YSS Kaiyō
Power Armor Bay
The
real Mat's arrival was more an annoyance than a distraction, but an exploitable distraction for the IYS Mat and Meissa nonetheless. It was right when Aiko's momentary
death stare addressed the incoming Mindy's crunch with Wil's Reaper that they made their move, lashing out at the princess and her bodyguard. It was as good a plan as they could ever realize, given the circumstances.
Rei, for her part, zipped away in a blur to avoid the chunk of armor and Mat's low attack. She reappeared behind Meissa with the razor's edge of her sword pressed up to the Neko girl's throat while the warrior's other arm grappled tightly around her waist in restraint. And as the tossed power armor chest sailed through where Rei was previously standing, Aiko struck back.
The princess ducked low, both to match her adversary and to make sure the heavy object barreling down on her missed, and slid quickly toward Eve's version of Matsuvo. She wasn't as inexplicably fast as Rei, but Yui's daughter still moved like lightning, propelled forward by her strong valkyrie legs and inertial control. Before he even realized Rei was gone, Aiko was upon him with her katana extended out through where he knelt for his attack on the samurai.
Aiko then stood at the place where her sweep ended. Her eyes were closed and remained so as she re-sheathed her blade. The Neko Meissa squirmed violently in Rei's arms but stopped — neither in excitement or horror, but anticipation — when she saw her comrade Mat still breathing behind Aiko.
"Hah!" the IYS Mat shot mockingly. He began to turn his head to the side so that he could look down on the Ketsurui with disdain. "You missed!"
But there was at which his gaze stopped tracking and the whole power armor bay seemed to weirdly shift sideways and tumble around, and his body wouldn't move to stand when he told it to.
Restrained by the killer's bodyguard, all Meissa of Eve's Yamatai could do was watch as her friend's body slumped over and gushed like a fountain of
Hinomaru crimson as his head bounced across the deck.