RP: YSS Miharu Mission 5, Part 2: The Fight For The Lost

Kai followed the back and forth between his two superiors, trying to take stock of what was going on. Finally, the Shosa deferred to the Taii, and so Kai registered the Taii's commands as the ones he needed to follow.

Kai formed on the Shosa, with Rin and Yuzuki as well, and headed off toward where they had been ordered, the tip of his gun never pointing far from the group of enemies. Finally, they made their position, and, without a word, Kai followed orders, Opening fire on one of the five armed Mishhu, trying to bring it down quickly as those five were obviously more able to fight back immediately.

Miyoko reached the armor bay without incident and looked over her choices. It had been months since she'd touched a power armor, but at this point, just having some protection beyond her pistol would be nice. She stared at the options in front of her for a few seconds... she'd never laid her hands on a Mindy, so despite its reputation as a killing machine, she wasn't sure she'd know what to do with it. Plus it would take time to swap out multiple modules, time she didn't have.

So, Miyoko chose a Daisy 1C, which she'd at least used before. She didn't bother to strip the sensor pack off of it, since it was small enough that it wouldn't hinder her, but she replaced the countermeasure pods with offensive augmentation ones. Moving around to prepare the armor didn't feel pleasant at all, as battered as her body was, a fact she very briefly reflected on as she stripped, revealing inch after inch of brused or chafed skin. After this, the scientist repeated to herself, I am going to sleep for four days. Had it been three before? No matter, she'd probably earned an extra day of rest at some point.

Once she was settled into the suit, Miyoko quickly grabbed a LASR and slapped a SLAG on it, then swapped the grenades out for HE ones and stashed some extra ammo in her pack. That done, she contacted Masako and peeked out into the hallway. "I'm all set. I'll defer to you for where I should head now. One of us should probably stay near the bridge just to monitor the Taisa."

Yukari cried out as fire began, and she joined in. No time for second thoughts now; she blasted away with her ASP at the Mishhu closest to the elevator and prayed the monster would just quickly die, please quickly die, monster; do not get up, simply fall and stay fallen!

"Ha ha! Calamari's on tha' menu!" said Asher with glee as he finally unloading a payload of plasma from his forearm weapon. The Malifarian kept his shield raised, and began to activate his barrier module should the fight become more serious. He started with his first selections, and transmitted his next target squad wide, picking off any of the Mishhu that hadn't already been selected by his fellow squad mates.

@black Knights:

Thundering clamors announced the arsenal of the Black Knights being unleashed.

The first mishhu struck had one of its double-eye socket fountain in blood at a projectile punched through and tore into its brains, sending the creature to the floor. A plasma bolt half-incinerated through the shell of another mishhu before a spray of armor-piercing bullets punched through and finished the creature. More shots sprayed across the chamber in deadly crisscrossing patterns, coaxing gurgling screeches from the Mishhuvurthyar round maws on the underside of their shells as their tentacles flinches and curled from the pain.

Most telling, though, was Rin's incendiary grenade whom exploded in their midst shortly after the power armored team had opened fire. Sheets of flame spread across the enemy ranks and sent the mishhuvurthyar flailing around in a panic, blinded by agony or heedlessly burrowing themselves into the milky muck coating the ship's interior to try to douse the deadly flames.

One of the creatures, maddened with pain, still had the presence of mind to vindictively charge on Rin, but combined fire from Yukari and Yuzuki's pistols brought it low short of the younger sprite, carapace shattered and tentacles still twitching limply before Kai ended its life with a concentrated hail of metal that deeply sawed through its innards.

Before long, the battle was over. The enemy's panic had yielded the Black Knights an enormous advantage and with the Mishhu only sparingly counterattacking, continued statacco fire from the handheld railguns ultimately mowed the tentacled creatures until none were left aloft. Shards of their ruined shell and puddles of their spilled entrails littered the room.

The Yamataian power armors had not exactly escaped unscathed, though. Some of the railgun counter-attacks had hit hard for the little the mishhuvurthyar had managed. Kyou's barrier had collapsed and she had just been able to shield-parry a shot meant for her helmet; Kai's shield module had been nearly depleted; Asher's own shield module was at half-strength. Fortunately, none of that damage was permanent and given a minute, the only sign of their fight would be the missing ammunition.

