RP: YSS Miharu Mission 5, Aftermath (8th day)

Kai just shook his head. At least Yuzuki was still reasonable. Asher and Nimura were bruisers, fighters more than thinkers, but even Asher was right in this situation. Nimura was about to cross a line that shouldn't be crossed. For what had they fought if not the nation that had created them? That had trained the rest of them? That had given them a place to live, and had kept the families of those who had them safe?

"Actions can wait..." He muttered, obviously not wanting to get embroiled in something insane. "Nyton's solved the problem anyway, there's nothing to worry about."

"Very well," Yui said, handing the bottle back to her entourage. She let Kotori lead the way, leaving most of her officers to start debriefings and reorientation trainings while she retained two samurai. "Planetary forces are being mobilized and should be here soon. Is there going to be room for the Eucharis to dock next to the Hoshi?"

Kotori had motioned to Yukari to come along before leading the Taisho toward the landing bay Hoshi was due to arrive in.

"I don't think so," Kotori answered to Yui's question. The Yuumis were big and luxurious, but hadn't quite the amount of functionality and hangar facilities as the more modern Sharie-class battleship had. "If we need to connect to the Eucharis, Hoshi could just land long enough to pick us up and then dock with the Plumeria gunship afterwards with a minimum of hassle."

They reached the appointed landing bay and waited a moment as Hoshi slid herself into it backwards before her deployed landing pads touched down on the flooring. Once the engine stilled, Kotori lead Yui and Yukari into the bay to then climb up the rear ramp the auxiliary craft extended out from its opened rear airlock.

Once inside, Kotori ordered: "Hoshi, notify Claymere-Taii and Freeman-Juni that I want them to join me at the starboard cargo hold. I also want the ship ready to head to the rendezvous point with the Eucharis at the earliest convenience." She then moved to open the sliding shutter closing of the said cargo hold from the central corridor while asking Yukari: "Shosa, perhaps you could provide the Taisho with an overview of Miharu's final mission?"

"Yes Taisa," Yukari said as she kept up, finding herself next to the Mistress.

"After Miharu infiltrated and destroyed the Bowhordia base of Black Spiral, we obtained a significant amount of information about the operations of the Daughters of Eve. We confirmed Eve's connections to Amaya's Gate, the presence of her assistant, Ashigari Amaya, and several connections between both of them and Melisson.

"When we discovered the details of Project Gate — an Elysian-based interdimensional transportation system — we realized there was very little time to stop Amaya and Eve from reaching their goal, near the Blue Rift Expanse, to reach the Second Draconian Fleet lost in some dimension of time. They planned to take over as much of the fleet as possible using technology to amplify their psionic powers, allowing them to forcefully take over the minds of the fleet's members.

"Though we believed it would be prudent to ask for assistance, we could not. We discovered earlier in our mission that Black Spiral, and the Daughters, infiltrated the Star Army's subspace communication systems, in part through Eve's NH-23 body and also in part because of its remaining links to Black Spiral and SAINT. We feared we would alert the enemy if we requested aid.

"We elected to move out with all available speed. Our plan was to confront Amaya and her ship, destroy it, then somehow disable the Gate before it could be used by anyone else, including Melisson."

Yuzuki, who was walking at a brisk pace along a short corridor, found something blocking her way into the starboard cargo bay.

It was the imperial entourage.

That brought her up short; it only took a few seconds to register just who it was that she was looking at. Although she had never seen the face before, never personally met the green-haired Taisho with the crimson eyes, it was ingrained into her memory. She found herself bowing low, automatically, as much as the armor would allow. Had she been unarmored she would have prostrated herself in complete reverence.

A lot of things flashed through her mind rapidly. The armor bay must be in chaos, right now, and they were walking right towards it. Yuzuki had stopped Nimura and that had been difficult enough. The sprites were worried and scared. Yuzuki was worried, and Yuzuki was scared, too. She had been hoping to avoid the encounter entirely – now it was right in front of her.

There was no way to guess what was about to happen.

Afraid to speak, afraid even to move for fear she might do something wrong, the sprite-Heisho maintained her respectful bow, and bit her lower lip so hard it nearly bled, hoping with all her hope that Nimura was doing the same.

