Re: Mission 5: Amaya's Gate
@Miharu:
Caught in two graviton beams, invaded by Mindy II power armors that threatened the main computer and prevented the technicians in the subdeck from doing their job, and prey to most of
Takumi's arsenal while not even being able to raise her shields against the enemy flagship,
Miharu seemed to hover on the brink of disaster.
Restoring shields and superluminal propulsion had priority. Everything depended on Yukari regaining some mobility so she could compete in positioning with Eve's command vessel. Unfortunately, seeing Rin was the only technician free, her restoring the synchronization of the remaining 3 CFS units meant leaving the coolant leak and the unresponsive fusion reactor unattended.
While Rin worked, Miyoko continued pouring particle beam fire into the Takumi's bridge dome, finally rupturing it, which caused a satisfying decompression to announce the demise of everyone that had been on the bridge.
Miyoko took advantage of the lull from the
Takumi's command structure disabled (hopefully) to then use a projected energy beam as well as the remaining dorsal turret to take out the graviton projectors that had held
Miharu captive.
Yukari spun the ship around - if she could just get the rear torpedo launcher lined up, she could have a subspace detonator torpedo fired at the enemy vessel and hopefully have some time to
think about what she could do to hold against the heavier cruiser.
Unfortunately,
Miharu was interrupted midspin. The lower port fin fusion reactor - unresponding to commands and with no coolant lines intact to effect an emergency shutdown - went critical and exploded. Not only did this obliterate the lower fin it was housed in, but the deflagration also worked to destroy the last of the weakened supports holding the gravimetric fin to the heavily damage left wingpod.
Structural struts shuddered and snapped! The left gravimetric engines - fin and all - was severed off to spin lazily in space under the momentum given to it by the reactor's explosion.
The delay was enough for Takumi to manage another volley of weapons fire from its forward batteries. The positron bolts heavily impacted over
Miharu's dorsal side and this time the energized armor wasn't sufficient to stave off the worse. The anti-matter attacks plowed through the weakened structure of the rollbar and the impact from the heavy cannon that struck last sundered the whole thing off at the base of its supports.
This brought the shattered rollbar down ram over the top of the wardroom before it burst to pieces. The sheer kinetic force brought down was too much for that part of the ship to withstand: the roofing of the wardroom bent under pressure and this caused the hermetic seals around the transparent zesuaium windowpanes to twist and bend, effectively creating many hull breached - too many for the atmospheric retention field to quickly counteract.
In an explosive decompression, both the wardroom and the extending observation deck burst open to space. The transparent zesuaium plates were first flung away; and then chairs, couches, potted plants, spatulas and wrapped chicken-salad sandwiches were sucked out into space.
Having the rollbar ripped off to then have that whole weight thrown down on top of the ship, above the bridge, was by far the harshest impact those on the bridge had ever suffered. The ship's superstructure gave a loud moan (which was a
very bad sign!) before the recently fixed ventilation system its the bridge's ceiling came loose again to again crash over the command console with an equally loud clamor, along with some extra sparking wiring.
Lighting flickered, instrumentation reported that the energized armor was compromised, structural integrity down to 46%, coolant supply at 80% and dropping, and it appeared doubtful that the ship could recover enough to survive a second concentrated volley like the last -
and just then, the Combined Field System came back online, having been restored Rin's handiwork having restored it nearly to 70% strength.
Miharu blurred away at lightspeed an eyeblink before twin raker turrets swept hull-cutting aether beams in the position the ship had previously occupied. Close call.
* * *
Suzume opened up on her Mindy II opponent with her LASR, but her enemy almost disdainfully held up a forearm forcefield to batter her attacks aside while it braced the opposite forearm weapon - probably charge it for a powerful beam attack.
The sprite sucked in a breath. Her Daisy's barrier would prove poor protection against that. She wouldn't be able to survive many hits like that.
The sprite launched a flurry of subspace detonator mini-missile as a counter as she continued emptying her clip against the forcefield. One SDM impact later, the shield collapsed and the Mindy tried going on the offensive by blasting Suzume with its charged shot, but the sprite luckily blocked it with her zesuaium shield.
Breathless and a little amazed to be holding her own, Suzume tried to keep firing, but her LASR ammo ran out at that point.
