2011-03-26 - Tug Of War

SIDE SIX SPACE FORTRESS AME-NO-MIHASHIRA

All is quiet. Almost TOO quiet. All systems are normal. Then--

"Sir, w-we're getting readings!"

"Readings? Of what?"

"We think it's the readings of a warp fi--"

SIDE SIX OUTSIDE AME-NO-MIHASHIRA

A fold in space opens. From the odd, violet fluctuations emerges a small but intimidating ship--and around it, mobile units. Several of them. Among them is the Weissaber, O.O. rifle hanging freely at its side. In the heart of the machine, Lemon offers a tiny smirk.

"Our mission is simple: we will assault the Space Fortress Ame-no-Mihashira and attempt to wear their defenses and, ideally, resources out as quickly as possible. We want to burn them out so we can seize it. This fortress is an ideal place, and would be a valuable resource to the Crusader cause. Let the mission...begin."

Lifting its O.O. rifle, the Weissaber fires a single but high-powered shot at the fortress and its emerging defensive forces, all but decimating the hapless grunts that manage to be in the beam fire's path.

The Crusaders' battle has started.

Lemon is out alone as Ashsaber appears along the Weissaber and James smirks, yes as alwayshe's got those damn shades of his on. As Lemon gives the orders he's already picking out targets.

"Roger that m'lady. We'll send these idiots packing."

Beam machine gun is ready and James follows up towards the station only after Leomn has fired.

"Come out and play! You only are going to die for a bucnh of idiot brucrats! Come on show us whatcha got!"

He opens up on several grunts as he closes in!

Going from Earth to Mars and then back to Earth in the span of twelve hours is a grueling task. It may well be physically impossible as well, so let's not look at the numbers too closely. Perhaps it is just that Paptimus Scirocco, the vaunted Man from Jupiter, is capable of doing the impossible. But can he make the impossible possible?

"I wonder whatever happened to the Hawk of Endymion," the Admiral says to himself, as he lifts a cup of warm tea up towards his mouth. He looks at his pink-haired adjutant, whose mouth opens to give a reply when--

The building shakes. Struck from the outside, the impressive armor of the fortress stands the test against the initial volley from the Weissaber and its powerful O.O. rifle.

In the meantime, his tea jostled about, Paptimus Sciroccoi is left with a similar expression: o.o

"Let me guess, we're under attack?" he rhetorically questions, as the klaxons go off, and the call to sortie against Crusader forces rings out. Sending his senses out, he's assailed by the immediate loss of life, as low-ranking ensigns are torn apart in the initial volley. Nearby defense systems are crippled, the teleportation ambush proving remarkably sensible.

"They'll try to siege us out as quickly as possible. Let's not let them do that."

Taking the express elevator to the command hangar bay, he looks at his top of the line unit, 'The O,' still being repaired after dealing with the Jovian Chulip Forces yesterday. His gaze slinks over to the nearby unit behind the tarp. It's not a difficult choice to make.

Meanwhile, nearby battleships begin opening fire on the Shadow Mirror vessel, GN-X units engaging in battle against the equally grunt-like dolls that the Crusade sends out. Beam sabers clash, blasts fire everywhere, ordnance fills the air and chaos rules the airwaves!

Ilyse Amsel has, despite her best attempts, still not managed to get a working teleportation device on Whipporwill. She can, however, set up sensors for them. Not that that helps her get much of a warning, and all of the time is made up for by moving into position to deploy.

A built-up and slightly heavier GN-XIII, painted midnight blue and accented with shining silver, launches from the fortress itself; Ilyse had been stopping there overnight after on a whirlwind tour of several ships to make some adjustments. She doesn't actually get her helmet on until after she's already in space. The machine coasts, apparently unarmed except for the GN Shield - but it could be hiding any number of internal armaments.

"Amsel here," Ilyse transmits to A-LAWS forces, once she's fully equipped for combat. "I'll be keeping an eye out in case they try to sneak in some more reinforcements. Let's kick these jerks out, huh?"

 Ascian Luddite transmits, "Ascian Luddite, on the Amenthes, ready for action!"

 James Heller transmits, "Tch, this is going to be a turkey shoot."

