2022-09-24: What The Heart Dictates
- Log: 2022-09-24- What The Heart Dictates
- Cast: Celebro, Akane Shinjo, Yuta Hibiki, Dr. Spartura, Rikka Takarada, GaoGaiGo Team, Kamille Bidan, BP-119 Duke, Qivi, Alouette Pommier, Ruri Hoshino, Nidaime, Renais Cardiff, Sayla Mass, Liam 7-020, Shinji Ikari, Lucine Azul, Alexis Kerib
- Where: AEU France - Industrial District
- OOC - IC Date: 0096-09-24
- Summary: Akane
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
An industrial district in Paris -- almost completely operated by BioNet shell companies, inherited from the work of now-gone BioNet executives like Gimlet, Dr. Moebius, and Dr. Laplace. The names on the deeds have changed, but in the end: it's still BioNet.
"Just stop! Just -- let me defeat you!!"
As one hand slides against the side of the building the rest of the way down, the other holds up her phone -- the one she uses to talk to Alexis, not everyone else. "Alexis!! Give me as many of my old kaiju as you can!" Specifically old; she doesn't want to blow any new resources on a situation that's already falling apart.
Alexis is perfectly happy to do that one, nevertheless. "Of course. Instance Abreaction!"
One by one, familiar kaiju start to appear in the landscape -- and Akane has hit the ground, kitten heels first, and started to book it -- away from Gridman, away from Rikka.
Every kaiju present has its own task. Go'yavec trundles across the landscape, kicking over warehouses and generally making itself a target; Ghoulghilas belches flame out into the distance, making it difficult for mechanized units to respond thanks to melting asphalt from a perch atop Go'yavec. Devadadan, meanwhile...
... well. Akane secures a megaphone from an abandoned fire truck and makes things quite plain.
"You know what? I don't need BioNet's help either! This whole idea was /stupid/! You guys are useless! I have my kaiju and that's all I need!" she announces --
-- and Devadadan rounds on the mobile suit menacing Gridman, starting to move on it at speed, charging its beam.
Gonglee is nowhere to be found, presumably because... Akane used it last month and never bothered to fix up the clay model. She needed that time for Mecha-Ghoulghilas.
Mecha-Ghoulghilas still seems perfectly fine and ready to go on the whole 'pelting the Gridman Alliance with beams' thing though. Real commitment from that one!
KTS: Dr._Spartura has deployed as a Boss for 6 opponents.
KTS: Celebro has deployed as a Boss for 5 opponents.
<Pose Tracker> Celebro has posed.
The Monster Research Laboratory in Japan receives an alert.
One of the researchers looks up from where he's been furiously scribbling in a notebook on his desk, finding the alert on his computer. Low priority; Kaiju attack underway in Paris.
Shinya Kaburagi's eyes narrow. Not just Paris. He knows that region. ...interesting. More interesting than this, anyway.
He stands up, heading purposefully for the door. Kaburagi's section leader grunts, watching him go. "We're not deploying for that. There's a closer branch."
Kaburagi briefly spares him a look, something unreadable yet profoundly uninterested in his face. And then he silently walks out the door. The section leader mutters and stands up from his desk, marching after him. "Kaburagi, I said--!"
He rounds the door frame. Kaburagi is gone.
***
Thick rubber boots on Parisian concrete. Shinya Kaburagi's eyes scan the horizon as it fills with monsters. None of them are particularly engaging, and he's got medals of most already. But all of them are data. He finds one in particular - it's hard to miss. Designation Go'yavec, essentially a volcano with legs and a mouth. Really, it just stomps around and knocks stuff over? Dull. Insipid. ...but it might be a fun base..
"...kiete karekareta," he breathes to himself, and reaches into a pouch. He's getting used to piloting this irritating thing's fingers. He pulls free a single Medal from his supply, holding it out in his open hand for his inspection. Rimmed in black, it depicts a girl, of all things. Young. Some earth garment. Hoodie, he remembers. It looks more like a shell to his eyes.
He wheels his arm back and throws it. It flies, much further than that throw would take it, soaring on the track of his intent until it lands in Go'yavec's mouth. The massive thing stomps around and makes throaty, strange noises, before a light rushes along its entire surface, and it...changes.
It shrinks. It shrinks a lot, losing nearly half of its thunderous size. Go'yavec is so absurdly enormous that even reduced by half it is still absurdly enormous, but the reduction in size does make it so you can actually lose it among the Parisian skyline from time to time. Something flashes into being across it, covering its entire surface like a veil. No, like a shell...like a jacket.
It opens its mouth, and what comes out is less of a kaiju's scream and more of a melodic hum.
A building explodes anyway.
Shinya Kaburagi's lips quirk, one half of his face seemingly blank while the other quirks up in a too-wide grin.
"Beginning experiment," he says to nobody.
Sayla Mass teleports in.
KTS: Sayla Mass has deployed in ARX-107 Saint Lance - MS Mode. KTS: Sayla Mass has changed loadout. <Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
The abrupt adjustment in size that accompanies... whatever is going on with Go'yavec leaves poor Ghoulghilas homeless and about 300 meters straight up at an awkward angle. It crashes down, fairly unceremoniously turning a mid-sized BioNet warehouse that had been directly under Go'yavec's head into a crater. Ghoulghilas is not a durable creature by any stretch of the imagination, and while it can recover from losing its head...
... it can't recover from about half of its upper body being pulverized. That's. That's a bad one!
Akane's scowl intensifies. While she'd like to know what's happening, she's more immediately upset by someone apparently stealing her kaiju and getting another of her kaiju destroyed.
KTS: GaoGaiGo Team has deployed in GaoGaiGo. KTS: Akane Shinjo has deployed in AMK-01 Mecha-Ghoulghilas. KTS: Akane_Shinjo has deployed as a Boss for 7 opponents. KTS: Qivi's Blizzaia L Custom <Sarangay> has been disabled. KTS: Dr. Spartura has deployed in Spartura Custom Edition. KTS: Qivi has deployed in Blizzaia L Custom <Sarangay>. KTS: Qivi has changed loadout. KTS: Dr. Spartura has changed loadout. KTS: Rikka Takarada has deployed in Synchrotank. KTS: Rikka Takarada has changed loadout. KTS: Yuta Hibiki has deployed in Full Powered Gridman. KTS: Dr._Spartura has deployed as a Boss for 6 opponents. KTS: Alouette Pommier has deployed in GAT-01D Long Dagger Fortestra. KTS: Lucine Azul has deployed in Dianthus Mk. 3. KTS: Liam 7-020 has deployed in UNK-XX Proto Helios. KTS: Renais Cardiff has deployed in M9 Gernsback. KTS: Ruri Hoshino has deployed in ND-001 Nadesico. <Pose Tracker> Yuta Hibiki has posed.
"Akane! It's not safe!" Yuta calls after her, as she runs away from him. For a moment, it looks like he's going to pursue her, but Gridman shakes his head.
"Yuta, if we go after her now, the kaiju will destroy this city! We can't allow that to happen!"
Gridman's right, and Yuta knows it. More kaiju are appearing all around them, all familiar models. "What is she thinking, sending out this many at once?!" Borr shouts.
"We can't worry about that now. We have to prioritize this fight!" Max replies, light flashing around his armor. "Remain calm!"
Turning away from the collapsed building, Gridman picks Calibur up from the ground. "We can do this." The sword offers, simply.
As Full-Powered Gridman gets into a fighting stance once more, one of Akane's kaiju... shrinks? It looks like Go'yavec vanished, for a moment, but -- it's still there. Just smaller. Ghoulghilas goes smashing down into the ground. "Heyy, looks like someone's on our side!" Vit speaks up, with a chuckle.
It's puzzling to say the least -- surrounded by so many enemies and so few allies. Yuta fervently hopes backup arrives soon. He's worried about Akane, and her words to him sting as they always do... But his companions are right. He can't let the people of France suffer for his distraction.
"Right! We'll take it one at a time!" Yuta says, turning his attention to Mecha-Ghoulghilas. "Starting with you! Get out of my face! Full Powered Throw!"
Relying on Max's arm enhancements, Gridman lunges forward and grabs the kaiju. His armor groans under the weight, but he manages to raise it into the air and hurl it away, giving the Giant of Light some breathing room. Now to make a plan!
KTS: Yuta Hibiki targets Akane Shinjo with Full Powered Throw! <Pose Tracker> Dr. Spartura has posed.
EARLIER,
Akane Shinjo had asked for Bionet's help in compensation for their own use of her kaiju. Bionet's forces on hand, for the most part, punted on this. This was an unfortunate irruption of the world of adults into a realm where the give-and-take and feeling of the room is NOT THE WAY THINGS WORK.
Fortunately, some people are flexible. An experimental project had been underway which was not done... but WAS together enough to work, at least provisionally. And with the affirmative consent of the pilot candidate, Niko, a person of no real important background, DR. DOROTHY SPARTURA and her crony were able to wire Niko into a custom machine, not quite complete, called
HIGH TENSION
So what IS High Tension? Well, it's clearly been built on an Asshimar frame. That much is obvious from the shape of the head. It is not exceptionally larger than an Asshimar would be-- and what is more, it seems incomplete. There is *no* paint on it, only bare hull metal with the pallid gunmetal gray with a faint tinge of blue that tends to arise in metal forged on Earth. It is streaked with black carbonized scatterings, more and more each moment, and it also is missing its right arm, which is capped with a stout roundel that does not seem to be any kind of a secret weapon.
And what does High Tension DO...?
The machine had been under construction in a decrepit factory from which it launched. However, one of the summoned Kaiju intercepts the approaching Mobile Suit even as it brings back its one arm as if to execute an enormous power-fist punch on-- who? It was far enough back that it wasn't clear if it was Gridman or Synchrotank. But it's a moot point, because instead it strikes the side of Devadadan.
Heartbeat.
Another heartbeat.
Devadadan twitches. One more heartbeat --
and the abdomen of the kaiju ERUPTS in a blinding flash of million-amperage discharge; the kind of lightning normally seen on Jupiter. The rest of the kaiju explodes from itself while burning, most of it vaporizing into nothing in particular even if the screaming enormous CRACK of the thunder bursts windows and sends nearby parked vehicles flying.
"Kiiyaahahahahahahahaha!!" Niko cackles. They turn the machine around to sweep the one arm outwards. "This feels AMAZING! I can SEE IT! So who am I killing anyway?!" Behind the Aashimar, Devadadan's head smashes into a roof, shearing off the top story before coming to a halt and fracturing the floor below.
"Well, that's the thing," comes the reply --
From a stripped-down custom aircraft of some kind which seems to be lingering on the outskirts of the battle.
Within a fluid support tank, muffled by a breathing mask, Dr. Spartura answers Niko: "It's your decision at this point! I don't have ANY kind of way to control you, Niko. Zip! Zero! You're freer than anyone else in the world right this moment! What are you going to do?"
High Tension levitates on Minovsky particles, overwhelmed with the intoxicating brew of License. However, it seems to be considering Gridman.
KTS: Akane Shinjo fails to parry Yuta Hibiki's Full Powered Throw, taking 4180 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Yuta Hibiki's Telepathic Link activates, causing Insight L1! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Yuta Hibiki's Mediumship activates, causing Nullify! KTS: Yuta Hibiki has engaged Akane Shinjo! KTS: Yuta Hibiki begins a Formation attack! KTS: Kamille Bidan has deployed in FA-178 Full Armor Gundam Mark-II. <Pose Tracker> Rikka Takarada has posed.
Akane fell, but Gridman caught her. Relief washes over Rikka as she pilots Synchrotank forward to meet up with the both of them...
...But, she catches up in just enough time to hear Akane shouting at Gridman. Rikka winces. ...It hurts, to hear her so upset. Akane jumps from Gridman's hand, this time of her own volition... and begins to run. Away from Gridman...
...Away from her.
"Akane...! Don't- You don't have to run away from me!" Rikka pleads. But Akane still runs, and the roaring and the chaos of the kaiju prevent her from pursuing, the presence demanding her attention. Particularly as Mecha-Ghoulghilas opens fire with a barrage of beams, forcing her to brace Synchrotank against the barrage. The machine is pushed back.
For a moment, RIkka switches off outside communications, turning her attention to Junk.
"Yuta, are you hanging in there?" Rikka asks. He's been Gridman for a while now... is he going to have enough juice to deal with...
...All of this? ...Well, he's going to have to, she supposes. But it's a good thing they warned everyone about something happening ahead of time. She can only hope everyone gets here soon...
Synchrotank unfolds, standing up to its full height and drawing out a familiar weapon - one of the glue blasters more commonly used by Phormocannon. Gridman grabs Mecha-Ghoulghilas and hurls it away. She waits for it to land, then takes aim at Mecha-Ghoulghilas and unleashes a spray of glue in an attempt to restrain it somewhat before it can fully recover. That done, she switches communications back on. All the while she's a little distracted, eyes flitting off in the direction Akane ran. She can hear her still shouting. ...Is it really okay for her to burn her bridges like this...?
...She is distracted, suddenly, as Go'yavec in the distance abruptly shrinks. It sings, and a building explodes.
"What in the world...?" Rikka remarks, shocked. That dealt with vanilla Ghoulghilas, at least, but... somehow she doesn't think this situation has approved any. And then there's that mobile suit, eying down Gridman...
...Is this maybe a little too much for them to handle?
KTS: Rikka Takarada targets Akane Shinjo with Glue Buster! KTS: Akane Shinjo successfully avoids Rikka Takarada's Glue Buster <Pose Tracker> GaoGaiGo Team has posed.
It's an emergency. Monster alert in France. Perhaps a bit far for GaoGaiGo's pilots, ordinarily, but they're in Orbit Base, and they also asked to be alerted of any issues in that region.
They told Alouette they'd protect her mother. They've got to be there.
GaiGo deploys. The Neuronoid moves forward, looking upwards at the much-much-larger Go'yavec. Mamoru overlooks his data from the 'womb'. "That one's huge...isn't that one of Akane Shinjo's?"
"Focus. We need to protect the citizens. Shinjo comes next." Ikumi remarks in the head, as he signals Mamoru. Mamoru shouts out, reaching a hand up.
"YOU HAVE CONTROL!"
Ikumi reaches his hand out.
"I HAVE CONTROL!"
Both shout out, simultaneously.
"REQUESTING FINAL FUSION!"
On Orbit Base, Shigeru Akamatsu nods his head. With a big grin and a raise of a hand, he gestures towards a nearby operator.
"FINAL FUSION APPROVED! GaoGaiGou, don't give up! Alouette!"
KTS: Celebro has deployed in Go'yavec. KTS: Celebro has deployed as a Boss for 5 opponents. KTS: Celebro has changed loadout. Sayla Mass has moved to Urban Battle Zone <Pose Tracker> Kamille Bidan has posed.
Kaiju. Paris is plagued by kaiju, alerts are going off, and Dr. Kamille Bidan is available to deploy. Or, well, he doesn't have any active patients, and he just gets a feeling...he gets a feeling he should be here. He's learned over the years to trust those gut instincts.
The Full-armor Gundam MK II launches, dwarfed by Gridman and the kaiju as it hovers. "I hate urban combat," Kamille mutters as he stares at the ruins around him. Can't be helped... the only thing to do is to end it as quickly as possible. Which...doesn't seem likely with kaiju exploding, singing, transforming...
"...Can't hestitate! Wait, that monster..." A lot of them look familiar. And that's Gridman, and Gridman is that boy Yuta, and...
"Gridman! Hold on, help is on the way!" Kamille broadcasts at the giant as he rushes into Ghoulghilas, slamming his shield into it from the front. "Do what you have to do!"
KTS: Kamille Bidan targets Akane Shinjo with FA-178 Shield Bash! KTS: Akane Shinjo fails to parry Kamille Bidan's FA-178 Shield Bash, taking 4680 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Kamille Bidan's This is Why People Keep Dying activates, causing Sparkle! KTS: Kamille Bidan has engaged Akane Shinjo! <Pose Tracker> BP-119 Duke has posed.
Isn't it kind of weird for a fire engine to just be sitting out in the open when the situation only just started escalating to the point that it'd be required?
We'll come back to that.
As the additional kaiju start to appear and commit to their rampage, Regina Argine, nestled snugly in a cubicle in the Paris Brave Police offices into which she has smuggled several blankets and pillows in addition to her operations hardware, stretches out a long yawn, nursing her cocoa and tapping a few keys on her laptop.
"Okay so the stakeout paid off, I guess..." She mumbles, not quite used to pulling an all-nighter. "Let's see... We've got one anomalous kaiju sighted previously in Kabukicho... one unidentified one-armed mobile suit, modified Asshimar with high-volatility electrical discharge attacks, and anomalous Tokyo-3 megakai - scratch that last - modified turtle-mountain kaiju?" She's swiping at blown-up holographic images of camera shots taken from somewhere on the scene, removing kaiju from the equation as they're destroyed or incapacitated. "Friendly presence identified as 'Gridman' by 3G associates is on the field; 3G and other friendlies approaching the scene. Designating those three kaiju the priority targets; One, Two and Three respectively. Duke, your discretion on who to engage."
Go'yavec the Second opens its (her?) mouth and unleashes that destructive, explosive song. A white robot about the size of an Arm Slave crouches behind cover, watching Go'yavec-II carefully. "My lady, I would care to engage the... turtle-mountain. Target Three."
"Confirming Target Three as primary engagement; establishing telemetry uplink." Regine takes a sip of her cocoa. "Time to go to work, Duke. Activating Fire Roader autopilot. Brave Up: Duke Fire."
With a bark of siren and roar of engine, the abandoned, empty fire engine Akane just swiped the loudspeaker from comes to life, gently rolling away from Akane before picking up to full speed and screaming towards the scene. The white, knightly robot sprints to intercept the red vehicle as it comes apart, forming gleaming crimson armour as he announces his name: "DUUUUUUKE! FIIIIIIIIRE!"
Hitting the ground running, the thrusters on the tips of his wings ignite, propelling Duke at speed towards the sound-fire-breathing turtle! "Defenders of Paris!" His proud voice booms. "The Brave Police are on the scene, here to assist!"
BP-119 Duke has moved to Urban Battle Zone
KTS: BP-119 Duke targets Celebro with Fire Buster - Pistol Volley! <Pose Tracker> Qivi has posed.
Kaiju in Paris? That's a problem.
Paris is normally outside Qivi's stomping grounds. She rarely goes to Europe in general; about the only time she does is, once in a long while, to connect with her contacts in Moralia. There's a (probably unsurprising) overlap between arena battlers and independent mercenaries.
Which is why she was here this time, actually, nominally. The Shuffles did warn her something might be up... but why do one thing when you can do two? It gives her a perfectly legitimate excuse to be here if an annoying government official asks, anyway.
Though transporting her unit is a little harder.
Still, she managed it, which means that a long, semi-trailer truck, driving with a reckless disregard for possible traffic (it's fine, she wants to go the direction everybody else isn't) and speed limits (especially in a vehicle that large) squeals to a stop near the outside of the industrial district. It sits there for a few moments while things happen internally.
And then the entire side of the 18-wheeler opens up, a gigantic door revealing a carrier with enough room for three wanzers if they squeeze. Right now there are two in there. One is a weird-looking wanzer, a quad-legger with no head, an enormous gatling gun mounted as its front torso and 'arms' that are missile boxes, with no elbow, painted blue; a surplus Manege. It looks more like a vehicle than a wanzer, and honestly Qivi would never drive it; she intended to strip it down for parts.
The other is the green-and-black Sarangay, armed with its shotgun and spiked knuckles, a square missile box mounted on one shoulder and a shield on the other, painted with Qivi's logo: a snorting bull's head surrounded by a ring of rainbow gems. It's instantly identifiable if you've seen it before or follow Huffman arena battles.
The Manege remains idle. Sarangay steps out of the truck, hits the ground, and activates the landspinners, kicking up sparks as it accelerates rapidly toward the group of kaiju -
One less? No, it's just mostly blocked by buildings. Which is a good trick, because Qivi didn't know you could *get* Go'yavec behind a building; she didn't get a good look at it and didn't see most of the changes in detail before she started going through side streets, narrowing her field of view to what amounts to a tunnel in front and behind. Plus, she's been called.
"<Hey, Alliance! Coming in hot!>"
Sarangay skids out of an alleyway it barely fit in, the shoulder shield kicking up *more* sparks as Qivi takes the corner a little too fast. It angles one foot, sharply banking to one side before she grinds along the edge of the curb, shotgun firing upward at the still-big-but-not-too-big-to-punch Mecha-Ghoulghilas. Absolutely none of the piloting is safe or particularly sane.
KTS: Qivi targets Akane Shinjo with Covet V300 Boost Shot! <Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
It's just as Akane said... a huge kaiju attack on France backed up by BioNet. The Gridman Alliance is currently holding the fort, and although Alouette is a bit regretful that she never had the chance to warn them first, at least they have the kaiju alarm, so they are first to be alerted of any attack. She's a bit more concerned for Akane, but perhaps she doesn't need to be... she has an entire army of kaiju out there. She is most concerned about her mother, but she doesn't live in this district of France. If they let this situation keep up though, it could engulf more of the country... Mamoru and Ikumi promised they'd do whatever they could to protect her... and the other citizens too.
Facing the destruction of France, Alouette has a worried look on her face. "It's not looking good out there... so many destroyed buildings and Gridman and Synchrotank are surrounded." Her worried expression changes to a determined one. "However, we won't abandon them. Saving them and the citizens is our mission today. Are we ready?"
When Mamoru and Ikumi request final fusion, and Akamatsu simultaneously approve it, Alouette is standing before her desk... wearing her pilot suit, though. "Final Fusion... Program DRIVE!" She calls, pirouetting to the computer in front of her, gracefully SMASHING the button, and a whirlwind that signals Final Fusion emits below the base.
"Ikumi! Mamoru! I'll be right behind you!" The now-repaired Long Dagger whirls to life, covering GaoGaiGo's advance.
BP-119 Duke has cancelled his attack.
KTS: BP-119 Duke targets Celebro with Stunning Strike! BP-119 Duke has cancelled his attack.
KTS: BP-119 Duke targets Celebro with Lunging Thrust! KTS: Alouette Pommier targets Celebro with Igelstellung 75mm Multibarrel CIWS Dash-and-Fire! KTS: Akane Shinjo partially guards Qivi's Covet V300 Boost Shot, taking 5670 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Qivi's Unbreakable activates, causing Sparkle! KTS: Qivi has engaged Akane Shinjo! <Pose Tracker> GaoGaiGo Team has posed.
As Final Fusion is approved, three Gaomachines - the train, the drill, and the stealth jet, burst forward from the distance, creating an electromagnetic whirlwind that smashes up light posts around GaiGo and overturns a car. They have insurance. Probably.
