level 1
Abandoned Hallway

William nodded to Charbon. "Yes I do. I can relay the message to her." He replied before the others returned. He spared Sif a glance to give her an eyeroll at the making up comment. As the Overseer opened up a path for him and the cattle to get to the starport, William mounted his steed once more, and turned back to face her.

It was then that she had given the revelation that the others were in trouble. He didn't spare Charbon a second glance. She had earned a stay of execution... if the information was accurate. "Sif, Kasa, go. Take all that equipment and go back up Hoshi and Aiko's team." He said pointing back towards the holding pens. Then turning to Kasa he added, "make sure they get the information about the YE 47 plans for Elysia. Hell download their whole server if you can." He pulled out his data jockey and tossed it to Kasa. "Plug that in to their system and it will download whatever it can. But make sure it gets that Elysia data."

With that taken care of, William whistled long and low, herding the cattle through the opened gate. "Come on boy. Back at it." He told his stallion, tapping his heels against the horse's flank. With a snort, the cowboy and horse were off again, driving the cattle through the base's interior.

 

[Gles]

Caldera Base, Level 15

For as much as Myga had tried to prepare herself for the rain of Mishhu viscera that rained down in the wake of the crew's hail of bullets, there wasn't a long enough lifespan in the galaxy to get used to the rancid stench of the blood and gore that splattered over every inch of Myga's body. The element of surprise and overwhelming force had felled it, but ironically enough, something as mundane as gravity had taken Myga by surprise once the carcass of her enemy fell upon her with frightening speed. The velocity at which it fell outpaced the speed of the nekovalkyrja's flight, leaving her trapped as she felt the heat on her back rise to such a degree that she screamed out from the sudden pain of burning flesh. It would've been less agonizing to give up on fighting gravity and let the molten liquid melt the nerves that signaled pain entirely.

Suddenly, the weight of the Mishhu was lifted, and Myga's first instinct was to fly up as fast as she was able, and any onlookers behind the young neko could witness the gruesome sight of body armor that was in the process of melting over a charred uniform, exposing bronzed flesh that had had taken on a similar color as said armor. It was as painful as it looked, but for the time being, the adrenaline of the fight kept Myga from succumbing; it was a mercy, considering she'd practically flown into the face of the dead Mishhu's comrade, who had decided to use its fallen as a makeshift projectile. Myga didn't need to look at where it'd decided to throw it -- Sahty's shrill scream was enough to make her ears ring from guttural rage.

What followed was a display of pure instinct as Myga, sensing a dry weapon in her hands, flew like a bullet to the room's ceiling, punching through the waterfall of refrigerant with reckless abandon. Within a matter of seconds, she was descending with the rifle's thin barrel raised like a club, screaming like a crazed berserker that wanted nothing more than to smash the Mishhu's head to pieces for daring to harm her comrade.

 

[Nameless]

Caldera Base, Level 1
Abandoned Hallway, Equipment Lockers

No response other than a puzzled look.

So Charbon wasn't leaving them with gear. Which means the NSP was likely a spoil of war, rather than a gift from a new ally. That makes it a lot easier to doubt the Overseer, should the time comes down to it. But if William was willing to trust her information, then Cynea was going to trust it as well, with a side of salt of course. She had hope that the Overseer was indeed on their side, but she wasn't so naive as to think that she went all in. But neither was she without manners.

"Thank you, Overseer," she said as Charbon left, giving her an appreciative nod. "I hope we meet again somewhere more... picturesque."

With a nod to William as he and his herd split off, Cynea moved back to the lockers so she could get through to the hanger. So much for strapping the aether rifle to one of the horses. Looked like she was slinging the weapon to herself. She could just imagine how comedic she looked right now, armed to the teeth like she was about to wage war by her lonesome. If only there was a mirror around here so she could commit the look to memory.

 

[Ametheliana]

Caldera Base, Level 15

Touching down on the magma below, Rio’s helmet and pieces of her equipment hit the dark coalescence of reds and blacks before she did. They sizzled and burned, sinking slowly into the near-molten liquid before igniting completely. More lucky than them, Rio’s instincts had her flying away from the magma the second her body make contact. But not before the same initial sizzling of nerves, flesh, and fat on the NMX Neko’s exposed body parts could be felt. Her mustard uniform, on the other hand, lit on fire almost instantly on the side of her body that had hit the magma.