Among the group of machines that have struck out as the first wave of the assault is one that's made a bit of a splash in the last week or two: The black Assault Dragoon that is more often than not referred to as 'the custom Ashsaber,' the ASK-UC90 Flickerist. Hindustania, over the Atlantic, and high in the skies, this machine has rapidly made a name for itself with it's abilities and brutality.

The girl within, however, is still a relative unknown.

Lethe Rusina is dressed differently than before, but that isn't so much a point of detail as what is actually going on in front of her: Lemon Browning throws the opening salvo with the Weissaber, members of the W-Series are on the move, and the A-LAWS response is scrambling out into position. Her eyes hidden under the translucent lenses of wraparound sunglasses, the gynoid's attention shifts from the myriad of sub-monitors in the cockpit's space and focuses instead straight ahead, tightening her hands on the control sticks.

"Understood, Mistress Lemon."

The Flickerist's verniers fire and send the machine blazing toward the front lines, the massive right hand clenching up into a fist. Drawn back, the arm swings around to slam square and true into a GN-X's cockpit with a thunderous crash, the hidden vernier mounted inside the arm itself firing to accelerate the blow, sending one poor mook flying head over heels back to Ame-no-Mihashira with the majority of it's chest blunt-force torn open.

"W18, engaging the enemy."

 Lethe Rusina transmits, "W18, engaging the enemy."

Earlier that day Earth Cradle

"You lucky bastard you." One of the DC privates pokes against Ascian's chest, which gets a wince from him. He's still not entirely healed from recent combat events. Being on the other side of the Ultimate Shield, and a gigantic explosion, tends to do that to someone. His left eye is still eyepatched off with a bandage. The bluehaired framerunner bats the guy's hand away. "It's not what you think." He claims calmly. The soldier quickly quips; "Dude. What are you getting defensive for? Three girls man, three!".... Ascian groans. Then suddenly he notices James coming his way. A discussions occurs between them, and something is handed off between the two which ends up in an embarassed yet grinning Ascian.

Now Space, near the Space Fortress Ame-No-Mihashira

The Amenthes breaks out of the folded space, and immediately opens its wings. All twelve bits push a bit further out, Metatron crystals quickly pursing out between the folds and sending a red shockwave of energy outwards whilst an almost gas-like glow sets on its very body. The Orbital Frame's hands reach behind itself; the space behind it suddenly warping and twisting, a strange white-red distortion showing as it opens its Vector Trap, and removes... a gigantic sniper rifle of sorts. The weapon gets readied, and metal begins to bend and twist on its right arm as it begins to almost 'integrate' the weapon.

Within the cockpit, Ascian is calmly breathing, looking at the base through one of the vid-windows that are up. Duat had gotten better at organizing and anticipating what he wanted, to such an extend that he barely needed to give any more commands. His hands on the controls tap a little, setting some variables he knows he can manipulation, before quickly glancing at the reddish panel before him, indicating his combat computer being active. "Duat?" He inquires, trying to break the silence. "Yes sir. All systems are operational and at onehundred percent. Ready for combat." It replies. "How is Amenthes... is she staying quiet?" A quick flash of memory plays through his mind. "She is remaining quiet." Whenever it was not about the state of the machine itself, the A.I. always seemed more... human. Slowly developing out of that metalic voice.

"Good. Then let's strike." The sniper rifle suddenly begins to reform further, the barrel getting red lines of Metatron, then reforming into a series of barrels, splitting the energy. "Fire." Right along with Lemon's Weissaber, the Amenthes fires a piercing set of weaponized metatron-energy beams, cutting through a series of grunts, before it lowers the arm and moves one leg up - the other coming 'down' and speeding forwards, leaving its arms at its sides - rushing towards the space fortress.

Among the other machines launching from the ship comes one which sticks out like a sore thumb. Among the many Mobile Suits and PTs and other robots flies much stockier machine. As it approaches firing range, Moribito-02 draws its machinegun and cradles it in its arms.

"I hope this goes well..." Aoba shifts nervously in the pilot harness, gently biting her lower lip. Frontal assaults are not really the sort of thing she usually likes engaging in. The last one was difficult for her... but she -did- get to see Mazinger Z. That was worth all the trouble and worry! Maybe she'll see something equally awesome out here?