As Go'yavec smashes a building, GaiGo flips into GaoGaiGo - a large, heroic robot with an actual head. Two jet turbines stretch out on the wings, as GaoGaiGo takes a stance. Ikumi is in control, so..."Ever since Guy got injured, we're the primary Braves left at Orbit Base..." Mamoru remarks, as he sends his partner data. "Ikumi! Let's go!"
Lifting is impossible for once - the foe is larger. Anchoring - difficult. Punching it in the face - perhaps actually possible.
"Let's focus on the mini-mountain turtle thing, Alouette! It's the largest single threat!" Mamoru shouts out once more, as Ikumi finally decides his approach.
GaoGaiGo does not fly. It hovers. But with a running leap...it can boost itself enough that it launches high. Ikumi pushes forward, blasting upwards with an ignition, as GaoGaiGo pulls back a fist...
And moves to slam it into Go'yavec's massive face, before the other comes up, moving for full-force fisticuffs! It'll have to land.
They'll figure that out later.
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
The lightning of Jupiter erupts, and the enemy of Jupiter is come.
"I'm reading distress signals from AEU France," Megumi Reinard, communications officer, reports. "It's... kaiju!"
Jun Aoi, executive officer of the Nadesico and current heritor of the bridge as Yurika has some no doubt antic-fuelled business elsewhere, scowls as he looks at the screens. "We'll respond," he decides, with all the hot blood in his veins.
(He's a rather hot-blooded young man himself, even if his own forays into an Aestivalis aren't always fruitful.)
And as the ND-001 Nadesico -- almost 300 metres of battleship, the twin stag-beetle prongs of its Gravity Blast Cannon jutting out before it in a constant reminder of its temerarious threat -- rises on the horizon, their systems operator, Ruri Hoshino, issues her report. "Several Shinjo-type kaiju have deployed... one has been disabled from the transformation of another. A third kaiju has been destroyed by a machine with an NRX-044 Asshimar signature."
Ruri pauses, for a moment, as she reaches out to the machine, introduces herself, asks its name --
"It's the High Tension," she supplies, a breath later.
(There are normal ways to get this information as well, of course. Ruri isn't.)
"Looks like Gridman is on site," Megumi continues the report, without missing a beat from Ruri's step. "With this many enemies, don't you think he'll be in trouble..?"
Their military advisor, Goat Hoary, looks up from his station beside Jun. "Gridman and the Gutsy Global Guard will be able to handle the kaiju," he points out, gruff. "For now, let's deploy the Dianthus."
Minato Haruka, their helmswoman, points out to him, sly: "Oh, and you think our guests will be satisfied sitting on their hands..?"
Jun cuts in, opening a communication window to the pilots: "Lucine, deploy. Guest pilots, we'll ask you to deploy, if you can. Aestivalis wing, stand ready to respond to further developments."
In the pilot lounge, Izumi sighs, draping back on her chair. "Held in reserve... my interest's getting lower and lower... I was really banking on some action...!!"
The Nadesico hangs in the air, as those machines deploy from it. And from it -- from one girl, to another computer -- a question:
Why are you fighting, High Tension?
GaoGaiGo Team has moved to Urban Battle Zone
<Pose Tracker> Nidaime has posed.
NIDAIME.
Is naturally inclined to lend a hand!!
Anosillus the Second is riding Anosillus the First who isn't the fastest of turtles but you know what they say: Slow and Steady Wins the Race.
"Gridman!!" Nidiame says. "Come on Anosillus, lets help him out!!"
And naturally Anosillus unleashes a sound wave that should hopefully support Yuta and Rikka!
But Anosillus is briefly distracted and turns his attention towards the Go'yavec. And it stares for a moment.
"Is everything okay, papa?" Nidaime asks.
KTS: GaoGaiGo Team: Will Barrier Activates. KTS: GaoGaiGo Team targets Celebro with Clobberin' Time! KTS: Shinji Ikari has deployed in Evangelion Unit-01. KTS: Ruri Hoshino targets Lucine Azul, Liam 7-020, and Shinji Ikari with Coordinate. KTS: Nidaime has deployed in Anosillus the First. KTS: Nidaime: Will Barrier Activates. KTS: Nidaime targets Yuta Hibiki and Rikka Takarada with Sound Spirit. KTS: Nidaime's sound spirit flares with his performance, raising Yuta Hibiki's Morale! <Pose Tracker> Renais Cardiff has posed.
RECENTLY
In her Paris apartment, Renais hears distant explosions... and, right on cue, gets the news down the Shuffle wire. A kaiju attack in Paris. In...
She frowns as she sees exactly *where* it is. That district's nothing but BioNet shell companies. If it weren't for the fact that the report's coming in from the Gridman Alliance, she'd have half a mind to leave it alone. It'd be doing the world a service to let the rampage go on, otherwise. But...
It's Akane. Why would she be attacking there to begin with?
NOW
An empty alley shimmers and melts to reveal an M9 Gernsback, its optical camouflage projectors flipping shut as it races onto the scene. [Club-6, deploying!] she transmits over the Shuffle line, flipping a switch to activate her IFF transponder:
Unknown unit - Disposition Friendly
"Hn. I see the Brave Police are out in force as well. Welcome to Paris! Duke Fire! GaoGaiGo! Alouette! I'm reasonably sure that thing is just as much stone-and-earth as it looks. We can pierce into it if we concentrate our fire." She whips the Boxer off her hip into both hands, letting a slug fly into the beast's side to follow up the others' strikes.
KTS: Renais Cardiff targets Celebro with Boxer 57mm Shotcannon Slug! KTS: Renais Cardiff has activated the Strike Spirit Command. KTS: Nidaime's sound spirit flares with her performance, raising Rikka Takarada's Morale! KTS: Alouette Pommier has activated the Rouse Spirit Command targeting GaoGaiGo Team KTS: Ruri Hoshino coordinates maneuvers, raising Liam 7-020's Piloting! KTS: Ruri Hoshino coordinates maneuvers, raising Shinji Ikari's Piloting!
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Yuta and Rikka had given forewarning, but having the Shuffle Alliance waiting in the city would be immensely difficult. Unless, say, someone who worked in the area with enormous sums of money hired a warehouse in advance, and was waiting in her expansive office on the upper floors of an office building and watching the situation on another device.
Completely unrelated, in her expansive office on the upper floors of the Yumi Foundation, Sayla watches the battle start to unfold. She presses her intercom. "Kevin, get the emergency wardens moving, I want everyone accounted for and in the shelter. I'll be down as soon as I can." For said emergency wardens, Sayla Mass's official registered location, at this moment, is across town in a meeting. Huh.
---
The advantage of a flight moden is even if you set up in the wrong warehouse, it's not hard to close. The two parts of the Saint Lance take flight, recombining and dropping to the ground. That's an interest mix of friendlies- the Nadesico, GaoGaiGo, the... Gundam Mk II.
And also Brave Police are here, that's definitely not gonna make things worse in an already bad situation. She grimaces, her comms array aiming lasers for communication. "This is Heart-2 to Alliance troops. Gridman and Astral Dragon have been out here longer than the rest of us, we need to end this quick. Transmiting existing combat data on the kaiju- And then Devadadan explodes and Go'yavec shrinks. And sings like... "What the hell!?" (That does not go over comms. Sayla's a professional.)
"Heart-2, highlighting known weaknesses on targets. Don't let Mecha-Ghoulghilas get then better of us this time. Aashimar data transmitting too. Stay alive, people."
KTS: Sayla Mass targets Dr. Spartura, Celebro, and Akane Shinjo with Designate L2.
KTS: Sayla Mass designates Dr. Spartura, making her easier to target and opening her to indirect fire. KTS: Sayla Mass designates Celebro, making him easier to target and opening him to indirect fire.
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
It hasn't even been twenty-four hours since the disastrous raid in the Wastelands, and Liam is still hurting from what happened. The bruises have healed, but both Ouka and Chienne left wounds in his heart, in their own ways. When the Nadesico put in a polite request for guest pilots, Liam jumped at the chance. Lucine is there. Lucine can help him, and he can protect her.
Then Akane's kaiju ruined everything.
THE SKIES ABOVE PARIS
"Acknowledged, Nadesico. Pilot Seven-Dash-Zero-One-Zero, deploying."
A Mobile Fighter, all brass and silver and blue-steel, leaps from the Nadesico's hangar bay like a skydiver. Maneuvering jets ignite beneath it, twisting in mid-air and slowing its fall; brighter, plasma-torch engines blunt that impact even further, tracing heat haze in the air. By the time it lands in the middle of the street, the Proto Helios is already glowing from a half-dozen open vents, and surrounded by its own heat-mirage.
NEARBY, BENEATH AN INDUSTRIAL PARK
In the relative safety of an underground bunker, a woman stares at a wall, her eyes hidden by the glow of her glasses. "Congratulations, Miss Shinjo," says Doctor LeBlanc, as she watches the scene above, backdoor programs feeding camera data to her display lunes. "You've become a problem." Her lips twist in a rueful little smile. Beside her, a nervous-looking man in a business suit fusses with his hands.
"The backdoor will be ready for departure in ten minutes," he says. "If we last that long. Four kaiju?"
"Four kaiju," says LeBlanc. She pats the cushion of the seat next to her.
And then, LeBlanc spies an intimately familiar reactor signature amongs the kaiju and Mobile Suits and super robots. She smiles like a razor. "SUNDOG," she says, looking at the feed from her lunes like it's a delightful birthday present. "I was hoping you'd show up."
LeBlanc hasn't activated the radio, of course, so her musings remain private. For now.
INDUSTRIAL SECTOR, PARIS
"Pilot of High Tension, this is Pilot Seven-Dash-Zero-One-Zero of the NERV task force. Power down your machine and stand down." He doesn't like the way they're talking, or the way they're looking at Gridman. Something isn't right about this.
But Liam has his orders.
The Proto Helios' plasma cannons iris open, and a spray of burning, fusing hydrogen rips through the air, aimed very precisely at the High Tension's limbs. Liam wasn't trained to disable enemy machines. This is nerve-wracking.
KTS: Liam 7-020 targets Dr. Spartura with Pass! KTS: Celebro partially guards BP-119 Duke's Lunging Thrust, taking 3084 damage! KTS: BP-119 Duke has engaged Celebro! KTS: Celebro partially guards Alouette Pommier's Igelstellung 75mm Multibarrel CIWS Dash-and-Fire, taking 1620 damage! KTS: Alouette Pommier has engaged Celebro! Liam 7-020 has cancelled his attack.
KTS: Celebro parries GaoGaiGo Team's Clobberin' Time, taking 1290 damage! KTS: GaoGaiGo Team has engaged Celebro! KTS: Celebro partially guards Renais Cardiff's Boxer 57mm Shotcannon Slug, taking 3895 damage! KTS: Sayla Mass designates Akane Shinjo, making her easier to target and opening her to indirect fire.
KTS: Liam 7-020 targets Dr. Spartura with FACULA - Plasma Shot! KTS: Dr. Spartura successfully avoids Liam 7-020's FACULA - Plasma Shot <Pose Tracker> Shinji Ikari has posed.
An encounter with Alexis in the flesh -- assuming Alexis has flesh under the robes and helmet -- has eaten Shinji's nerves down further on all things Tsutsujidai. Others keep telling him that somehow he might be one of the people who can reach Akane. He does not believe in himself, but he still has to try. So when there's the threat of Akane Shinjo's kaiju. Shinji Ikari does what he always does when the Nadesico asks its guest pilots to deploy: he gets in the robot.
He enters the battlefield with a massive leap, Unit-01 slender, violet and purple landing in a deft crouch more appropriate to an organic form than something mechanical. Shinji breathes heavy at the controls, before the battle's started, desperately trying to assess the situation.
He isn't trained for combat. He has his experience and his instincts now, but one of those instincts is not necessarily the physical threats, and certainly none of the protocol: he looks for his friends and the way everything is poised to attack them. He sees High Tension assessing Gridman -- Hibiki.
Shinji squeezes Unit-01's controls. It rises, it lunges, and it breaks into a sprint, going full tilt not so much to punch the High Tension, but tackle into it. "Wait, stop! He's not an enemy...!" A deeply naive sentiment, of course, to think that High Tension is here only to fight kaiju. But Shinji doesn't think anyone here needs to be enemies. Unfortunately for him, it's far too late for any manner of conversation that doesn't involve advanced weaponry. Why is everyone always so eager, so ready to fight...!
KTS: Shinji Ikari targets Dr. Spartura with Eva-01 Unarmed Strike! <Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Devadadan is designed to absorb energy.
Scratch that. Devadadan is designed to absorb certain energy; the Electrifying Great Sword certainly had no trouble with Devadadan, when Akane's world was only open a crack and not spilling out into everything. An electrified melee attack is, in fact: the number one proven Devadadan beater!
All that to say that Devadadan gets teamkilled basically immediately. Akane deployed four kaiju and has promptly lost half of them -- or three, depending on how you count -- to infighting. She's not happy -- and she's less happy as the 'abandoned' fire engine roars to life and becomes another opponent. "UuuuUUUGHHH THIS IS STUPID!!" she declares, furious. Brave Police AEU branch... that's great. Just awesome. She continues to run away as fast as her legs will move her (and it's urgent, so she doesn't struggle in the way she often does in this damn outfit!), she struggles to recognize the feeling in her gut.
(It's panic, but it's been a long time since panic. It's more a physical sensation than an emotional one, at this point.)
Slowing as she hears Rikka insisting that Akane doesn't need to run away from her, Akane... looks back, for just a moment. She tries to find the words -- and can't; how does she even explain to Rikka, how does she -- she's tried everything --
(Everything?)
Gridman grabs Mecha-Ghoulghilas and hurls it; the Giant of Light gets that breathing room, as Mecha-Ghoulghilas crashes into a building. Its lurching movements as it stands back up -- already firing on Gridman with everything it's got, or at least the beams -- barely clear the path of Rikka's glue buster shot. It immediately fires back with the heat array in its mouth, sweeping with a heat beam that it then swipes up and over to Go'yavec-II. The beam eventually gets interrupted by the Gundam Mk. II's shield -- and while the bash is very successful at both redirecting the beam harmlessly into the sky and booping it in the schnozz to establish dominance, it also means that Kamille meets with an immediate thrash of the metal plates along its head -- the exterior of the head-enveloping drill assembly that it often uses. ... at least it's not drilling now?
The small arriving Wanzer catches Akane's attention -- so much so that she ducks into a building for a moment, pulls out her tablet, and opens comms with it. "<Hey, little guy -- you're a bit out of your league, so maybe take this one as an excuse to get away early?>" she half-asks, as Mecha-Ghoulghilas meets that close-quarters shotgun blast with a stiff kick from metallic legs while simultaneously firing off a few blasts from its smoothbore guns at Anosillus.
Mecha-Ghoulghilas finally gets back around to High Tension; it seems most displeased with this, of all its opponents. Perhaps it's kaiju solidarity? Whatever the case, it swivels the smoothbore guns over, firing multiple rounds into both the MS and the ground near it. It fully sacrifices positioning, but the Saint Lance has eyes on it anyway.
Akane -- once again on the move through the streets -- scowls. This would be so much easier if everyone just... wouldn't. If they understood what was at stake -- if they understood how hard it was to live in this world, if they understood how nice the dream was in comparison to this -- perpetual waking nightmare of the Universal Century --
... She decides to try one last time. Opening comms with Synchrotank from under a crumbling building facade, Akane asks: "<Do you remember what I told you on the roof, right before summer break? ... That's still on the table.>"
'I wouldn't blame someone for figuring out how to run away.'
... It's worth asking.
KTS: Akane Shinjo has activated the Focus Spirit Command. KTS: Akane Shinjo has activated the Strike Spirit Command. KTS: Akane Shinjo has activated the Alert Spirit Command. KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Yuta Hibiki with AMK-01 Six-Emitter Beam Array Trick Shot! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Rikka Takarada with AMK-01 High-Intensity Heat Array Twirl! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Celebro with AMK-01 High-Intensity Heat Array Twirl! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Kamille Bidan with AMK-01 Head-Mounted Drill Assembly Bash! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Qivi with AMK-01 Super Hard Steel Claw Grab! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Nidaime with AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Blast! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Dr. Spartura with AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Detonation! KTS: Yuta Hibiki rushes into the attack! KTS: Yuta Hibiki partially guards Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Six-Emitter Beam Array Trick Shot, taking 3526 damage! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Detonation, taking 5700 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo roots her unit, coming to a standstill and leaving her vulnerable. KTS: Qivi's Physical Wall L1 activates, negating 1000 base damage. KTS: Qivi parries Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Super Hard Steel Claw Grab, taking 510 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo has engaged Qivi! KTS: Rikka Takarada blocks Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 High-Intensity Heat Array Twirl, taking 3000 damage! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Shinji Ikari's Eva-01 Unarmed Strike, taking 3330 damage! KTS: Shinji Ikari has engaged Dr. Spartura! KTS: Kamille Bidan fails to react to Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Head-Mounted Drill Assembly Bash, taking 2850 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo has engaged Kamille Bidan! <Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.
While Lucine's home colony of Nemi had been more or less been based on an idealized version of 'pastoral' France, there's far too much filed off to even really be considered a reflection of anything. ... But still, Lucine had always had a passing interest in someday visiting France, even one of the cities, like, say... Paris.
Just... not like this.
The greenhouse is a balm for anyone to be there. Piano music plays over the room speakers as Lucine coaxes the newest batch of vegetables to germinate, giving Liam instruction if he decides he wants to help, or letting him have a seat on the floor or a stool. The same offer is extended to the other guest pilots, like Shinji, though Lucine doesn't push.
Looking up from her plants in the greenhouse, Lucine nods to the communications window. "Alright. Will be there promptly." She gives Liam a worried look, then her expression softens. "... It'll be fine. Gridman and the GGG squad need our help, right?" The black and red flight suit, thankfully, is underneath her baggy gardening get-up, making it a quick matter of stripping it all off (... she does step behind a screen for some privacy) and leaving out the sliding door, her hands quickly pulling back her teal blue hair into a ponytail.
Climbing up into the Dianthus with a few confident moves, she settles into the cockpit and puts on her helmet. "... Alright..." She takes in a breath, and slowly lets it out, closing her eyes. "... No one can catch me, when I'm in here." A private mantra.
The dark magenta and black Dianthus escapes to the sky over the city of Paris. Lucine Azul, one of the few 'secret' Newtypes aboard the Nadesico, makes an assessment built from a slowly strengthening grasp of the psychic network of bonds that have been slowly forming since humankind has set their focus to the skies far above.
<"... That's a lot of kaiju..."> she murmurs, over the radio. "<And we're targetting High Tension, correct? It seems like it's just attacking the kaiju... just.... very violently.>" Shinji isn't alone in wondering if the High Tension might be assisting.
Yet, something pings in her gut. Anxiety, most likely, judging by Liam's own tension and the... manner the unit is acting. <"Mr. Ikari.>" she transmits to Shinji's and Liam's units. <".... Be careful. I don't like this, just.... the setup.>"
She opts to neutralize the High Tension instead. The five pink transparent 'petals' hook outwards like a mandala around the Dianthus's back, the bright magenta light rolling outwards across the material. Then, a sharp exhalation of energy, built to force the target away.
<"...... Oh shoot.... I should have identified myself first...>"
KTS: Lucine Azul targets Dr. Spartura with Lunate Crown v.2 Scream! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Lucine Azul's Lunate Crown v.2 Scream, taking 2400 damage! KTS: Lucine Azul repulses Dr. Spartura, forcing her to disengage. <Pose Tracker> Celebro has posed.
Shinya Kaburagi's body emits an involuntary sludgy SLORP and then a more human chuckle as the Ghoulghilas falls to its destruction. "Kiete karekareta," he says, in roughly the tone you'd expect someone to say 'top kek, idiot'
The strange, jacketed Go'yavec squirms. As Renais says, it's mostly a mountain, and peppering it with fire from that shotgun mostly serves to blow up some rock. Still, damage is damage, when you're facing something that's basically just a block of materials. Or...normally is? What IS this thing, now? Go'yavec is a pretty known quantity at this point, its raw destructive power harnessed multiple times by Shinjo and Bionet. But this thing is changed, somehow. Duke gets in and clobbers it across its uncovered upper jaw, and there's something more cohesive about it. Go'yavec always used to look more like a mountainside than an identifiable creature, but the features seem more cohesive, now. Its eyes wider, less beady and more peering. No longer glowing with untamed malice, they're more visibly casting about with something resembling thought. Animalistic, perhaps, but still.
Alouette comes in close along with Duke Fire, unloading across the stone with the head vulcans, dislodging stones.
GaoGaiGo charges at it, though, and it seems to look at the King of Braves with more focused intent. It makes a noise, not a scream, more like an inquisitive, almost froglike throaty "blorp", before it raises one of its massive talons - even reduced, the hand is several times the size of GaoGaiGo - and raises the stony claws, simply...catching Ikumi's punches on the tips of its claws.
Then it sings at him, a strange, droning melody that doesn't immediately resolve to anything. But shockwaves fire down from its mouth, sonic waves that grind away at GaoGaiGo. It makes a noise like a weird gurgling laugh.
THen it BARKS because Mecha-Ghoulghilas just blasted it entirely across its flank with a heat ray!! It parps and blaps and now finally SCREAMS, but less like rocks grinding and more like an angry massive lizard. It STRAINS, like it were humming something in its stomach poorly, and then makes a noise like BLAAARRR
And then a flying treble clef made of light comes out of its mouth and flies directly at Mecha-Ghoulghilas. That done, it tries to hum again, and NOW something WEIRD happens. A hazy wave of sonic pressure rips away from the massive beast; what windows have managed to keep standing under the pressure of its raw footsteps are probably shattered, now, but more than that, electronics get...weird. And more weird. And then half of Renais' monitors turn off.
Duke Fire and Alouette, closer to the thing, experience a more visceral kind of sonic blast, Duke's body and Alouette's machine RATTLING under the pressure waves of being so close to such a song.
KTS: Celebro targets GaoGaiGo Team with Turtle Melody Shot! KTS: Celebro targets Akane Shinjo with Go'yavec Fireball Blast! KTS: Celebro targets Renais Cardiff with Jam! KTS: Celebro targets Alouette Pommier with Anosillus Anthem Boring Shot! KTS: Nidaime's Will Barrier activates, negating 1000 base damage. KTS: Nidaime blocks Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Blast, taking 1230 damage! KTS: Celebro targets BP-119 Duke with Anosillus Anthem Boring Shot! KTS: BP-119 Duke blocks Celebro's Anosillus Anthem Boring Shot, taking 3220 damage! KTS: Alouette Pommier successfully Evades Celebro's Anosillus Anthem Boring Shot KTS: Celebro jams Renais Cardiff's sensors, reducing her accuracy. KTS: GaoGaiGo Team's Will Barrier activates, negating 1000 base damage. KTS: GaoGaiGo Team blocks Celebro's Turtle Melody Shot, taking 2700 damage! <Pose Tracker> BP-119 Duke has posed.
