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

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

@Amaya's Gate:

Tom could see Ichigo already accessing the control console, though the volumetric windows did not tell a pretty story - the station had already been locked out.

"Already? Tch!" Ichigo sank to one knee and bent to pry away the cover for the computer systems under the controls. She carelessly threw aside the bent piece of metal to then examine the circuitboards inside.

"What the-?" She reached in to seize the network access circuitboard and pulled it out. Rather than the computer hardware Tom was used to working with, the piece of equipment Ichigo was holding looked more like a thin sheet of pale crystal, with the circuit imprints replaced by an organized but very organic-looking network of veined branches. "What is this?"

Tom knew the Elysians used rather advanced biosynthetic technology to run their power armors and ships... but this was much more alien.

* * *

Asher's grenade exploded, scattering the three remaining nekos before they reached the exit of the power control room. One had caught aflame and was shrieking, flailing around in a panic, while the two others were badly singed and were scrambling toward the doorway.

His plasma rifle belched a white-hot discharge after them, but partial cover from the next passage's threshold absorbed the blast and both had again gone out of his line of sight; from his lifesign readings, they had gone into the main passageway and were headed for the next hangar. The remaining burning neko was easily killed.

Asher was ahead of the rest of his team and clearly in the lead. With the main passageway being long and rather featureless, he knew that if he kept up his dogged pursuit he'd catch them into the open without any cover and would surely be able to finish them off.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

"Careful, Asher. Even if they're running, they're still dangerous."

Click to expand...

"I'm startin' t'get a lil' suspicious wit' all tha' chasin' n'shit." responded Asher announcing his only worry. With another kill tallied on his mark, Asher felt confident, but he felt smart enough to rush too much further. Even if he was fairly skilled, he was still only one Power Armored individual. So, as he rounded the next corner into the passageway, he held his fire. The Hei made sure to scan the room first before gathering any targets.

If he spotted more of the enemy, he would retreat and allow the last too to live, but if all he saw were the remaining two and nothing else, he would risk it and finish them off. After all, he had full confidence in his Thermoptic Camo.

Though, this was his limit, he wasn't going to go any closer to that hangar than this without support.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Tom quickly shot a message to Nyton.

He stopped short of ordering a prisoner to be taken, but he secretely wished the Taii would listen to his reasoning and permit at least a small stay to the executions.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

@Amaya's Gate:

"What do you think this is?" Ichigo asked. "Mishhuvurthyar tech?"

Tom wasn't sure of what it was, but this wasn't Mishhuvurthyar technology. Even though the Mishhu certainly had a gruesome organic cast to most of everything they designed, the circuitboard he beheld felt too elegant - even 'pure' - by comparison.

* * *

Asher's restraint proved judicious.

As he discreetly peeked around the corner, his Daisy shrouded in thermoptic stealth, he noticed - as the two singed nekos flew into a retreat - a visual aberration. It was a hard to distinguish, transparent silhouette. A very large, tall silhouette.

He held his breathing as he concentrated on the noise he heard from his external audio pickup. They were muted, careful footsteps, but he could tell they were the footsteps of something quite massive - and it seemed to make footfalls - so it wasn't a Mishhumachina. Most mishhuvurthyar mecha he had studied in the past usually lacked thermoptic stealth as well, so it couldn't be one of those either.

A moment later, he distinguished another sound - breathing. Breathing through an helmet's air filter. As he was on the left edge of threshold between the main passageway and the power reactor chamber, so was what seemed to be another translucent power armored silhouette - whom was glancing discretely in from the right corner of the entrance.

If he could hear her, she might hear him. She might already have heard him with her sharp nekovalkyrja hearing if he had not fortunately been holding his breath.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Tom shook his head.

"It's too unique. Mishu tech is grimier than this... it's organics are more like a cancerous blob than this. I can see a little of the Elysian approach in this... but it's too different than what I've seen. It must be some kind of hybrid technology or something completely original... is it giving off any kind of psionic activity?"

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Ichigo's helmeted head tilted on one side as she considered and she bent back to put her head closer to the other still-plugged circuitboards (or veined crystal sheets, which could be more accurate).

"With them still plugged in, I'm picking up some sonic occiliations coming from them. Their plugged ends seem to have adapter ports which do look like hybrid technology, but I can't really identify it."

The sprite reared herself out and turned her head to look at Tom. "Would it be possible that the Daughters of Eve made contact with another alien species to furnish them the goods to finish building this place? An alien species we don't know yet?"