 Aoba Tsuzaki transmits, "This is Aoba... coming into range."

 Divada Kirador transmits, "This is the Ark Hammer, we're keeping back in case any big ships show up. otherwise we're simply supporting...."

SOMEWHERE NOT THE AME-NO-MIHASHIRA An extremely burly looking fellow in possession of both slick aviator's shades and a truly fearsome moustache is currently screaming his lungs out through what appears to be a very flimsy communications link from someplace far, far away from the Space Fortress Ame-No-Mihashira, if the picture and sound quality are any indication.

"I DON'T CARE /WHO/ IS IN CHARGE OVER THERE." roars the very personification of Axe Cop rage, his A-LAWS uniform damp with spittle as he has his own personal freakout session over the radio. "--YOU ARE TO ABANDON THAT STATION AND RETURN TO BASE IMMEDIATELY GOD DAMN IT! IT SAYS RIGHT HERE IN POLICY THAT--" Luckily, everyone is spared the agony of additional capslock shouting because the communications link appears to falter and disappear rather suddenly, winking out and leaving the seething professional hardass with nothing to take his rage out on but the operators in the communications hub he appears to be standing in. Someone's about to get manhandled.

THE AME-NO-MIHASHIRA, RIGHT NOW, RIGHT NOW The hangar shakes. Barrels, crates and people alike all tip over, for the force exerted by oversized beam shots splashing on the Space Fortress's exterior does not discriminate. A guy waving those sweet glowy batons to guide ships in and out is knocked straight onto his ass in dramatic slow motion as space itself seems to go crazy, now very much a chaotic obstacle course of explosions and lasers and missiles and dead grunts. Poor grunts.

Ibis Douglas grits her teeth at the idiot shouting at her from relative safety halfway across the Solar System. How /dare/ he have the audacity to have both sweet sunglasses /and/ a moustache. That asshole. She throws her hands in the air in exasperation as he rants, sitting in the cockpit of Project TD's misguided attempt at creating an interstellar Armored Module, the YAM-07-1 Astelion. The tesla drives are already flanged up to full, that droning, annoying-ass whine permeating every inch of the hangar because it is cutscene time as the music swells.

"What? I can't hear you!" yells the thoroughly-annoyed redhead, who then proceeds to flip the radio off, her genius excuse for sticking around in this fight having been given and jams the throttle wide open, bolting out of the hangar and into open space. She immediately makes a complete ass of herself by missiling every DC mook in sight, because that is what you do in a war zone hell /yeah/ killing people.

Some days are luckier than others. The One Man Army is a pilot of no fixed assignment; the famed, if somewhat unpopular, masked ace of the A-LAWS task force is essentially given license to operate wherever he feels like, in whatever capacity he feels appropriate. It's the good fortune of the A-LAWS forces stationed at the Pillar of Heaven that he, and his custom mobile suit, are currently present for whatever reason. The attacking Crusaders, on the other hand, might not find it as pleasant. Moments after the Crusader assault on the Space Fortress Ame-no-Mihashira begins, another machine launches from the fortress' bays, by itself. It makes no move to join the existing defenders, to form up or take position or anything of the sort: Instead the machine, a spindly, armored form in jet black with white highlights, trailing the distinctive burnt orange particles of a machine powered by a GN-T drive, rushing past the defensive lines and recklessly into the attackers, one slightly curved, pitch-black blade in either hand. "COME, CRUSADERS, WHO DARES FACE ME?!" the man who has come to be known by the peculiar epithet of 'Mister Bushido' calls, over an open frequency because that's what he does. "WHO HAS THE COURAGE TO FACE CERTAIN DEATH?!"

A Guarlion hovers at the fore of apparating ship, and from the looks of it it's seen better times. It's unmistakably a custom job: armoured plates layer its upper arms, only to terminate in massive boosters, a long, slim sword hilt stretches along its left side and its body is largely rust-coloured with black and gold accents along its shoulder/arm boosters.