Go'yavec rears back and instinctively Duke Fire pulls back, winged plates snapping out from his left arm to form a kite shield. "FIRE SHIELD!" He thrusts the shield out in front of him and takes cover against the soundwave.
It still rattles and jars him to hold out against this force, but the pressure waves are, at least, somewhat dissipated by his defense, even as the paint on his shield begins to smolder and bubble.
Part of the advantage of being part fire engine in your combined combat form is you come with all sorts of neat instruments for monitoring a potentially-incendiary situation as well as fire-suppression equipment. A 360' thermo-imaging readout is transmitted to Regine in her cosy stakeout cubicle in real-time as her partner engages the enemy, letting her analyse exactly what's going on as it happens.
"Sound waves agitating the molecular structure of materials to a volatile state?" The pre-teen prodigy sighs. "Bloody hell, kaiju are weird. Duke Fire, take that thing down quick as you can, we don't know what other tricks it has. And keep an eye on Seven-dash-oh-two-oh, too, that unit's heat index is climbing rapidly."
"As you say, my Lady," the Brave Robo Knight replies over their private line. He has no teeth to grit, but his transmission sounds strained as he holds out under the sound assault.
"Curse... you!" Flipping his grip on the Fire Sword to plant it in the ground, he moves his free hand down to his waist, armour plates parting on his right leg to obligingly pop a Brave Robo-sized pistol into his grasp. "FIRE BUSTER!" Bringing the weapon up and bracing it against his shield, he unleashes a volley into the massive stone kaiju!
At this distance, aiming is irrelevant.
KTS: BP-119 Duke targets Celebro with Fire Buster - Pistol Volley! <Pose Tracker> Yuta Hibiki has posed.
Yuta's tired. He's taken a few hits already, and he can still feel his synapses jumping from the electricty of that odd mobile suit's attack. But when Rikka asks... "I'm okay! We have to protect everyone! But Rikka, if it looks like things--" There's a pause, as though Yuta can't bring himself to say his worries out loud. "If it looks like we're not going to make it, get out of here, okay? We'll do all we can until then!" If Gridman is defeated, they should all just pop back out of Junk, right? They've never really checked that, but... It would be fine. They'll fight until the last moment!
He doesn't seen Akane turn to look back at Rikka. Gridman's focus is on the battlefield, now. It has to be.
Fear weighs heavy in Yuta's heart. Are they really going to be all alone against all these enemies..? Emergency services are doing their best, but there's only so much that can be done against this many kaiju. But then--!
Allies begin to arrive! Beginning with a familiar voice, is that Dr. Bidan? In a mix of relief and thankfulness, Yuta laughs, taking a moment to wave at the approaching Gundam. And he isn't the only one -- friends old and new pour in from all sides. Any particuarly sensitive psychic beings would feel hope and determination rise in Yuta's heart, nearly intoxicating in its strength. He wasn't going to be fighting alone! They really could do this! Nidaime only amplifies this with her papa's sound wave. Gridman glows just a hint more brightly, sunlight glinting off his brilliant colors.
"Everyone!" Yuta calls, emotion in his voice. "Thank you! Let's protect this city together!"
That's all the time he has to express his gratitude, Mecha-Ghoulghilas has recovered and launching a counterattack. Gridman runs toward it, leaping into a spinning flip at the last moment. The beam attack grazes him, but it's fine! Nothing can dampen their spirits now!
"Gridman, I've got this!" Borr calls, as Gridman lands with a graceful bend of the knees. "Let's go!"
"Right! I'm counting on you, Borr!" Gridman straightens. The drills on his shoulders begin to open and glow, charging up. "Twin Buster Grid... Beam!"
Enormous beams the color of sunlight tear across the field. They split into multiple parts, targeting each enemy. The radiant attack embodies Yuta's gratitude for the allies who came to join the fight -- illuminating the Giant of Light as he stands in the middle of the battlefield.
KTS: Yuta Hibiki has activated the Strike Spirit Command. <Pose Tracker> Dr. Spartura has posed.
The High Tension turns slightly. It can't turn its head. The mounted cowling on top of the head component is like a blinder. Towards the direction of that voice and its origin, the Nadesico.
Niko seems to hear a question. "What do you mean, why?" the cyborg answers. "... What? That's what I was made to do, fight! You think I did all of this for nothing?!" Omoikane might sense a certain amount of confusion there, but Niko is processing something. Freedom. Systemic integration. Perhaps wholeness? Perhaps a new vision of the world? It's difficult to say.
Sayla arrives and begins to coordinate. And she may get something encouraging.
"Heart-2! This is Tokyo-3," comes an energetic voice of a young man. "Lt. Hyuuga reporting! We're monitoring the situation with orbital assets. Stand by - this sure is a mess, isn't it? Euro Branch doesn't have much on site, but we're linking up. We should be able to support Unit One!"
When someone speaks - giving a particular code - the High Tension's pilot pivots the machine towards them. "... That code," Niko says. "Hey. Hey! You!" Niko says. "I'm--" And that's when the plasma wave is hurled forwards, the fusing hydrogen flame shockingly bright. It whips with an elegant sort of billow towards the High Tension
which...
... seems to just float out of the way. "Haha! The halo! I like the halo! Look, though, are you--"
"HE SURE IS," broadcasts DR. SPARTURA. "Hey there, squirt! Sounds like you're doing good. Don't mind me."
Niko continues. "I'm 028, the doctor told me that was just, like, something to remember if-- hey, though, hey, you see those monster things, right? That girl who summoned them and there's this other guy, like Alexis something? These guys are assholes, and this city sucks too! Why don't we wipe it all out, Oh Twenty!? If we're the only ones standing," and here they make a sort of gesture with the High Tension's one hand, as if to tap the side of the machine's cowled head components, "we're the heroes, right?"
THOOM, THOOM, THOOM; Eva-01 is approaching. Unlike whatever it is that Niko saw, the High Tension is not able to predict the approach of Evangelion; Shinji is able to tackle the hovering unit although he would feel that it doesn't WANT to hit the ground. It seems to be floating, although he is able to bobble it downwards, and the Minovsky pack that is *part* of its flight struggles to push back against Unit One. "Hey! Who are you talking about!? Gridman?? Screw him! G, get off of me--"
Pressure is building. Sayla may be able to feel it. There's a sort of decisive feeling here, but it might be clear that this is a decision made nearly a minute ago -- it's just now *emerging*. So many things in the brain are rooted in arbitrary determination, and our reason simply makes up an explanation to thread it all together. The battering of the incoming flittering petals, the burst of magenta energy, pushes even further - forcing Niko out of Unit One's tackle and down enough to rebound off the French street. "Gghhh," the pilot says.
Which is when the bombardment begins. As the enormous smooth-bore direct fire rounds belt down on High Tension, there's a visual of a sort of aura around it, which seems to slightly divert one round as well as get limned by the smoke and wreckage. There is a momentary spike of fear from the pilot. Which catalyzes immediately into something else: a grasping for the recent past. For joy. Triumph. There is a glimmer there -- something... novel? But it resolves into something more classic, more definable: Anger.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCO30lsBFv8
"GET OFF ME!" Niko howls as a sizzle-tense-CRACK snaps upwards towards Unit One, lightning thrown from the High Tension's single hand. Staggering back on foot several paces, a different sort of spray is thrown towards Liam, something more like a rattling SHEET of lightning. Stagger, stagger - Niko regains the air, rising upwards.
"What are those... funnels? I heard about funnels! You're not going to get me twice, prick!" Niko declares, before suddenly sweeping forwards despite a lack of thrust to throw one plated knee at the Dianthus: "Die!" And it doesn't STOP moving, the lightning seeming to trail behind the High Tension, bursting into slamming blasts of ball lightning (if ball lightning hurt to look at, went off like a blockbuster bomb, and happened every fifty meters or so) while flitting forwards. High Tension seems to not quite 'get' what Saint Lance is doing, but:
"And STAY OUT OF MY HEAD!"
Niko seems to have figured something out about the Nadesico, sending a final bolt of lightning towards the Martian ship!
-=-=-=-=-
"I think I saw something," Dr. Spartura tells Jiro Fuma, the man flying the aircraft. "On the meters, I mean. It was just a moment, but it matched all the parameters. Oh wow, this is exciting. And at least Liam's here too, right? Maybe it's a buddha talking to a buddha kind of thing!"
"Can't comment, flyin' the whip," Jiro says, "but I'm excited! Now let's hope they don't blow up the city before we're clear!"
KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Shinji Ikari with High Tension Wireframe Burst! KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Liam 7-020 with High Tension Wireframe Spray! Shinji Ikari has connected.
KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Lucine Azul with Shock!! High Speed Attack!!! KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Sayla Mass with High Tension Wireframe Strafe! KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Ruri Hoshino with High Tension Wireframe Blast! KTS: Lucine Azul fails to react to Dr. Spartura's Shock!! High Speed Attack!!, taking 5280 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Dr. Spartura's Defiance activates, causing Sparkle! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Dr. Spartura's My Vision is Augmented activates, causing Control Bonus! KTS: Dr. Spartura has engaged Lucine Azul! KTS: Yuta Hibiki targets Akane Shinjo with Twin Buster Grid Beam. KTS: Akane Shinjo successfully avoids Celebro's Go'yavec Fireball Blast KTS: Akane Shinjo partially guards Yuta Hibiki's Twin Buster Grid Beam, taking 7320 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Yuta Hibiki's Telepathic Link activates, causing Insight L1! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Yuta Hibiki's Mediumship activates, causing Nullify! KTS: Yuta Hibiki roots his unit, coming to a standstill and leaving him vulnerable. KTS: Ruri Hoshino fails to evade Dr. Spartura's High Tension Wireframe Blast, taking 2850 damage! KTS: Ruri Hoshino coordinates maneuvers, raising Lucine Azul's Piloting! <Pose Tracker> Kamille Bidan has posed.
Metal screeches against metal, a terrible sound as Mecha-Ghoulghilas tears at the Gundam MK II with its sharp drill assembly plates. It leaves deep grooves in the shield and the armor. But Gridman waves at him, as he catches in the corner of his cockpit display, and that can't help but put a smile on Kamille's face. He (or rather the Gundam) sends a thumbs-up back to Gridman, as saying much more in the midst of battle is going to be a little difficult.
Urban battle, with someone Gridman is desperately reaching out for. With...
No, it's not like that. It's different this time, Kamille reminds himself, and even if it is he has to be the one to keep it from ending that way this time.
"We'll buy you time!" He doesn't say for what, assuming Yuta can guess already, as he turns his attention back to Mecha-Ghoulghilas, the Gundam's beam saber illuminating brightly as it slices downwards at the kaiju from above.
KTS: Kamille Bidan targets Akane Shinjo with Direct Slash! <Pose Tracker> GaoGaiGo Team has posed.
"Pommier. Glad to have you with us." Ikumi radios, as the punch is caught. He grimaces, up until the weird sonic waves are blasted, sending GaoGaiGo plummeting downwards, barely turning on the hover enough to blunt the blows.
Mamoru's uploading data, as he calls out to Ikumi. "We need to burn the lower half to have a chance at the face! Pass it to me!"
Ikumi nods, hand out. "YOU HAVE CONTROL!"
"I HAVE CONTROL!"
Mamoru, taking control of GaoGaiGo, begins focusing. "Alright...let's do this! Break Synthesize!"
The machine's chest grill glows alight with energy, as a large three-pronged claw unfolds from the back.
"G-Set!"
GaoGaiGo straightens, before rushing for the hip of Go'yavec.
The glowing claw is about to impact! "Synapse Attack!"
And then strikes hard, hopefully enough to do damage, as the burst of energy tries to fry and open a hole for others to capitalize on, Mamoru focusing mentally to strike true.
KTS: GaoGaiGo Team targets Celebro with Synapse Attack! GaoGaiGo Team has cancelled his attack.
KTS: GaoGaiGo Team has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: GaoGaiGo Team has activated the Spirit Spirit Command. KTS: GaoGaiGo Team targets Celebro with Synapse Attack! KTS: Sayla Mass has activated the Alert Spirit Command. KTS: Sayla Mass fails to Evade Dr. Spartura's High Tension Wireframe Strafe, taking 5520 damage! <Pose Tracker> Rikka Takarada has posed.
"I can't just- I can't just leave you." Rikka replies with a shake of her head, as Yuta insists that she leave if it looks like Gridman won't make it. She doesn't know what would happen if Gridman were to be defeated...
...But it isn't something she wants to think about, either.
Gradually, help starts to pour in. Rikka breathes a sigh of relief. This is starting to feel... actually possible, now. That there's still a chance they might make it out of this okay. More immediately, there's a Gundam she doesn't recognize, soon followed by Sarangay - each of them targeting Mecha-Ghoulghilas alongside them. GGG and the Brave Police are targeting Go'yavec, and the rest are dealing with the mobile suit...
"This is Synchrotank. Thanks so much for coming to help, everyone... We appreciate the support!" Rikka says. And not long after that, a familiar soundwave passes over Synchrotank...! Anosillus and Nidaime are here too...! Their presence on the battlefield is always a relief.
But, Mecha-Ghoulghilas is back on its feet, avoiding her glue shot. It retaliates with a heat beam. Rikka raises her bulldozer blade shields, taking the heat ray head on. It blasts her back, the shields briefly burning red hot.
"Gundam unit and Sarangay, we've fought this kaiju before. I'm sending the combat data over to you now!" Rikka says, quickly tapping away at Synchrotank's console. This should be a big help in fighting the kaiju, combined with Heart-2's targeting. Yuta, of course, will receive some encouragement through Junk.
...But then, just as she's sending out something else, communications open to her machine, and she hears Akane's voice. Rikka's hands stall, just above the keyboard. Her expression falters for a moment.
"...I remember." Rikka replies quietly. She said she wouldn't blame someone for running away. ...She didn't really understand the full depth of everything, back then. "...I'm sorry. I can't. Not when I'd be failing..."
She pauses - hesitates.
"...Someone important to me." She decides. ...How would Akane take it, if she knew that 'someone important' was Akane herself? She hesitates again, and then tries to turn it around on her. "...It isn't too late for you, either, you know. You can... You can come back with us."
...'With me', goes unsaid.
KTS: Rikka Takarada has activated the Trust Spirit Command targeting Nidaime KTS: Rikka Takarada targets Yuta Hibiki, Qivi, and Kamille Bidan with All-Out. KTS: Rikka Takarada orders an all-out attack, raising Yuta Hibiki's Skill! KTS: Rikka Takarada has activated the Attune Spirit Command targeting Kamille Bidan KTS: Akane Shinjo parries Kamille Bidan's Direct Slash, taking 1230 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Kamille Bidan's This is Why People Keep Dying activates, causing Sparkle! KTS: Kamille Bidan has engaged Akane Shinjo! KTS: Shinji Ikari's EN Barrier activates, negating 1000 base damage. KTS: Shinji Ikari fails to evade Dr. Spartura's High Tension Wireframe Burst, taking 4743 damage! <Pose Tracker> Renais Cardiff has posed.
Electricity arcs over the Gernsback's armor as Go'yavec's "song" washes over it, rendering Renais half-blind. She grits her teeth. This is a new trick... she groans in consternation.
"Shit. I'm half-blind here, it's knocking out my cameras. Are the kaiju... fighting each other?"
That's probably bad. But it means they're at least partly preoccupied... Renais gives one of the nonfunctional monitors a whack... no luck. She's stuck using secondary cameras to aim. But Go'yavec is a big goddamn target, so...
The Gernsback brings up both arms, assaulting the earthen kaiju's flanks with chaingun fire while she waits for things to (hopefully) come back online.
"Akane," she yells out, "What the fuck are you doing?!"
There's probably room for nuance in there.
She can't find any.
KTS: Renais Cardiff targets Celebro with AM 11 12.7mm Chain Gun Burst! Kaworu Nagisa has connected. POT: Kaworu Nagisa is now set observer. <Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
What was once an army of kaiju has now been reduced to two standing, including Mecha-Ghoulgilas and the large, earthy one. And it seems like they're fighting amongst each other now...? Whatever happened, it's an all-out melee and it seems Akane has really pissed off BioNet this time...
Mamoru suggests targeting the earthy one, which after a quick scan, Alouette identifies as Go'yavec-II, and Alouette agrees. It is the most dangerous kaiju on the field in terms of damage to its surroundings, but it's also the biggest target. In such a close, urban battle, its size should ensure they don't ensue in any friendly fire.
Speaking of friendly, more and more allies begin to emerge on the scene and the situation is beginning to look significantly better. Aside from the Gridman Alliance already on the scene, Alouette identifies the Nadesico, the AEU Brave Police lead by Duke Fire, two Gundams, a Wanzer pilot, and an Evangelion. She also once again detects encrypted comms which she now knows to belong to the Shuffles, who have undoubtedly moved to support Gridman and Rikka. On the open line, Renais greets Paris' visitors. "It's very good to be home... I wish I could say. But right! We'll back you up against the stone kaiju!" Alouette responds. "Duke Fire, as fellow Braves, we're counting on you, too! Let's work together against that kaiju." She doesn't quite give orders to the Brave Police per se, but they've always worked semi-closely with 3G: she feels comfortable coordinating with them.
As she gets close to the kaiju with her vulcan fire, she begins to get a strange feeling from this kaiju... it's emitting extremely loud sound waves, that Alouette barely makes out as music. Swiftly manouvring to the side of the hulking kaiju, neither her unit nor her ears sustain any damage whatsoever. Staying cleanly away from the radius of the shockwaves, she scans the kaiju for a weak point... and fires her beam rifle!
KTS: Alouette Pommier targets Celebro with M703 Beam Rifle Sighted Shot! KTS: Rikka Takarada orders an all-out attack, raising Qivi's Skill! <Pose Tracker> Qivi has posed.
"You got it," is Qivi's response to Yuta. She'd give him a thumbs-up but her hands are busy, and in any case she's not sure if he can see her right now. "You wanted a hand, you'll get it - I'm not going to sit around while Paris is under attack. Thanks, Synchrotank," Qivi adds, because any information is useful.
Even if it is hard to handle while she's piloting so recklessly.
Qivi receives an unexpected contact on her comms. Without thinking about it - it could be anyone around here! - she thumbs it on. If Akane has visuals, Qivi does too: a woman wearing a wanzer piloting suit, with the helmet on but the style that doesn't entirely hide her eyes; it ends at about her headband level, where it wraps around her forehead and covers the tips of her ears.
"<One, not a guy, and two, it's not the size of the robot in the fight, it's the size of the fight in the robot.>" Qivi suddenly reverses on instinct, bringing up Sarangay's spiked fist. It's nowhere near the size to stop Mecha-Ghoulghilas' kick cold...
...and Qivi doesn't try. She grabs onto the kick, letting it swing Sarangay up and into the air. It's an accident (or a death sentence) for most wanzers to let that happen, but Qivi has a back-mounted jet and thruster system, and she blasts at the apex of her toss, letting Mecha-Ghoulghilas literally throw Sarangay over itself and come down on the other side.
The landing is still hard. Sarangay can't absorb that much force with its knees, and Qivi's rockpit (and the view Akane has) shift alarmingly. "<You know, you could stop too, if you wanted to get away a little early,>" Qivi says, "<but if you don't, I'm not either. If there's *one* thing I figure can do about this shit, it's fight,>" before dropping visuals.
Why *are* they fighting each other? Qivi felt that noise in her bones and she had Mecha-Ghoulghilas to use as cover. She expected laval, but the Go'yavec looks weird. Figure it out, Qivi, it's important, she thinks to herself, frustrated at her inability to guess. "You know anything about the OTHER kaiju?" she asks Synchrotank - and the Gridman Alliance in general - more quietly.
She pops the missile box open while she reorients, firing a quartet of missiles at close range. It's not like it's a hard target to lock onto. Last time she fought a kaiju, she couldn't manage to get a solid lock with her older gear - but this one's half metal!
"<Oi, Gundam!>" Qivi transmits to Kamille. "<You need some covering fire?>" Apparently she knows MS tactics, at least a little.
KTS: Alouette_Pommier Changes attack to GaoGaiGo Team, BP-119 Duke, and Renais Cardiff with Awe. KTS: Qivi has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: Qivi targets Akane Shinjo with MGR-M Launcher Lock-On! KTS: Liam 7-020 charges into the attack! KTS: Liam 7-020 partially guards Dr. Spartura's High Tension Wireframe Spray, taking 5394 damage! <Pose Tracker> Nidaime has posed.
"...Brr......AAAAK!" Anosillus complains. He seems confused. He's smarter than the average turtle but he isn't exactly a brainiac. A Kaiju using the power of music...
TO DO EVIL? That's something that's quite alarming to Anosillus the First.
And so too, Anosillus the Second. Nidaime listens to that song and her first instinct. "Papa. Mama. Is that kaiju...being controlled?"
Not in the way she's thinking of.
"Why?" Nidaime cries out. "Why are you the using music to hurt others...!" Can that really be called music?
IT doesn't immediately occur to Nidaime--her lost shoes. Why would it?
Nidaime understands how difficult the world can be. Or she thinks she does. But when you've lived on the outside, when that's where you are starting...
But Nidaime isn't thinking about that right now because dad is taking fire--the Mecha taking advantage of his moment of distraction that is growing into a longer point of time with every droning melody.
It retaliates by ducking into its shell and attempting to crash right into the mechakaiju!
She hopes Gridman can figure it out. All the kid kaiju can do is trust him at the moment.
KTS: Nidaime has activated the Trust Spirit Command targeting Yuta Hibiki Alouette Pommier has cancelled her attack.
KTS: Nidaime targets Akane Shinjo with Shell Shock! KTS: Alouette Pommier targets Celebro with M703 Beam Rifle Sighted Shot! KTS: Alouette Pommier has activated the Attune Spirit Command targeting Renais Cardiff KTS: Alouette Pommier has activated the Trust Spirit Command targeting BP-119 Duke KTS: Akane Shinjo fails to react to Qivi's MGR-M Launcher Lock-On, taking 3870 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo parries Nidaime's Shell Shock, taking 1260 damage! KTS: Nidaime has engaged Akane Shinjo! <Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
Ruri wasn't asking him. That Niko responds, rather than High Tension... tells her an awful lot about what's going on, in the machine.
Her eyes narrow precisely three-point-seven-eight millimetres.
The 'will to fight'...
And then, her eyes widen, instead.
"As I thought," Goat Hoary scowls, hearing Niko's justifications. War smells war. "Blinded by aggression."
The High Tension launches its lightning towards the Nadesico, and the Distortion Field flares. "I'll leave the damage report to you," Ruri has enough sense to delegate, to Minato, glancing aside to her.
(The helmswoman flashes a V-sign, and informs her, cheerfully: "We're still fine, Ruri!")
"Requesting permission to open communication channels," Ruri settles on, after a moment. "... I think I can reach them."
"Go ahead," Jun says. "Minato, maintain evasive manoeuvres."