"Damn!" The Mindy came charging at her and both armors collided against each other in a clamor, driving Suzume's Daisy back into the wall. The Mindy made to slash her to pieces with its two forearm energy blades, but the sprite dropped her rifle and instead grappled on the mindy armor's forearms for her dear life, wresting the deadly aether swords away from her.
The enemy did not let up: its shoulder-mounted gauss cannon flipped from the back and into its armed position before swiveling to point at Suzume's helmet. Crying out, Suzume hunched her head to having it conveniently lined up for the gauss cannon before bracing one foot against the wall and pushing off while shoving her helmet forward in a heatbutt at the weapon to either damage it or have it veer off.
She missed, instead ramming into the Mindy's helmet. The blow did not appear to cause any damage, but there was the tell-tale sound of an hermetic seal coming undone. Suzume blinked in recognition and with a yell she pursued her offensive, using her Daisy's booster pack to jet both away from the wall - she needed moving room.
They slammed into the corridor's opposite wall sooner than both expected, the result being a surprised Suzume and a stunned Mindy pilot - they had not hit the wall, but rather a fircefield Miharu had created to prevent the enemy Mindy from properly bracing against the collision.
Suzume seized the brief opening by letting go of the Mindy II's forearms to instead grab on its helmet and heave it upward, hard: the headgear promptly snapped off from where the Mindy's hemosynthetic insert had it secured, revealing the bare head of a very surprised nekovalkyrja.
"Flares, point-blank!" Suzume ordered her AIES, and the Daisy's on-board computer accommodated her by shooting a counter-measure flare missile up at the chestplate of the Mindy II. Normally, flares were mostly harmless to a power armor, but the burning head was enough to burn exposed flesh - like the Mindy II pilot's unhelmeted head.
The enemy neko cried out in pain and shied away, shielding her face with her forearms. With a growl, Suzume raised her right forearm cannon toward her enemy and fired a heavy blast not at the Mindy II, or the exposed head, but at the wall behind.
The blast rocked things in the nearby medlab, but it had fortuitous results for Suzume. The enemy neko had been caught unware by the attack and had fallen down on all fours. With nothing in the way of a finishing blow, Suzume aimed her forearm cannon again and - setting it on the killing setting - killed the invader.
* * *
Junko's battle with her opponent in the subdeck was brutally brief. Both Mindy II and Daisy charged each other, with the Mindy II making a fancy aerial tumble that allowed it to make a slash in Junko's back, killing her barrier and ruining her fusion booster.
The sprite, whom had intentionally given her enemy that opening, spun around and rammed her zesuaium shield hard into the Mindy II's midsection, with enough force to shatter the torso's titanium support frame.
The Mindy II stumbled almost drunkenly and laboriously turned around - too slowly to defend against Junko's next attacks as she closed in, massively increased her M6 Daisy's effective weight with gravity control and slammed her knuckleguard-reinforced gauntlet into the Mindy's flexible flank, and then following with another shattering shield-clubbing blow on the front.
That latter attack caved in the torso armor as the Mindy II folded in two around the arm bluntly driving the zesuaium shield in.
"Raggh~!" Junko pulled the shield away from her now listless opponent, jumped aloft and again brought it down - but this time to smash it over the Mindy's helmet.
After the Mindy when down, with its helmet looking sufficiently concave to have Junko judge the pilot braindead, she contacted Suzume.
"Suzume, need any help?" Junko was glad for telepathy - it allowed her to avoid showing she was panting from the exertion and the flood of adrenalin.
"I-I think I just finished mine. Please tell me that's all of them."
Junko sighed and then reported to Yukari:
"Shosa, the invaders have been cleared."
* * *
@Amaya's Gate:
Mara gaped at the sight of Asher - or, more precisely, the sight of his helmet.
"Um, Asher... there's women underpants on your helmet," she pointed out in the vain hope that the panties being set over Asher's helmet had been somesort of accident.
* * *
"Yes, Sigurd will remain here, in case we need him to operate the Gate," Kotori answered Nyton.
The Akuma reached the hangar Mara's shuttle rested in and approached where it opened up into space. Kotori opened up a transmission to
Miharu and said:
"YSS Miharu, the Gate has been secured. Amaya is dead, we've captured an Akuma and this signaler crap works; I know how to counter burst psionic attacks."
"Miharu, we request extraction. Please arrange a brief fly-by to collect our Fox shuttle, and notify medical to haveNakamura-Heisho and Kurohoshi-Juni revived."