Its armour is /dull/, though, and roughly patched in numerous places to boot. One of its eyes is missing, too, but the socket still casts brilliant green light into the space around it. It's unlikely that the machine's seen much time in a proper hangar in months, but its shabby state hasn't kept its pilot from occupying one of the point positions for this assault.

"Murata," said pilot roughly transmits as the last lights of space folding fade from his eyes, "Guarlion Mumyou." The Armored Module reaches behind itself with its left hand to draw the wakizashi sheathed there; as soon as the weapon's been brought around to be held ready at the Guarlion's side, the machine's eyes briefly, brightly flare.

"Be /careful/, as you slaughter them; I don't think we want to damage this place /too/ badly."

Fire explodes from the Guarlions back and arms with that, bearing it speedily into the A-LAWS' lines; its boosters, along with the scrapped metal and loosed GN Particles of slain defenders will make up a trail behind the Armoured Module as it races towards Ame-No-Mihashira itself.

Ame-no-Mihashira is under attack! It's the Alpha Numbers' job to respond anytime, anywhere, and so it is that a white Gespenst launches from a neaby (in space terms) ship!

So far, Rio's use of this suit has been a rather mixed bag... She's ended up taken out before she can really show off its capabilities... And she _knows_ she can do better than that. Today, she'll prove it. "Rio Mei Long, Gespenst Mk IV T-Link Type, coming to assist!"

MOMENTS AGO

Space Fortress Ame-No-Mihashira has been a very useful station for the Earth Federation forces, and recently, for the Aggressors in particular. Since the space battleship Phrike was struck by the Vector Cannon, it has been under repairs; it's entire hangar was practically shot out from under it, and as it is a primarily A-LAWS model of spacecraft, using their facilities for proper repair and resupply is simply more efficient.

It is ultimately fortune that the vessel has finished repairs on today of all days, and even more that it hasn't yet launched and departed. When the station shakes and the alarms sound, the captain of the ship and commander of the Aggressors, Leos Klein, slows in his stride for just a moment. He suddenly takes off down the seemingly endless metal corridors, his long stride that of a much younger man and carrying him towards the hangar of his ship.

NOW

A dark blue Armored Core leaves the Space Fortress, darting into space and turning to head straight at the incoming Divine Crusaders. The optics of the distinctive Ethermaster shine, the red gleam focusing on the enemy machines as it's radio comes to life.

"This is Klein. Aggressors are inbound."

The Phrike isn't like the Hiryu Custom, it's a very sterile craft with white washed metal walls, and it feels more calustraphobic then the former exploration ship turned battleship Still, it is Meiya's home away from home now. She had been trying to settle in an apoint her quarters while the ship was docked at Ame-No-Mihashira.

The vibration of weapon impact came before the sounds of the alarms, and Meiya steadied herself against one wall. "Tch." She shighs and left her quarters in a run, turning towards the hangars, passing her own captain in his own mad dash as she entered hte locker room.

The sky blue TSYF-22 Raptor that serves as Meiya's back up unit load into hte Phrike's catapult. "Meiya Mitsurugi, Valkyrie-1, launching!" The space propulsion packs of the Raptor ignite as it accelerates down the catapult and out into space, taking up position behind and to the right of Leos' armored core.

"...We really should standardize our callsigns." she murmurs under her breath.

James Heller gets into contact with Murata and feeds him some tatical data as he pick up the incomming unit. He will be curious to see how Murata fairs against Mister Busido. This should be a hell of a fight, he thinks he keeps one sensor unit on that incase Murata needs anymore tatical support.

However Illyse has caught the Ashsaber pilot's attention.

The Beam Machine Gun opens up on Ilyse's machine s he closes in and he opens a channel.

"Another one for the chalk board then again maybe the wreck would be worth salvaging! If you value your life I'd punch out now and let me take the suit!