"Aye-aye!" Minato agrees, hands on her own controls.
And aboard the High Tension, a communication window flashes open. Ruri is a girl -- no older than thirteen, pale and fey and humourless. "This is the ND-001 Nadesico. Systems operator Ruri Hoshino speaking. You asked me to stay out of your head, so I'll speak to you like this, integrated pilot. Is your name High Tension, too?" It's more a curious question than anything scathing; Ruri can't assume anything.
"In any case, let me ask..." Ruri pauses, and thinks, for a moment. Her face doesn't shift from its still-pond stoicness. "Is this your dream? Is it really okay... to burn yourself up to get it? And everyone else, too?"
Ruri blinks, once. "If the world sucks, and you make it better, don't you want to live in that world too?"
And her gaze shifts, to the side, because she's sure she's not the only person listening into the High Tension's communications. She's made this a public window, for one. But that voice she heard --
"I thought about what you said, Doctor Dorothy. And... actually, I agree with you." Ruri pauses, again. "But I think dreams are something people should get to enjoy. Maybe these dramatics generate more energy potential, but I think a lot of people die, trying to reach that point. I wonder if they're really okay with that... or if they're just desperate." Certainly, she has the impression that the High Tension is desperate. It's right there in the name.
"I still don't know the answer. And I don't know the answer for me, either. But I'd like to tell you, when I do. And no one can tell anyone anything if they're dead."
She pauses, for a long moment -- and then presses her hands to her console, and opens up a second communication window. ... beside one Akane Shinjo, despite the fact that she demonstrably isn't in a machine. (The Nadesico provides its own communication windows at close range. Fun fact!)
"Miss Shinjo," that pale-haired girl asks, white-to-paper skin, gold eyes, "are you satisfied fighting the world?" She does not smile, not with face, not with tone. "I don't think they'll be able to forgive you if you keep quarrelling, so even if you get what you want, it will be like this for a long time. Until you die, probably." She pauses, and presses: "Are you okay with that?"
The nice thing about the Nadesico's communication windows, of course, is just how physical they can be despite their holographic nature. Why, it wouldn't be difficult to literally swat them away!
KTS: Ruri Hoshino targets Dr. Spartura with Pass! <Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
The enemy pilot speaks, and Liam's guts start to twist in earnest. They don't sound that old at all--maybe his age, or Lucine's. And the way the High Tension is moving sets off alarm bells in his brain. Are they...
'Hey, there, squirt! Sounds like you're doing good!'
The Proto Helios stands there, flat-footed, as its pilot flashes back to a lab. To that same voice speaking to him--to the soft, aseptic foam of the surgical gurney, and the slickness of his own blood. They used anaesthetic, of course, but they also kept him awake. Helpless. More injections. More genetic editing. And she was there.
"You," Liam chokes out. The Proto Helios' gaze fixes not on the High Tension, but on the nearby aircraft observing the fight.
'I'm 028, the doctor told me that was just, like, something to remember if--' Niko keeps talking, and Liam can only listen, fear and rage struggling for primacy inside him. Are they serious? They can't be. They are. No. No.
"Unacceptable order," Liam chokes out.
Twenty-Eight does not stop. Lucine and Shinji are in horrific danger; Liam's instincts tell him that the only acceptable place to be is between them and the enemy. The Proto Helios rockets forwards, plasma blazing from every vent on its fuselage. Several of its vent covers detach, floating in its magnetized aura and forming paired bit-like shields. The lightning rolls over them, and keeps going, scoring the Mobile fighter's chassis. In the cockpit, Liam's body jerks as the feedback from the Mobile Trace goes directly into his nervous system. The Proto Helios twists like a marionette on tangled strings. Liam lets out a breathy scream of pain.
I can't--
Lucine--
For a few seconds, Liam watches helplessly as the High Tension lays into the Dianthus. "No. NO! STOP! TWENTY-EIGHT, STOP!"
Liam sucks in a few shallow breaths as the Proto Helios' magnetosphere control resets; it thrusts its hands forth, plasma boiling from the emitters. "Get you--retrieving enemy pilot--" He barely notices Hyuuga's transmission. The Proto Helios presses its hands together at the wrist, its fingers curling. The plasma within boils, burns, and then erupts in a single, great streamer, racing to try and cut the High Tension off at the legs.
NEARBY, BENEATH AN INDUSTRIAL PARK
LeBlanc taps in a sequence on a nearby terminal, and waits a few moments for the radio to adjust for local Minovsky radiation. It's imperfect, of course--it always is--but her voice transmits to Doctor Spartura's machine with only some interference.
"I like what you've done here," says LeBlanc. "Could you tell me a bit more about it?"
KTS: Liam 7-020 targets Dr. Spartura with SUNBURST - Prominence! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Ruri Hoshino's Pass, taking 0 damage! KTS: Liam 7-020 rattles Dr. Spartura, making her next maneuvers more difficult. KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Liam 7-020's SUNBURST - Prominence, taking 4100 damage! <Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
As Sayla feels that mess of.... urges? Emotions? Desires? And it's an unpleasant, horrid feeling as she tries to close off. She doesn't need that in her brain- but it's enough of a distraction that the strafing fire scores the Saint Lance and she has to take cover behind a building. Damnit...
"Akane you idiot, didn't you listen to a thing I said..." Of course she didn't. There's too much going on here. The lasers on the comm array retarget to the Nadesico, Eva-01, the Dianthus and the Helios. A heavily modulated male voice, comm's windows blocked, comes through. "Nadesico crew, Evangelion pilot. Do you intend to take this enemy alive or dead?" She needs to know what their plan is, even if she has her own preference.
At the same time, the Saint Lance takes a bet, and holds it's shield out past her cover- and the three Mega-Particle Beam Emitters on the front charge, and fire. Blindfiring with a shield...
The comm lasers cut, apart from the Nadesico's for the response. A second fires out to Renais' Gernsback. "She decided to agitate Bionet. We both know what that means. Both Kaiju and the remodeled Titan's suit are targets. Focus on stopping them before they decide each other aren't good enough targets."
KTS: Sayla Mass targets Dr. Spartura with Saint Lance Mega-Particle Shield Beam Cannon! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Sayla Mass's Saint Lance Mega-Particle Shield Beam Cannon, taking 3990 damage! <Pose Tracker> Shinji Ikari has posed.
Lucine does not push, and Shinji shows reticence, but he does not reject the effort. In time, piano music and the greenhouse atmosphere seem to calm him. Gardens and farmland are rather nice, he thinks, when he gets down to it. He doesn't hate the feeling of dirt, or the sight of plants.
These are things he's forgotten about now that an all out brawl between multiple kaiju and machine has broken out, with Shinji barely able to tell who is on what side. All he can tell is: there's more than two sides to this fight. Shinji... does not like that.
Lucine tries to provide a rational warning, and Shinji nods even though she can't see him do it. "<R...Right,>" he responds, hearing her and agreeing with her. Something is off. He needs to stay on his guard.
Lt. Hyuuga is on radio. "<I don't understand -- there's kaiju here...! Aren't we supposed to be fighting those?>"
Why is High Tension fighting? He'd like an answer to that! Unit-01 pushes against the hovering, but not brutally. Shinji's arms shake with the focus of trying to decide the right amount of pressure. The pilot declares to 'screw Gridman' and that is not an encouraging response, and he's mercifully shoved off before the High Tension is bombarded. By kaiju! The thing they should all be fighting!
Evidently, High Tension has more than enough fight for all of them. There's only fragments of time for Shinji to deploy an AT Field before crying out, Unit-01 convulsing and arching its spine in electrocution before it slumps back into its usual position, shoulders hunched.
Shinji struggles to pull in his next breath, getting his vision back in time to see where High Tension is aiming next. Nadesico. "<I said stop!>" he cries out, launching after it. A leap, a kick, a grab and an attempt to slam High Tension down, none of it meaning to crush past its primary defenses. They are not genuine attacks so much as attempts to disrupt and interrupt.
Sayla asks if they want the enemy alive or dead: <"ALIVE!">
KTS: Shinji Ikari has activated the Alert Spirit Command. KTS: Shinji Ikari targets Dr. Spartura with Eva-01 Unarmed Combo! <Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
It wasn't -- it wasn't supposed to go this way, Akane thinks, as her kaiju start fighting each other. ... OK, there has to be something up here -- she fumbles in her coat for the device Juggler gave her months ago. She already used this on Go'yavec; she knows what the kaiju's cry is supposed to be -- so what's this one?
The Bio Devizer helpfully reports:
'Amusement. Translating... feels good.'
"Oh, so it's definitely... not mine anymore," Akane mutters, without a hint of irony or self-awareness about the idea that her kaiju never have particularly positive emotions.
Mecha-Ghoulghilas gets mobbed. While it nullifies that treble clef coming toward it with a heat beam of its own, Gridman more than makes up for the lost time with an absolutely massive blast of energy that sweeps across its whole frame. It lets out a strained roar as metal starts to melt and claylike flakes start to slough off -- and then slams its feet on the ground, rooting itself and firing back with a heavy shot straight for Gridman's center-of-mass. The other smoothbore gun swivels to trade yet more shots with Go'yavec-II in much the same manner -- though there it cycles in penetrator rounds instead.
Rikka... tries to extend a hand back -- but hesitates, shifts, turns the play around. "Oh, Rikka... still such a good girl, even out here," Akane replies, a little wistful as Mecha-Ghoulghilas rounds on her with a shot from the beam arrays mounted on the shoulders. "I really screwed up making my world so nice. There's no coming back from this kinda thing."
Renais asks her what the fuck she's doing, and Akane opens comms to her to reply. "Well, I was going to see if I could get BioNet to help me fight Gridman, but it seems like they're pretty useless. Today's your lucky day, 'cuz I think I'm more interested in solving my new pest problem than sticking with BioNet. ... That doesn't mean we're friends, though~"
Mecha-Ghoulghilas brings up two claws -- one to interrupt Anosillus's advance, the second to catch Kamille's beam saber. While the steel claws do start to melt a bit, the kaiju doesn't seem bothered at all. Kamille receives a forceful swat with the claws that might spike the hovering Gundam back down into the ground; Anosillus, meanwhile, faces the full might of Mecha-Ghoulghilas's head-mounted drill assembly, hoping to crack a turtle shell.
Qivi says that the one thing she can do about this is fight, and Akane muses back, "<You don't sound like you enjoy that that's all you can do,>" though it sounds a little hollow -- she's not doing a great job of teasing. "<You sure you don't wanna give up?>" Mecha-Ghoulghilas charges into the missiles a bit, having no time to get away -- and turns its head-drill down toward the wanzer next.
Niko receives relatively little of Mecha-Ghoulghilas's ire for now -- just a token shot from the beam arrays. Akane takes the time to reply to Ruri while it attends to business. "... if all of you would just let me defeat Gridman," she answers, "it wouldn't have to be me against the world!" She angrily swats at the Nadesico comms popup, shoving it aside.
A presence appears on Sayla's monitors, meanwhile -- a familiar one. "Oho. Hello there, 'Heart-2,'" the presence enthuses, teal panels blinking on and off in a parody of a skeleton's smile. "I'm surprised to see you pass this way again. Seeing the battlefield painted in red madder tones -- familiar for you, I suppose. Tell me -- do you feel more helpless this time, or less?"
KTS: Akane Shinjo has activated the Strike Spirit Command. KTS: Akane Shinjo has activated the Focus Spirit Command. KTS: Akane Shinjo has activated the Alert Spirit Command. KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Yuta Hibiki with AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Core Shot! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Celebro with AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Penetrator! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Rikka Takarada with AMK-01 Six-Emitter Beam Array Shot! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Kamille Bidan with AMK-01 Super Hard Steel Claw Crush! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Nidaime with AMK-01 Head-Mounted Drill Assembly Charge! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Qivi with AMK-01 Head-Mounted Drill Assembly Bore! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Dr. Spartura with AMK-01 Six-Emitter Beam Array Shot! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Six-Emitter Beam Array Shot, taking 4800 damage! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Shinji Ikari's Eva-01 Unarmed Combo, taking 3520 damage! KTS: Shinji Ikari has engaged Dr. Spartura! KTS: Rikka Takarada blocks Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Six-Emitter Beam Array Shot, taking 3010 damage! KTS: Yuta Hibiki blocks Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Core Shot, taking 4020 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo roots her unit, coming to a standstill and leaving her vulnerable. KTS: Qivi rushes into the attack! KTS: Qivi partially guards Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Head-Mounted Drill Assembly Bore, taking 6840 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo has engaged Qivi! KTS: Rikka Takarada orders an all-out attack, raising Kamille Bidan's Skill! KTS: Akane Shinjo anchors Kamille Bidan, forcing him into close range. KTS: Kamille Bidan parries Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Super Hard Steel Claw Crush, taking 780 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo has engaged Kamille Bidan!
<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.
Decision. Fear. Bittersweet yearning. Trees grasping for the sky. Branches dividing, joyful, sweeping lines, triumphant. A glimpse of something vague, and the Icarus's wings of Lucine's mind collapse into anger.
'Hey there, squirt! Sounds like you're doing good. Don't mind me.'
Slick blood, a familiar voice. The pinch of needles, injections. Awake, but numb. Can't move. These ones are clearer than Niko's, less easy to push away like any other sensory information, because her psyche *doesn't* want to push them away. They're Liam's. It's like listening to someone you care about cry.
And then coming to grips with things you don't understand.
The Dianthus doesn't move at all, when Niko crashes by. Its pilot is far too occupied.
<".....">
Lucine's hands grip the controls. The glaive telescopes out from one of the Dianthus's hands as it grasps for it from its side, the blade snapping into place by the time she attempts to ram it into the High Tension. <"I'm *NOT* in your head, I can't help it!!"> Lucine lashes back at Niko, one hand clutching the side of her temple protectively.
A lightning bolt snakes from the High Tension to the Nadesico, correcting Lucine's mistake. <"..."> She needs to get control of the situation, for Liam and Shinji's sake.
A com window comes open. Lucine doesn't recongize the voice, but she realizes, a second later, this is by design. <".... I'd prefer if no one dies.>" It's a genuine response from the still shaken Lucine, though it doesn't answer Sayla's question. Shinji answers, and Lucine repeats his response. "<... No killing.>"
<"Liam, Mr. Ikari. Maybe this is our chance.>" She *has* to be able to handle this. <"Can you two still move okay? The unit's using lightning, so be careful as long as you have contact with the ground.">
Her hands are gripping the controls so tightly. <"Let's move in sync. They can't handle all of us at once, while Ruri is talking to them...">
KTS: Nidaime parries Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Head-Mounted Drill Assembly Charge, taking 1590 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo has engaged Nidaime! KTS: Lucine Azul has activated the Foresee Spirit Command targeting Liam 7-020 KTS: Lucine Azul has activated the Foresee Spirit Command targeting Shinji Ikari KTS: Akane Shinjo rattles Celebro, making his next maneuvers more difficult. KTS: Celebro partially guards Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Penetrator, taking 5795 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo roots her unit, coming to a standstill and leaving her vulnerable. KTS: Celebro partially guards BP-119 Duke's Fire Buster - Pistol Volley, taking 2170 damage! KTS: BP-119 Duke begins a Formation attack! KTS: Lucine Azul targets Dr. Spartura with CL0-V3 Glaive Ram! KTS: Dr. Spartura partially guards Lucine Azul's CL0-V3 Glaive Ram, taking 1575 damage! KTS: Lucine Azul has engaged Dr. Spartura! KTS: Celebro parries GaoGaiGo Team's Synapse Attack, taking 1500 damage! KTS: GaoGaiGo Team has engaged Celebro! KTS: Celebro partially guards Renais Cardiff's AM 11 12.7mm Chain Gun Burst, taking 1819 damage! KTS: Celebro partially guards Alouette Pommier's M703 Beam Rifle Sighted Shot, taking 2115 damage! <Pose Tracker> Yuta Hibiki has posed.
Gridman, stuck in place as he recovers from the enormous beam attack, raises Calibur to partially deflect Mecha-Ghoulghilas' shot. It still hurts, but between the sword and his armor, it's not going to take him down. Once he's ready, Gridman leaps away, taking in the battlefield once more.
"Rikka..." Yuta says, glancing at Akane's distant figure. "If you need to help Akane, go. We can manage." It'd be so much easier with Rikka on the battlefield, of course, but Akane must be hurting. All her kaiju fighting each other feels like a bad sign, for some reason. Not to mention whatever happened to Go'yavec. Did it have a hoodie on?
Satisfied, Gridman gives a curt nod. There were plenty of fighters on each of the major threats. He felt free to continue attacking Mecha-Ghoulghilas. The metal kaiju is beginning to melt, which is a sure sign the battle is turning in their favor! Gridman takes cover behind a mostly-destroyed building. That last beam attack took a lot out of him. Time to recharge.
Dazzling incandescence shines from the Giant of Light, illuminating him once again. Weariness eases from Yuta's joints, and Gridman's armor feels just a bit lighter. With this, he'll have the strength to rejoin the fight in no time! Placing his trust in his allies to hold out until then, Yuta lets his breathing slow. He's putting on his own air-mask first, as Dr. Bidan said.
Akane keeps saying if he was defeated, that everything would be okay. Is that true? Is he doing more harm than good, causing her to send out kaiju after kaiju to fight him? The outskirts of this city are going to be devastated, buildings crushed and roads ruined. Would less people be hurt if he stopped fighting back?
"No." Says Calibur, speaking up quietly. "You're not responsible for her actions. If you didn't fight, many more people in Tsutsujidai would be dead. Not to mention the rest of the world."
"Calibur's right, Yuta. While we try to reach Akane Shinjo's heart, we can't allow the suffering of innocents." Gridman says, an unusual gentleness in his voice. "You're not doing anything wrong by fighting back."
"Alright." Yuta murmurs. "I wish it could be different.."
KTS: Yuta Hibiki has activated the Trust Spirit Command targeting Kamille Bidan KTS: Yuta Hibiki has activated the Trust Spirit Command targeting Sayla Mass KTS: Yuta Hibiki has activated the Trust Spirit Command targeting Rikka Takarada KTS: Yuta Hibiki targets Akane Shinjo with Full Power Charge! <Pose Tracker> Kamille Bidan has posed.
Kamille whips his saber up to take off the brunt of the kaiju's claw. On the upside, this lessens the impact, but he still takes a hard smash; the Gundam lands on its feet, but it's a rough landing. And Kamille, jolted in the cockpit, senses flashes of something...something bad from Liam. Something too familiar in this battlefield that already reminds him so much of the Psycho Gundam, of Four.
'No. Stay here. You're here,' he tries to tell himself as he squeezes the controls, even as reality starts to waver a little and liquify around him. He sees stars-stars, again, though he's on Earth. The stars are calling, and...
And Rikka and Qivi are too, and that helps him get a grip on where he is (Paris) and when (now) and let the emotions his powerful empathy picks up just flow around. It helps.
"<Won't say no to cover fire,>" he radios Qivi, though he doesn't recognize the voice. Allies are allies in the chaos of battle. And to Rikka he adds, "<"Combat data received, thank you!...Thank you."> There's a little more gratitude in there than one might expect from data alone. Granted that the information is all he needs. He hits his thrusters to get the Gundam aloft again, aims his saber and takes a shot right at Mecha-Ghoulghilas's...face. Does it have working eyes? Does it work that way? Kikaiju are weird, Primevals were weird, monsters are weird.
KTS: Kamille Bidan has activated the Strike Spirit Command. KTS: Kamille Bidan targets Akane Shinjo with Snipe! <Pose Tracker> Dr. Spartura has posed.
Ruri opens a comm window. Ruri sees a face - from the neck up at least. The face is more or less human, lank black hair hanging in front of amber eyes. They turn to look towards the camera point, though not much. "Hgnh!" they answer Ruri, followed by: "You trying to talk me down?! I'm not interested! There's no way your crap here can beat this power. You don't have ANY idea --"
And Niko DOES try to share it. It's not really anything directly useful other than a brief clip of something that might be visual feedback from Niko-- the world, but also a hundred different subtle wavelengths. Auras around everyone and everything. Tracing around the city. Liam seems to be a huge bubble; some kind of power seems to be going into Unit One's back--
But things get disrupted. Because Liam is sending a coronic wave up towards High Tension.
"Fff--"
-=-=-=-
"Hey, miclone," Spartura answers Ruri. "You sure you ought to be calling me right now?" And then there's a beat or two. Thoughtful silence.
"I mean in a general sense, I'd agree right back at you," she says, "but here's the thing: when you blaze a trail, there's gonna be a fire... and later on the trail is just part of the 'set of reality'. The first person to plant crops... to bring the wild dogs in from the fire... to make a wheel. To sail across the ocean, you know? There's always some blood on the ground, but..."
She trails off. "Damn, they messed him UP," Dr. Spartura muses as she eavesdrops on what Liam is saying. "Miss Miclone, I'm not going to apologize for anything I've done, but I want you to know that I'm not on board with whatever psychotronic shit's going on with Oh Twenty over there. Alright? He seems to really be hurting!"
=-=-=-=
"You want to die?! FINE" Niko shouts as the superheated plasma engulfs the underside of the High Tension. There is a countervailing electromagnetic waveform -- which may start to impact Liam's combat awareness, if not necessarily his *thoughts* -- something that pushes AWAY the superheated plasma. Alas, the transmission of heat energy cannot be entirely done by on-the-fly magnetodynamic effects, and there is visible scorching--
Followed by a cometary kick!! "Get murdered!" Niko shouts.
Lt. Hyuuga answers Shinji after a couple of seconds' pause. "<Shinji-- I think this is just -- kaijus against kaijus at this point. The specs on this machine are barely like a Mobile Suit's!>" Which may not actually address Shinji's comment in any way, but at least an adult is sort of listening to what Shinji is saying, so he may already be beating his typical daily average. "<This is affecting Liam, I can hear the stress in his voice-->"
The beams come for Niko after their hell-dive on the Helios. The first and smaller barrage comes from Sayla, who gets another "ngh!" in response. "You're all so-- so HESITANT! Don't you commit to anything?!" (Niko has little grounds to talk, or to compare. What Niko does have is electromagnetic control, which Niko proceeds to use to hurl an arc of thundering lightning up towards the Saint Lance. Sayla has learned something, at least -- the electromagnetic aura that seemed to be buffering some of the physical impact on the machine is far less effective against Minovsky weaponry.)
(As shown in what happens next.) Streaking rays of magenta intersect the High Tension's flanks; they clip off metal, even if there seems to be SOME effect from the level of energy pouring out of the machine. Before Niko can bring something to bear, though, Unit One is coming again. The kick only clips the machine, but the grab succeeds--
"Ghh!! Why do you care?!" Niko asks Shinji. And --
"-- Your heart's divided, isn't it?!"
-=-=-=-=-
"Another flicker," Dr. Spartura muses. "This is wild."
