UOC Station Helios
Ten and a Half Hours after Shuttle Crash
Koyama stared at the unfolding situation with an almost dispassionate gaze. That first heavily armored Kuvexian ignoring her and continuing on the attack of the wounded Elysian. She'd laid waste to its guards. Blasting a literal hole in one of the Wind Armors, and had made a display of the other with her blade. Composite Stone Thread plating was no match for the strength of monomolecular Zesuaium weaponry, let alone when it was sheathed in an exotic radiation discharge looped around the seemingly impervious substance that had made Yamataian ships so legendarily durable. Her suit had plates upon interlocking plates of the degenerate matter over advanced meshes, flesh-based muscular inserts, and mundane titanium exoskeletal framework. Combined with a shield system designed to stop almost any known energetic attacks, both energy-based and kinetic. With agility that garnered it, its nigh-mythical maneuverability and finesse into a platform designed first for Nekovalkyrja, and then for lesser, non-synthetically derived organic species.
But first and foremost. This was somewhat of a physical representation, a visible representation of the Nekovalkyrja Warmachine at work. It had been battered, scoured, pockmarked from repeated strikes of aetheric weaponry or high-density plasmic packets. A monumental crash and held against the repeated strikes of Lorath-built railgun weapons designed to cut down lightly armored personnel with varied and flexible types of ammunition. Just as surely as her armor looked, its pilot felt. Battered, but not broken. A Mindy couldn't feel pain in the same sense of a living breathing humanoid. Its systems could only report the damage. Augment the wearer into a more effective combatant based on their training and experiences. In her case, she was tired. She had endured injury after repeated injury. Parts of her had healed at the sacrifice of others. Her mind was still addled from the lack of complete regeneration. Where once she would have used the 'soft' skills drilled into her. Analysis of her situation, trying to see it from all angles, avoid fights as necessary. Yet being awoken in the state she had been, it had been a choice her AIES had made for her.
The severe strike to her head despite the helmet had shut down portions of her mind while her hemosynthetic systems had worked to repair. She had also been bleeding out. Resources had been wasted upon trying to seal a wound that had remained gaping and open thanks to a thick shard of the shuttle that had sandwiched itself between the plates of her suit. Judgment calls made, it had awakened her earlier than expected. Her mind had been partially healed. Her body than working on the rest. Hours of fighting had left her thoroughly emotionally drained, physical stresses had piled up, system resources had begun to dwindle. Her kind were never ones for being fat, obese. Therefore they had lacked long-term endurance without resupply of caloric intake, essential vitamins, minerals, proteins, fats, and other things to keep a Neko healthy, happy, and fully functional. She had been alone. Wounded, disoriented. Her mind had blanked, yet flashes had come through. Looking at a dead soldier before her, the wound within its neck, the next with broken limbs. It had been as if her mind shifting and struggling between rational thought and planning and simple whiteness and instead replaced by the overarching imperative for survival. Flashes. Glimpses of the carnage as her mental and physical training had taken root and partly to the fore. Muscle memory and reflex.
And here she was now. Faced with one of the bulkier Kuvexian suits that had continued bearing down on the injured Elysian. Another dropping in with the metallic thud of heavy plating and whining servos. As it had turned to its fellow, the question it had asked, the click, click, snick of the katana folding in on itself was audible, then the dull whomp as it went back to the hardpoint along with the heavy pistol.
As this secondary antagonist turned his attention to her, the two soldiers accompanying him. The floating Mindy seemed to tilt its head just a little askance at the situation. It had heard the challenge and declaration even as the heavy weapon spun up. Once the barrels began to spit their orange-golden bolts of exotic energy, the Mindy shifted, a blur as the Combined Field System lurched it toward the far right. The bright and deadly bolts missed by millimeters before the agile-yet damaged Yamataian armor slammed into something else entirely once out of sight.
One of the first Heavies soldiers had suddenly collided with a ballistic shell of Zesuaium, sheathed in a distortion field. There was the smell of ozone as the air around the two ionized followed by the scent of scorched metals and screech as they both slid to a halt. The Infantryman's rifle clattered to the floor a short distance away as the alien warbling curse escaped its lips in grunts of effort and struggling. Soon the remaining Wind-Armor fell upon the struggling duo just out of sight of the two heavily plated Kuvexian suits. Judging from the sounds coming from that corner it had turned into a full-on brawl. The Gust kitted Wind stumbled back into view as an almost rhythmic thump of something organic met metal. Once, twice, thrice. The first was a curse of pain in the native Kuvexian tongue, the second punctuated by a grunt and the last a wet gurgle the sound of a crunching squish followed by silence.
