RP: YSS Miharu Mission 5, Part 1: Amaya's Gate

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

The last SMX gunshipand the Watcher were destroyed. The five Nozomi class ships were reduced to two derelict husks. He passed a quick scan just to double check that there were no life signs remaining. Depending on just how much of the crews were made up of Nekomachina he could say he just managed to slaughter a sizable number of enemy personnel.

Am I a murderer grandfather?

Well that may depend my boy.

On what?

Were they trying to kill you?

Nyton nodded at the grayed names for the Nozomi ships and grinned slightly. He had killed those who would have tried to kill them. However he knew that it was more than just accomplishment of duty. It was satisfying as though a hunger were being sated.

It had been a hot day in Roger Wilco. Once again there was violence in the streets. This time it was an attempted raid on a warehouse belonging to Anthony Claymere. It just so happened that both father and son were there. It would be here that Nyton would kill someone again. The man was rushing with a pistol at his position and Nyton had been quicker. This time he had not hesitated like before and the man was dead. Followed by another one. And then one more. Three kills that day. He earned a pat on the head from his father. Good job, son.

Fast forward to one night when a stimulus package of money was being dropped in the poor section of town. During the operation to grab the money Nyton had manned a machine gun nest. As usual the local population made a rush to reach the money. Nyton stopped them with a hail of gunfire. After a few unsuccessful rushes no more came. Ten killed earned a thumbs up from Thomas. Well done, boy.

Another night, another gang fight. Anthony had a habit of renting warehouses in poor sections to save costs on overhead. If it meant spilling a little blood then so be it. Nyton was using his first grenade delivery device attached to his assault rifle. Along with several kills made by gunfire he increased his count with the use of explosives. Twenty five dead including those killed by collateral damage. A dismissive shrug from Anthony and a lecture from Thomas regarding killing non-combatants. Ya still did well given the circumstances.

More training. More deadlier weapons. This time Nyton set up a perimeter of explosives. He was good at it, methodical and precise. It was a good thing too because the human wave that rushed them was larger than usual. They really wanted that stimulus package today. Everyone did. Daylight was creeping in and Nyton could see the approach of people even without the help of his NVGs. Men, women, even children were approaching. He set off the charges and turned one wave of people into so many corpses. Another wave met his next wall. And a third. The fourth met gunfire before Anthony secured his goal and they could escape with it. Anthony actually gave Nyton a smile this time. They knew the risks. Not one would have treated you any different. Good job son.

Eventually the praise was unnecessary. Nyton knew he was a killer and he accomplished it eagerly. Killing was satisfying in and of itself. His grandfather had instilled the distinction between killing those who were enemies and those who weren't. It was not right to kill those who weren't fighting against you. Of course that definition was very broad since 'support' personnel could be considered legitimate targets.

It was a realization Nyton had come to long ago: the only thing separating him from a murderer and a soldier was the direction he pointed his gun.

All this passed through Nyton's mind in an instant. The edge was in sight now. Right there about the point where one may step off, were the well worn tracks that he had left time and time again. And there he stayed.

"Enemy ships destroyed, your highness. No signs of life detected nor any further enemy action detected. Currently monitoring the Dominion for any source of enemy action." Nyton reported. He locked weapons on the remaining enemy ship in case any actions were taken along with keeping an eye open for any attempted escape by anyone aboard. At the same time he wondered about the NH-23 Kotori's condition and whether she was still fighting. The aetheric activity was suspicious and he worried that it may not be working in her favor. "Is there anything we can do to assist your sister?" he then asked, uncertain as to how else to address her.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

"Hai, Nakamura-Hei." Kyou had the BSPR unslung, reasoning that the heaviest resistance would be either right here when they disembarked, or at some defensible point later, and either way, she wanted to be ready now, just in case. "Try and stay out of my line of fire, I don't want to accidentally hit one of you with this thing. We're out numbered enough as it is, without powerful friendly fire factoring in. I plan on hitting whatever high power targets I can as soon as I see them, try to disable them quickly." She paused, realizing that sounded fairly authoritative. "Assuming you're okay with that, of course, Hei-san."

