RP: OIF Atuan [OIF Atuan] Episode 4: In Hot Water

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

The fall seemed like an eternity. She felt the change in direction, the blur of motion, and yet, the Ex-neko couldn't help but think, and think, and think. Yoshiko's body continued to tilt back from the underhanded assault, her skin breaking the surface of the onsen's water; hot bright waves rose as she fell, diffusing the light with it's prismatic properties. The one year old's decent into the waters slowed, and finally came to a gentle rest on the bottom of the onsen pool. After a minor time, the water's surface clarified, and they all could see Yoshiko resting on the bottom, a blank expression on her face. Slowly, slowly, she floated up to where the air met water. Yoshiko spat out a small stream of water up into the air like a whale after a long dive.

"I didn't...I didn't know Lucien was a lolicon." she spoke flatly.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

"Wot?" Was all that came from the Scotsman's mouth from that baseless accusation, "Listen 'ere. Buggerlugs o'er there seems t' think so," He pointed to Shinji, and his urge to drag him into the pool had reached its limit, "Methinks I loike Async's sense 'o humour better."

He called out to Shinji in a semi-jovial tone, with a hint of anger somewhere in the message, "If ye weren't in a cast, I'd toss yer bloody arse in!"
He grumbled bitterly as he slinked to a secluded corner of the bath and took a swig from his ever present flask, whilst his shoulders were just above the waterline.

I damn near get killed and these 're the people I need t' deal with t'get me paycheck 'n a roof o'er me head? He contemplated sourly, taking another swig of whatever that flask contained, Cripes, I miss me old workmates. Methinks actin' wosn't fer me. I can only act like a fock'ead 'round these blokes...
He sighed deeply, feeling dejected and alone.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Async giggled at Lucien's outburst as she scooped up Yoshiko and sat the Yamataian on her wetsuit-clad lap like an oversized doll, "I think enlisting in this company was a good decision..." she sighed, resting her chin on Yoshiko's shoulder and watching the other two pilots, not finishing the thought.

'-for all of us,' at least not out loud.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

"Huh?" Yoshiko quickly found herself exclaiming a little bit of surprise as the smaller Freespacer placed her on her lap. The Ex-Neko instinctively reached for both of Async's hands and unconsciously used them to 'buckle up' in her seat. As she did so though, Yoshiko couldn't help but take note of Lucien's distressed tone of voice. 'There's got to be something we can do to cheer him up...I guess it's hard being part of a frowned upon niche of consumers.' She tried squirming in her buckled up seat for a bit, and finally managed to bring her mouth to Async's ear to whisper something.

"Psst. Shouldn't we try to cheer him up?"

Perhaps Yoshiko wasn't even actually paying attention to anything being said at this point. Perhaps the Neko was stuck in her own little version of the world. It seemed most likely.

****

Meanwhile, Kelly kept out of sight as he walked away from the co-ed onsen, suppressing his most innate desire to leap in. "I'll just go to the guys' onsen..."

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

"The Onsen, or Dawn station in general?" The nepleslian asked, deciding that she wanted to move around. The dark-skinned girl began to swim in the shallow waters of the pool, calmly drifting around on her back, lazily pushing at the water with her hands.

It wasn't long before Meena found herself lightly bumping into the Neko, as it was difficult to pay attention when moving backwards. "Oops, Sorry..." she apologized.

******

"There's a reason why I'm Ova hea, Lucy-man." Shinji chortled, tapping the cast with one hand and one of the large nearby rocks with the other. "Iss safer Hea."

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Taela almost answered immediately, but she realized that that was a far more difficult question than she gave credit for. But, for the sake of not having to think too hard on the matter, she answered "The Onsen. It is by far the most relaxing thing I have ever done."

The Neko hardly noticed Meena when she bumped into her, as she was too far into enjoying the bath.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

As Kelly made his way from the onsen, he couldn't help but notice some construction workers hurrying by with some moving equipment, muttering amongst themselves. The younger of the two rung his cap in his hands and asked in nervous tones ."Its stable right? We can move it?"

"Yeah, it's a dud for now. The entire nose and detonator assembly's busted up by the impact. We just need to gut that section and rip it out the way they told us to so it's dead for good."
"W-why we doing this? Shouldn't Origin do it for us since it's their mess?" The older of the two cuffed the younger, pushing the equipment along as he spoke.

"Because they're up to their noses in this stuff already. Those bastards they didn't get to in time just spammed this stuff around before going down. They're short on crew to take care of this. Just follow the instructions they lent us, and we'll be fine."

The Ensign followed just out of sight, and got a solid look on the culprit; an Armiore Missile, most likely fired out of a frame's calf launcher. It's nose was crumpled in from crashing through the ceiling and a few rooms in the resort, most likely stumping it's ability to self detonate. Kelly stepped out into the open and spoke.