From her perch, Hoshi watched Sahty fall and moved in quickly. Doffing her NMX bullet vest, Hoshi began hitting it against the parts of Rio actively on fire. For a moment, it seemed futile as the fire grew in size, a pillar above Rio’s form. Then, with a few more thwacks of the flak vest, it released its hold on Sahty. Hoshi spared no time as she ripped into Rio’s uniform, pulling any parts where embers of little red lines threatened to further burn her crewmen. As they hovered feet above the magma, the heat emanated upwards in dizzying plumes. This low in the room, beads of sweat sprouted from Hoshi’s forehead and what wasn’t caught by her bandana over her browline plastered her blue hair to her flushed pink skin.

Above, Molli’s vengeance was unmistakable as she plowed forward. The Mishhu was prepared for a counter attack from the server room and was looking towards it, but its eyes had been too badly damaged to make out any would-be attackers. It only turned towards the rest of the room as Molli walloped into it, unleashing a furious strike with her gun. The stock of the rifle struck into its carapace a foot from its eyes, then closer and closer still to where Rio and the support shooters had hit into it already. Molli was soon gutting into the old wounds with the rifle, pulling viscera out with each strike.

 

[raz]

Caldera Base, Level 15

In the few moments since Aiko had burst out from the server room to attack, already two of her comrades had been injured. Not as a result of Mishhuvurthyar martial prowess nor their speed, but by their abominable wiles. Even the nonsensical construction of this command center suspended over a lava pit now made a strange sort of sense to Aiko as she watched the events unfold, preparing to act. When Molli punched up toward the ceiling near where the princess was perched and then back down again in a flash—a fine example of Nekovalkyrja spirit Aiko thought, especially for a Nepleslian—she was already yanking at one of the chained pulleys attached to the chamber's roof.

The other three Advanced Type Mishhu stalked in fast toward the Kaiyō's fighters as those Star Army soldiers mopped up the first two alien beasts despite their own injuries. Agile and swift through the stifling air, the trio of Mishhu wriggled with murderous intent toward Hoshi and Rio, and Aiko had resolved herself to keep the enemies away even before the battle had so quickly escalated. With her immense brawn, the Eihei princess easily freed the chain and its hooked hoist block from where it was anchored on the ceiling. She ripped it away from the chitinous surface, sending flakes of hardened organic sinew and sputtering orange hemosynth spraying out into the heat, and then turned her eyes toward her new target.

Aiko pounced on the closer Mishhu who floated flanking the one that'd barked its eldritch orders just prior, swinging the big metal pulley hook down from above her head while holding its attached chain tight in her left hand near her hip. At nearly 70 miles per hour, she intercepted the Advanced Type and embedded the curved prong and its bulky housing into the Mishhu's shell and then kept going. Each thick link in the series passed through Aiko's hands as she flew a vertical circle around her foe until the trailing chain wrapped around it twice.

Then, with the appropriate tension achieved, Aiko dove straight down toward the hot, angry floor and pulled the Mishhu fastened to the chain over her shoulder. Quickly stopping herself before she made impact with the burning ground, she released her grip and let momentum do the rest to send the Advanced Type slamming into the dense molten metal that pooled beneath them. The chain followed the Mishhu until its body crunched to a halt and then, with no air left to glide through, joined the monster in a messy pile.

"Spread out!" she called to whoever among her allies were still in the fight. "Make them chase us and take them down one-by-one!"

 

[Megabirb]

Caldera Base, Level 15

Even as the flames consumed her uniform Sahty tore at the ruined uniform in a panic, wailing like a woman possessed as she pulled at the remnants that covered her left side. Her left arm had taken the brunt of the exposure to the magma. The limb was now a charred mess, blood weeping from cracks in the ruined skin. She couldn't really feel her arm, the nerves scorched with the rest of it. The rest of her left side had not escaped unscathed thanks to the extreme heat and her burning uniform. Her left shoulder and side of her face quickly became red, swollen, and extremely painful.