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

"It looks like the fighting has moved to the lower decks of the Dominion," Miyoko announced. She freed one of the graviton beams she'd been using to drag the ship, then pointed it at the shuttle bay and prepared it for activation at a moment's notice. She got the feeling that the battle would get a little less complicated with Amaya out of the picture.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

As the two shuttles closed in on the top left hangar doors, Sanri opened fire with her Cougar's positron cannons, savaging the heavy hangar doors. After several scattered hits the whole thing broke up, allowing the Cougar and the Fox shuttles to dart inside the hangar bay.

The bay itself was large and spartan, with metallic flooring, cargo crates stocked in multiple alcoves in the far back along with a pair of utility vehicles with cargo-lifting forks, and there was a set of catwalks that ran against the walls of the hangar bay as well as two bridge-crossings going from one wall to another, with machinery such as graviton projectors on hydraulic mounts. Even though the hangar doors had been blasted open, an atmospheric forcefield prevented atmosphere from venting out. Two wide corridors on each far corners of the hangar bay opened up to provide further access into the structure, either clockwise or counter-clockwise.

Sanri's Cougar made a quick spin to point the nose toward the starry space outside and touched down, opening the rear hatch an heartbeat after the vehicle came to rest. Mara's landing was a little more dynamic, with the Fox's rear hatch already opening as the shuttle spun around to show its stern to the hangar and landed shortly afterwards.

There seemed to be no enemy detectable in the immediate vicinity.

* * *

The Taisa furrowed her brow to ponder Nyton's question, especially in light of Miyoko's information. "I'm not sure we can," she finally said. "I'm unwilling to risk the death of one of our teleporting Mindy - I figure the enemy was only lucky thus far - and our armor teams are already committed."

Kotori then noticed something on her displays: with one graviton beam freed to be on hold and the earlier torpedo explosions, Dominion had strayed to being 7104 meters away; "Miyoko, I need Dominion to be within five klicks to stop Amaya's abilities. Quickly!"

* * *

Amaya was at a sprint to gain distance from the breached Lion shuttle and then skidded to a stop, twisting around to glare at the said vehicle - though her murderous intent was more directed at the person taking cover behind it.

As if answering to her will, the shuttle shuddered into motion and, before Kotori could do anything else but widen her eyes in alarm, the vehicle became a giant projectile that slammed into her and then pushed on... until the shuttle crashed into one of the shuttlebay's wall, with Kotori sandwiched in-between.

The kinetic impact was strong enough to have the durandium bulkhead cave in slightly. Amaya let out a frustrated breath and turned to address her two other armored companions telepathically. "Meni, we're risking a teleport - I need to get to the Gate. Mani, find a way to secure Dominion's MEGAMI out of our enemy's control."

Amaya walked up to Meni's armor and the Black Mindy set its aetheric machinegun back on its shoulder rack before it took hold of Amaya and both vanished, teleported. Mani's power armor turned on its armored heels to leave the shuttlebay, intent on getting to the fortified computer room but stopped when she heard something on her external audio pickup.

The moaning of metal being moved, bent, twisted out of shape.

The Black Mindy turned, both saber-rifles at the ready, and the Lion shuttle - whom Mani noticed was no longer flush against the wall anymore - was suddenly flung away by a very irate Kotori.

The amber-eyed nekovalkyrja turned a baleful look at the remaining Black Mindy and bared her teeth in a snarl: with Amaya spirited away, Kotori had missed her chance to kill the enemy leader. On the upside, her odds of survival had improved considering there was only one power armor left for her to fight.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Kai watched as the shuttle's doors opened- and nothing happened. He breathed a sigh of relief, both for the lack of fighting and for the fact that he had just noticed Gunshin-hei was holding a Positron rifle.

"It's Heisho now, Gunshin hei." Kai corrected his subordinate, putting a hand on her rifle before she could do anything more with it. "And please, do not fire that in an atmosphere; I'd rather not have you dead by your own inexperience. Please get the Plasma rifle or your LASR for now."

The Noncommissioned officer stepped out of the shuttle and looked over at the other. "Kurohoshi-Juni. Orders?" he asked

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

"Miyoko, I need Dominion to be within five klicks to stop Amaya's abilities. Quickly!"

Click to expand...

The freed graviton beam would just have to be put back to use. Miyoko added it back into the mix, then upped the power so that all of the graviton beams were tugging the Dominion back into range with all the force they could reasonably muster, while she kept the sensors trained on the shuttle bay.