"Excuse me, I'm Ensign Kelly of the Atuan. I might be able to take this off your hands and de..." The young man stopped mid syllable and simply stood there for a moment, completely stumped, as he looked at what was on the side of the missile.

"WHAT THE HELL?!"

A tool slipped, and the missile started to smoke.

****

The shaped charge of the missile exploded, blowing the roof off the building and burning through the onsen's thick bamboo partitions as it sailed overhead, exposing the occupants of each room for all to see. The destruction could have been much worse, but because the missile was damaged, it's explosives did not detonate properly. Other than some minor injuries, everyone was fine.

****

Yoshiko was still sitting on Async's lap, hair frazzled. The ex-neko then turned her head to the left, seeing the occupants of the men's onsen. Next, to the right; she waved to Meena and Taela.

****

Kelly was scraped, bruised, but otherwise alright. A hand helped him up. "Yeah...that's what we said when we saw it the first time." Kelly shook his head as the older worker spoke, and replayed the image in his artificial eye. On the side of the missile was a pair of large dots for eyes, and underneath those, a cute cat mouth. A single heart floated above the neko face. The younger worker chimed in at this moment,
"T-that was. Was a bit stronger than our reaction. Um. It ring any bells to you?

"Yeah. I think I know who did that doddle."

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

The sound of the explosion made the Onsen's waters visibly rumble for a moment. Lucien blinked as his brooding calm was disrupted. He watched as bits of the roof sailed through the air and came down on top of the Onsen with a clattering thump. He sidestepped a burning piece of bamboo and watched it hiss as it entered the water.

"Wot th' bloody hell wos that?" He asked, startled into wakefulness and searching searching for his weapons, which he'd kept with his change of clothes.
He stood up out of the Onsen, frowning visibly, "Dinnae tell me that th' wos, but-" His train of thought was interrupted by a piece of wood hitting him on the head and shoulders with a loud crack, "ACH!"

Fortunately, his drunkenness had eased the pain, but he was bruised and bleeding lightly. He held his head to stem the bleeding as he searched for something to bandage his head.
He used a nearby towel to act as a makeshift bandage, tearing out what he needed wrapping his head tightly.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Async rose out of the water and her comfy seat under Yoshiko, dumping the Yamataian unceremoniously into the water for a second time today "OI-Z3 Armiore Anti-Vehicle Missile..." the Freespacer blurted out, reaching for an SEP that wasn't on her thigh before blushing and looking backwards at the damage, "but the blast pattern was off..."

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Taela's ears twitched as the explosion went off. As the wall between the two areas of the onsen were demolished, a pebble harmlessly bounced off her head, irritating the neko. When she looked up to see what had happened, she saw Yoshiko waving at her, and then she politely waved back.

"Yoshi-san better not be the cause of this," She muttered, sinking lower into the water until it reached her chin. For the sake of modesty, she swam over to an area of the women's bath not visible through the hole.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Shinji attempted to duck at the noise, but his usual ability to get the hel out of the way when the s*** hit the fan had been demolished by the cast on his leg. Luckily, all he managed to get was another singe on his uniform jacket, and a small amount of smoke inhalation, nothing serious.

"Oi! Wot da Fock was dat?" he shouted, turning around in his wheelchair to find the source of the missile.

******

Meena blushed as the screen separating them from the men disappeared, and she sank further under the water, and then retreated to where Teala was. "That was uncalled for..." the Nepleslian muttered, seeming not to care about the explosion itself. Living on Nepleslia did strange things to people, it seemed.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

As the dust slowly settled, three forms could be seen emerging from the swirling clouds like specters. They closed in on the occupants of the onsen , with a clear intent and purpose in mind. They made no noise as they moved across some of the rubble and exposed hallways. A single voice called out from the din. "Hey! Is everyone alright?" A tall man with dark skin and short cornrows emerged followed by a pair of construction workers. "There was some unexploded ordinance that landed here as a result of the earlier battle, and, well..." His voice trailed off for a moment as he looked back at the two. They snickered.

"It went off."

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Shinji turned around in his wheel chair, seeming to be very, very mad at Kelly. "You 'ad sum unesploded Orinanace, an Ya didn't call me fo' it? Wat are ya, Stoopid?" the demolitions expert practically exploded, wheeling his chair over to the ensign and giving him a sharp kick in the shin with his good leg. "Oi'm actually qualerfied ta do that! Ya coulda been killed, or worse, killed sommat else! You did thousandsa DA wortha freakin damage to the spa!"