"What the hell is that thing, anyway? Gridman's cousin from Australia? It's got an extension cord, for crying out loud!" says Jiro, steering into a sharp turn down a boulevard. "Anyway, this sounds like you might just be seeing that Augusta Labs stuff."
"No, no... I bought all of that data already, four months ago. It'd flag it if it was just THAT. Kid's esper rating was below average," Dr. Spartura says, folding her hands in front of her mouth and failing because of the air mask in the liquid bath tank. "And other than the pressure-arginine treatment, I didn't touch the brain."
-=-=-=-=-
"Hnf," Niko answers Shinji. "If you're so worked up about this, take a nap. I figured out your weak spot!" And then the one arm of the customized Mobile suit twists, fingers curling upwards despite the embrace as something reaches, not towards Unit One, but *past* it --
Error messages go into the entry plug as the power system's megavoltage gets a little unreliable. Shinji's probably seen occasional flickers of this in the past, but it's never been quite this bad. "Check this out," Niko says, before there is an enormous SPARK in the cable connector linking the Evangelion to its power network!
Which is when Lucine dives downwards -- the High Tension had been squirming loose from Eva-01's general neighborhood as best it could but this interferes with the entire dodging process, badly. A chunk of sparking metal falls off the shoulder as Niko screams at Lucine, "NOT YOU! THE BLUEHEAD! GOD!! None of you are - are ANYTHING like the shows!!"
After a moment, High Tension's electromagnetic field collapses -- yay! -- and then suddenly surges as the polarity shift becomes revealed. The Dianthus is the negative pole: the High Tension is the positive; and the attraction is undeniable. The Mobile Suit goes flying towards Lucine's suit, aiming to twist round and smash her with both feet -- again, what's with that move? Even if there ARE limits to what you can do with mobile suit martial arts with one limb already gone -- as Niko says hotly, "You're NOTHING! You're - only getting this far because you're in a pack!"
Niko is sounding increasingly strained, and while Lucine is the first to 'draw blood,' so to speak, the customized Mobile Unit's coated in a lot more black than it was before, smouldering somewhere in the left leg.
KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Liam 7-020 with Newtonian Bounce Back! KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Sayla Mass with High Tension Wireframe Spray! KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Shinji Ikari with High Tension Wireframe Cool Trick! KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Lucine Azul with Sayonara' To Intrusive Noise! <Pose Tracker> Celebro has posed.
Indeed. Go'yavec the Second appears to be having something resembling fun. It wiggles like a dog that's gotten too excited, the huge...that's a hoodie, right? There's no way that's not a hoodie? on its back wags like a shaggy coat. And actually...wait, no, hold on.
Why is it one, wearing crocs, and two, only wearing them on its back feet?
The answer reveals itself as it REARS UP ON BACK LEGS LIKE A GOD DAMN (turtle) BEAR, standing FULLY A HUNDRED FIFTY METERS TALL and briefly completely dominating the skyline of Paris. As this happens, attacks pummel it. Mamoru and Ikumi spot the exposed belly and rake it with the chemical-synthesizing Synapse Attack, but it sees it and swats at GaoGaiGo with its massive claws; the powerful acids reduce much of the hand and claws to a blunted slurry, but it's not serious damage to the vulnerable belly of the main body. Duke Fire's blaster has a little more luck with similar objectives, though, raking superheating blasts across the sides of the beast and leaving a trail of heated stone that can be later abused.
Renais is busily blasting away at the sides, cutting a bullet pattern through the beast's hoodie. And Alouette manages to blast it - it's hard to call it a WEAK point, but its belly is probably closer to internal framework than the massive mountain on top, so blasting at it has some favorable results.
Then one of those croc-clad feet slips forward. Then the other. It's...walking. Toddling, more like, despite its absurd size, scampering across the city and bowling over anything in its wake, until it flops forward...directly on top of Mecha-Ghoulghilas, belly flopping entirely on top of the mechanized kaiju with a whole dang mountainside.
Once it has done so, it opens its mouth and croons - like the way a dog's howl becomes melodic, held long enough, more of a sound that evolves into music. Unfortunately, in this case, the music causes a series of musical notes to appear over its head and fire off in every direction, blasting toward Alouette, Duke Fire, Renais, and GaoGaiGo!
KTS: Celebro has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: Celebro has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: Celebro targets Akane Shinjo with Go'yavec Flatten! KTS: Lucine Azul has activated the Dash Spirit Command and has disengaged. KTS: Celebro Changes attack to Alouette Pommier, BP-119 Duke, Renais Cardiff, and GaoGaiGo Team with Go'yavec Fireball Bombardment. KTS: Sayla Mass blocks Dr. Spartura's High Tension Wireframe Spray, taking 5208 damage! KTS: BP-119 Duke retreats from the attack! KTS: BP-119 Duke successfully evades Celebro's Go'yavec Fireball Bombardment KTS: Akane Shinjo partially guards Yuta Hibiki's Full Power Charge, taking 2100 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Yuta Hibiki's Telepathic Link activates, causing Insight L1! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Yuta Hibiki's Mediumship activates, causing Nullify! KTS: Yuta Hibiki begins a Formation attack! KTS: [Lucky] GaoGaiGo Team's Unleash Your Soul! activates, and luck goes his way! KTS: GaoGaiGo Team successfully Blocks Celebro's Go'yavec Fireball Bombardment KTS: Akane Shinjo partially guards Kamille Bidan's Snipe, taking 5970 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Kamille Bidan's This is Why People Keep Dying activates, causing Sparkle! KTS: Celebro enervates Akane Shinjo, reducing her Morale significantly. KTS: Akane Shinjo partially guards Celebro's Go'yavec Flatten, taking 9000 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Celebro's Kiete Karekareta activates, causing Deject! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Celebro's The More Hurt, The Better... activates, causing Nullify! KTS: Celebro has engaged Akane Shinjo! KTS: Celebro completes the Formation attack! KTS: Alouette Pommier retreats from the attack! KTS: Celebro enervates Alouette Pommier, reducing her Morale significantly. KTS: Alouette Pommier fails to evade Celebro's Go'yavec Fireball Bombardment, taking 7200 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Celebro's Kiete Karekareta activates, causing Deject! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Celebro's The More Hurt, The Better... activates, causing Nullify! <Pose Tracker> Rikka Takarada has posed.
Yuta assures that that if she needs to help Akane, she can leave. Rikka pauses for a moment, her expression conflicted.
...It's... incredibly tempting. She does want to, but... honestly, she's not sure that if she went to her now, there'd be much she could do.
"Thanks, but... I couldn't just leave you all." Rikka replies with a nod. Meanwhile, Qivi asks about the other kaiju. Rikka frowns, considering exactly what to tell Qivi.
"...I'm... not sure. We've fought that one before too, but not like this. Someone's done something to it - changed it, somehow. And, apparently, turned it against Akane..." Rikka replies. "Those soundwaves, it didn't do that before, and it got smaller before it started using them."
...It seems a little familiar, but... something else distracts her before she can follow that train of thought.
"Nidaime..." Rikka murmurs. Hearing her cry out like that kind of hurts. She isn't used to hearing her sound so genuinely upset. Kamille, meanwhile, thanks her - he sounds... a lot more grateful than she expected?
"Uh... you're welcome! Hang in there, okay?" She replies.
But then, Akane responds. Rikka frowns a little. Her response... it rankles her a little. But at the same time, it also drives her to be more direct.
"Don't... don't patronize me, Akane." Rikka asserts, with a shake of her head. "...It'd be convenient if that was the case, wasn't it? But as much as you try to tell yourself, and make others think that's the case... it's not. You can always stop, and come back. There are so many people worried about you - for you."
There's another pause - punctuated and perhaps enforced by Mecha-Ghoulghilas turning its attention on her, forcing her to drive Synchrotank into the cover of an already demolished warehouse. She raises her shields, using the building and shields both to mitigate some of the harm to her suit. But after that, though...
"...I'm not giving up on you, Akane. I'll never give up on you." She says.
She takes a moment to assess the combat situation. They're still... holding on okay for the most part, but her previous fights with Mecha-Ghoulghilas have caused her to develop a healthy fear of the kaiju - like she's fully expecting everything to suddenly take a turn for the worse. She needs to be careful.
She brings out the glue blaster again, taking aim at the kaiju again. Instead of just a single spray, she unloads on it - aiming not to restrict its movement, but targeting joints and areas where damage has already inflicted so that she can really gum up its inner workings.
KTS: Lucine Azul successfully evades Dr. Spartura's Sayonara' To Intrusive Noise KTS: Rikka Takarada targets Akane Shinjo with Full-Body Glue Buster! KTS: Renais Cardiff blocks Celebro's Go'yavec Fireball Bombardment, taking 3600 damage! KTS: Rikka Takarada has activated the Trust Spirit Command targeting Yuta Hibiki KTS: Rikka Takarada has activated the Trust Spirit Command targeting Qivi KTS: Rikka Takarada has activated the Enable Spirit Command targeting Nidaime KTS: Rikka Takarada rattles Akane Shinjo, making her next maneuvers more difficult. KTS: Akane Shinjo fails to react to Rikka Takarada's Full-Body Glue Buster, taking 5859 damage! KTS: Liam 7-020 has activated the Focus Spirit Command. KTS: Liam 7-020 has activated the Strike Spirit Command. KTS: BP-119 Duke has activated the Trick Spirit Command. KTS: BP-119 Duke has activated the Trick Spirit Command. KTS: BP-119 Duke has activated the Trick Spirit Command. KTS: Liam 7-020 has activated the Spirit Spirit Command. KTS: Liam 7-020 blocks Dr. Spartura's Newtonian Bounce Back, taking 6000 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Dr. Spartura's Defiance activates, causing Sparkle! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Dr. Spartura's My Vision is Augmented activates, causing Control Bonus! KTS: Dr. Spartura repulses Liam 7-020, forcing him to disengage. KTS: Shinji Ikari fails to evade Dr. Spartura's High Tension Wireframe Cool Trick, taking 5360 damage! <Pose Tracker> BP-119 Duke has posed.
Regina purses her lips as she listens to the comm chatter, and opens a comm window to the Long Dagger joining the fight against Go'yavec-II. "Miss Pommier, is that you? Are you out fighting? The twelve-year-old with short blonde hair, who Alouette should be familiar with if only as a fellow computer genius, seems incredulous. "... Assistance appreciated."
Go'yavec-II spits a tremendous barrage of fireballs, Regine's eyes trace the projectiles as her telemetry systems calculate their trajectories, feeding the data back to Duke Fire, who weaves effortlessly through the firestorm as he jets upwards and away from the massive kaiju even as it rears back to a bipedal stance.
"My Lady! Requesting reactor reserve allocation!" The Fire Buster extends into a long rifle and Duke closes his shield, taking a two-handed grip on the weapon. At her console, Regine nods, tracing her fingers up holographic gauge and circuit patterns to reroute her partner's energy allocation and coax more power out of his reactor.
"Fire Buster: FULL POWER!" Hovering in midair, Duke Fire takes careful aim with his rifle, sighting in on the portion of Go'yavec-II's body he blasted with pistol fire previously.
"Take this! FIRING!"
A crackling violet-and-gold beam lances out from the flying Brave Robot towards the hole carved by the group's persistent assault.
<Pose Tracker> Qivi has posed.
"<I was there when it showed up before, in Tsutsujidai,>" Qivi replies to Rikka. "<You probably didn't see Sarangay, I'm easy to miss on something that size and I could barely hurt it. I don't know what the hell's up with it NOW though - >"
Qivi is easy for Kamille to feel. Not because she is a Newtype herself (she's not; there's no sense of connection quite like that) but because she's loud. It feels like a lot of person in a small space. At least if all he wants to do is give himself something to focus on, she's there.
"<Pretty sure>," Qivi shoots back to Akane. "<Sometimes that's all you can do. What about you? Wanna try something else for a change and see if it works better?>"
That's all she says because she has to deal with getting drilled.
While Sarangay's armour and agility and a helpful hand was useful against the kick, Qivi can do no such thing against the drill. She's not sticking her hands in the way of that! She accelerates, wheels squealing as she tries to get *inside* the drill's reach, catch the side of it rather than the point.
It doesn't work. The drill digs in, catches, penetrates; it goes into Sarangay's shield arm, tearing the shield itself apart and starting to shred the arm before Qivi manages to get enough backwards propulsion to pull herself away from the drill.
Qivi fires something from the ruins of the shield - it's a slash harken, built to about double scale and with a thicker braided cable. She aims it at Mecha-Ghoulghilas' side, trying to use it as an anchor point to swing herself around to the rear of the kaiju so she can actually prepare something *without* having Sarangay ripped apart. That arm is still sparking - it's a wonder it's working at all. Sadly she doesn't get as much fire support for Kamille as she'd like, but you can only do so much.
KTS: BP-119 Duke targets Celebro with Fire Buster - Full Charge! KTS: Qivi has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: Qivi targets Akane Shinjo with XL Slash Harken Hook! <Pose Tracker> Nidaime has posed.
Nidaime squints.
Is that a hoodie? Os that CROCS?
Nidaime goes quiet. There's no doubt about it. Somehow that kaiju is like her. She might never know how it came to be but she knows that somehow that kaiju came from her in some way or another.
Nidaime doesn't say anything. She just kind of gets down low. She doesn't like this.
She doesn't like this.
She doesn't like this.
She doesn't like this.
Less painfully, Mecha-Ghoulghilas slams a drill into ANosillus's shell, causing it to stumble back as a crack forms upon the point of impact. Maybe not as deep as someone might hope, but it's enough to get the Kaiju to back off a bit.
"Grooonk?" Anosillus wiggles.
Nidaime just lies there on the turtle guy.
Anosillus tries to hop a little to rouse Nidaime, bouncing her up and down but she just keeps lying there.
This keeps them busy for a moment.
KTS: Nidaime has activated the Daunt Spirit Command. KTS: Nidaime has activated the Daunt Spirit Command. KTS: Nidaime targets Akane Shinjo with Pass! <Pose Tracker> GaoGaiGo Team has posed.
The volcanic fireballs blast out, after being swatted back. "Ghgh...we're gonna get crushed!" Mamoru shouts out. Ikumi raises his fist. "Come on, you can do it, Mamoru!"
Mamoru pushes forward, raising both hands. GaoGaiGo does the same, as..."PROTECT SHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAADE!"
A massive sparkling barrier forms in front of the younger Kings of Braves, as the fireballs pound into it. It crackles under the impact and heat, but Mamoru focuses, as he thinks about the data...
And sidesteps, dodging the last one, GaoGaiGo unharmed. Go'yavec is open - it's blunted a claw, so...
"NOW!"
Mamoru pushes GaoGaiGo forward, as Ikumi shoust out encouragement. "We've got to protect everyone here. Braves don't give up...come on!"
The Synapse Attack fires up again, but this time, the claw soaks up more of that energy, and when it impacts, it *blasts* it straight towards the sensitive belly, trying to send a surge up Go'yavec's entire body!
"SYNAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAPSE...BURN!"
KTS: GaoGaiGo Team has activated the Spirit Spirit Command. KTS: GaoGaiGo Team targets Celebro with Synapse Burn! KTS: Qivi anchors Akane Shinjo, forcing her into close range. KTS: Akane Shinjo fails to react to Qivi's XL Slash Harken Hook, taking 4200 damage! KTS: Qivi has engaged Akane Shinjo! KTS: Akane Shinjo fails to react to Nidaime's Pass, taking 0 damage! <Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
Ruri takes in the feedback from Niko. She blinks, twice. She doesn't, immediately, respond.
Meanwhile, there's quiet aboard the Nadesico, as Sayla issues that question to the Nadesico. Alive, or dead?
"Our enemy is a human," Minato speaks up, first. "We can't just kill someone, even if they're all riled up."
"This isn't like the Jovians," Megumi agrees, unsettled. "Ruri just proved that's not an unmanned unit."
The Prospector, sitting on the bench behind them, speaks up: "It would be an insurance disaster if we started having to pay up for enemies killed in battle. Purely from an economical standpoint," his glasses glint, "I'm against it."
"I guess we're going to have to keep asking this question," Ruri summarises their discontent, flat-faced.
Both the bridge and the pilots are united -- even the Nadesico's guest pilots.
Jun sighs, and responds formally, to Sayla -- and to their fighters, "We want to capture the pilot of High Tension alive. The Nadesico isn't judge, jury, and executioner. That's not our mission. I'm sure the Captain would say the same."
And as it happens, having that communication line open means that Omoikane is in communication with the Saint Lance's systems. He flashes up a window, < ! >, which doesn't entirely communicate his alarm at feeling another presence in the mobile suit. Ruri turns her own attention that way --
And she appears on the monitor, once Sayla has said her piece.
"Excuse me, Mr. Kerib, but I think you have more important things to do right now than make... this woman," Ruri is at least delicate enough to realise when someone is using an alias, "feel bad. Please leave."
Her polite request is coupled with a harmonisation of the Saint Lance's firewalls to help it recognise Alexis's signal as a threatening entity it should evict. This is, of course, remarkably impolite on the part of Ruri, given Alexis couldn't have entered Sayla's systems through any of the conventional paths. It means he'll have to put more work in if he wants to come back and harass her some more!
Ruri looks to her window to the enemy -- one of them -- as Dorothy Spartura tells her what she can't support. "Dr. Dorothy, we're attempting to retrieve the pilot. We'll assist him once we do." She doesn't offer apologies; Ruri doesn't demand them.
She gives a moment of consideration, before she answers the rest. "Do you think Galileo was happy to die for what he saw, Dr. Dorothy?" She presses, with curiosity. "I don't accept that people have to die to change the world. The blood on the ground is a lesson for how to do things better next time... not a reason to accept more. If the visionaries of the world are all a bunch of fools who can't try and do things differently, all that means is they need a better telescope."
She presses her hands to her console, and offers defensive advice to the Dianthus and the Helios, as well -- but not to the Evangelion, because when Ruri tries to talk to Evangelions, it doesn't go well.
Meanwhile, Megumi opens a communication channel to Liam, her purple hair and freckles showing a concerned face. "Liam? Seems like you're running pretty hot right now. Are you okay? If you need to retreat, the Nadesico can cover you. Oh, but it's not an order or anything!" She remembers to add, a hand coming up to her mouth.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Someone is in her systems. The fact that she feels it before she hears it... That awful pressure. He knows her codename. Of course he fucking does. "Alexis Kerib. I was wondering when you'd deign to inconvenience me directly."
Seeing the battlefield painted in red madder tones -- familiar for you, I suppose.
"You complete and utter piece of shit. You fucking scumbag!" Alexis seems to hit the note. "How DARE you bring him up?" She's not going to ask how he knows. He knows. He knows and-
The responses from the Nadesico come to her. "...idealistic children." Alexis knows now too. She growls. "You know what, it makes sense. You're a lot like my him. A selfish, empty fool with nothing to do but use and hurt people to feel *anything*. But there is one big difference."
The well of pain in her heart as boiled to the surface and finally, for once, there is an acceptable target who KNOWS her anger and deserves it. "You? I am going to make sure that before your pathetic existence ends, I am going to make you feel the pain you deserve. I am going to ensure you fail. And just like I promised Akane, I am going to make sure you deal with the consequences at the end. And I'm not like my brother." Sayla looks Alexis in the visor he has for eyes. "I keep my promises."
The voice modulator comes back on, but it may be too late to be needed. "Your preference is acknowledged, Nadesico. It lacks signifcant beam coating. Make of that what you will." And then the Saint Lance dashs out, rifle drawn, aimed for the High Tension- where the reactor would be on the Aashimar. Time to put an end to this- and hopefully the Nadesico crew know how to pull their potential rescuee out.
<Pose Tracker> Renais Cardiff has posed.
Renais drops down onto one knee, letting the Go'yavec's fireball, the tension easing just slightly as her cameras flicker back to life. Thank God. Rising back to her feet in the Gernsback, she ejects the last shot's shell.
"I don't give a SINGLE GODDAMN FUCK," she yells through the Arm Slave's speakers, managing to clip and distort them, "whether you think we're friends! That's not why I'm doing this. I'm doing it because saving helpless fuckers like you is my JOB!"
She glares up at the little figure of Akane for a long time before turning her attention back to Go'yavec.
She has the same realization as Nidaime, then.
She tunes over to Nidaime's headset. With a level of calm that makes her sound almost like a different person than the one who was just shouting, she tells the little kaiju, "That thing's nothing like you are, squirt. Whoever made this thing's trying to throw you off... don't let them." A pause. "Let's grab some hot chocolate when we're done here."
This is personal now.
With that, she takes aim at Go'yavec's underbelly. The G-Stone on her wrist keens, and flashes of fire spill from the Boxer's muzzle, one after the other.
KTS: Sayla Mass has activated the Strike Spirit Command. KTS: Sayla Mass has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: Sayla Mass has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: Sayla Mass has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: Renais Cardiff has activated the Spirit Spirit Command. KTS: Renais Cardiff has activated the Spirit Spirit Command. KTS: Sayla Mass targets Dr. Spartura with Saint Lance Beam Rifle Charged Shot! KTS: Renais Cardiff targets Celebro with Boxer 57mm Shotcannon Slug Magdump! KTS: Ruri Hoshino targets Lucine Azul, Liam 7-020, and Sayla Mass with Caution. KTS: Celebro partially guards BP-119 Duke's Fire Buster - Full Charge, taking 6745 damage! KTS: BP-119 Duke roots his unit, coming to a standstill and leaving him vulnerable. KTS: Ruri Hoshino suggests caution, raising Sayla Mass's Intuition! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Sayla Mass's Saint Lance Beam Rifle Charged Shot, taking 7020 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Sayla Mass's Fighter Ace activates, causing Insight L1! KTS: Celebro has activated the Wall Spirit Command. KTS: Celebro partially guards Renais Cardiff's Boxer 57mm Shotcannon Slug Magdump, taking 6240 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Renais Cardiff's Defiance activates, causing Sparkle! [OOC] Akane Shinjo says, "blu-ray ruri-sayla pose juggling, i'll handle it in post"
KTS: Celebro partially guards GaoGaiGo Team's Synapse Burn, taking 5766 damage! KTS: GaoGaiGo Team has engaged Celebro! <Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.
"<.... .... Blue.... head?>" Show? Wasn't there a blue-haired guy in that one show the crew kept watching? <"..... Are you... talking about Gekiganger?">
No, no, this isn't the time, because High Tension is coming *straight* for her! The Dianthus is already twisting to make a sharp turn to the side, that mix of paranoia and foresight coming in handy, rather than a source of confusion. It's deadly close, with even the slightest error in contact, the barest of scraps, meaning that she'd be in as much pain as Liam and Shinji.
The high from pulling it off is enough to make her forget she was about to throw up minutes earlier.
'You're NOTHING! You're - only getting this far because you're in a pack!'
Sayla's modulated voice's advise is noted. "<... Thank you.>
She flips some switches, and the Dianthus skirts around in the air like an annoying sibling in a game of keep-away, depositing glowing balls of energy about the field.