"Very good Hinoto-san. Let us not keep the Taisa waiting." Nyton responded, heartened by the news of the direct secure data transfer. As well as by Hinoto's relieved smile.

"It has been some time since I last met with Ketsurui Hanako Shosho. I wonder how she has been." he then wondered aloud.

After arrival to the Mokuren the senior command staff boarded and Nyton received the notification from Kotori. "Freeman-Juni, the Taisa wants us to meet her in the starboard cargo hold. Hinoto-san, Saito-Heisho, prepare the ship for departure to meet the Eucharis as soon as Hoshi is ready." Nyton ordered while standing up from the command seat.

With a quick glance towards Tom and a motion of his head he beckoned the man to follow him. "Let us not keep the Taisa and Taisho waiting."

@Nimura and Yuzuki:

Nimura swiftly grabbed Yuzuki's armor by the arm and dragged her away, away from the sight of Yui's samurai bodyguards and back into the armor bay.

"If we are going to do nothing about them," Nimura began. "Then we best stay out of sight and not give them cause to be edgy. That will hinder the Taisa."

@Yui, Kotori and Yukari:

"You should probably mention Kikyo's involvement too," Kotori telepathically prompted to Yukari.

Back in the 'safe' zone, Yuzuki began to breathe regularly again.

"You're right," she said, nodding briefly, still somewhat disoriented. "Thanks. I'm not sure why I did that."

Then, Yuzuki turned back to the armor bay, found a crate of spare parts, and sat on it, though she had to pull the rifle from the magnetic hardpoint to do so comfortably.

And there she sat, waiting, mildly stunned.

The decisive nature of the battle left a sharp edge in Tom's stomach. He had been so attuned to struggling for every last bit of ground that the engineer felt he was watching an action film in a theater.

And it was over in 15 minutes... not even enough time to cook lunch.

He sighed as he bent over the control panel, waiting for orders. He felt tired and spent.

Was he tired of battle? Had he been so used these last few years that looking at war made him sick to his stomach? Indeed, he, the Yamataian, had seen enough death to fill lifetimes. It was something not as easy for him to shrug off as it was for the Nekovalkyrja, the maidens of war.

But there was Yukari. She was one of them now... her heart had found its calling. Tom was at her side during the body transfer, as he had promised to be, but the finality of it had stung him despite his best efforts to shield his emotions.

He would have to deal with it and hope that Yukari would not forget him and the things he was giving up for her.

And now he had the expectations of Kotori on his shoulders. He had ruminated on their ugly conversation for three days, playing different scenarios in his mind, different conclusions. In some dark corner, he had hoped the Taisa would have chopped his arm off with that blade of hers, spill his insolent blood on the floor and give some finality to it all.

A clean break that he could move on from. Instead, he was left with her expectations for Yukari on his shoulders as well. And it was impossible to even take solace in his own mind...

These were selfish thoughts, but true ones nevertheless.

Suddenly, the real world and its problems stole him from his reverie.

"Yes, yes, I'm coming," Tom said, as he followed alongside the Taii.

He didn't sound particularly thrilled.

"Sir!" went Rolf, announcing himself to Nyton and the rest of the bridge crew before the standing officer made his way out. "Yuzuki-Heisho tol' me t'tell you 'dat tha' sprites are hunkerin' in Power Armors t'preserve their memories or somethin'. I dunno what. I think this whole bid'ness wit' tha' Taisho's freakin'm out, sir!" The Malifarian nodded his head solemnly to the superior officer, and everyone else that was a higher rank than him, so, everyone in the room. He kept his head nodded til'dismissed or until the Taii dismissed himself.

With a massive fleet trying to work together, Miyoko didn't suffer from a lack of work--finding the formation of ships to get optimum sensor coverage and troubleshooting communications between systems that had nearly a decade of subjective time difference were bad enough. It didn't help that a few ships in the fleet had battle damage affecting their computers, and Kessaku-certified technicians weren't all that common. She tried to lend her help where she could, but it was all fairly touch-and-go, and the lack of clear chains of command and sources of information made it hard to get a big picture. Like balancing plates blindfolded during an earthquake.