The Tange piloted Wind suit seemed to stand stunned for a moment as the light infantryman and its armor was bodily flung into view of the Gatling gun-carrying heavy armor to slide to a halt a mere ten feet away in an almost careless manner of brute strength. There were no marks on the plate, yet a trail of dark purple blood left a smear as it skidded to a halt before him. Part of the soldier's head had been caved in, where once had been an (in her mind) distasteful alien face had been was now pulped. Fragmented bone, gray matter, and other viscera seemed to add to the gruesomeness of the scene.
While his fellow toyed with the Elysian, and the other soldiers began taking up their positions. The Wind-armored Tange began to inch forward with hostile purpose but only to stop once more. The sounds of punctured steel, the steady 'Pop' of punctured metal, and the screech of it as if the sounds were telling the story of the deep furrows being dug into it. A sudden 'ping' issued forth from the Mindy's AIES in the form of sensors.
Short-ranged, but ultimately detectable by the other Yamataian team slowly fighting its way forward a deck below. What followed suit was as if each of their AIES had been partly hijacked, nothing incredibly serious but enough to be heard. A simple alert at an IES-based system having found them. A message came through, the voice light, airy, sweet as honey, and with the promise of an ultimately kindly demeanor but did not overpower their chatter between any of them. Their AIES reacting in somewhat the same way as if a direct channel had been open along with that brief ping as if it seemed to unlock something from their suit's vast memory stores.
Layers of encryption being sent with a relatively short message to which the quantum-based computers of their power armors instinctually seemed to understand as based on the Kessaku OS and SAoY schema. Yet it seemed to have momentary trouble piercing the remaining layers. These layered encryptions were older, foreign to those not truly old enough, or well-versed and or entrenched in the longstanding professionalism of a career soldier with decades of experience. Yet the suit's suite of computers eventually cracked this unfamiliar set of coding signifying it as 'Friendly' but with a timestamp twenty or thirty years old. Still quite advanced and difficult still, but woefully not within current Star Army schemes and protocol. It was an old failsafe code.
'This is a Level Three Warning to all Star Army of Yamatai Forces in the current A.O.' the voice sounding chipper yet somehow serious at the same time as the IES made it known as Kessaku Anri's words. That sweet voice gave way to something more masculine, the words slightly tinny as if recorded on an older audio medium. It had not been heard in years and years unless those devoted to their studies on the history of the early Empire and projects that lay therein if they had delved deep into the brief history of the Yamataian Star Empire.
'Cortisol levels have reached a critical state,' it breathed, sounding bored, it was the sort of tone one reserved for visualizing that person as if absently picking the wings off a fly. 'Frontal, and parietal lobe damage confirmed with synaptic misfiring. Blood pressure at elevated, dangerous levels.'
Then the sweetened voice returned as if pushing aside that masculine tone. 'Bodily harm has exceeded safety parameters for Type Thirty-Three, Model Series Tennyo.' it was as if the two voices were warring with each other as the little logos that had accompanied them, one Kessaku Systems, and the other a combination of two other, relatively unknown until the IES identified them as WickedArms, and PNUgen spun in a slow, stationary spin around the Kessaku icon.
The masculine voice returned, the boredom beginning to be replaced with a bit more interest as if it had found something more amusing. The tone somehow had a sneer to it. 'Statistical damage has surpassed current Nekovalkyrja Operating System safety parameters. Version One-Point-One Tactical Operation System function triggers have been met. Partition Layer One breach confirmed.' a touch of wry amusement trickling in at the latter statement of fact.
It all sounded like gibberish until the IES began to translate. Code-Three, Imminent Danger to allied personnel and originator. TacOS for some reason was either not listed, or buried so deep it may have perhaps been above their paygrade, or it simply was not in the system.
'Operational code and designation Red Four. Confirmed at Level Three Warning Status.' Anri's sweetened voice laced full of concern. And just like that the cutesy girlish tones once more replaced.
'Tertiary mind Functions have activated, emotional range gap narrowed. Primary memory systems are regulated to secondary status. Berserker Status initiated.' that voice, sounding so smug, self-satisfied in a begging to be punched in the face sort of way as if it had somehow unleashed some terror upon the universe and was immensely proud of this fact. What followed had been a list of obvious damage to whomever this originated from and current statistical data.