"<Liam, Mr. Ikari. We have our opening. For the sake of the person inside, let's do our best.>"
There was no plan here, only trust.
KTS: Lucine Azul has activated the Spirit Spirit Command. KTS: Ruri Hoshino suggests caution, raising Lucine Azul's Intuition! KTS: Lucine Azul has activated the Spirit Spirit Command. KTS: Ruri Hoshino suggests caution, raising Liam 7-020's Intuition! KTS: Lucine Azul targets Dr. Spartura with Lunate Crown v.2 Fireflies! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Lucine Azul's Lunate Crown v.2 Fireflies, taking 3000 damage! KTS: Lucine Azul begins a Formation attack! <Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
Along with Duke, Alouette receives a communication from another familiar voice. "Mademoiselle Argine... so you're the brains behind Duke," she smiles. She had recognized the girl as a rising star in the robotics scene who was just a few years younger than her, and it seems that reputation is warranted. She doesn't belittle her age: she knows how it feels to be underestimated for that.
"And yes! The Mobile Corps are... unfortunately understaffed at the moment, so I've been doing my own part. I would say I'm getting pretty good at fighting kaiju, you know."
Alouette can also hear Akane over the communications, and she decides, perhaps against the better of her judgement to beam herself a communication line to her. Perhaps Akane continuing to talk like the only thing that matters still is Gridman struck a bit of a nerve as she looks at the ruined streets of Paris.
"Akane. It's Alouette: it seems like we did meet again in Paris, but maybe not in the way you expected." She shakes her head, not that it matters because it's an audio communication.
"I told you so many times: this is how BioNet operates. I'll be clear... right now, this has absolutely nothing to do with Tsutsujidai or defeating Gridman. So let's work together to clean this up this mess of yours, shall we? We can't afford to be enemies right now, after all."
Each attack bounces off the walking fortress of a kaiju, with Alouette's beam rifle shot on the belly being marginally successful. And then it... erupts with musical fireballs raining upon the team attacking it. The fire melts off a significant chunk of the Long Dagger's Fortestra armor, with Alouette making a quick retreat behind a still-standing building, before she can sustain more damage. "Tch... a direct hit. I'll stay back and provide missile support from here." What remains of the Fortestra lowers, firing a rapid volley of missiles aimed towards the belly of the kaiju. "Missiles, fire!"
While she has the chance, she also takes a look at GaoGaiGo's status. She's still one of their operators after all, even when she's out here. They blocked that last hit, that's good. In that case... "Additionally, sending firing data to GaoGaiGo! Try aiming for the underbelly."
KTS: Alouette Pommier has activated the Attune Spirit Command targeting GaoGaiGo Team KTS: Alouette Pommier has activated the Strike Spirit Command. KTS: Alouette Pommier targets Celebro with Missile Full Volley! <Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
The Proto Helios' shoulders sag from exertion. Niko's electrical blast didn't fry the communications, but part of Liam wishes it did. The others weighed in, and he feels redundant, but: "Save them," he says. His voice is somehow hollow and ragged at the same time. In the same breath, he goes back to pleading.
"Twenty-Eight," Liam says, "Twenty-Eight, please--!" There's no answer, beyond the ranting and the violence. What did she do to this person? What did she do?!
The waveform slams into the Proto Helios, and the plasma venting from it starts to dissipate violently as the magnetosphere loses cohesion. The computer struggles to compensate; static builds in Liam's thoughts, and his face twists. The Mobile Fighter stumbles backwards, its back slamming into an industrial cooling tower. The metal softens and deforms beneath it, outright running like water where the plasma touches it. Liam fights through the interference--it's disrupting his neural wiring, he realizes--
And then Niko catches him while he's unprepared. The modified Asshimar's foot slams into the Proto Helios' shoulder, and metal crumples beneath the impact. The Mobile Fighter goes right through the bulk of the cooling tower, crushing through fans and catwalks and machinery. It comes out the other side missing most of its ablative armor, with a shoulder wound trailing sparks.
Megumi's face appears in the display, floating above Liam's. The transparent optic shields are down, lending a glassy sheen to his eyes, and his face is pale despite the withering heat in the cockpit.. <Finish this,> he chokes out. He saved Anti. He has to get the pilot out of there. <Can't be useless.>
Lucine opens the way. Liam has flown alongside her enough to know how she operates. As the fog dissipates from his brain, the Proto Helios picks itself up, even as chunks of its armor melt off its frame, and fire spreads along the ground. (Duke might want to deal with that, should the kaiju give him the chance.) The Mobile Fighter lifts off with pilot-crushing acceleration, and Liam weathers the G-forces with gritted teeth as he tries to simply rush down the High Tension. A long, thin blade of plasma extrudes from the emitter in its hand. Liam banks left, then right, then right at an angle, and flies right through the formation of Lunate Crown spheres. He brings that knife down at the High Tension's arm, trying to hack through in a single strike.
KTS: Liam 7-020 targets Dr. Spartura with SUNBURST - Starshard Knife! KTS: Celebro partially guards Alouette Pommier's Missile Full Volley, taking 2430 damage! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Liam 7-020's SUNBURST - Starshard Knife, taking 5580 damage! KTS: Liam 7-020 has engaged Dr. Spartura! KTS: Liam 7-020 completes the Formation attack! <Pose Tracker> Shinji Ikari has posed.
Shinji grits his teeth as Lt. Hyuuga reports. Shinji is listening, grip tight, posture leaning forward. "<But -- but there's a pilot!>" he protests. Pointing out Liam's stake in this has Shinji tense up. He looks through the windows toward his comrade, pupils shrunk down. 'Stress' is a mild way of putting it.
But that doesn't mean they can kill a person!
"<I don't want you to die!>" Shinji tells Niko as she asks, and he has no reason for that beyond not wanting anyone to die, but that makes it no less genuine a plea. Something about a divide heart might be true, too, but it doesn't feel divided! He just wants everything to stop and for the wrong people to stop attacking each other!
Niko is far less inclined to hold back than Shinji is. Warning messages have him sitting up straight, jerking his gaze around in panic. "Huh?!" Flickering like a bulb caught in a storm, except his whole unit is the bulb, and the world's about to go dark. The spark goes through directly through the power network, and Shinji --
Shinji is not sure what he feels, eyes wide and body numb and webbed with fire at the same time as Unit-01 twitches and goes slack. So does Shinji, slumped in his entry plug.
Lucine intervenes, forcing High Tension away from Unit-01's crumpled form. There's screaming, but it sounds distant and... blurry? Why are sounds allowed to be blurry? Liam's distressed voice cuts through, because Lt. Hyuuga said something, he said... what was it?
The softer sounds are easier to make out: 'We' have 'our' opening. For the sake of the person inside.
Unit-01's face lights back up. With not so much as a twitch of warning, it bursts to action, launching itself at High Tension. A shoulder pylon smokes open, knife seized, and erratically following Liam, Shinji and Unit-01 drive the prog knife for the other arm, aiming to disable both limbs in nearly the same moment.
KTS: Shinji Ikari has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: Shinji Ikari has activated the Alert Spirit Command. KTS: Shinji Ikari targets Dr. Spartura with Progressive Knife Drive! <Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
The good news: For all that it's more machinelike than many of Akane's past outings, Mecha-Ghoulghilas is still a kaiju and still has parts that function. It cringes from the light in Gridman's heart, leaving itself fully open for Kamille's attack on its eyes the instant the drill assembly snaps back open. Rocking back and forth a bit, Mecha-Ghoulghilas gets ready to respond --
-- and rather than respond, it finds itself crushed under the full weight of Go'yavec. When it lets out that cry, Mecha-Ghoulghilas -- almost every part cracked, spiderwebbing, breaking -- crawls out from underneath its attacker. It's not defeated -- but it's close. And in the meanwhile...
'Don't patronize me, Akane.'
It prompts a genuine flinch from Akane, if only for a moment. She... she can't keep doing this. Not this way. Even if Rikka can leave, she's too spun around to actually do it. "... Do whatever you want," Akane finally says. "But don't patronize me with your worrying! You'll probably get it sooner or later -- give it a little more time out here."
At least she knows, now, that when she floated that question about what to do about Renais, that Rikka was honest. ... if Rikka's the hero, though, and not Akane's victim, doesn't that make --
Oogh. That's a bad feeling. Like many bad feelings, she shoves it back down.
Akane watches as Mecha-Ghoulghilas -- already severely damaged -- now has to grind itself against adhesives just to move; it doesn't need to move to shoot, and it seems to have no issue with bringing its smoothbore guns to bear against both Rikka and the unmoving Anosillus, but it does need to move to reposition or defend itself and it's stuck doing less and less of that by the minute.
It's a familiar cadence for those who were at Kabukicho -- Mecha-Ghoulghilas is in meltdown mode, now, trying to get one last gasp of murder out before it falls to bits. Qivi has plenty of time to reposition herself, which means she receives less of its attention -- all it can really do about cool swinging maneuvers is swat at her with some annoyance. (Akane asides to Qivi, at this point: "<There -- there isn't anything else! Force is the only language this crappy world speaks!>" Kamille's heavy-armor Gundam receives a barrage of beams, while Niko's machine -- still subject to Akane's violence -- gets a quick mouth blast. It can't quite reach Gridman to close, so it settles for a concentrated beam from the heat array in its mouth -- sustained fire.
Meanwhile, Alexis gets exactly what he wanted out of Sayla: fury. He practically bathes in it, saying, "Ah -- I see, I see! I welcome the attempt. Please -- bring all the sentiment you have to bear over Edouard to me. I'll be sure to honor it as best I can."
Ruri tells Alexis to scram, and helps the Saint Lance along in the process. "Oh, very well," he says. "I simply thought I'd check in on a persistent thorn in Akane-kun's side! But if you insist." No more of that, then.
He pops up on Akane's tablet. "The pilot of the transformable-type is actually quite known to you, Akane-kun! Miss Mass sends her regards -- and reaffirms whatever promises the two of you have exchanged."
Oh, Akane thinks a little distantly. So it wasn't just local EF garrison presence. "Thank you for the heads up, Alexis," she half-drones, already drawing the mental line from Sayla's presence to Renais's and back.
Which also means she finds the time to reply to Renais. "I'm not helpless! I have my kaiju! We've been over this!"
Alouette contacts Akane, too, and Akane starts off with a, "No, this is more or less what I expected -- though I thought BioNet would actually be helping on their turf." Alouette takes a slightly different tack to a lot of the others, though -- she doesn't try to make them friends, doesn't try to paint her as helpless and in need of saving. There's a mess; this is BioNet-normal; they can handle it.
"I'm not going to stop trying to defeat Gridman," Akane prefaces, "But you know what? I bet you're the kind of person who'd hate seeing someone joyriding in something you made, too." Akane -- now juggling entirely too many items -- swaps back to her megaphone. "Show them no one takes my kaiju and gets away with it!" she shouts at Mecha-Ghoulghilas -- which is really in no position to make a sustained attack on Go'yavec-II without grinding harder against the adhesives and the broken pieces, but --
Kaiju don't have any agency anyway.
Mecha-Ghoulghilas is a bully against a giant, put off its usual movements -- but it's also a driller near a mountain. That much is very doable. It trundles forward, body grinding, driving the drill assembly straight for as much of the crag as it can.
It's certainly not enough to undo all the other damage Akane is causing -- but at least it'll bring things to a close potentially faster than Akane's previous trajectory, if Mecha-Ghoulghilas is grinding itself to shreds against its own damage.
KTS: Akane Shinjo has activated the Strike Spirit Command. KTS: Akane Shinjo has activated the Alert Spirit Command. KTS: Akane Shinjo has activated the Focus Spirit Command. KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Qivi with AMK-01 Super Hard Steel Claw Swipes! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Rikka Takarada with AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Core Shot! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Nidaime with AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Penetrator! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Kamille Bidan with AMK-01 Six-Emitter Beam Array Rapid Fire! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Dr. Spartura with AMK-01 High-Intensity Heat Array Blast! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Yuta Hibiki with Concentrated AMK-01 High-Intensity Heat Array! KTS: Akane Shinjo targets Celebro with AMK-01 Head-Mounted Drill Assembly Bore! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Shinji Ikari's Progressive Knife Drive, taking 4000 damage! KTS: Shinji Ikari has engaged Dr. Spartura! KTS: Dr. Spartura fails to react to Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 High-Intensity Heat Array Blast, taking 4680 damage! KTS: Qivi's Physical Wall L1 activates, negating 1000 base damage. KTS: Qivi parries Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Super Hard Steel Claw Swipes, taking 600 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo has engaged Qivi! KTS: Rikka Takarada blocks Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Core Shot, taking 8040 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo roots her unit, coming to a standstill and leaving her vulnerable. KTS: Celebro fails to parry Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Head-Mounted Drill Assembly Bore, taking 6840 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo has engaged Celebro! KTS: Yuta Hibiki blocks Akane Shinjo's Concentrated AMK-01 High-Intensity Heat Array, taking 3060 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo roots her unit, coming to a standstill and leaving her vulnerable. KTS: Kamille Bidan successfully evades Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Six-Emitter Beam Array Rapid Fire KTS: Nidaime fails to rush. KTS: Akane Shinjo rattles Nidaime, making her next maneuvers more difficult. KTS: Nidaime partially guards Akane Shinjo's AMK-01 Smoothbore Rapidfire Gun Penetrator, taking 5002 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo roots her unit, coming to a standstill and leaving her vulnerable.
<Pose Tracker> Yuta Hibiki has posed.
There. Back at full strength again. The radiance surrounding the Giant of Light dims, and Gridman stands, brandishing Calibur at Mecha-Ghoulghilas. And though the kaiju attacks him with another beam, it then... goes to attack the other kaiju?
"This is all too weird for me." Vit says, sounds vaguely disapproving of the whole thing.
"I can't say I understand any of this, but we can't leave either of those kaiju active." Gridman replies. Even he sounds a bit puzzled. "The people of France are depending on us. Let's finish this!"
"I'm glad you're staying with us, Rikka!" Yuta calls. It's a little uncomfortable being able to hear bits of her conversation with Akane. It feels so private... Something he shouldn't intrude on. Rikka's words remind Yuta of her speech in the Deculture Pageant -- how the both of them dedicated their performances to Akane. In a way, they're still performing for her. They're showing her their resolve, both to save her heart, and to protect their world! Even if its borders are a little wider, now.
With a running start, Gridman leaps, turning in a graceful somersault in midair. He comes down sword-first next to the dueling kaiju, hoping to sever Mecha-Ghoulghilas' neck. It always seemed to work before..! "Full powered slash!"
Let our words reach you, Akane..! We're here, just reach out!
KTS: Yuta Hibiki has activated the Strike Spirit Command. KTS: Yuta Hibiki targets Akane Shinjo with Full Powered Slash! <Pose Tracker> Celebro has posed.
As Go'yavec The Second lies self-satisfied on its belly, fire rakes across it. First, Duke Fire capitalizes on his earlier assaults, searing through pre-damaged surface to reach subsurface...stone? This used to be an Akane kaiju, there should be that strange plasticky skeletal material in there, but more of this one appears substantive than usual, even after burrowing past the armor. What was DONE to this thing? How'd it happen so FAST?
On the streets below, unobserved, he watches from a concealed place, his body's lips split in a rictus of a grin. Perhaps that poisonous delight is out there, to be felt, like a toxic cloud.
Go'yavec the Second wobbles off to the side, because sitting there being Incredibly Present on Mecha-Ghoulghilas isn't going to get these man-things ate. It opens its mouth to croon, but GaoGaiGo seizes its moment, blasting yet more Synapse Attack-derived Substance onto the thing, melting away at it with custom-built chemicals. It barks in pain!! That's a bad idea because it lets Alouette just shoot it in the dang mouth, explosions lighting up the cavern inside, making it even easier for Renais to lay in.
And then Mecha-Ghoulghilas gets in on it, tearing away its own self to drill completely through Go'yavec's belly, exposed now only to the ground and the beast beneath. It SCREAMS that time, a loud yelp that rattles across the sky. For the Mecha-Ghoulghilas all it can do is try to apply its weight yet further, lifting up and then SMASHING back down, ruining pavement for blocks.
Then it opens its mouth and makes a noise almost like a song. Almost, at least, like it doesn't know what that is but is simultaneously deeply in tune with them. The sonic waves of the effort rocket forth, sudden waves crashing into Alouette and Renais, strange forces, not entirely strictly sonic, rattling through the metal of their machines. Gaogaigo and Duke Fire, it tries a simpler approach - slapping at them with its half-ruined claws.
KTS: Celebro targets Akane Shinjo with Go'yavec Squish! GaoGaiGo Team has connected.
KTS: Celebro targets Alouette Pommier with Turtle Melody Instantaneous Shot! KTS: Celebro targets Renais Cardiff with Turtle Melody Instantaneous Shot! KTS: Celebro targets GaoGaiGo Team with Go'yavec Claw Swipes! KTS: Celebro targets BP-119 Duke with Go'yavec Claw Grab! KTS: GaoGaiGo Team rushes into the attack! KTS: GaoGaiGo Team's Will Barrier activates, negating 1000 base damage. KTS: GaoGaiGo Team partially guards Celebro's Go'yavec Claw Swipes, taking 2580 damage! KTS: Celebro has engaged GaoGaiGo Team! KTS: BP-119 Duke blocks Celebro's Go'yavec Claw Grab, taking 3290 damage! KTS: Celebro has engaged BP-119 Duke! KTS: Akane Shinjo partially guards Yuta Hibiki's Full Powered Slash, taking 5760 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Yuta Hibiki's Telepathic Link activates, causing Insight L1! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Yuta Hibiki's Mediumship activates, causing Nullify! KTS: Yuta Hibiki has engaged Akane Shinjo! KTS: Yuta Hibiki begins a Formation attack! KTS: Celebro enervates Akane Shinjo, reducing her Morale significantly. KTS: Akane Shinjo fails to react to Celebro's Go'yavec Squish, taking 7320 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Celebro's Kiete Karekareta activates, causing Deject! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Celebro's The More Hurt, The Better... activates, causing Nullify! KTS: Celebro has engaged Akane Shinjo! <Pose Tracker> Kamille Bidan has posed.
Kamille feels a flicker, a reflex, and darts back and over the beam barrage with speed that belies the MK II Heavy Armor's...heavy armor. And he readies his beam rifle, when...
A shock of rage and spite, focused around Quattro. Now? Here?
He's no stranger to intrusive thoughts, but he wasn't even thinking about Quattro. The situation feels familiar to him, but not because of his old mentor. And as furious as he is towards Char sometimes, he's never felt that strong of a...no, that isn't his. The mind of a powerful Newtype is fluid, receptive even when focused on something or someone else. And it takes him a second to figure out where the feeling is coming from, but soon Sayla will feel his presence briefly, confusion and recognition and the starry sky.
*Sayla?!*
It doesn't last, merely a flash, as Kamille is focused on how...how that other kaiju is attacking the other-other kaiju. Odd, and strange, but beyond it is a miasma of hopelessless, and surrounding it he sees-sees with his senses...
"Akane!" He calls out over the speakers, if she'll hear. "You have so many bonds, so many hearts reaching out to you! You aren't alone! You're never alone! I see it...!"
He knows he's just a stranger in a mech suit, but he has to say what others can't see. It feels like a duty of his. From there he turns his attention to what remains of Mecha-Ghoulghilas, giving Yuta's slash a little boost of extra gunfire.
KTS: Kamille Bidan has activated the Strike Spirit Command. KTS: Kamille Bidan targets Akane Shinjo with Volley of Fury! <Pose Tracker> Dr. Spartura has posed.
Dr. Spartura answers Ruri: "Will you?"
Then she laughs, suddenly and sharply. "Death! Ah, yes. DEATH. The great enemy. And everyone who looks at it either comes to term with it or gets into some kind of moral UPSET about it. Don't get me started about death, my little Miclone. Anyway, I can't chat much longer. We'll meet again, some summer day, I'm pretty sure."
Of course, Ruri could probably keep in touch pretty well if she wanted, but Dr. Spartura is at least flicking the switch off for now.
"This stuff always makes me wonder," Dr. Spartura says as the aircraft begins to rise.
"What does, talking to a kid? Heh heh - must be your mother's heart kickin' in. Don't worry, Doc, if you don't think you have it in you, I'll do my best," Jiro chortles, with the air of an established conversation.
"I'll come smack your head," she says, and then: "No. But seeing this out there... you know, maybe we're looking at something REAL, but we're looking at just one FACET of it."
"How do you mean?"
"Street racing... mobile suit battles... that's not the only crucible of human endeavor, is it?"
"Hrrrrm. Your problem is having a decisive point, though, right?"
"Hrrrrm."
-=-=-=-=-
For those of us who are not philosophes, violence has arrived again. THWAM! A single shot that aims to hit the reactor. It should be a clean hit. Sayla can see a meaningful distance into the back of the Mobile Suit. But... it seems like it simply isn't there. The reactor must be located somewhat elsewhere; and huge amounts of the interior materials of the machine seem to be some kind of electrotransmissive mesh. Something with fluid cooling, it seems, because it's boiling and hissing, like poison blood.
"Ghh! That hurt!" Niko protests.
The High Tension pivots around then, but before it can hurl more levinbolts after the Saint Lance, it is being assailed by little objects - Niko attempts to blast one to nothingness, but while it works, the glimmering ball of faerie-fire is not, in fact, either completely obliterated or unaffected. They make a noise of frustration, but then answer, "No!!! The girl!!! Idiot!! The one in the real world!! I know the difference between a show and real life, asshole!!"
Which is enough for Liam to come in. Pleading to them ("Don't call me that!") and smashing inwards, the magnetospheric interference preventing the High Tension from just bobbling off the prevailing lines of magnetic force in the Earth's surface like an *asshole* again. One leg comes upwards to try to kick at the incoming mobile weapon
when
The plasma compression shrinks which only makes the blade hotter and with a neat, glowing wound surface, Liam removes the forward part of the High Tension's arm. Niko screams; why wouldn't they? Shinji probably gets it.
Lt. Hyuuga answers Shinji, faltering, "It's - I mean, it's like Baron Ashura! Do your best, Shinji!" Cold sweat is running down the back of his neck. There are reports coming in of the damage to Unit One. Most of it isn't that critical, but he can feel a strange mixture of pathetic identification with the hard place where Shinji has found himself and terror for his career.
The progressive knife comes down and there are no arms to remove but the leg comes off next, the one on the left, even as Niko shrieks again, kicking up at Unit One with the other. "Why!? Let me go! You're all pathetic, WHY AM I LOSING?!" Hyperventilating audibly, they say, "You think I need limbs to kill you!?"
Traditionally, they do help.
