RP: ISC Phoenix [Mission 6] - The Trounce of Tami

"Close call, good drivin' mate," Mel gave Nyezeh a high five.

As Jim shot the needle into Luca's shoulder and pushed the painkillers in, a dumb grin came across his face as the painkillers got to work.
"That feels good..." He said slowly as he got up from the truck tray and walked into the cargo hold, ignoring the wound completely, "Thanks Jim... now everyone hold tight."

He lied down on the floor of the cargo hold, completely bereft of the fact that several Mishhu had been splattered in picturesque fashion. Of course, he didn't lie down in their entrails, the medicine didn't make him go that nuts.

"I think that's the signal to split this town," Sebastian commanded as he got his WIND armour suit off, he was wearing his clothing underneath it, "Go, John, now!"

"Yessir, everyone strap in. We're about to blow town from atmosphere. This may result in a portion of the atmosphere going missing and a fire or two planetside," He got the FTL systems online, overriding the perimeters with Allison's help, "But hey, it's not our atmosphere, or the Yamataian's atmosphere, any more."

Everyone grabbed towards the firmest things they could find, and weighed themselves down, as they didn't have much time to spare.

"Going FTL in 3..." John counted down.
"2..."

"1..."

KRAKA - THOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOM...

It was pretty hard to tally the total damage they'd caused on the ground thanks to that stunt, but now they were well away from Tami at last, surprising the Mishhu forces with their daring escape.

Once things had gotten to a cruising pace, which was about 3 minutes of frenzied flying in, John had saved everyone and pulled a daring rescue. He sighed and put his head to the console with a audible "bonk!" noise. The ship begun to autopilot towards Nepleslia.

"We're safe for now..." Allison commented, as she examined the engine, "What about our captain?"

Luca had been pushed against a wall as the ship was flying, babbling something along the lines of: "Pretty Pretty Lights!" as the medicine really begun to kick in. His mother, who'd been petrified, was now very, very cross, stomping towards her son.
"Young man, do you know how much trouble you're in?!" His mother, Anna approached him and lifted him onto his feet, without mercy, "I am telling you RIGHT now, to you and your friends: have a holiday before you KILL yourselves!"

She gave him a slap across the face, knocking some sense into him.
"But mum!" He said to his defence as he got slapped again, "The world needs to be saved!"

"Too bad!" She slapped him again with all the strength of an angry mother. It was all in fair play, of course.
"Aaagh! My face! Stop rear - OW!! -ranging it!" Luca didn't have the heart, or the need to strike back against his mother.

Everyone around begun to laugh as the captain got pummelled by his Mother. It was only a few years ago in the Pavone family that Luca had done some risky things, but by far, his most recent endeavours and misadventures had landed him in some serious trouble.
"Some things never change," Sebastian chuckled as he got his usual garb back on.

Even Mitch mustered a smirk on his plain face. Hitori giggled to herself. John had come to expect this sort of silliness. Crane made a mental note to cook something with extra protein once dinner was on.

"How's Robert - OHHHTHATHURT!!- doing?" Luca asked Jim as he got one right between the eyes, making them go crooked for a moment.

Jim looked back at Luca, with a face brought back to a barely concealed laugh by the reminder of Robert. "He's stable," Jim replied, "Now that we're safely away from anything that could screw with healing him, like that takeoff, I can get back to treating him. He should be alright in a few days."

Jim chuckled as he watched the beating of Luca by his mother again in his head. "I can give you something to dull the pain, but I can't take something like your mother there away. She's too damn fun to leave behind!"

"Good work..." Luca said as his mother stopped berating him, since he had a ship to run, "John, ETA to Nepleslia?"

"About six minutes to... whoa," He said over intercom as he checked the radar and the space map, "Hmm, you're not gonna believe this, the Mishhu are attempting to take Nepleslia."

Luca frowned, this called for an alternative measure and a yet-again postponed holiday. It seemed like these Mishhu were causing a lot of bother for the crew, and Luca had to plan accordingly to make sure they didn't get stroppy.