As the Guarlion Mumyou blasts right through the defenders' own lines, practically passing right by the Susanowo as it does the opposite, the masked ace's attention is finally caught. Fresh from his open challenge to the entire attacking force, Bushido's green eyes glance towards the unusual signature appearing on his cockpit's panoramic monitor, the holographic displays picking it out easily enough. A heavily customised unit, designed for melee combat... A small, grim smile pulls at Bushido's mouth, below his mask. The GNX-Y901TW whirls around suddenly, changing directions quickly by dint of the mysterious properties of a propulsion system based on GN technology, forward thrust building as it chases after Murata's Guarlion. "I apologise," the One Man Army radios directly at the custom Armored Module, his high-speed close combat mobile suit closing with an almost disconcerting quickness. "But it seems you are far too dangerous to be left to my allies." And then, one of the hybrid-state black blades whirls to be held in a reverse grip, before the Susanowo tries to stab it down /into/ the Guarlion Mumyou!

Ascian guides another snipergun burst through a series of mooks, and swivels his Amenthes graciously through some laserfire, spinning around, sending multiple blossoms of laserfire further towards the station when his eyes catch something. Duat immediately responds to the man's curiousity by displaying the source of the sudden explosions of missile fire everywhere. "That machine..." He suddenly recalls fighting that machine, how much trouble it'd been for him to fend it off. The only reason he'd had so much luck was due to the fact that he'd caught the pilot off-guard the first time. "I wonder if it's the same pilot." Ascian whispers to himself. "Let's find out." He pushes his hands down, closer against the controls, and moves his body a bit forwards against the reins of the pilot-harness.

Immediately, the Amenthes gains another burst of speed, whilst metatron crystals push out from the back of its legs - another 'circle' of red energy exposing itself to space, announcing its acceleration. His eyes quickly dart, checking on the status of the sniper weapon. "It's out of energy." The metal of the weapon quickly begins to retreat, de-integrating with the Amenethes' arm and gets shoved into its Vector Trap whilst it rushes 'above' the Astelion's path, hoping to surprise it again. But the red streak of light may very well give it away a bit too easily.

"Okay. Let's do this." The Amenthes lifts its left arm up, aiming it towards the flying machine, and then suddenly gains yet another boost of energy as it switches which leg is up and which is down, almost as if it 'kicked' itself off against an invisible structure in space, going straight for that machine. This time, its opening move wasn't using a blade however. Instead at high velocity, its hand begins to reach out to that machine's cockpit. Purple lightning /crackles/ across the hand, preparing to bind the enemy unit with its hand, to form a hyper-magnetic hold.

Ilyse Amsel's GN-XIII wouldn't be that distinctive, really, aside from its colour scheme. Except, if James checks his notes, it was there when the Aegis Shield went down - and was the leader of the team to break through it with a gravitational shockwave.

That would explain how it deflects the beam fire. Whipporwill thrusts its hand out, and the beams act as if they hit a barely-visible bubble, flashing bright and making a weird luminous ripple on impact and then swerving around the robot, carrying on somewhere behind her.

"/Somebody/ wants some," Ilyse says, cracking her knuckles before she grips the controls more tightly. Whipporwill accelerates without any visible thrusters, moving almost perfectly sideways, orbiting the Ashsaber at distance. She flicks on the radio.

"Yeah, right," Ilyse transmits. "I may not be the best pilot in the world, but I think I can stop you from putting your fingers where they don't belong - and the last thing I'm gonna let you touch is my Whipporwill!" She holds her hand over a set of keys for a moment, considers, then taps out a short code.

The thrust-forward hand of Whipporwill shimmers for a moment before blasting a beam forward. It isn't bright, and appears most like a pinched-in line in space, drilling through whatever it hits and leaving a neat core of supercompressed material in the center of any hole.

The shooting continues -- shots are just filling the space, making friendly fire sometimes a possibility, although the A-LAWS troopers -- elites that they are, down to the very last man -- are pretty good at holding off their shots until the stage is clear. But such is the chaos that initially reigns supreme, the attack by Shadow Mirror and Friends so sudden, that even soldiers find themselves in apparent disarray.

And so order enters the field. A radiating beacon of it, a miasma of pressure, the Man from Jupiter.

Blasting out of the Space Fortress in what can only be described as 'The Messala crossed with a Dinosaur,' the Messala Dinofaust surges out with its twin thrusters burning a bright blue. Like some form of GERWALK, it immediately unleashes, sending a thick flurry of missiles through the dead of space to create dead people.