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

"If it's completely alien, it's going to take us forever to figure this out. We either need someone who's alive and willing to work with us or we have to take brute force approach and hope for the best. I'm not liking the 2nd option, myself."

Tom reached into the tool kit on his leg and started to take out the wiring and cutting tools necessary to work on the panel.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Shit. Cut it close 'ere... said Asher, restraining his breath. He stood still, as perfectly as he could. A lil'too close. For a moment, he thought he could just stand there, perhaps even listen in. Though, he figured since he could listen on them, their more-sensitive hearing could listen in on him. This meant that if Nyton called on him to report, then he'd be exposed fairly easily.

Ah, this shit don't cut it... growled Asher mentally as he threw caution to the wind. He bent his knees, and then jumped in the air, kicking in his thrusters for a hasty retreat. Though, as he blasted away from the door, he brought his RGL to bear again, letting loose five grenades at the door way as he retreated down the hall. The Yamataian's heart was beating quickly as he set up a channel with the squad. If this thing struck him down, he could at least warn his unit.

"Three outta Five tangos down, remaining two escaped wounded, unknown bogey unit spotted, strange features, didn't get tha' best look of it." breathed Asher as quickly as he could, making his escape, being sure to check behind himself for any pursuing hostiles.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Nyton watched as Asher took off in hot pursuit, a little jealous since he was forced to hold back after stalling. However it did keep him abreast of the technical situation as Tom and Ichigo struggled to make sense of the Gate's technology.

Code:

"The technology here is completely alien. It's going to take a long time to decode, if it's possible at all. Someone we could interrogate about these systems, a prisoner of war, would be quite beneficial in this situation, sir."

Click to expand...

Unfortunately it would seem that a prisoner was now necessary just to understand what the Gate was made of. He had not counted on the system being so foreign that their engineers couldn't decipher it.

"Three outta Five tangos down, remaining two escaped wounded, unknown bogey unit spotted, strange features, didn't get tha' best look of it."

Click to expand...

"Good job Westwood, drop your drones to keep tabs on any pursuit and regroup." Nyton replied, checking the AIES video feeds to get some idea on what he encountered.

"Alright, Freeman, Ichigo, keep trying to figure this thing out. We'll see if we can rough up a prisoner and get you some intel. Nakamura, you stay with them and keep them covered. Everyone else, we're regrouping with Westwood and pursuing the remaining enemy forces. Get ready to engage this unknown weapon system Westwood reported." Nyton ordered while moving towards the corridor the enemy had retreated down.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Poor Asher suddenly found himself experiencing how it felt for a fly to be swatted down by something massive. An impact, one he never saw coming, had him crash down bodily to the gridded flooring of the power reactor room.

He briefly registered his armor's warning that his Psionic Signal Controller defense had been compromised when he took another hit - it was like a giant foot kicked him while he was down, so powerful it tossed him into the air as if he was some soccerball.

A avoided another bruising impact against the ground by feathering his anti-grav to cope and land in a crouch, but he was still back at the entryway to the corridor.

There was a blurr of motion - the big transparent thing- and the Malifarian suddenly heard a 'clung!' sound as something seized his helmet in a vice-like grip.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

"Aw! Fuck!" yelled Asher through the channel as he was sent on a roller coaster of pain. He was helpless to do anything. He started to struggle in anger, it seemed that he had gotten himself far deeper than he had intended. He squirmed and fought, but it didn't seem he would be given the opportunity to do anything. If he hit his thrusters on, he'd only end up either breaking his neck or becoming victim to another kick when trying to escape this monster's grip.

As he wracked his brain, all he knew as the he couldn't give up, as this was the only life he was going to get. Despite having no problem in dying in his service to the Empire, Asher had no intention in taking death, or being psionically controlled sitting down.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Nyton's AIES warning him and his combat computer about Asher's condition made him grit his teeth. Whatever it was that he had seen was already bearing down on him.

"Freeman, forget the tech, all three of you follow and cover us! Everyone else, form up and hurry! We need to get down there. Adjust your aim via AIES link up with Westwood and be careful in your tracking! Go go go!" Nyton yelled, putting on a burst of speed to spur everyone else along.

Reaching out via AIES Nyton also tried to get any scans or data through Asher's Daisy to get any kind of intel on whatever it was that had grabbed him.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

When Nyton's Super Phalanx came upon the scene, he saw that something had caught onto Asher's helmet and lifted him up six feet off the floor. The Malifarian was flailing around, his shield hand trying to grab hold of whatever was holding him in an attempt to preserve his neck from being snapped off by any sharp motion (in case the big thing decided to whip him around) while he raised his plasma rifle and fired in the general direction of where he thought his opponent's body would be.