The Yamataian man continued to verbally assault and berate his superior officer for a while, mostly shouting mild expletives and calling the man various versions of 'stupid'. Shinji completely ignored the fact that he had just broken his own leg jumping off of a mecha, but if presented with that fact, he would counter with the fact that he had at least handled the explosives he placed on said mecha properly.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

"Well, I was going to call for you to diffuse the missile, I swear!" the Ensign defended himself. "After I got a good look at it, that's all..." Kelly's voice trailed, off, as though he were hiding something. "Um. to be a little more frank, I saw something on the side of the missile, and it shocked me. Something slipped and the rest is all around us." He spoke, gesturing to the area around them.

"I will take full responsibility for all this, and I probably rightfully deserve all your scorn at the moment. It's just that..." The dark skinned man's voice trailed off as his eyes searched for someone in particular. "I just need to know something first." The Ensign's eyes locked square onto Yoshiko as she was trying to sneak away while everyone's attention was on him. "Yoshiko. Did you doodle on all the missiles? If so, why did you do it?"

The still wet ex-neko froze mid stride, her face widening in terror. She finally burst out. "But, but, I-I WAS SO BORED!"

Kelly facepalmed, obscuring his vision. Because he could not see, the Ensign did not notice the small piece of metal floating in the air by Yoshiko's hip. It was a small, sharp shard from the missile case, and had apparently embedded itself into the air, roughly where she would wear a belt. Her currently cloaked apparel array had stopped the dangerous fragment, but what now?

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

"Miss Tachibana?" Async asked, pointing at her belly and the piece of shrapnel embedded in hologrammic material just a smidge from the Yamataian's belly, a wash of concern and surprise twisting her normally composed features.

"You seem to have suffered minor colateral damage..."

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Lucien eyed Async, he was getting a little tired of her mathematician's answers to problems.
"Well, yeah, methinks we can all see that," He said as he nudged a piece of steaming wreckage away from himself, not understanding that the collateral damage was Yoshiko. As he looked up to survey the damage, he noticed a head with cornrows on it.

"Oh, 'lo Kelly!" He was a bit happier to see a familiar face that wouldn't accuse him of things he didn't imagine doing, "Good t' see ya again, I wos gettin' worried fer a bit."
That's when he noticed that a shard was sticking out of Yoshiko's chest, but not quite, and the Scotsman had a legitimate excuse to eye Yoshiko.

"Er, yeah, she's right, y'seem t' have, well," He was having a bit of trouble getting the words out, "A pointy bit in yer chest, but not."

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Async touched the shrapnel briefly in case it was still hot from the explosion. Finding that Yoshiko's dunk had cooled it enough to be inspected properly, the Freespacer immediatly grabbed the ex-neko by her waist and prodded her belly delicately, puzzling out the injury.

"No penetration observable..." she felt up the Yamataian in an almost professional manner, "not volumetrically cloaked body armor... but no injury, so it should be safe to remove," at last she plucked the shrapnel from the invisible Apparel Array, inspected the part that had been imbedded in the device, and then tossed it away from the pool in a lazy arc over her shoulder.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Yoshiko gave out an "Eh?!" of surprise as she was quickly patted down by Async before eying the fragment herself. As the Freespacer yanked it out, the ex neko followed it with her eyes like a child watching candy being tossed around. As the shard landed in the water with a puny splash, the airhead remembered something.


Yoshiko's eyes widened in horror as she looked down to where the shard of metal entered her own Apparel Array. A single droplet of water from Yoshiko's wet, dripping body slid down her side and into a circuit filled crevice that floated just off her hip.

A moment passed, and nothing happened.

"Phew. For a moment there, I thought my Apparel Array was go--" The sound of white noise filled the room as Yoshiko's volumetric bikini went from blue to television static. Holes started appearing and widening as the electrical resonance cascade burned out one volumetric projector after another, putting even more strain on the ones that remained.

Yoshiko screamed bloody murder as she covered herself with her arms.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Taela peered around the corner to see what all the ruckus she heard was about, and almost immediately regretted the decision. The first second or so, she saw her ex-neko pal covered in what appeared to be television static, which then got many holes that widened quickly. Not much longer after that, Taela noticed that Yoshiko was effectively nude. Then quiet let out a stream of curses and hid back around the corner.

"Don't look." She told Meena, blushing profusely.

Re: Episode 4: In Hot Water

Async watched in a sort of horrified fascination as the volumetric array shorted out and left Yoshiko nude. The Freespacer grinned when the Yamataian-bodied Nekovalkyrja screamed and covered herself ineffectually with her hands. Async quickly covered her mouth to stifle the roar of laughter which was quickly unleashed as she grabbed her aching sides, doubled over, and shed tears of amusment.

"Aaaa- hahahahaha- oh- heeheehee- no- haahaa- it hurts- aahahahaha~"