It also gave her plenty of opportunity to work closely with the Hoshi's C-IES, which wasn't unpleasant. The soft-spoken ship's computer had tended to stay in the background with Miharu around, and whlie Miharu had worked closely with her for so long that it was nearly second nature, Hoshi was no slouch.

Still. After flying solo for so long, being part of a larger fleet felt weird, as did being back in hopefully-friendly territory. The anxiety she felt when PANTHEON started re-integrating the ships around them was telling... it was hard to tell who was on their side anymore, or if there still were clear sides. If Kotori had suggested flying off and founding their new empire with the warships, she might not have given it a second thought.

But, that fortunately wasn't what had happened, and from Miyoko's perspective as Nyton headed out to meet more royalty, all seemed well with the universe. "Hai," she acknowledged the order as she leaned forward to prime a few systems on the controls in front of her. With that done, she smiled over to Hinoto. "If this all works out, I think the empire owes us about a resort planet each to retire on..."

Nyton listened to Rolf and nodded. "Thank you for the update Westwood. Go ahead and carry on with whatever you were doing but I suggest you make yourself scarce. These Samurai are edgy enough and the less personnel around for them to be concerned about the less they will have to worry. If you are not busy could you perhaps warm up Melisson for us? She seems to like you and I have a feeling she will be receiving visitors soon. May as well have her in a good mood." Nyton quietly replied to Rolf.

"Hinoto-san, Rolf tells me that Nimura and several members of the crew have suited up to isolate themselves from PANTHEON. The impression I got from his report is that they appear to be nervous. Could you address this while we entertain our guests? Let me know if the matter gets out of your hands." Nyton telepathically messaged to Hinoto while Rolf departed. He wished he did not have to dump more work on her but he could not keep the senior command staff waiting.

"Lets keep moving Tom. I alerted Hinoto to the situation and I believe she can handle it." he said and continued walking.

"Gotcha' boss, go butter up Melibutt, gotcha'." Rolf repeated, making quick turn, and jogging on ahead to the Medical Laboratory to pay another visit to Melisson. His boots clonked along choosing not to make a quick, silent hover on his way there. He felt it best, actually, to get a nice running start down the hall, helmet still under his arms. Upon reaching the entrance to the Medical Bay he leaped forward, legs first. When he hit the floor, and with a little minor assistance from the gravimetric drive, he slid across like a baseball player sliding home before stopping right in front of Melisson's pod.

"Mornin' Mel! Had y'coffee yet? Or should I come back lata?" said the home safe Malifarian as he pointed back to the doorway.

"You should probably mention Kikyo's involvement too," Kotori telepathically prompted to Yukari.

Click to expand...

Yukari sent a brief thanks back to Kotori and continued as they arrived at Hoshi.

"There also is the matter of Ketsurui Kyoshi Kikyo," she said. "We have evidence Eve and Amaya hired her, and her skill at infiltrating Yamatai's communication networks, in order to kill the Taisa. They believed the Taisa's growing ability as a Signaler posed too much of a threat to their operations, and hired Kikyo to kill the Taisa, her officers, then her adoptive family, the Sylvesters.

"We did not encounter Kikyo during our mission. Her location is unknown, but SAINT must be made aware that she likely has retained hidden portals into PANTHEON."

@Hoshi:

Once it was clear all passengers were onboard, Hoshi took off again, slid out of the Mokuren's landing bay and into space.

Hinoto had given a nod at Nyton's order, but settled for taking care of it once she had made the rendezvous with the Eucharis.

@Rolf:

Melisson was still, like usual, in the hemosynthetic tank. The interpreter was kneeling, eyeing the room's door, and barely blinked when Rolf made his flashy entrance.

"If it isn't Asher," she deadpanned, making again the point that if he was going to call her nicknames, she'd call him by his 'former' name. There was, however, no levity in her.

The redhaired alien eyed up toward the medlab's exit and said: "Yui is here. I can feel it."

@Yui:

"Kikyo is the main reason we broke off communication," Kotori added to Yukari's overview. "We've evidence strongly implicating her in the death of her birthmother, the Former-Empress Ayame. On top of that, I have strong reasons to believe that she still has double agents in both the Ketsurui Samurai and several SAINT agents. We just have no idea who, hence our paranoia. Kikyo had a track record for succeeding at killing people, and we chose to take as few chances as possible in that regard."