Plasma discharges cracked against a conformal energy screen of sorts and, while they didn't seem to incur any damage, they did spoil the thermoptic stealth of the hidden aggressor, whose transparency saturated with colors, highlight with light reflections and contrasted with shadows.

The enemy looked like a machine that had stepped straight out from hell. Gargoylish in appearance, with red-white armored plating, it carried itself in a slightly hunched posture that carried across an uncannily bestiallistic body language; had it stood up straight, it would have likely topped at eighteen-feet tall... which made it a giant in comparison to the six-feet tall Daisy power armors.

Its head had a bat-like cast to it, with a snout and ear-like fins that flared back. It had visual sensors set as recessed glassy eyes and even sported a mouth, which boasted a pair of wedge-like tusks that extended up from the lower jaw. A segmented armored cowl protected the hunched neck, with the cowl melding into the dorsal portion of the machine which as a big thruster pack center as well as wings. Each wing bore a housing from which deployed two emitter fins that did not look too unlike those the Dominion's psionic amplifiers had extended out once active.

The main body had a beak-shaped chest that tapered down into a narrower torso with then lead to the groin section, from which extended down a set of powerful triple-articulated legs - with the topmost knee bending forward, then next knee bending in reverse and finally the ankle actuator from where stemmed a clawed foot, with three digits fore and two at the heel. Flaring shoulderpads marked the beginnings of the arms, and the forearms were larger and elongated, finishing into a triple-clawed hand that was large enough to close around a Daisy armor's upper torso and likely powerful enough to crush it.

Surtur, king of fire giants from a nearly forgotten mythos, was a good name for it... but Nyton knew what that machine was. It was the Ev-M1-1A, the Akuma prototype Amaya had been building.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Kyou had been right behind Nyton, tossing the gauss cannon back to Ichigo as she went, doing her best imitation of a sprinter. When she hit the room, however, she skidded to a stop, raising her rifle at the same time. "What the..." Before she did anything else, she launched a volley of 5 subspace torpedoes at the monstrosity, promptly opening fire with her PLAs and anything else offensive she could as soon as the torpedoes hit.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Firing subspace collapsing mini-missiles at a potentially heavily shielded target like the gargoyle-demon-thing that faced them seemed like a great idea - only someone else had expected it. Kyou saw her mini-missile volley mowed down in mid-air by a stream of aetheric darts that came from around the corner of the ceiling, diagonally up from her.

Before she could decide wether to follow up by firing on the invisible attacker with the aether submachinegun, Mani... Meni - the Black Mindy with the damaged left shoulder, chestplate and right kneecap - misted into visibility as she pounced toward Kyou and Nyton and cut at both with her two lit aether swords.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Kai, for once, made his way at a reasonable pace, rather than blasting headlong as he usually did. this was partially due to the conflicting orders being machine-gunned at him, and partially due to the fact that running headlong into a firefight with three obviously superior enemies was never a good idea.

From his vantage point, Kai couldn't fully see into the other room, but he could see that enormous figure well enough to get a bead with the Gauss bazooka- but it was kind of useless when the shields were still up. However, he maintained thermoptic stealth and called out over the comms "I have a clean shot on that huge thing, Somebody take out its damn shields!"

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Before Nyton could give out any orders he was forced to engage the immediate threat leaping at him. Dropping the LASR/SLAG as Meni closed in he released two plasma streams from his hand emitters while back pedaling on the floor unaided by the gravimetric propulsion to prevent another stall out like before. Each plasma stream was independently guided to wrap around each of Meni's arms at the elbow where the joint would be weakest to try and sever the limbs. Along with the two controlled streams with every step back Nyton took the emitters on his feet quickly fired off a shot of plasma whenever his foot was lifted off the floor. The plasma bolts were aimed right at the damaged portion of Meni's chest plate to try and catch her right at her weakest point.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

@Amaya's Gate:

Meni's attack on Nyton and Kyou was stopped by Nyton's flurry of plasma bolts. Her aether saber-rifles extinguished themselves before she spun them around to strike at Nyton's incoming attack, with the ensuing stream of ionized gas fizzling as it met with the double-pronged blades of the weapon.

Too late, Nyton realized that she was doing more than defending herself - she was using the energy field properties of her weapons to harness his plasma attacks. A scattered scalar wave from her left forearm cannon briefly extinguished his plasma streams and she used that opportunity to fling around both of her weapons toward Kyou, loosing the gathered energy.