And yet
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n6y6-OgVDJc
there is a sudden SURGE past the Evangelion and the Mobile Fighter, something that stabs upwards. Liam might recognize it (subliminally if not emotionally; he *is* going through a lot right now) as something borrowing from his own heliophasic techniques. It rises upwards, like a shooting column, almost entirely invisible except to meteorological sensors.
It wavers.
The Minovsky reactor inside of the High Tension had been linked to the complex meshwork of electromagnetic emitters around it. This engine was not really meant to go at this level of power output - it was tweaked, overclocked, mounted in excess cooling material (which has now been partially destroyed by beam weaponry) - but much as one can force oneself to swallow something, Niko forces it past the safety restrictions. The former-Asshimar begins to *glow* faintly as the invisible-something wavers--
Lightning arcs down in a storm, localized in a broad sort of oval around the High Tension's location. This is the kind of thing that honestly, probably shouldn't be quite possible; and yet, nevertheless, the electrical discharge is real. Bolts seem to aim, as if by malice, towards the Saint Lance; towards Dianthus. Thunder smashes through the air; it is worse around the Nadesico, even if that ship of space may at least be hardened.
Curiously, Liam and Shinji are spared.
The reason isn't self-defeat. The lightning's coming... it's just that most of it is landing on the neighboring buildings. An electrical curtain, buzzing almost, like a Tesla coil turned to musical ends...
KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Ruri Hoshino with High Tension Wireframe Special Trick! KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Sayla Mass with High Tension Wireframe Spray! KTS: Dr. Spartura targets Lucine Azul with High Tension Wireframe Spray! KTS: Celebro enervates Alouette Pommier, reducing her Morale significantly. KTS: Alouette Pommier blocks Celebro's Turtle Melody Instantaneous Shot, taking 6840 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Celebro's Kiete Karekareta activates, causing Deject! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Celebro's The More Hurt, The Better... activates, causing Nullify! <Pose Tracker> GaoGaiGo Team has posed.
Go'yavec is crumbling. Everyone else is focused on Akane - Mamoru wants to, too, but he's gotta focused on the kaiju. Ikumi reminded him of priorities.
"Ikumi, let's finish this. YOU HAVE CONTROL!"
"I HAVE CONTROL!"
"Sorry. But you were just too slow." Ikumi speaks to himself, as he calls out, rushing into the claw strike to run UP the arm and towards the head. "PHANTOM RING PLUS!"
The right arm is lifted, and a Phantom Ring circles down over it, locking into place as the arm begins spinning. It's pulled back...
Ikumi cries out, "BROKEN PHAAAAAANTOMMMMM!"
The fist launches off, moving to try and drill through Go'yavec's head and not stop until it's cleared to the other side, before returning back to GaoGaiGo. It's not an attack you can parry, due to speed and range, as GaoGaiGo moves to hover out of the way, making an immediate counter-assault difficult!
KTS: GaoGaiGo Team has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: GaoGaiGo Team targets Celebro with Broken Phantom! KTS: Akane Shinjo partially guards Kamille Bidan's Volley of Fury, taking 4069 damage! KTS: Kamille Bidan completes the Formation attack! KTS: Lucine Azul charges into the attack! KTS: Lucine Azul partially guards Dr. Spartura's High Tension Wireframe Spray, taking 5208 damage! KTS: Qivi has activated the Trick Spirit Command. KTS: Renais Cardiff charges into the attack! KTS: [Spirit Defense] Renais Cardiff's activates, and her spirit endures. KTS: Celebro enervates Renais Cardiff, reducing her Morale significantly. KTS: Renais Cardiff partially guards Celebro's Turtle Melody Instantaneous Shot, taking 6840 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Celebro's Kiete Karekareta activates, causing Deject! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Celebro's The More Hurt, The Better... activates, causing Nullify! KTS: BP-119 Duke has activated the Trick Spirit Command. KTS: BP-119 Duke has activated the Trick Spirit Command. KTS: BP-119 Duke has activated the Trick Spirit Command. KTS: BP-119 Duke has activated the Trick Spirit Command. KTS: Ruri Hoshino has activated the Wall Spirit Command. KTS: Ruri Hoshino's EN Barrier activates, negating 1000 base damage. KTS: Ruri Hoshino fails to evade Dr. Spartura's High Tension Wireframe Special Trick, taking 5490 damage! <Pose Tracker> Qivi has posed.
"<It listens pretty well to force,>" Qivi admits, "<but you gotta know where to use it. Just smashing around doesn't always help as much as you'd like.>" Like that time she spent with the Black Knights. "<Sure, right now, things are listening. A little. But all you're saying is bullshit.>"
Qivi gives Nidaime a slightly worried look - not that she can see it from inside the cockpit - but she can't just rush over there, and in any case she doesn't know the turtle-rider very well anyway, so what could she help her with? What good would her words be?
She really is just here to hit things. Which makes Akane right, a little bit, even if she doesn't know it. Qivi usually ends up the muscle. She's used to it. She just sometimes wishes she could do more.
"<I'm going in,>" Qivi sends - not to Akane, but to the Gridman Alliance (including Nidaime) and Kamille. From behind Mecha-Ghoulghilas she actually has an approach; even the waving arms don't put her off it for more than a moment as she goes in low, skidding right up toward the kaiju.
Sarangay lifts off. The backpack thrusters fire as Qivi turns it into an enormous leap, no longer skating but simply *rocketing* directly toward Ghoulghilas' back, drawing back the spiked-knuckle weight fist. Her shotgun is in her other hand, the damaged hand, but she can still raise it.
Qivi *slams* her fist as hard forward into Ghoulghilas' back flank as she can. The spikes impale on a solid blow, digging in as she tries to literally crack right through the plating, smashing again and again while dangling from the still-attached slash harken cable, roaring in her cockpit in a blaze of vigor.
And then, once she's made a hole, or hopefully made a hole, she fires the shotgun. The kickback is enough to destroy the rest of the arm, the sparking gap bursting and spraying smoke as the lower half of the arm falls to the ground. But by that point, she's already fired.
KTS: Qivi has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: Qivi has activated the Valor Spirit Command. KTS: Qivi has activated the Alert Spirit Command. KTS: Qivi has activated the Alert Spirit Command. KTS: Sayla Mass has activated the Dash Spirit Command and has gained proficiency bonus. KTS: Qivi targets Akane Shinjo with Double Nail Shatter Punch! KTS: Sayla Mass fails to Evade Dr. Spartura's High Tension Wireframe Spray, taking 5208 damage! KTS: Sayla Mass has been defeated! KTS: Akane Shinjo partially guards Qivi's Double Nail Shatter Punch, taking 7245 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] Qivi's Unbreakable activates, causing Sparkle! KTS: Qivi has engaged Akane Shinjo! <Pose Tracker> Nidaime has posed.
Nidaime says softly to Renais. "I know."
".....But it's still awful."
Anosillus remains underassault all the same. In truth, he doesn't really need Nidaime to fight. He fought before Nidiame was a twinkle in an electronic musical keyboard's eye. But Anopapa's priority is always going to be the kid.
Anosillus takes some heavy fire. Portions derezz horrifically before the form stabilizes uneasily.
Renais tries a different track after that though.
Let's get some hot chocolate when we're done here.
Nidaime immediately perks up because she is a child. "Okay!! I love hot chocolate!! How did you know???"
She pats Anosillus's back to let him know it's ok to shoot death beams again.
Which it does, finally, by unleashing his own song.
In comparision to the droning melody of Go'yavec the Second, this turtle song inspires hope, encourages courage, and soothes souls. It is a turtle song though so it might be hard to sing along to.
The sonic blast erupts towards the Mecha Kaiju!
"GROOONK!"
"Can I have marshmallows too?" Nidaime says, who knows how to work this situation to her advantage because, again.
She is a child.
KTS: Nidaime has activated the Enable Spirit Command. KTS: Nidaime has activated the Enable Spirit Command. KTS: Nidaime targets Akane Shinjo with SuperSonic Wave! <Pose Tracker> BP-119 Duke has posed.
The shield comes up as the claw comes down, and Duke Fire mitigates most of the damage that way!
Unfortunately, he was in midair. The tarmac is less kind to his chassis.
A synthetic, simulated grunt barks from the robot as he struggles to his feet, pulling himself back up by his sword, still impaled in the ground. Pulling the weapon free, Duke Fire steadies himself.
For a moment, silhouetted against the fire and beam light... If we zoom out far enough... We see a tiny human knight struggling against the very earth rising up to squash him and his flat.
But Duke Fire, though very much a knight, is also much more than human. His steel, boxy shoulders square (pun intended), and he levels the blade, stating thus: "This must end."
Regina continues to shunt power where it needs to be, but: "I don't think I can get you enough, Duke, your reactors are at their limit."
"Worry not, my Lady. I will persevere." Duke Fire twirls his blade, ending by pointing it parallel to the ground at Go'yavec-II. "Come at me!" He swings at the stone, blade crackling with energy, to draw the great beast's attention for the final blow.
KTS: BP-119 Duke targets Celebro with En Garde!! <Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
The High Tension's arm comes off, and falls away. Liam's stomach twists, Niko's scream echoing in his ears after the transmission ends. "Hold on," he says, through gritted teeth. "Retrieving pilot." The Proto Helios grabs for the Mobile Suit's remaining leg with its free hand, but Niko's too quick; the Mobile Fighter is left grabbing empty air. "Shinji!" Liam shouts, seeing the High Tension whipping towards Eva-01--
And past it. What are they--
The Proto Helios is, to put it bluntly, a terrible idea that was finessed into being by some of BioNet's brighter Mobile Fighter designers. But it has top-notch computers aboard--it needs them to manage the heliosphere, and turn data from Liam's posture and implants into magnetic bottles. But those same sensors see what the High Tension is trying to do, as Liam himself sees it. "ABOVE," Liam shouts, sudden panic in his voice. Heart-2 takes a strike dead-on. Lucine--
For a moment, Liam sees the Dianthus lit up against the sky, washed in red. It takes him a few seconds to realize the red is in his own eyes. "No," he grates out.
In those few seconds, the Proto Helios has already made corrective movements. It rockets up off the ground, chasing after the High Tension. Plasma pours from the emitters on the back of its hands, and flows back from its jets, forming an ionized trail like the tail of a comet. The remaining armor starts to drip from its frame.
"No more." It drives both hands into the High Tension's back, a precise, calculated strike. The magnetosphere sparks and flickers as it interacts with the High Tension's own electric field. "No more. Come home!" Liam's back to pleading, even as he tries to grab the shielded box of the cockpit block, superheat the supports, and rip the thing free with main strength alone. Guy could do it.
<Pose Tracker> Rikka Takarada has posed.
Rikka blinks for a moment.
"Ah, sorry..." Rikka apologizes. "...But, yeah. This isn't the first time it's happened - I don't know how they do it, but somehow the kaiju become... changed, in some way. Inheriting the powers of other kaiju..."
She pauses for a moment, as she says that. ...Nnno. It couldn't be, right? Even if it isn't, the way Anosillus and Nidaime have come to a stop...
"...Nidame, we're here for you, okay?" Rikka urges.
"Thanks..." Rikka replies to Yuta... but then, Akane shoots back to her. 'Do whatever you want', she says. She says not to patronize her with her worrying.
"You-" ...Rikka has to bite back her hurt and frustration, at that. She shuts her eyes tight, balling up her hands into fists and smacking them onto the console in front of her(she at least has the presence of mind to avoid any sensitive instruments).
'Do whatever you want'...
"...Fine. I will - even if you won't want me to." Rikka says after a moment. She meant what she said, after all - she still isn't giving up on her. "...You don't get it at all..."
...Stupid. Of course she isn't going to get if you keep dancing around it like this.
"...I worry because I care about you. So much that it hurts. I've seen what this world is like, I know it can be so, so cruel... but I'm certain it's better with you in it." Rikka says. "I can't-"
Mecha-Ghoulghilas forces her back onto the fight. Smoothbore guns open fire on her in a devastating blast- Synchrotank is blasted back, its cover and its shields both blasted to pieces. The mobile suit hits the ground and Rikka winces at the shaking of the cockpit. Fortunately, Junk is at least firmly fixed into place and her seatbelt is pretty good, so she doesn't have to worry about herself or the old computer being painfully thrown about.
Still... she doesn't know how much more Synchrotank can take.
...Better make it count, then. Put her heart and soul into it - something she can't ignore.
Synchrotank shakes off the dust and debris and rights itself, putting itself into tank formation. It drives out from behind cover, taking aim with both cannons. Rikka releases her breath, and focuses, and focuses - and fires, unleashing the full contents of Synchrotank's water tanks straight at Mecha-Ghoulghilas.
KTS: Rikka Takarada uses lucky charm KTS: Rikka Takarada has activated the Attune Spirit Command. KTS: Rikka Takarada has activated the Attune Spirit Command. KTS: Rikka Takarada has activated the Enable Spirit Command. KTS: Rikka Takarada has activated the Enable Spirit Command. KTS: Rikka Takarada has activated the Dash Spirit Command and has gained proficiency bonus. KTS: Rikka Takarada targets Akane Shinjo with Extreme Extinguishing Burst! KTS: Akane Shinjo fails to react to Nidaime's SuperSonic Wave, taking 4720 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo has been defeated! KTS: Nidaime roots her unit, coming to a standstill and leaving her vulnerable. KTS: Akane Shinjo fails to react to Rikka Takarada's Extreme Extinguishing Burst, taking 6900 damage! KTS: Akane Shinjo has been defeated! KTS: Rikka Takarada roots her unit, coming to a standstill and leaving her vulnerable. <Pose Tracker> Renais Cardiff has posed.
Renais' Gernsback shakes and creaks under the sonic assault, her ears left pounding and ringing in the aftermath. The paperdoll on her damage readout is blood-red, the mocking Go'yavec's sound attack leaving the AS nearly shaken apart. Hydraulics and servomotors whine in protest as she moves...
And move, she does, charging toward the kaiju, drawing a sword-length mono-cutter from the Gernsback's hip.
She can't help smiling a little as Nidaime lobbies for marshmallows, and she replies, "Of course. What's hot chocolate without marshmallows?" She's already got the perfect cafe in mind. Just gotta wrap this up and keep these kaiju from leaving this sector...
She gets up underneath Go'yavec, both of the M9's shoulder-shields having fallen off, left in the street behind her. She leaps. "You will NOT! MOCK! MY FRIENDS!" she screams, plunging the sword in, carving through stone and earth.
KTS: Renais Cardiff targets Celebro with GRAW-2 Monomolecular Cutter Press! <Pose Tracker> Dr. Spartura has posed.
"I AM home," Niko spits to Liam, "why aren't you - recognizing -- I --"
-=-=-=-=-
Whatever strange indicators Dr. Spartura are watching flicker. They've flickered twice before. This time they jump noticeably.
-=-=-=-=-
"-- did they -- screw up your head or - nngh--!!"
Heat surges. The cockpit block is a rugged and independent piece of technology. It would have to be, or you would need a lot of political motivation to get into a Mobile Suit. The original design for most Federation-derived Mobile Suits had it as an autonomous unit - the Core Fighter.
There are many connections. In the primal chaos of plasma and electromagnetism, those connections are tested. Something might give -- Liam hopes it is the physical connections -- but something else pops, and --
Niko gazes dead ahead and sees something that is pure and white and clean. Something flicks at the edges of their consciousness. Like a cat licking your finger. That is the last distinct feeling before--
-=-=-=-=-
The indicators go dead.
-=-=-=-=-
The High Tension's electromagnetic activity goes frenetic for a moment, producing a strange ghostly column of light for a moment, and then the machine goes limp. The reactor continues operating for fourteen seconds before some failsafe routine, no longer suppressed by will, terminates the fusion reaction -- safely, if with severe reactor-vessel damage.
<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
Akane insists that she won't give up on fighting Gridman, and Alouette doesn't argue this point. As long as Akane survives this battle, they can always talk later.
Akane also continues on into another point. Someone else joyriding something you made. "As a programmer and designer, I can see what you mean. There's a little part of our soul in all of our work, and your kaiju.. they aren't any exception." She briefly switches her cameras towards Nidaime and Anosillus... who are suffering so much because of what happened to Go'yavec-II. "Whatever technology BioNet used on your kaiju, it's not right." It's less of a moral statement and more of a strange feeling of unease in Alouette.. one she had been feeling the entire time she was fighting Go'yavec-II.
The unease transforms into alarm when the Long Dagger takes another direct hit, forcing Alouette's sensors into the red and cutting off her communications with Akane. As an immediate countermeasure, she purges whatever is left of the busted Fortestra. The Dagger is on its last legs either way, sacrificing it for the extra mobility should be the play. One by one, GaoGaiGo, Duke, and Renais all launch their finishing attacks. Utilizing the speed of the purged Long Dagger, Alouette steels herself, whipping out two beam sabers from the pauldrons of the mobile suit, and drives them into the kaiju's weakened body. Will their combined efforts be enough...?
Alouette Pommier transforms to GAT-01D Long Dagger
KTS: Alouette Pommier has activated the Rouse Spirit Command. KTS: Alouette Pommier targets Celebro with ES01 Twin Beam Sabers Thrust! KTS: Celebro partially guards GaoGaiGo Team's Broken Phantom, taking 5250 damage! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] GaoGaiGo Team's Roar! activates, causing Insight L1! KTS: [Dynamic Hit] GaoGaiGo Team's Shout! activates, causing Sparkle! KTS: BP-119 Duke anchors Celebro, forcing him into close range. KTS: Celebro partially guards BP-119 Duke's En Garde!, taking 1920 damage! KTS: BP-119 Duke has engaged Celebro! KTS: BP-119 Duke roots his unit, coming to a standstill and leaving him vulnerable. KTS: BP-119 Duke begins a Formation attack! KTS: Celebro partially guards Alouette Pommier's ES01 Twin Beam Sabers Thrust, taking 3132 damage! KTS: Alouette Pommier has engaged Celebro! KTS: Alouette Pommier completes the Formation attack! KTS: Celebro fails to react to Renais Cardiff's GRAW-2 Monomolecular Cutter Press, taking 4700 damage! KTS: Celebro has been defeated! KTS: Renais Cardiff has engaged Celebro! <Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
"I will," Ruri confirms, stoic. Her expression does not shift -- has not shifted, this whole time. "All right."
The window closes.
Omoikane is the one who sees the way Ruri considers, in her heart, the weight of death against other measures of meaning. She does -- quite earnestly -- wonder whether she understands what she's trying to say. Is there something worse than death?
Briefly she wonders this -- and locks it away, for later. Ruri Hoshino is engaged in a combat situation; she has no room for emotion or doubt, in her split-second reflexes.
"Ms. Azul, I believe he is referring to me," Ruri helps Lucine out, finally. (It's not something she particularly wants to disclose.) "The pilot is integrated with High Tension's systems, so when I queried the mobile suit, he experienced the question himself. It wasn't intentional."
But why is he losing? The pilot of the High Tension is at the highest feedback level, to borrow a term. But... that means he can use every aspect of the machine.
"The pilot of High Tension is exceeding his power output," Ruri reports, stoic, to the bridge, to their pilots. "He has bypassed its safeties. The engine is overloading." The pilot told Ruri to stay out of his head -- so she can't go in and try to turn those failsafes back on, can she?
He told her to stay out.
"But what is he --" Minato starts, cut off, sharply, by Ruri:
"Incoming."
That's all the warning Minato gets to try and pull the Nadesico away from those bolts. But have you ever tried to escape lightning? It's quite difficult to outrun -- and the bolts reverberate through the Nadesico, the whole ship LIFTING and LURCHING in the air, with a sick, horrible reminder that the ground is very much nearby, relatively speaking.
The battleship stays aloft, but not without damage.
"The enemy's attack isn't finished," Ruri warns them.
Liam moves to save the enemy -- to stop this, and --
"Oh my god," Megumi gasps, as the readings flash over a window on the bridge. Her mood is echoed by almost everyone else in the room -- they're shocked.
"The enemy's attack has dissipated." Ruri reports, unmoved. "The pilot is dead. The High Tension's failsafe systems are re-engaging. No runaway overload anticipated."
Jun stares, at the screens. "That's... not what..." He shakes his head, and steels himself. "Deployed units, please return to the Nadesico. Repeat: return to the Nadesico." The pilots are bound to be upset, but -- they can't help them if they run off.
<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.
Lucine is already on it a second Liam cries out. Calculations are laid out in the space of a sober eye's flicker from screen to readout, and Lucine makes the decision to fly inward, charging ahead with the intent to beat the much shorter distance.
It's just.... it's lightning. Whatever stroke of foresight she had, it wasn't enough. She's like a weather balloon in a direct strike, the current passing through the Dianthus with a painful pop. The armor carries the deadilest parts, keeping its pilot safe for the most part, but it's still a painful, confusing experience.
'Feet' that were never meant to hold the Dianthus's weight instead cut into the ground like two blunted blades; the midsection and head slumps forward like a doll, carrying Lucine down like a knife. Thankfully, it never has a chance to collapse completely; the vertigo is not great, but it's not the worst she's suffered either.
<"... Mr. Ikari. I'm going to help Liam."> She doesn't make a command or choice this time for Shinji; she wonders if her logic really is the best to follow at all. Or, is it her heart she's trying to follow?
The red warnings dot the Dianthus's readouts, but not intrusively; its creator only included such alerts as a way to engage the pilot in pushing harder. Otherwise, he may have made then even less noticable, as annoying as he thought they were.
You go big or you go home.
Liam might notice the Dianthus coming closer. With the smaller size, it may be able to help extract the pilot's cockpit more precisely.
Sweat tickles down one cheek. They're close.
----- ---- --- - - - -
It's not that Lucine hasn't felt death before. She's had to find a peace with it in her own way.
This isn't the white flower field. She can't imagine it to recenter herself. Her senses are shot. Her reserves are already low. Maybe, she could have managed through it before, but.
And added on top of that is what she feels from--
It has to come out somehow.
She's cut the feed on her radio, but anyone receptive enough, or just simply on the right wavelength, there's a terrible, unvoiced scream.
<Pose Tracker> Shinji Ikari has posed.
The screaming. Shinji gets it. His blood runs cold. Hearing his teeth rattling in his skull is what makes him realize he's trembling.
"<We...We can't keep doing this!>" But what can they do? Shinji doesn't have an answer to that. Liam seems to. Shinji has to pin his hopes on that, staying close by, ready to follow Liam's lead and defend him.
Lt. Hyuuga has more data, but all Shinji manages is to strangle out a helpless sound from his throat in response, because he's come to learn do your best occasionally means just try not to die.
But disarmed as High Tension may be in the coming moments, it only means a storm has been summoned. Shinji can feel the electricity along his jaw, static heavy enough to make his nose itch. Liam calls out to him, and an AT Field deploys... unnecessarily. It fades and Unit-01 turns. He cries out in futile warning as the bolts lash out.