And then, a significant spike on the subspace sensors. Something had heavily distorted space in the area of the fighting for a brief moment... and in the aftermath, there was one less aetheric signature within. Unless somebody in the ship had just killed a power armor with a anti-starship weapon, most of the options except one were ruled out. "Something just teleported out of the Dominion," Miyoko announced.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

As soon as the shuttle had landed, Masako was opening the hatch. Loading a SLEX round into her SLAG, the young Warrant Officer brought her LASR up and scanned the room in front of her for targets.

Kai said:

"Kurohoshi-Juni. Orders?"

Click to expand...

"This is where we split off," she announced over the channel via telepathy. "Nakamura-heisho, go Port and assault the nearest power generator. Don't destroy it, but damage it to make it to cut power flow. Make sure it isn't easily repairable. Once that is done, move on the the next one and do the same thing. My team will mirror yours and we'll disable all six generators." she ordered the NCO calmly.

"Sigurd, guard the shuttles. If there is overwhelming force, evacuate this hanger and make it scrap. Then move the shuttles to the top hanger. We will be facing overwhelming odds here, so we don't want to stay in one place for long." she explain vocally.

Switching to a separate channel for her team, she contacted Tsuya and Nimura. Nimura-hei, take up the rear guard position, I have point. Yamada-hei, since you are our grenadier, I want you between Nimura-hei and me. In this manner, you can bring your firepower to bare on either direction. Just be careful of what you aim at," she told her team before switching momentarily to Wing channel.

"Move out!" And with that, Masako was on her inertial flight and towards the Starboard Corridor. At the entrance, she would stop at the door edge and look through with her LASR up and ready.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Yukari once failed to save Kotori. She was not going to again fail her friend.

The Shosa was already deep inside Miharu. It was a trick she had used once before on an unsuspecting NIWS, without forethought or skill. It was the only way she could save her, from where they were.

Visual renderings of a computerized world pored though her eyes. She saw Nyton to her right, greenish and pixelated above his keypads, but not further connected; and Miyoko to her left, white-blue strings of data flowing from the keyboard under her fingertips. She reached over and grasped the data with her hands, and she was pulled by it until it reached the outer hull of Dominion. The aetheric signature was unmistakable; a power armor.

Miharu was already talking to the Dominion's MEGAMI unit. It sounded more like politicking, cajoling, convincing. She ignored it, focusing on the aether signature. She needed more!

"Heisho-san," she said, distant. "I need an active ping on the hangar, please. Confirm one power armor, with AIES, and one lifeform."

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

"Hai, Kurohoshi-juni, the grenadier transmitted as she exited the shuttle. Now that they were in action, all thoughts of anything else drained from her mind. She thought only of her duty and her orders as she brought her plasma rifle to bear, not using the really heavy stuff just yet, before they actually entered the fray.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Teleported out? Damn witch must've escaped. Nyton thought to himself. It was the only assumption unless Amaya wasn't in any danger. Given the power of the NH-23 that had to be the circumstances. "Is there anyway to determine where the teleportation signature's destination was?" Nyton asked, unsure of what to do but standing by with weapons still at the ready. He kept his eyes on the scanners ready in case more ships arrived or some new threat from the Gate appeared or if the Dominion launched any new challenge. As he did so, he found the cable connection for his Fast Time interface and looked it over to determine whether it was still usable or not.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

It was time, finally time.

All of his life, Asher had fought a battle with everything, at least, that's how he viewed it. He warred in the differing ideals between others and himself, fought face-to-face with the coporeal enemies of his life, and skirmished every day to keep every weak emotion such as fear, sadness, and grief from ever rising to light. That's why now meant so much to him, this battle with such an indominable enemy. It gave meaning to an otherwise empty life. He had no plans past this fight, in fact, he expected to die.

Unlike the others, he didn't have a future in plain sight, nor did he have someone to love. To anyone else, such a belligerent, cold, and empty life would seem uncomfortable or unbearable were they forced to live it.

But of course, Asher, this Asher didn't know any better. Every battle was an adventure, every war was an odyssey, and every slain foe was another stain of blood on his armor to fuel his desire for both. In a sense, Asher was a living weapon with legs, simply point him in a certain direction and anything in that direction would die with little discretion.