It took a moment for Sahty to finally realize that someone was there by her side, helping to put out the flames and pull at the still smoldering uniform. That presence alone helped somewhat calm and refocus the young neko's mind and return some situational awareness. She was in the middle of a fight and needed to get into cover. It wasn't until she had turned to retreat back into the server room that she saw it was Hoshi who had come to her aid. "Th-thank you Captain." Sahty said weakly as she began a wobbly ascent towards the server room door and cover.

 

[Sunny D]

Caldera Base, Level 1
Abandoned Hallway, Equipment Lockers

“Uh, Sure.” Kasa said awkwardly, catching the device and sliding it into a large pocket on her bandolier beside one with three antenna and a dozen cables coming out.

“Captain, my instructions were to submit to the Kaiyo’s command structure, so I will comply.” The operative continued with a professional cadence, straitening herself up. “However, I would need to note that letting an enemy combatant, no matter how sympathetic, dictate our movements is unwise.” She then smiled and placed a hand on his shoulder as she took a step forward, She lowered her head slightly, her gaze catching his around the edges of her glasses. “Don’t eat anything bigger than your head by yourself, alright?”

With a thought her body suit shimmered and blurred, the holographic camouflage bending light in a seamless cascade. Within moments, she had vanished entirely, leaving only the faintest ripple in the air as evidence she’d been there at all.

“Cynea, I’ll be right behind you. Act like an NMX and head towards the others.” She said telepathically. The operative plucked the Ather rifle from the smaller Neko’s back. The weapon was quickly engulfed by her holographic field and vanished with a shimmer. “Probably going to have an easier time getting past the checkpoints if I take this.” There was an inflection of inevitability in her inflection. “Don’t worry, I’ll give it back if you’re intent on resleaving before the end of the mission.”

Level 15

Morgana held her position behind the door frame as the captain dashed away, though crouched down to make herself as small of a target as possible. Her eyes followed Hoshi for a moment as she darted towards the crispy infiltrator before her eyes realigned with the sights of her gun.

With Molly now in the process of eviscerating her target she switched it to the one barking orders while it was distracted watching Aiko’s manoeuvre. Once again, she targeted the eyes of the creature, hoping to debilitate it so the close quarters specialists could finish it off.

“They need Hemo.” The science officer said to Hoshi via telecoms, its tone was clipped and efficient, like someone trying to say something between breaths. “We have a few large blood bags floating around. Not sure if it’s a great idea risking infection. Would be interesting it see if NMX NH29s had immunity. In a different context perhaps." Each sentence was punctuated by a burst of plasma directed at the face of the leader Mishhu.

 

[Gles]

Caldera Base, Level 15

Throbbing pain in her arms, vision clouded in red, and ringing ears that drowned out the guttural roars and colorful words which rubbed her throat raw; that was how Myga understood she was still alive amid her injuries. The nekovalkyrja carried out her assault with reckless abandon driven by pure instinct, sparked by hate, and fueled by a burning desire to protect those dear to her. Eventually, Myga's frenzied swings connected with air, and her vision cleared in time to see her foe's corpse falling from the sky. The rifle she'd wielded was all but useless -- its well-constructed form now unrecognizably malformed and unusable as a firearm.

Two targets remained after Aiko's predictably efficient handling of a chain. Through the haze of agony that was her ruined body, Myga briefly contemplated the enhancements that allowed the princess to skirt the heat of the molten floor. Stop, bleary eyes narrowed at the Mishhu closest to her, and blackened digits clasped her viscera-stained rifle tightly. You've got enough in you for one more, she wasn't a doctor, but anyone could tell that being half-immolated was hard to come back from in the best circumstances. Her muscles tensed, and she shot toward her target with her weapon swinging wide like the katana she'd imagined it to be. In that moment, she was the soldier her past life had always wished to be.

Be careful what you wish for.

Myga's blows rained down from above, obfuscating the true goal of her seemingly mindless rage. Each strike accompanied tackles, kicks, and shoves that were intended to push the Mishhu down to the inferno below. "Die, damn you!" the squad leader cursed over the hail of plasma fire that pelted this horrific creature, "DIE! DIE! DIIIIIIIIE!" Her commands became a mantra and reinforced Myga's sheer will to see it driven down to the depths, even if it meant she might join it.