On reflection, Hinoto had not exaggerated when she had recommended fire against the Mishhuvurthyar. Asher noticed that while his plasma attacks had been potent, the LASRs the rest of his team had used had just seemed much better suited against their present enemy (a contrast to earlier battle were the LASR had not seemed that deadly against armored and shielded targets). Fire and surprise had played a large role in their success, but the damage they took in the short one-sided battle still warned that the Mishhuvurthyar could not be taken lightly - if their enemy got the jump on them, broken Daisy shells could very well litter the floor at the end of their next engagement.

But for now, the halls seemed quiet.

Yuzuki lowered her rifle slightly, breathing out slowly and relaxing the iron grip she had been using. It had only been a few seconds of concentrated fire, but they had won the battle. For some reason, that just made her more nervous. They had taken out a small squad of enemies, guarding what appeared to be something important. This couldn't be right. It gave her a bad feeling.

It could also be her heart pounding in her ears.

"You alright?" she sent to Rin, turning slightly to the side, Yukari and Rin at her back, to scan the rest of the room with her primary forward-facing vision.

Yukari only realized she was laboriously breathing because her armor told her so.

It had all happened so fast. She had not killed a live opponent since the Ghost Mishhu, which seemed to be so long ago. She hardly had thought about anything other than wishing the Mishhu before her would die and stay down. Charred and putrid flesh filled the air with scents her armor was not aware could be filtered, so she could smell it. And she had watched them die, all of them, cut down or incinerated.

Monsters, yes. But not demons. Not entirely evil. Did they have to die that way?

Her HUD told her she had expended an entire magazine. No kills were recorded; Rin had killed three, Kai two, and Asher two. Tom had killed one. Nyton killed two; Yuzuki, also two. Gunshin had killed three.

She stood up from her kneeling position. "Freeman, start working on the elevator, please. Yuzuki, Rin, please assist him."

Yukari began to reload, carefully. She wanted to switch to her rifle, but was afraid of being able to effectively use it in tight quarters. She cursed at herself for choosing a weapon she had not qualified on.

Nyton kept his weapon trained until his scanners were certain that the 15 Mishhu were dead. He had fired restrained bursts to conserve ammunition but he had still managed to expend 30 rounds from his large magazine. His sensors scanned wide by tapping into Tom's pack to ensure no enemies were approaching. After two seconds of making sure the enemy was dead he snapped into action.

Nyton messaged everyone as he slung his rifle. With orders given only to the engineers, Nyton quickly took charge of putting the others to work.

Immediately the man began to scavenge around the chamber for materials to jury rig traps. Being cautious of the napalm coated regions and the possibility of enemy bullets or explosives going off, Nyton eagerly looked at everything they available: slings and fasteners for strapping down firearms and setting trip points, enemy explosives to blow up in their faces, even enemy armor pieces to secure weapons and fixtures or become counterweights. To Nyton, the sky was the limit. Even with only the time it took to get the elevator going, barring an enemy attack, the man was in his element.

Tom was on the move immediately after given the order. Proper use of time was essential, so he gave orders en route to the control panel.


After he gave the order, he started to boot up the emulation software Hinoto provided him with. He also assisted in scanning the panel as Yuzuki worked on it in her own way.

@black Knights:

A preliminary scan from the techs did not reveal any boobytraps concealed in the elevator's console cover or the hardware beneath.

Nyton had begun gathering material amidst the mishhuvurthyar corpses and began setting up to make a trap on the passage they had come from (he had three to cover total) but he was interrupted by the sudden appearance of a new signal contact.

A Daisy power armor materialized out of stealth and its armored feet splashed into the the milky fluids a few meters ahead of him. Nyton recognized the scars over Nimura's Daisy power armor, confirming the Arethusa's positive identification of her ID.

"Claymere-Taii, I've been ordered to fetch you," Nimura nonchalantly told him over the team's private channel. "You must return with me at once."