These thoughts muddled the Yamataians mind as the shuttle flew to it's destination. Though, the sum of all these thoughts?

Man, the Asher would be kickass name for a weapon. thought Asher, before the rear door of the shuttle opened and the armored soldier burst forth. With shield raised, and Bazooka aimed, he scanned the room in a moment before sliding into the nearest point of sustainable cover.

“Awright, Naka-sir. What's Kuro-Juni say first on tha' agenda?” Asher relayed to Kai, the childish excitement evident in his voice.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

"Hai, Kurohoshi-Juni." Kai answered to his superior, before being confronted by Asher.

"Kurohoshi-Juni says we are to split into to groups and destroy power generators to help weaken the enemy. I Suppose we need to fight any enemies that show up along the way, but I don't know where any enemies are."

The Heisho checked his rifle one more time, Needlessly, and then moved out as the Juni told them, going in the opposite direction of her towards the other door, and nearly mirroring her actions.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

"Heisho-san," she said, distant. "I need an active ping on the hangar, please. Confirm one power armor, with AIES, and one lifeform."

Click to expand...

With sensors already trained on the hangar, it was almost trivial for Miyoko to get that sort of resolution, only needing to add a bit to the mix. "Confirmed, Shosa. Shooting seems to have stopped for the moment, though," she added, not sure quite why.

"Is there anyway to determine where the teleportation signature's destination was?" Nyton asked,

Click to expand...

To Nyton's question, Miyoko shook her head. "Not a quick one, unless it was somewhere we were actively scanning when it happened. All I can easily say is that she didn't arrive in the area on the Dominion that we're scanning."

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

With no friendlies to worry over anyhow, Mani apparently made the decision that if it took overkill to defeat the upstart enemy Taisa, she would go for overkill.

Five of the mini-missile covers at each sides her thighs opened up, and a volley of ten mini-missiles jetted out in Kotori's direction. With a gasp, Kotori evaded them in the only way she could: she darted back behind the wreck of the Lion shuttle. The roar of explosions nearly deafened her, but fortunately her position was a little better than it had been before.

With a roar of her own she braced against the Lion as it took several more hits from Mani's twin aether saber-rifles and pushed, her legs flexing as she had the metal carcass inch closer and closer to her enemy. Shrieks of metal competed with the thundering the second volley of missiles Mani sent thundering into the wreck made... but even with their concussive pushes Kotori did not relent.

The Lion was only a scant few meters away when Mani's final missile barrage had it explode to pieces. Ruthlessly, Mani followed the missiles with a similar barrage of aether beams in the area behind the cover it had provided to finish off her opponent...

Which was the opening Kotori had needed, as she streaked out of the smoke above and plunged down on the Black Mindy. The battle had been a mismatch from the start, but as the nekomachina had taught Miharu's crew, anyone with an aetheric saber-rifle in hand to be deadly.

Mani tried to turn, but too late. Kotori's aetheric sword swept down and struck the Black Mindy's breastplate. Hit!

* * *

As Sigurd moved out of the Fox shuttle, Hinoto's portrait appeared to the Black Knights.

"Juni, in my role as Mission Control for this assault, I must protest your initiative to split your squad," Hinoto said, trying a balance between urgency and politeness. "It's your call, but if this place is protected anywhere nearly as well as the Bowhordia outpost, one team alone won't go very far before attrition would either force your defeat or retreat."

* * *

"On Miharu's bridge, Kotori stood up from her station and went back to the rear bench to pick up her weapons. Contrary to her habits, she began strapping the NSP 27s on the side of her calves and she belted her samurai swords to her waist.

She did perk an ear up for the going ons of her three bridge operators. If Yukari has some idea of how to help, more power to her, she thought.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

kai said:

"Kurohoshi-Juni says we are to split into to groups and destroy power generators to help weaken the enemy. I Suppose we need to fight any enemies that show up along the way, but I don't know where any enemies are."

Click to expand...

"Breakin' things is 'bout as good as killin'em." Asher responded, following behind Kai, his weapon ready. He checked behind himself to see if the their third member was coming or not, but quickly diverted his attention back forward to the task at hand.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Masako listened to Hinoto's protest as she detached one of her tactical drones and sent it forward ten meters down the corridor before taking off once again to follow with her LASR raised and ready.