"The Sylvesters - the family that raised me - are involved due to the father of the family, Karl Sylvester, having been blackmailed to be in the right place, at the right time, with framed orders that looked like they were given by you... to replace the bodies of any fallen in the PNUgen operation with the body I have now. I suppose his value to the enemy was that he knew me and since he was a gentle person of integrity we - I - would have cause to trust him."

"It was the aim of Eve's lieutenant, Amaya, to have whomever was changed in a anti-psionic body design crafted by Doctor Shinichiro to make close contact with Melisson - an ally that had outlived her usefulness for Eve - and mutually destroy each other in some mental battle."

Around that point, Tom and Nyton arrived. Kotori spared a nod to greet them both, but continued talking to Yui.

"Hanako survived the PNUgen operation, but I was dying. My foster father was supposed to respawn her in that new Signaler body, but what he instead did was smuggle that dying Kotori out of the Sakura, take extensive measures to reanimate her in secret, and have a NH-29 Signaler clone of her created to take her place: that's me."

"Amaya's plans were ruined when, during the Battle of Lor, I never got close enough to Melisson to have that supposed mental battle that should've have had us do a mutual suicide."

Kotori hadn't been sure if she really wanted to reveal the convoluted events that resulted in them having her original on board, and her somehow having modified into a body meeting NH-23 specifications. But with Hoshi's datafiles being entirely copied to the Eucharis... the matter was moot: there was going to be full disclosure.

"Because Karl Sylvester was under watch with his family threatened, he found some way of improving our odds to get back at the people threatening him. He extensively altered the original to have near NH-23 PANTHEON nodal administrative properties - like Eve's own bootleg body. That new NH-23 body he somehow had smuggled to Scorpio where Miharu was built and she was secretly integrated with our MEGAMI computer. We had her from the beginning and having her with us saved us from most hacking attempts the Daughters of Eve attempted on us."

"We never said anything about it, once we later found out, because we were concerned about how SAINT spooks would react to the security breach, even though it was pretty clear that my original entertained no treasonous thoughts. She was... just trapped by who she was, having had no choice but to try and make the most of it."

Kotori shook her head gently. "In any case, you don't have to worry about her anymore. When we started fighting for Amaya's Gate, we goaded the enemy in kidnapping me - except I had changed places with her. Once she was on the command ship of the defending force, she subverted their local PANTHEON connection and took control of them long enough for Miharu to destroy the dozen of guarding warships unopposed. Unfortunately, Meni and Mani - Eve's lieutenants - were present at the gate and they killed her."

"I... well, she wasn't able to respawn. Shinichiro made my body partly as a way to control you in case you got out of hand - whenever a NH-23 dies within my telepathic range, instead of their minds congressing to other PANTHEON node, I bait myself as an administrative unit, draw them in and destroy them via somekind of absorption. It's not a process I can really control... but the end result is that the NH-23's mind is destroyed. That's how my original died."

"Iss' Rolf, Melisson." Rolf pressed his finger against the glass, the digit curling up a bit against it. He couldn't help but emphasize that enough to people, but Melisson seemed intent on having her name pronounced perfectly. That little fact made him glad her name was Melisson and not something like Melpralphra, something he would never be able to pronounce correctly as long as he lived.

"But yeah, y'right. Yui showed up after we finished wipin' tha' floor off at Nataria." explained Rolf, laying on his side and propping his head up on his hand, from where his elbow rested on his helmet. "Yui brought PANTHEON wit'r, and it's freakin' out all tha' sprites. Nimura almost flipped tha' hell out. Lucky we got Yuzuki, though, sides tha' crazy she spouts out every once in a while, she wass' able t'calm'r down."

The Malifarian looked back towards the door.

"Everybody's real tense right now, one'a those, 'here's where it all counts' moments." he got that out before letting loose a tired yawn. "Wish they'd hurry up an' kill us or not. Waitin' around an' doin' nothin' iss' worse than death."

Yui nodded, staring off into space as she absorbed and processed the information. "SAINT will not tolerate further betrayal in its ranks. We will find and eliminate Kikyo and any other spy."