Luckily, Kyou had been attentive, waiting to edge in a shot while Nyton was throwing around gouts of plasma, so when the plasma attacks were diverted toward her she made a quick pounce back. The plasma counter-attack striking the nearby wall did cause her splash damage, but the damage to her barrier was minimal.

Meni did not stay around to trade more hits. She flew off to their left and out further into the corridor out of their line of sight, growing transparent as she re-engaged her stealth. Nyton and Kyou both attempted to strike at her as she retreated with their rifles, but Mani started spraying the both of them with aether submachinegun fire.

Kyou, thanks to her earlier dodge, was the furthest away and she managed to back away again and get around the left corner of the power reactor room's entryway. Nyton, though, was struck more solidly by Meni's staccato attacks, his barrier taking substancial damage before Meni also disengaged.

Asher kept struggling against his captor, trying to pry himself loose and - failing that - reaching for an heavier weapon (since using offensive mini-missiles at this distance would be nothing short of suicidal)... but the Akuma hefted him up higher and gave him a violent shake, forcing the Malifarian to grab on tight to his helmet and limit the strain on his neck.

With that done, to Kai's dismay, the Akuma started backpedaling. With heavy footsteps it was retreating further back toward the hangar. If any of the Black Knights wanted to continue attacking their enemy, they would have to leave cover.

* * *

Giving harsh pants, Kotori floated down at the edge of the corridor that lead into the power control room and leaned against the wall. Her earlier efforts against Eve's four youngling daughters had been encouraging, showing her that her Signaler Reversal ability was working like a charm, but it had also made her feel very feverish.

Her concentration had become increasingly harder to maintain - voiding her eavesdropping on encrypted telepathic conversations, and to top that off, there had been two uses of telekinesis which had been so quickly executed that she had not been able to seize control of them.

Burst psionics? Probably.

She took out her communicator and flipped it open. "Mara," she forced out.

"Yes, Taisa?"

"Send Sigurd out... into the clockwise passage. Have him reach the power control room there and then... hold position. There might be... two other nekovalkyrja whom will get there and... lock the console out. He's to secure the area and prevent that from happening."

"Taisa, are you alright?"

"You have your orders, Shoi."

Kotori grit her teeth as she pressed the button to terminate communication, and then sent out a transmission to Miharu. "Taisa Kotori to Miharu. Situation report!"

* * *

@Miharu:

Things were not going well. They were running out of time.

The CFS engines did not like what Yukari was forcing them to do. As Yuzuki's sprites in engineering struggled to keep the hardware in working order, Yukari had to struggle to maintain a strong continuum distorsion field to keep the best pace possible while under the punishing effects of their own interdiction field. The ship gave the occasional shake when the CFS fields fluctuated and were then adjusted... and those were only getting worse.

They still had the Takumi caught in the anti-FTL field, but they only had 30 seconds left to reaching the Gate.

Hinoto, whom had come to relieve Miyoko on the operations console so the Heisho could transfer over to the better combat outfitted tactical console, bit her lower lip at the readings she was getting and then told her two fellow crewmates: "Takumi is energizing her amplifier systems - they might be about to deploy them."

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Masako had continued to hold the ladder area has other went up into the control room after Nyton and had been the last one up. But that was just in time for all hell to break loose in the corridor leading out. She had chosen not to crowd the others out of concern for blocking any support fire, but that seemed to have been the wrong idea as Asher seemed to be pulled farther and farther away from the group.

Now, the young Warrant Officer may have not liked Asher very much, but she knew he was a good comrade to have in the midst of a fight. Plus, that was just what he was--a comrade. Masako had always been willing to throw herself into the fray to protect one of her comrades. So as Asher was carried back towards the Hanger, Masako gritted her teeth and prepared to leap into action.

Activating her shield, she rushed out of cover and charged in on her inertal flight. Just as she broke cover, the young Warrant Officer began to unleash a hail of missile fire. They weren't all subspace collapsing mini-missiles however. In an effort to at least get some through, Masako had dumb-fired several anti-radar and multi-function counter missiles in order to confuse the two defending Mindies. Over all, Masako would have fired a full volley of twenty missiles with most of them being counter missiles and only five actually being Subspace Detonating Mini-Missiles.

Charging full bore after her missile barrage, Masako carefully aimed her Plasma Rifle at the Bat-like head of the Akuma and waited to see if any missiles impacted before firing.

Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate

Yukari barely nodded to Hinoto, glad as she was to see her. She had to focus on piloting and power management. Bad enough one of the crew was injured.

"Taisa, the Takumi is preparing to deploy psionic amplifiers and we are nearly 30 seconds from the Gate. What are your orders?"