Dolls explode into parts and explosions, through which the reborn Messala slams right through, the pilot within already wearing an almost-eager smirk. "Where's the leader of this insurrection?" he demands to know across open frequencies, casually igniting a beam saber from one of its stubby, dinosaur-like arms to slash apart a PT as it flies past. The mega particle cannons begin charging up as it lines up a shot on the Shadow Mirror command ship--!

Lethe finds herself with a moment of pause as the fight advances, her green eyes shifting back and forth a little slowly in the cockpit of her machine. A number of the responders for the Federation are largely special units of some design, from custom-tuned GN-XIIIs and the Raptor to the Susanowo. This, from what she has been able to glean from the few battles that she's been in, is where the fighting becomes more intense.

One of the early responders is a Gespenst. Not coming from the station itself, but from Federation traffic in the area, Lethe reaches out to the console in front of her and starts to type out commands while Rio advances. Though the commands are only a scanner being triggered, the eyes shed an ominous yellow glow when it turns it's head toward the Federation soldier.

Lethe's mouth twitches. She wants to speak, but there's no logical reason for it, right now.

With a heavy pair of CLUNK noises sounding through the hull of the customized Assault Dragoon, the first pair of Shadow Bits-- the likewise heavily-customized Sword Breakers-- detaches from the frame, followed moments later by a second pair. They swarm through space at high speed, ducking and weaving around each other and blazing toward the Gespenst, taking turns to fire purple beams at the Personal Trooper-- and aiming to show it no mercy right from the get-go!

With only a wakizashi to protect himself, Murata nonetheless rises to the One Man Army's challenge rather than shy from it; hybrid-state blade meets folded steel, but all it really does is provide the aging swordsman with the leverage to guide Mister Bushido's blade to the patch across its abdomen.

Better an /already/ damaged region of the Armored Module's body than the alternative.

"Don't," Murata lowly replies, unconcerned with the scant few sparks already leaping from his console; the wakizashi gently slides down along the hybrid blade's length.

And then, in a flash, not only is it scything in a diagonal arc towards Susanowo's torso--

--it is joined by the katana in its right hand, the twinned swords endeavouring to carve an 'X' into the GN-powered mobile suit's center. The specifics of exactly /when/ the Guarlion went from holding one sword to two are hazy, but if someone were to play footage of this fight back frame by frame, they'd probably be able to catch it.

"We won't know each other long enough for your apologies to be worth the effort," Murata finishes as he fires the Guarlion's boosters to help separate the two machines a bit.

The Astelion, visible from quite a ways away what with the advent of high-powered optics and bright paintjob, performs a totally radical barrel roll inbetween twin streams of beam weapons fire as it untwists itself from a really goddamned big space jet into the clunky Lion-style Armoured Module we've all come to know and love. Honestly, who paints their ship white and then goes and has a fight in space? What a goofy god damned thing to do.

The Lion-custom's freshly-transformed arm grabs hold of the burst railgun from the Armored Module's back and swings the business end of the weapon into a vaguely third-string-animation-team-drawn enemy mobile suit's face, bashing it into submission rather than wasting ammunition on mooks as Ibis jets on past, trying to claw her way through the enemy's forces towards whatever passes for leadership. If she can just cause enough trouble there...

But wait! A familiar-looking piece of enemy hardware is bearing down on her! But this time, Ibis is prepared for the surprise attack! And as such, the Astelion ducks to one side in a burst of maneuvering jet fire and elbows one of the dead enemy mobile suits into the magnetic hold from the Amenthes, or at least close enough that the Armored Module is not in fact getting the hell magnetized out of it.

"Tch...!" hisses Ibis, whose fingers are so /hardcore/ placed on the firing studs of her flight controls. "You again!" There is a click heavy with intent as she squeezes down on the missile dispenser. The Astelion, moving to optimal range and trying to keep inbetween as much debris as possible, looses a trio of needlessly complicated-patterned missiles at the Amenthes.