Grimacing at both the news and the sight of Kotori suffering, Masako leaned her non-SLAG LASR beside Hinoto before placing several magazines upon the console. "Hopefully you won't need them," the Warrant Office stated before sliding her helmet over her head and locking it into place.

With that, Masako dashed out of the Bridge and towards the Defensive Line, drawing her Bazooka from its hardpoint. "It would probably be better if you did considering your medical skills," Masako transmitted back to Miyoko. "She seems to be suffering quite a bit."

"Understood." Miyoko glanced down the hall toward the defensive line to make sure that things were safe before stepping out and heading back toward the bridge. She deployed her two tactical drones on the way--one near the medlab, watching toward the defensive line, and the other right outside the bridge door, facing aft. That would hopefully give her some forewarning if something approached. Then, she contacted the Hoshi's C-IES.

"Hoshi, can you use the nodal system to give me an update on the Taisa's vital signs?"

Asher leaned his head left and right, popping his neck and letting his barrier module recharge. The combat was quick, deadly, and unfortunately easy. While that was good for the sake of the mission, he had wished there had been a little more risk in the combat. The soldier switched over to his Plasmathrower and looked about the room. If there was anything planning to jump out, or suddenly wake up, he'd be ready turn it into a cookie crisp.

"Gunny, I'll take tha' left, you can have tha' right. We'll circle around tha' sides and sweep tha' middle t'getha. We roast whateva' sticks it's left ass-cheek out tha' wrong way." with that, Shikamaru, his named armor, faded out into stealth and floated along the left side of the room. He added a gleeful comment as he moved, "Nice shootin', by tha' way, was pretty sexy."

He reved up his Plasma Torch, and extended it to a meter and a half length, running it through any Mishhu body he passed, insuring their death.

Kyou definitely would've slapped Asher if they'd been in arms reach at that point, but she restrained herself from catching up to him to do it and started her side's sweep. "Just the left cheek? What about the right? Or do Misshu even have ass cheeks?" She wasn't sure if he'd catch on that she was making fun of him, but his reaction would probably be funny either way. She also planned on keeping score on the kill count, just to mess with him, though based on his last comment, it might just make him hornier (assuming that was possible, of course).

"Considerin' that Mishhu are juss' NH's wit' a different build up, I'm assumin' tha' one asscheek they got iss' tha' left one." responded Asher, running his torch through another Mishhu as he floated on. He sweeped his head from side to side, keeping an eye out for anything that might would crawl out of the organic structure of the ship. "So if you see somethin' stickin' iss' ass out, shoot it. Iff'n y'wantin' t'stick your ass out, be sure to let me know before y'do. Don't wanna' shoot it by accident or nothin'."

The swift combat reminded Kai of his first combat against mishhi. it had been during the previous war, while he was still in training. the Mishhu had attacked nataria, where he was stationed, and were in the process of killing the head armor instructor when he showed up, having lost a simulation. Along with a could other rookies, Kai had managed to help bring down the mishhu in the area, saving that instructor's life. The LASR had made it easy there, it was good against the chitinous shells of the mishhu, and it still served him well even several years later, despite how fast technology seemed to change during this war.

However, Kai didn't keep to this reverie for very long, and swiftly began to follow out his directions from Nyton, beginning to set up booby traps near one of the three passages, and was mid-way through disguising one when Nimura appeared from nowhere. Apparently, Nyton was being called back... But something was odd about this, even if they had lost communications, why would they send another power armor after the black knights?

Tom noticed Nimura on his sensors, but kept his attention on the matter at hand.


The Mishu emulation software was very intriguing to the Engineer as he analyzed it, trying to pick up some of the nuances of the alien technology. There were some consistencies between what was found on Yamataian and NMX ships, something that would probably be very fascinating to study had he more time.

Gallant said:

"You alright?" she sent to Rin, turning slightly to the side, Yukari and Rin at her back, to scan the rest of the room with her primary forward-facing vision.