Her eyes gradually made their way over to Kotori and Yukari again. "You have done so much already but there is more to be done; We must tie the other loose ends...for example, until recently the NMX Nekovalkyrja we have captured have been standard NH-29 models. However we suspect the NMX is developing a replacement. I am assigning Taisa Nagase Nagako of Black Spiral to investigate. As you know, she is very...familiar with the Mishhu."

The Taisho conjured up a volumetric image of the YSS Asamoya in her hand. "Kotori, the other prototype Himiko is available. You should claim her for your replacement ship."

@With Yui:

Amber eyes settled on the volumetric projection of the ship Yui was offering.

It looked like Miharu. But it wasn't. It wasn't her home. Her home couldn't be so easily replaced.

"Thank you, Taisho, but it is not something I feel should be discussed right away," Kotori's voice was soft, with the tiniest bitter edge to it. She didn't bow her apology, but rather walked past to stand amongst the cargo containers in the hold.

"There are more loose ends than you yet know," Kotori replied softly. "After the ships guarding Amaya's Gate were destroyed, my power armored infantry squad - I call them the 'Black Knights' - made a concerted effort to try and capture the Gate from the enemy. They made their foray inside the structure, battling opponents large and small while being constantly hounded by the elusive Meni and Mani."

"I left Miharu in Suzuka-Shosa's charge to guard the Gate and went along with them to counter the psionic-user we knew was there: Amaya. With no other guards in the way, we finally cornered them and the Black Knights were able, with some losses, to defeat the copies of Meni and Mani Eve had lent to Amaya along with capturing a psionic-amplifying mecha the nepleslian woman was piloting. Amaya tried to escape, but I chased her down myself and killed her."

The Taisa left a short pause as she worked the lid of one of the containers open and fished inside.

"Once the Gate was ours, my technicians scoured it for information to find a way to pacify it - as Amaya had triggered its opening. Thier search was cut off by the arrival of Eve's flagship, but they did manage to find these."

She extracted from it an odd crystalline sheet riddled with almost-leaf-like veining with one of its ends having an array of integrated quasi-cybernetic components that seemed like adaptors to more conventional port slots to connect into the inner workings of a computer console.

Kotori handed the living glass apparatus over to Yui so she could examine it more closely. "Freeman-Juni, why don't you tell the Taisho what we've learned about the origin of this object?"

@Rolf:

Melisson appeared unmoved by Rolf's plight.

"I doubt you came to me for the reasons Claymere promoted to you. Why are you in my company rather than your crewmates, Rolf? You seek someone whom will relate with you better - especially when that bond might be shortlived due to Yui's coming?"

"Well, I can't help that ya'pretty interestin'." noted Rolf, looking back over at Melisson. He gave a short grin at her, before pushing himself up into a sitting position. A relaxed sigh exited his lips as he seemed to be rather comfortable. "T'be honest, I cn'sorta see it. If we'd been on tha' same level, we'd eitha' be tryin' t'kill eachotha', or pretty good pals, depending on which side we were on. In anotha' life, juss' maybe, we mighta' got along real well." He shrugged a shoulder, holding out a hand.

"I think about that sometimes, 'cause, despite all the shit you done, y'pretty cool. I mean, that whole bid'ness wit' 'dat big blue artifact thing you was usin' 'gainst us in that last chambah'? I digged tha' whole entrance y'had 'dere. An' takin' us all on at once? That wass' ballsy, considerin' what happened next." went Rolf, somewhat wistfully admiring the caged falcon. "I ain't one to offer hate, but I ain't one t'shake hands wit' m'enemy eitha', specially one as dangerous as you." He chuckled. "Even I got tha' smarts t'know when someone's too dangerous."

"But I do wonda'..." his smile was slight as he rested his elbow on his knee, and his chin in his hand. "... what it woulda' been like t'meet someone like you on this side a'tha fight."

Nyton bowed deeply to both Kotori and Yui when she nodded in recognition of his arrival. He followed the conversation in silence and remained alert to the moods of the two neko. When Kotori signaled for Tom to give his analysis of the alien technology he glanced at it and recognized the Varin origins. He then briefly wondered just how much truth Melisson's nightmare held.