The damage to the lobes of the brain along with heightened hormone response. Adrenal activity had saturated the hemosynthetic blood which had seemed well below normal levels. Internal bodily damage, fractured bones, overall system resources used to heal and sustain a hemosynthetic lifeform were below acceptable margins seeming to heavily impede regeneration as the systems struggled to maintain the body. Bodily heat levels had spiked as blood pressure increased with skeletal musculature exceeding permissible levels for a Tennyo Model, Type Thirty-Three Neko. Whoever it was, whatever it was. Had entered into an extremely heightened state of response as blood oxygenation drastically increased whilst the cardiovascular system began going beyond safe operation. As if their bodies were being overclocked beyond their physical capacity and the ability for rational thought and response decreased with an extremely heightened aggressive response.
'Caution is advised.' Anri's voice whispered again, 'Subdue and Capture is permissible and preferred.' it seemed to plead. 'Projected Model Tennyo Type Thirty-Three Nekovalkyrja operational status and system resource usage has been reduced from one hour, forty-three minutes, twelve seconds.'
There was a slight pause then: 'Reduction confirmed to thirty-two minutes, seventeen seconds before hibernation shutdown sequence. Attempts to utilize automated systems and relaxants via SPINE interface have failed, Ke-M-Two-Four series Mindy restraints are inoperable. Power Armor damage over fifty-nine percent and currently engaged in combat with enemy forces. Override procedures failed, TacOS system overrides are preventing safe shutdown. Message repeats...'
The momentarily stunned Wind Suit soon found itself face to face, with the blank visage of the scuffed, dull-gray of Zesuaium where the paint had been chipped or scraped away. The Tange agent took a step back only to find its frontal armor plate having been latched into by the articulated armored fingers of the Mindy. It had stumbled partly back into view of the new Kuvexian and its troops. Only to be yanked back out of view. The snick, click and clack of before happened again, this time in a more timely fashion.
The damaged Yamataian armor came into view, hunched a little as the colored Stone Thread composite plating of the Wind's armor was held within a vice-like grip. a shortened sword, a wakizashi in the other. Lorath armors were known for their immense strength yet this one seemed to be struggling to even turn over and right itself as it was dragged still partly in cover. There were the crackling hiss and slash of composite meeting destructive energies, the Wind's grip loosened as the tendons were cut. The Mindy hadn't been hunting the body, but going for extremities, as the other Kuvexian soldiers saw this tactic, and the now squalling Tange flailing their legs and pained vocals echoing throughout the room. Koyama set the wakizashi, now limmed in the shimmery light of aether go for the wrist. Right at the radial artery and with a flicking slash, cut it. Blood began to gush and pool whilst the Yamataian let the person go.
As the soldiers began to open up with their rifles, the Mindy lunged for another of the Kuvexian infantry, bowling him over enough to slip behind, wakizashi pressed in a backhanded hold against its throat and using the poor guy as a shield. Those soldiers stopped firing for a moment to watch, waiting to see arterial blood begin to flow. Yet they would be sorely disappointed as the Yamataian then repeatedly plunged the blade into the chest armor and letting the limp body fall to the ground. A string of expletives in their mother tongue lept forth as more fired at this suit which went into a frenzied roll only to hamstring another of their fellows. The gaudy copper and gold suit toppling behind its cover as the distinctly different and streamlined arm of the Mindy came up, blade in hand and then plunge so hard into the crippled soldier it bit into the deck itself with a pop of protest and the gutwrenching sound of flesh tearing. It was clear, that rationality had left the lone Mindy soldier, only to be replaced with a cruel, brutality and frenzied violence.
Somewhere, deep within the red-haze that had fogged her mind. As if she'd been thrown backward and locked in an iron cage sat a Nekovalkyrja. The appearance not of a fully matured Neko, but one of perhaps a few weeks old, little more than the appearance of one being six or seven years old by Nepleslian standards. Her hair had been done in pigtails with pretty crimson ribbons, a sky-blue kimono with silvery thread embroidered upon it had their pudgy little hands on these bars of their new cage of steel bars. Velvety black ears laid back and quivering, eyes the color of molten gold wide with fright and panic. She tried to rattle the bars which had no give to them in the least. A girl's voice, a child's voice pleaded, squealed, and cried for help as they watched what was happening before them with eyes no longer their own in this hazy red, yet darkeningly black space. It tried desperately to be heard, to reason, that little voice of conscience going unheard as something pre-programmed and primal had subsumed their physical body, usurped it and this girl was seemingly along for the ride for now. Powerless to do anything about it. And there, is if carried on a non-existent breeze with the impossibly distant chuckle and feeling of barely a ghost of satisfaction from that one male voice that was somehow so maddeningly familiar. Yet felt so far away.
Looking forward to what you all produce!