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"I'm fine," Rin replied. While normally she might be a bit more... disturbed by the imagery she had seen of flaming organisms and more nervous at finally fighting some Misshu, and at combat in general, her current mindset had the sprite almost smiling at the fiery retribution.

Doshii Jun said:

"Freeman, start working on the elevator, please. Yuzuki, Rin, please assist him."

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"Hai, Shosa." Rin floated over to the control panel.

Tom said:

Code:

Rin,

Get your tools out and prepare to open the panel. Use extreme care. Go on my order.

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"Hai." Rin kneeled down and unstrapped the toolkit from the back of her shield. She looked at the Misshu tech then back to her tools, before she picked out what appeared to be the closest fit. Then, on command, she carefully, though still with some urgency given the circumstances, attempted to open the panel. Given her rather short duration of being alive since her creation resulting in comparatively less experience as some other engineers with standard Yamataian tech, just opening this completely foreign panel quickly wiped out the sprite's ever so slight cheer from the frying of squid.

The sprite-Heisho touched down beside the panel, squelching slightly as the boots of her armor hit the filthy slime of the ship's deck. It had been turned a cacophony of conflicting hues as they had blown apart the console's defenders, and that turned her stomach a little bit, but not particularly. Rifle up and firmly shouldered, she re-actived her thermoptics and faded from sight, braced for action.

To the two other technicians, she sent, "It's likely this elevator can be operated from another location as well. If we tamper with it, it might set off a matinenance alarm - if this is anything like our ships, Juni." Even as she said that, however, she realized it was a silly caution - there were probably so many alarms going off within this disgusting animal, nobody would notice just one more. She didn't really want to point out that they hadn't even tried to use the console the way it was supposed to be used - how difficult could it be to interface with a computer that only had a level selector?

"Anyway," she stated, pushing that out of her mind in favor of the Juni's decisions. The last thing this group needed was somebody causing ripples, or arguing. "If we really can't use the console the way it's intended, elevators are fairly simple - just jumper the power feed to bypass the control panel and operate the elevator doors, and if there is another panel inside, we should be able to control basic functions by selectively jumping those, too. It's a lot of power, though, so be careful, Rin-san."

Nyton saw the alert of the new contact and dropped his materials to raise up his LASR. Given the circumstances he was not sure if he could trust anything, even the ID signal in his suit or his eyes. Once the sprite engineer materialized he cautiously trained his LASR on Nimura. He did not shoot but he warily kept a safe distance.

"Claymere-Taii, I've been ordered to fetch you," Nimura nonchalantly told him over the team's private channel. "You must return with me at once."

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"If that is so then it must be important for you to have arrived here so fast." Nyton replied evenly, without any aggression. His sensors stayed alert for any invisible enemies, possibly even hiding under the filthy slime.

Nimura matched everything he remembered. The damaged armor and the tone of her voice. Although, something didn't seem right. Why would she be sent and for what would I be recalled for? How did she get past the horde of Mishhu and catch up to us so quickly.

"Shosa, my Armor positively identifies this to be Nimura but something seems off. Her arrival is too well timed with us getting cut off from the ship. I need you to stay alert and double check her with your sensors in case mine have been compromised and this is a trick." Nyton encryption telepathy messaged Yukari.

"Please understand though that in our situation I will need you to verify your identity by other means." Nyton continued over the private team channel while messaging Yukari. Keeping the LASR pointed at Nimura his mind began racing. He studied everything about the Nimura that he was seeing now: her stance, her motions, breathing, any weapons she carried, anything that didn't match up to the memory files he kept on every individual around him. Even the slightest twitch or change would be noticed if a thorough comparison analysis was being made.

If this was a trap sent by Melisson and Nimura was fake how could he verify Nimura's identity? Melisson had sifted through everyone's minds earlier so any memory he used was likely compromised. Worse yet, what if this was the real Nimura? According to Melisson, he recalled that she had manipulated her at a sublime level. What if she had not been completely honest and actually possessed Nimura like he had been? "Under whose authority were you sent and for what purpose am I being recalled? Answer that then contact your sister and have her message me. Certainly you could do that even if she is still recovering. After all its not like she needs her mouth to message."