"New plan," Luca announced, "We come in quick, take what we can from the base, and head to Nepleslia Prime ASAP. On Nepleslia Prime, we refit the ship, so it's suitable for us staying in it for extended periods," Luca sighed, shaking his head, "I think life is about to get much more hectic for us."
"We'll have to touch down somewhere eventually, right?" Mel asked as she nodded.
"Yeah, but only for things like proper food, alcohol, weapons, ammo and repairs we can't solve ourselves, but if worse comes to worse..." He looked away, "Don't wanna think about it."

He took off his armour, and his bloodstained singlet, sobered greatly by the experience to come, and sat back in the captain's chair shirtless. John looked at him for a moment, wondering about his emotional state (and wound), then resumed his duties making sure the small ship steered clear of Mishhu.

The captain pondered what'd come of this new change, and realised that he'd only been thinking about the bad things when he was addressing his crew. He then grinned as he realised that he'd be meeting lots of new people, new places, new women, and new job opportunities, more often.

Mel was idling in the cargo bay, realising that it'd been splattered with Mishhu gore and heckery-knows-what-else.
"Cleanup, aisle cargo bay," She mocked for a moment as she realised she and Crane were cleaning up. She wondered if Valo needed a clean, too, "Ey, Valo, what the hell happened to ya? Y'walk into a slaughterhouse offal pit or somethin'?" She asked casually as she got the mop and bucket, and a chamois for Valo.

"Those fucking Yammies!" Vincent slammed a large fist down on the console in front of him, his muscles almost smashing the console off the wall. He kept his gaze focused on the screen in front of him, but there were noticeable waves of anger rolling off him like waves. The merc diligently worked his way through the course calculations, stepping in occasionally to help John correct an error in his course.

Valo looked at himself as well as the remains of the intruders in the bay. "I believe cleaning is indeed in order for this room. I apologize for the inconvenience."

Jim walked briskly back to the medical rooms in order to finalize Robert's treatment. Still on the bed and completely sedated, Robert snored quietly as Jim opened up his box of supplies. Gently taking off the makeshift splint he had applied on the field, he grabbed a metal brace and adjusted it to Robert's physique, then strapped it onto his leg. It would be a bit difficult to walk, but it could be done, if a little unwieldy.

Arin was sitting on the side of her bunk. She had changed back into her old NAM uniform with its accompanying cleavage-compressing light body armor for some reason. Her eyes stared out emptily to a distant faraway point, her hands clutching the T1-Dragonsbreath tightly.

Its not safe on land. She thought, after overhearing the news.

Its not safe here. The floor where one of the Mishus once laid dead was next to her.

Its not safe.

Its not safe.

Vincent was clomping off the bridge, having left Jim to plot things out while he stewed down- as it turned out, he had actually gotten more pissed by plotting the course down to the planet's surface, thinking about how the government would be requesting help from Yamatai for controlling the situation. He passed by Arin's bunk and noted the door open and her completely tweaking out on the bunk. Poking his head inside the room (and doing his best to swallow the angry look on his face), Vincent tilted his head to the side wonderingly and clomped his boots inside.

"You alright?" He questioned simply, slowly making his way across the room to take a seat next to the little technician.

Upon hearing the ID-SOL's heavy footsteps, Arin was suddenly jolted with a syringefull of survival instinct. She bought the T-1 up to shoulder level in a twitch, gritted teeth and barrel pointed at Vincent, the look of hopelessness in her eyes gone and a grim determination replaced them.

"Get out."

She was careless to believe from the first mission that 'they' would be there for her, that her survival as always from before, rested on her own actions and mental acuity. But what dissed her the most was that he had the gall to walk in here and grace her with his huge presence after his conspicuous absence during the start of the attack.

In addition to Mishu attacks, she obviously wasn't ready for some other things as well.