"I'm counting on our speed and firepower to get this job done." she responded to Hinoto as she scanned the area up ahead for enemies. "Plus, you are forgetting the fact that splitting up our forces also splits the enemies forces as well. They cannot mass to assault us because it will slow them down and we will not allow them to pin us down so they can do so. I'm not planning on staying put and allowing us to die. We will keep moving and complete our objectives.

Pausing for a moment, Masako sighed quietly. "On a grimmer note, destroying one team won't hinder the mission either. If we were all together and die, we would all be forced to waste more time getting back to the Gate after awakening back on the Miharu. I'd rather not waste time or lives on this, Hinoto-shoi."

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Kyou blushed at Kai's remark. She didn't feel it was a good time to be explaining her reasoning to him, but rather simply slung the BSPR away, and switched to her LASR for the time being. "I'm assuming I'm to cover our backs while you guys destroy stuff, since I'm the lightest armed. Correct?"

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Hinoto's lips formed a thin line as she pressed them together, obviously disagreeing, but she did not insist: Masako was in charge of the operation.

"From what I can see, each of the passages you're taking are essentially the main accessways around this structure. They are sized to allow cargo to be ferried around from the hangar bays and are therefore the place more likely to have you intercepted by larger numbers, or larger opponents."

"There should be utility corridors that will open up on the way," Hinoto continued. "These should give you access to each segments. Each segments have two main power reactor chambers, each housing an matter/anti-matter reactor amongst other things, and between these two sections is a command and control room."

As Hinoto spoke, the way ahead seemed clear for the Kurohoshi team. The main corridor ahead curved gradually to the left, so Masako could only see the next 50 meters ahead, with her drone from there seeing the next 50 meters - including what looked like one of the entrance for Hinoto's afore mentioned 'utility corridors'.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

"Thank you Heisho," Yukari said in Yamataian.

The sensor information let her "see" into the hangar, confirming the vicious looking Black Mindy, and a simulation of the lifeform, Kotori. Now she had to do her part.

Missiles burst around Yukari as she watched what the sensors detected inside the hangar. Noise and heat filled her mind, robbing her of focus.

"Heisho," she said. "Through the MEGAMI and CIES, attempt to brute-hack through the Mindy armor's AIES. Target any system presented to you."

Kotori was about to make her attack, though Yukari did not know that. She reached out through Miharu and tried to establish a firm connection to the NH-23. She was trying to offer the ship as an active node, something that the NH-23 could immediately use to escape right before death. Visually it was hard to imagine: Was she supposed to touch her? Maybe shout at her, telepathically speak to her? She tried to do the last two, but could not hear herself. Did that matter? She did not know.

What had Ichiro done to her, when the KAMI unit had gone mad? Was it something similar? She tried to remember how she lost control, how her Yamataian cyberbrain was turned over to the quantum computer and pushed to kill, kill, kill. Miharu's computers were sane, but now Yukari was reaching for that effect, the ability to use an IES unit to telepathically link to a mind beyond just a simple vocal transmission. How? How had she done it when she was NH-17T?

On Miharu herself, Miyoko could see Yukari's console screen look like a flashing mess, with Kotori's face popping up now and then.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

How I wish Takuma were up here... Miyoko brooded to herself as she got to work. The man had more field experience with this area than she did, and with a military-grade computer, the Mindy would likely be much more difficult to hack than the Watcher had been. Of course, she was also able to dedicate her full attention to it, whereas she'd been trying to do four things at once while attacking the Watcher.

Step One was to find any weaknesses in the armor's digital defenses. Miyoko borrowed some of the MEGAMI's nigh-infinite power to spawn hundreds of independent threads, just probing every system she could access for any loophole that could be used to execute code or disrupt its operations. The ship's computer was going to need to do the heavy lifting--with the speeds that the target system was moving at, she could probably spend the rest of her natural life searching for an exploit without finding it. She'd just have to hope the armor hadn't disabled communication systems, or this would all be for nothing. If nothing else, perhaps the intrusion would distract the pilot for a vital moment... though she was aiming for rather higher goals at the moment.