"<Liam...!>" Shinji calls out, not with the panic of needing help, but with the urgency to help. Whatever Liam's going to do, Shinji has to be behind it completely and unquestionably. Shinji sees Liam trying to grab hold, and Unit-01 tries to help cut off High Tension's escape, to grapple, to let Liam do what he intends -- if they can just save the pilot...! Lucine's coming, too, so...!
Light. A bright column of it. Movement stops. Everything stops.
Shinji stares, mouth half open, bulging eyes more sclera than iris. Unit-01's controls shake violently in his grip before Shinji rips his hands free, covering his mouth and face, clawing his fingertips into his skin. His whole body curls into a tight ball.
A voice commands him to return to the Nadesico, but Shinji doesn't hear it. He sinks to his side, acid in his throat.
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
It takes terrible focus to keep the Proto Helios upright and hovering with both its forearms buried in the chest of another Mobile Suit. Liam has only tactile feedback to go on--parts of it melt, parts of it burn, parts of it withstand his touch, only to soften. Eventually, though, he comes to something dense and hard and boxy. The magnetosphere flares--
"She did this!" Liam insists. "Please!"
There's a sudden pop. The right hand reports an irregularity in the magnetosphere. Liam's first instinct is to pull it back, but that would rip open the machine's body further, and put the pilot...
The line is dead, Liam realizes.
did they
"Twenty-eight," Liam whispers, and the breath leaves him in a rush, like he's been punched. The High Tension starts to fall, and the Proto Helios' jumpjets kick in as Liam's body corrects automatically. The SUNBURST system shuts down shortly after, it hits ground.
There's still no answer. The High Tension is silent, and growing cold; with the reactor off, he can see the faint signatures of cooling wires and a body approaching room temperature.
The Proto Helios slumps forward.
In his mind's eye, Liam pulls his wanzer's pile bunker out of the shattered remains of the Zaku II's cockpit. The tip drips crimson in the dull light of the arena.
'And that's one less Zeon terrorist. Congratulations, Puppy, you're a man now.'
In his mind's eye, he is fifteen years old and fought a battle to the death against a captured Neo-Zeon pilot. He sees the blood, sees the shattered cockpit, but he can't--this can't be--
In his mind's eye, he screams and screams until his throat is raw, but no one is listening. Less than a minute in, they cut off the cockpit radio, leaving him alone.
In the now, Liam just stands there, hollowed out in one swift strike. "Unable to comply," is all he manages. This wasn't a kaiju with animal instincts, desperate to live. This wasn't even a captured soldier sent against him in some sick 'training exercise'. This was someone like him, and he... he killed them.
The Proto Helios kneels. Its arms shift, slowly pulling out of the High Tension's torso. Liam holds what's left of the Mobile Suit close, unable to move. The cooling Proto Helios is slowly melting the tarmac beneath it.
<Pose Tracker> Sayla Mass has posed.
Ruri's interference stops Sayla's building rage from getting worse. It's a valuable interference. "...Thank you." She says, quietly, tensely. "Terminating connection." The laser connection is destroyed, but the effects of the intruision remain. This system is compromised. Damnit. Damnit!
The lighting crashes down fiercely, and the Saint Lance is exposed, and the blasts fries the Saint Lance's arm, and the rifle explodes and takes most of that arm with it. Shit. She pulls back behind cover again, she'll need to- no damnit. Ruri and Omoikane may be benevolent, but who knows what Nergal has put in there. Plan B.
From behind cover, she opens the cockpit, with something that resembles a pistol with a cable running to her helmet. And then she pulls her actual pistol, shooting out a pair of upper floor windows to give her line of sight to the Synchrotank. She can trust Rikka with this. The other devise- a handheld laser comm- aims to connect to the Saint Lance. "Astral Dragon, forward to all Shuffle Alliance pilots- after battle, scatter and reconvene at Point Green 4. Heart-2 withdrawing, unit damaged and systems may be compromised so I will withdraw to a separate point. I am unharmed, and expect all of you to check in at Green 4. Over and out."
She doesn't reconnect to the Nadesico. Ruri knows how to contact her if she wants to talk, but right now... She needs to be somewhere else. Away from everyone.
Especially with that silent scream, and all that pain.
The Saint Lance's thrusters engage, and Sayla moves away from the battle in a direction away from Green Four.
<Pose Tracker> Akane Shinjo has posed.
Mecha-Ghoulghilas now orients much more on Go'yavec-II than on any of Paris's defenders; while kaiju are never fully under your control, they do take suggestions, and Akane's wounded pride is a perfectly serviceable negative emotion to orient on. It fully ignores the myriad attacks coming in, the drill assembly severed by Gridman without fuss and left lodged in the kaiju it was attacking -- which stomps it into the ground and presses. Mecha-Ghoulghilas has no sense of self-regard and will continue its nonsense single-mindedly no matter what, though --
-- which means it's up to Kamille, Rikka, Qivi, and Nidaime to make sure it stays gone. Kamille peppers the hole in its neck with gunfire, while Qivi makes some new holes of her own with both a fist and a shotgun. Much of the armor over its central core -- still essentially Ghoulghilas, underneath all the mechanization, still pink and baby-blue and white, still the same dorky kaiju Akane fashioned out of her feelings when her feelings were something like fun to indulge -- shatters from Anosillus and Nidaime's song.
As has happened countless times before, though -- Yuta makes an opening and Rikka reaches out through it. Whatever remains of Mecha-Ghoulghilas crumbles under the suffocating coolness of water, and when the steam clears, it is gone.
Kamille pleads with Akane to listen -- and while it hurts and makes her wonder what he even knows, it also... well. Akane can feel that pleading, a bit, as much as she wouldn't admit it; it does nudge her -- if slightly -- to open up.
Akane sags, then, as Alouette replies to her -- underlines that designers imbue their creations with a little bit of their souls. "I think we're a little past right and wrong," comes her answer -- though it... there's something about being engaged as a designer, as a peer, rather than an enemy... it's nice.
When Rikka tells her she cares about her -- so much that it hurts -- Akane finds she has no answer for that. "I -- you're right. I don't get it." Asuka was right. She screwed up Rikka so much. If she can see this world -- see all of Akane's miserable feelings on display and still feel that way -- then --
"This whole plan was stupid from the start. Whatever. I'm done for now. I don't think the kaiju attack strategy is working at all." If that restaurant meeting was a declaration of war -- is this, then, an admission of defeat?
Mecha-Ghoulghilas and Go'yavec were always Akane's greatest creations -- and here, not only did they come up short, they ended up doing more to get in each other's way than anything else. Akane brought absolutely everything to bear, and it got her --
-- the sound of shearing metal, above and to her side. She looks up, and sees the High Tension's fate. That's... where the cockpit block is on mobile suits, right? Then...
...
Akane says, dully, "Alexis. I'm going home. I don't think this strategy has anything left to offer. BioNet doesn't, either."
She dips into the rubble of an office building -- one filled to the brim with now decade-old notes from BioNet's now-deceased Dr. Laplace and Dr. Moebius, defeated by GaoGaiGar after their own expansive power plays in Paris in the late 0080s.
Akane returns home.
Akane slumps into her seat, throwing off her coat. Kicking off her kitten heels. She hasn't worn anything else in ages, but after a minute, she's shucked the corset dress and the silky stockings too -- back to the uniform top, hoodie, and skirt.
It never suited her anyway.
Akane looks at kaiju -- most of which no longer feel like hers. One for every eventuality. Kaiju capable of body division. Kaiju that make illusions. Another attempt at an autointelligence kaiju. Combined monsters like the ones from the Gekiganger movie and the last pre-One Year War Taraba show. So many ideas she'd had for ways to defeat Gridman, in varying stages of process.
Nah.
Alexis appears on the monitor. "I'm terribly sorry things went so poorly, Akane-kun. It really is a tragedy. Though it does open new doors... I'd say you're closer to defeating Gridman than you realize."
"No it doesn't. Shut up," Akane groans, head down on her desk. "We're not doing this anymore. They all just keep trying to understand me but they never really get it."
Alexis remains silent for several moments. "Just because you don't intend to fight Gridman head-on anymore doesn't mean there isn't a need for kaiju," he suggests, eventually. "I'm sure if you wanted, you could make them understand... kaiju are what allowed you and Renais to connect when you first met, aren't they?"
Akane groans a vague affirmative, soaking in her misery. Despite the fact that her room is a sickly yellow that gives her a bit of a headache if she just lies in it (but which makes all her kaiju toys look really cool!), she finally remembers to pull off her glasses at this stage, shoving them across the desk in abject frustration.
"You really must give them a little credit! I'm sure that plenty of them would understand your feelings, if you provided the right meeting place."
The gears turn in Akane's head, despite the fact that the teeth aren't aligned right at first and the act of grinding them into each other, at this point, has become agonizing. A kaiju that would really give them the chance to understand -- the chance to appreciate how badly she needs the dream...
Alexis has certainly been consistent in getting her closer to a victory each time with his suggestions; it's only been when she went off of them, or went off half-cocked, that things went miserably.
... it's worth a shot. After all, making kaiju is something only she can do. To throw away that last piece of something uniquely hers would be...
... she can try one more time. If it'll reach them.
<Pose Tracker> Dr. Spartura has posed.
The High Tension is silent.
In the Hakone region of Japan, Lt. Hyuuga is silent too, for long moments.
<"Shinji... I'll contact Col. Katsuragi. Just hang in there."> He thinks, for a moment, of saying something more encouraging, but sometimes the best thing you can say is nothing. Pushing back from the seat, he lets out a silent breath. He makes a phone call.
About two minutes later, he communicates with the Nadesico and with the AEU's NERV branch. There are resources. For all the good they might do.
-=-=-=-=-=-
"So much for the kid," Dr. Spartura says. "Do you think we'd have a shot at retrieving the body?"
"The engine in the state it was at? If they were lucky - and I think they were - they got about three million amps up the spinal column. You'd never know it happened," Jiro says. "Hell, I'd never know it happened."
"I'd hate to get near 020 right now anyway," Dr. Spartura says, if with a sort of sorrowful irritation. "Much less the purple thing."
"At least we got the data."
"We did get the data," Dr. Spartura concurs. "I don't know, though. Hell of a way to test the hologram theory."
"Pigs are gonna come rooting if I'm reading the room right. Isn't like Bionet's going to be any help," Jiro says, looking towards the sky and reaching up at last to pull close the duralumin canopy he'd had retracted, to feel the wind over his skull.
"I'm really feeling pretty down about Bionet after this," Dr. Spartura says. "Like it's just not a positive work environment. I mean it's not all bad -"
"Right, we learned a lot-"
"But it's got a LOT of bad. You got anything scheduled the next couple of years, Mr. Fuma?"
"Naw."
"Then let's go."
Something suddenly launches from the Paris streets, leaving a huge cloud of rocket exhaust from old-style chemical launch boosters, making towards orbit. It's small - it might be taken as a weapon if it were a little faster - but instead it swerves out, away from Neo France's space control zone, and from there, in the general direction of Luna.
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
A dead radio. Ruri queries the Dianthus, and reports: "Ms. Azul is alive. I cannot confirm Mr. Ikari from here. Mr. Seven is reporting. The Saint Lance is retreating from the area."
Jun slams a fist into his console, with a muttering which definitely isn't PG-13.
"Our pilots are mentally compromised," Ruri continues relating the facts, with an unwavering tone and cool eyes. "What are your orders?"
She has to tell them what to do. They're so... emotional.
"Deploy the Aestivalis wing," Jun settles on, through grit teeth. "Give Liam the time he needs, but get them back. Call Ms. Fressange to debrief them. Contact NERV -- they'll be able to help with their pilots."
"Deploying Aestivalis wing," Ruri confirms, as Megumi's voice catches in her throat, to her side.
"Did you -- did you know he'd --" Megumi finally chokes out, looking to Ruri, in her unsteady horror.
Ruri looks at her, and says, honestly: "No. I left the High Tension's systems when he asked me to leave, so I didn't realise how dangerous it was." She relates it like she would relate their current latitude, or their engine levels. "I'll take responsibility for not performing the proper diligence."
Megumi looks like she's about to say something else -- before she catches Minato, at Ruri's other side, glaring daggers through her tears. She sighs, and deflates. "... it's... it's..." She can't make herself say it's okay, "... we didn't mean for this to happen."
Ruri doesn't so much as blink, as she looks forward again, to focus on her console, and the myriad tasks which still need to be done after a fight.
And if she feels anything about it -- she's not the sort to weep at her station, like everyone else.
<Pose Tracker> Celebro has posed.
The modified Go'yavec seems all too happy to burble and wail, shattering parts of the city as long as it pleases. Duke will not allow such villainy. Alouette and Renais also go at it at this point - now just frustrated beyond measure with the massive thing, all three come at it with blades crackling, its damaged surfaces losing some cohesion. It yelps and barks and wails, but can't quite get itself worked up to sing again. Renais carves into it, finds a spot - just A Spot, really, vaguely on the neck - and carves in and through.
Eventually, GaoGaiGo gets in position. The Phantom Ring armed, it fires the Broken PHantom clear through the beast...and that's what does the trick. The combined damage causes its strength to finally fail, and the diminished but no-less-mountainous beast screeches one last time, before cracking in two like a broken model - and the two halves, Akane Shinjo's skeletal plastic exposed, collapse to either side.
Even in death, ruination. Truly a monster.
Some distance away, tucked somewhere unnoticed, Shinya Kaburagi's body watches keenly. So that's what it does...that could be used more effectively, perhaps...
Half his face quirks up in a grin while the other remains totally dull. "Kiete karekareta," he says. What fun...
<Pose Tracker> Yuta Hibiki has posed.
The kaiju are done. Seeing them destroy each other feels... bad. Kinda sick. Yuta doesn't like it. Once they're disabled, Gridman walks away from them, not looking back. Yuta doesn't need to see this.
"Rikka -- Akane, is there anything..?" Anything she said? Anything we can do? Who knows what Yuta means. The gross feeling in his heart continues as he looks over the rest of the battlefield. It looks like everyone is in one piece, except for Sayla's machine, but she confirmed she's okay. But as for the pilots...
Something's wrong by the remains of the enemy mobile suit. Yuta doesn't have any sort of Newtype abilities, but even he feels a wave of dread at the sight. "Yuta, you've done enough." Max tries, but the boy walks forward toward his allies.
"Shinji what's going on? Are you okay? Do you need me to get you out of there?" Yuta asks, kneeling by Unit-01. "What.... happened?"
Yuta doesn't know anyone here as well as he knows Shinji. It looks like everyone in this fight is feeling bad, though. He wishes he had something to offer. Gridman's light blinks insistently, signaling that he's almost out of time. Still, Yuta stays in place. If there's anything he can do, he's going to be there to do it. No matter what.
<Pose Tracker> BP-119 Duke has posed.
Standing patiently as Go'yavec turns to face him, Duke Fire does not waver or relent. He merely meets the giant stone turtlesque-kaiju's face. If his steel visage could smirk, perhaps he would permit himself this indulgence.
As it is, he merely remarks: "Got you."
Alouette, Renais and GaoGaiGo do the rest of the work, as though the Brave Robot had counted on their presence to finish it off. As the mockery-kaiju crumbles, Duke Fire replaces his sword over his back. "Attending to after-action care." He turns - just in time to see the High Tension slacken in a worryingly human posture - or rather, a posture adopted by someone that only moments before held the spark of humanity behind their eyes.
For the first time, a member of the Brave Police, built and sworn to defend humanity, must confront the reality of battling a human opponent, even though he was not personally opposing that unit.
Regina, too, is staring at the monitor as the electromagnetic aura over the battlefield clears up. She should be exhausted, but, somehow, there is something keeping her awake, electric in her spine. She swallows.
"Duke. Prioritise assist." That's all the instruction she can think to give.
Securing his weapons, and reviewing the open comm traffic of that part of the fight in his databanks, the Brave Police's knight detective unhooks his combination, stepping out of the Fire Roader as it splits apart around him and reforms into its conventional rescue vehicle form. The five metre white robot formed out of an ambulance is the least threatening he can possibly be. He considers data. Seven-dash-zero-two-zero. By now this designation is very familiar to him.
He walks over to where the Proto Helios kneels cradling the High Tension's Core Fighter, opening a comline to the Nadesico. "Nadesico: This is operative BP-119 Duke of the Brave Police. I will see to the safety of your pilots until they are capable of returning to your care." He switches lines now to his private, personal line: "Regina: We should go with them."
"Are you sure, Duke?" This kind of initiative from her partner is unusual; shaken as she is, Regina is caught off-guard, reacting without thinking - asking instead of refuting.
"I cannot say why; but I am certain nevertheless."
"... Alright. We probably deserve some leave, after this and the paint mission." Duke nods, resuming transmission to the Nadesico: "Requesting permission to come aboard with my partner and equipment."
That done, he folds his arms behind his back, and simply stands vigil until Liam is ready to move again.
<Pose Tracker> Kamille Bidan has posed.
Kamille watches the kaiju crumble, and then...
It never stops hurting, feeling death. Even when he doesn't know who it is. Even when the grief isn't his.
He's silent as he holds his head in the cockpit, shuddering, his radio off so no one notices his reaction.
<Pose Tracker> Ruri Hoshino has posed.
"This is the Nadesico's systems operator, Ruri Hoshino," Ruri identifies herself, when Duke opens communications. (The visual communication window, again, shows someone quite young.) A quick, more electronic query -- she makes a judgement call: "Heard and understood. Thank you for your help."
Normally, trusting something like that to someone unknown to them isn't really a call she should make, but...
... the bridge is a little upset, right now. She's the only one thinking clearly. (Unemotionally.)
And it's not like Jun overrides her, so she probably didn't do anything wrong.
<Pose Tracker> Nidaime has posed.
And so the battle is over. Nidaime gets some further encouragement from Rikka and something appropriating understanding from Alouette.
Her gaze looks towards Qivi's unit for a moment. She can't see Qivi, and she doesn't know it's Qivi until she radios, but she has a sense for emotional wavelengths. She doesn't always have the words, but she has the feels.
Renais is sweet. She's relieved to see Sayla is able to fall back. But other than that--
--she really does need a cocoa. And so it shall be.
<Pose Tracker> Rikka Takarada has posed.
Together, they bring down Mecha-Ghoulghilas once more. Rikka finds herself... a little relieved, that it actually took. But that relief fades quickly. After how much it took to say that much, putting her heart and soul into everything, the response is...
'You're right. I don't get it.'
Rikka inhales sharply, fumbles a bit to try to come up with anything... but there's nothing she can say to that. Akane decides she's done with this kaiju attack strategy.
...Rikka doesn't hear anything after that. She can only assume Akane left already.
"...I don't know." Rikka replies to Yuta quietly. She sits there, unmoving for a moment. She forces herself not to look at the remains of High Tension. Nothing good could have happened over there. Soon enough, however, Synchrotank's systems alert her to an incoming message.
...Ugh. She really doesn't want to deal with this right now... But if Sayla contacted her like this, it's because she trusted her to get the message out, and it is good to know she's unharmed...
So, she reaches for the communications, fumbling a bit before finally managing to hit the button to switch it over to Shuffle frequencies.
"...Astral Dragon to Shuffle Alliance pilots. Message from Heart-2." Her tone is a bit flat, but she relays Sayla's message... and then, she shuts her communications off and lets herself just go limp in the pilot seat for a moment.
Yuta is still out there, helping people... It's good, she's proud of him for that.
...And, a part of her is glad for it. She kind of just wants to be alone right now, even if for only a few minutes longer.
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
The decidedly skeletal-looking Proto Helios kneels on the softening tarmac, its head bowed. If it could curl up further, it probably would; as it is, Liam doesn't have the energy. He should get back to the Nadesico, but he can't even do that. The deaths of the two kaiju, and the ignition of the rocket engines, are so far away they might as well be on another planet. And then--
Strictly speaking, Liam doesn't need to look behind him to see Duke, but he does. The Proto Helios' eye-visor peers at him, emotionlessly. That's the AI that helped him. "...Understood," Liam says. His voice trembles. "...I did this."
<Pose Tracker> Alouette Pommier has posed.
The combination was enough, and the kaiju finally collapses, as Alouette breathes a sight of relief, as she begins ejection from the severely-damaged Long Dagger and prepares to have it sent back to Orbit Base. The relief doesn't last long, though, as she takes a glance at the devastation caused by the battle. She hadn't been able to spare too much attention to the other fronts of the battle, but apparently the pilot BioNet sent out was killed.
It's tragic but... it's all too common with BioNet child subjects. Alouette knows she was lucky.
"Ikumi... Mamoru. We did everything we could. Initiating Fusion Out." Although this could hardly be called a victory, they did manage to stop one of the greatest threats targeting Paris in many years, and Alouette was even able to achieve something closest to "understanding" with Akane ever since they first met in Porc-Auto.
As the 3G Blue team returns to Orbit Base, however, Alouette sits in silence, eventually closing her eyes for the ride. She may be strong, but the physical and emotional exhaustion have begun to set in. She will have more than enough time to process everything tomorrow.
<Pose Tracker> BP-119 Duke has posed.
Duke's head turns to regard the skeletal proto-Gundam, thoughtful. Technically, this is a confession; however, something in his AI insists that this falls outside the demarcations of 'law'.
"Strictly speaking: I do not believe that to be the case. I believe you were trying to save them."
"The fault lies with the people who did this to them. It lies with BioNet."
He does not understand the guilt. He is not Minae, built to understand the turmoil of the heart. However: He will accept it, even if he presents the facts otherwise.
KTS: BP-119 Duke's Duke Fire has left BP-119 Duke teleports out.
KTS: Dr. Spartura's Spartura Custom Edition has left Dr. Spartura teleports out.
<Pose Tracker> Lucine Azul has posed.
It takes a while, to crest ahead of those emotions. Liam, and Shinji, and herself, repeating over and over, obscuring the light.
But there was, light.
Like, the tickle of a cat's tongue.
What?
She finds herself in the melancholy field of flowers again, and, in that memory, she begins to center herself.
She is here, in the Dianthus. She is here, in Paris. Her hands are on the controls. Her com is off, but she is still receiving. There are people there, talking. Friends. They're so sad too. Yurika... Captain Yurika might be crying, after all this. Minako, Megumi, so many. And Ruri... it was her, in Niko's mind? Was that what she said?
<".... Liam."> The Dianthis hasn't stirred from where it landed. <"Shinji."> No, she needs to call him Mr. Ikari, but it's hard to say anything else, right now.
There are words she should say here to comfort him, Shinji, and herself. Duke provides better ones.
She just keeps the com on then, letting it register her silence. She's present now. They can go from here.
<Pose Tracker> Liam 7-020 has posed.
The Proto Helios does not move.
"Tried," Liam says. "Failed. Failure." Short, clipped, monotone, and yet full of self-loathing. Lucine says his name. What can he say to her? She knows who he is, now. What he is. He thought he could run from it.
Liam will return to the Nadesico eventually, with assistance from the Aestivalis. For now, though, there is only silence.