Vincent twitched as his military training kicked in. With a flash of his reflexes, Vincent's arm shot out like a grapple and he wrenched the T1 away from Arin, tossing it to the far side of the room, and drawing his Hand Cannon in the same motion. The Hand Cannon found its muzzle shoved rudely beneath Arin's chin, the hammer cocked and the safety off.

"Don't ever raise a gun at me again." The merc growled, pulling his gun from beneath Arin's chin and releasing the hammer. He flicked the safety back on and stamped out of the room, just as subtly as he had entered.

The Lorath woman who drove the GP-ORV into the bay peeked her head into the medical bay. "Is there a doctor in the house?" she asked with a weak grin. She was positively drenched in sweat, her hair matted to her head and the bloodstained remains of her tunic she had used to wrap her leg was bright red, as if the wound had reopened. Jolokia hoped it was because of the stress she had put on it and not due to whatever it was that was making her feel so sick.

"I'm not feeling too well," she confessed sheepishly. "I hate to be a bother, and I know this doesn't look to good on my first day and all but--" But, she didn't finish. Her eyes went wide and she scrambled for the nearest sink, losing her lunch into the basin in a rather noisy fashion. She quickly turned on the tap to squelch the sound and hopefully the smell as swiftly as possible. Round two tasted worst than the first time, and after the third, Nyezeh was pretty sure there was nothing left in her stomach to throw up.

Luca overheard Nyezeh's retching and vomiting, and motioned over the Intercom, "Mum, tend to her, quick..."
On command, Anna walked up behind Nyezeh, taking her hand towards a free bed and lying her down.
"Hmm..." She made a cursory glance at the technician, getting a series of tools ready, and placing a bin lined with a plastic bag next to her, in case she felt sick again. She took a small set of bandages, and wrapped them tightly around the wound on her leg.
"Have you eaten or drunk anything in the past few hours or come into bodily contact with with the Mishhu?" She asked as she made more observations on the Lorath woman.

Mel, Crane and Valo had managed to clean the hold from the splattered Mishhu, and were overall satisfied with the job, tossing the unwanted refuse out of the airlocks in the shuttle bays.
"That's the end of that..." Crane commented, trying to get the putrid smell out of the mop.
"Yeah..." Mel said, as she noticed Vincent stomping away from the crew quarters, "'Scuse me one sec..." She slid her mop bucket away, and slowly walked towards the quarters, immediately noticing Arin was seriously stressed from her woman's intuition.

"May I come in?" Mel asked Arin as politely as she could from the door of the room.

"I'm fine." Arin muttered. "It's something I have to deal with myself." She looked up, the sides of her eyes were wet, but a thin smile was on her face. "Otherwise I won't be able to use that thing as well as I do anymore." she nodded over to her trusty Fabricator leaning on a wall. How it had anything to do with the current situation was anyone's guess.

Vincent was still seething as he stacked the armor plates of his Wind armor, Gust plates and all, into the small bolted-down dresser in his quarters, leaving him in his civvies. He placed his Deviance on the floor at the foot of his bed and laid down for a little while before he had simmered down. Eventually, he realized that he had come off as a real dick to everyone on this particular trip, and that wasn't good.

Especially the way he treated Arin.

He figured that he owed it to the little technician to apologize. And besides, it was just a straight walk down the hallway from here. So Vincent got off his cot and plodded back down the hallway to Arin's quarters. Knocking on the doorframe, he skittishly stood outside. "Am I allowed to come in this time?"

"'Orright mate," Mel replied to Arin as she moved out of Vincent's way and back into the recreation area. She didn't regard Vincent as any less of a person, she understood that the mission was stressful just as much as he did. He gave him a pat on the back on the way out.

Meanwhile, Nepleslia was getting closer, and John had to negotiate some background checks and information giving as he came in, to make sure the ship was clean of Mishhu. John insisted he'd be in and out quickly.
They let the Big Bird land just by The Base, but The Base was about to get cleaned up and its contents put onto the Big Bird.

The process was easily done in the space of at least two hours with all of the spare hands around. The contents of the kitchen were easily placed into the kitchen, replacing the generic contents that came with it. The living space and electronic entertainment was put into the lounge. The entire armoury was moved into the cargo bay, weapon by weapon, locker by locker, and the workbench too.

The extra bunks were put into the cargo bay, ready to use in case extra people boarded. The contents of the bathrooms were put into the heads of the ship. All of the books in the strategy room and its bookshelf were plonked into the lounge too. They left the table behind.

"Oh," Luca said as he loaded the last thing onto the Big Bird, a small stack of books, "Does anyone want to do anything here on planetside before we leave?"
He took a look at the safehouse - now empty, and sighed lightly, but knew that he was making the right decision.
John, Mel, Allison and Hitori didn't have any objections, neither did Mitch, Sebastian or Anna.

Okay here it is, thought Zeta to herself. It was pretty long way for her from Funky City to the base of ISC Phoenix, but if she wanted to get a place in the crew, it will be well worth it. She got finally sick of Nepleslia and wanted to see the other places of the universe.

The Base itself looked little rundown but it was okay for her standards. The problem was fence around the base and closed gate. She looked on the gate but couldn't find a communicator or anything to contact occupants of the mansion. Well here goes nothing. "Hello, anybody home?!?" she shouted in hope that someone will hear her.

Jim looked around and shrugged, there was nothing he really needed from this place; he never had lived in Nepleslia, and the only memories he had of the place had been with Luca and company. "Nah, I'm good. Let's get out of here as soon as we can. I'd rather not catch even a glimpse of those tentacled terrors."

A shout from outside the base caught his attention. It seemed as though someone was hailing those inside it. "Luca, we've got company!"

The truth of the matter, as she plainly told Anna, was "Yeah, one of those squid-bastards nicked me while I was headed toward you guys." She wiped her mouth off with a towel and lay down on one of the free beds. "Uhg," she groaned, dropping the towel onto the ground. "I feel so hot," she complained, annoyed, but at least she still had enough sense to keep her clothes on.

Nyezeh's vision was getting blurry enough that it was giving her a headache, so she closed her eyes. "Just-- fuck, I need to sleep or something."

Anna made one last check over Nyezeh, and nodded, "You're quite right, you need to rest and recuperate. I recommend you keep your fluids up and get something to eat as well. Our chef can help with that,"
She looked out of the Medical room and towards the Kitchen, which was on the other side of the ship, "Crane?" She asked loudly, yet politely.
He poked his head out of the kitchen, "Yes?" He responded.

"Give our most recent patient something to eat and something to drink," Anna ordered as she moved Nyezeh to the sleeping area and put her down on a bunk with a bedside table on it.
"You got it, one sec," Crane said as he put a pitcher of water with a cup, a glass of milk and a bowl of mashed potatoes onto her bedside table. As he was about to leave, he thought an introduction was in order, "Oh, you must be new here, I'm Cranebeinn, the chef. Crane for short."

Anna made a note to herself about the Mishhu - but just brushing past one wouldn't cause anything serious.

-

Meanwhile, outside, Luca heard Jim as he was trying to put the fridge into place.
"One sec!" He said as he walked through the small ship and took a shortcut out of the shuttlebay, landing in the yard of The Base and heading towards the gates.

"Hi!" Luca introduced himself to the woman, as he unlocked the gates and pushed them open for her, ushering her in, "Who are you and what can I do for you this afternoon?"

-

Meanwhile, back in the kitchen, while Crane was sitting down with a recipe book, relaxing a little with his pot of mash potato ready to eat for dinner, he heard a bump in the fridge.
He looked over to the fridge, and thought that something fell over inside, and ignored it. He heard another bump, and looked at the fridge, then walked over to the intercom.

"Uh, guys?" He stammered.

Arin sticked her end of the Intercom with a screwdriver, she was undoing a few not so permanent fixtures of the base that the rest of the crew won't miss. "Yesss?"