The Ark hammer remains at the maximum range of it's weapons and out of the immediate battle. "My lady, if we're not joining the battle, why are we still here?" Divada, still with her arms crossed, continues to stare out of the view port. "It might be a naieve notion, Miranda, but I'm hoping this small act will stop the aggression on mars and actually allow them to recover enough to let them grow food on their own. Another concept is another ship to double the supply runs from Zeon to Mars." Miranda stands up quietly and sighs. "That...doesn't really answer my question, ma'am." Divad turns her head a bit. "I initially told you to watch out for other cruisers entering the area. But the other reason is, there are many many mobile suits out there and a really big colony behind the battle. We don't want to miss, do we?" Miranda chuckles. "good point..."

Incoming enemy contact, already? She's not even there yet... It looks like the fight has come to her! And here come two remotes... Rio takes a deep breath, and focuses, feeling the T-Link system... and _just_ manages to keep ahead of the remotes. "Alright, Crusader! I'll show you what I can do!" And she fires the chest cannon, plasma flying across the void towards the custom ashsaber!
 * WEENENENENENENENENENENENENENE*

Missiles... there are always missiles everywhere. Moribito-02 flies through a small swarm of them, neatly batting aside the closest one with its shield. A few more are shot down with the machinegun, and the rest are just avoided. Fighting in space is almost instinct by now, even if Aoba still prefers having her machine's feet solidly on dry land.

"Hmm?" Blue eyes shift to the side as she sees bits flying past. "Who has bits around--oh!" Her eyes widen, and she focuses on the Flickerist for a moment. "That's... that's a custom Ashsaber, isn't it? I recognize the design!" Leave it to Aoba to pick out something like that in the middle of the battle. "What kind of modifications were there? It looks cool!" Her chattering is cut short as a particle beam flies through space, missing her Jinki by just a few feet. "Whoah! I... I guess I'd better keep my head in the game here." Right. This is a battlefield. Even if there are some neat things around.

...like that one over there. "I... don't think I've seen that design before." The left arm comes up, and a chaingun flips out to fire a few rounds toward the Dinofaust Jupiter. It's really just an excuse to come closer for a better look, though.

You ever get the feeling that maybe you've done something you shouldn't? Bitten off, perhaps, more than you can chew? Yeah, Mister Bushido never gets that feeling either. In the moments after the black blade Unryu carves into the Guarlion Mumyou, the spindly form of the Susanowo skims backwards in the void, finely honed particle output controlling the machine's movements and positioning with unerring precision. The response from the other pilot, meanwhile, brings an even broader smile to the One Man Army's scarred face, even as Murata lashes out with a brutal dual-bladed attack on his custom-built machine. The Susanowo's right hand moves quickly, swinging the second black blade, Shiranui, but the attempted parry-and-riposte comes too slow; the Guarlion's blades bite deeply, dealing serious damage to the A-LAWS machine in the space of en eyeblink. Other people, sane people, would probably find this worrisome. "WELL SAID, GUARLION!!" Bushido roars in response, a manic light in his green eyes as the damaged, but still tremendously mobile, Susanowo springs into action. The spindly, armored machine whirls, bringing one foot up and then down in a hammering axe kick, and then uses its momentum to keep /going/, slashing first with one blade and then the other. "HRAAAAAGH!!"

Meiya glances at her instrument display as her Raptor accelerates. Gaurlion Mumyou? She opens a radio channel to inform Mister Bushido of the stolen propertly in the Guarlion's possesion and gets... flippancy in return. "Tch... Pretend samurai wannabe."

But the Gaurlion is too far away from the Raptor to easily engage on it's own. Instead Meiya locks on to a closer target, the Weissaber, it sticks out amongst the stock Shadow Mirrior units with it's uunique styling an O.O. rifle. "Locking on target.. firing."

The missile pods attached to the Raptor's shoudler launch a spread of infrared seking missiles for Lemon Browning's personal machine.

When Amenthes gets a hold of the Mobile Suit instead of the Astelion, Ascian is already reacting! The machine quickly gets placed between him and his opponent, catching a series of the missiles with its armor. The explosive projectiles strike against the mobile suit, before clustering the area around the Orbital Frame with more explosions. Whilst it can, it uses its right arm to fire a quick wide-spread volley of little plasma bolts into the area like a high-rate shotgun, before it has to move that arm to a safer place - as it erects a shield around itself.

The mobile suit itself then suddenly explodes, leaving a gigantic pink cloud in the area, hiding the Orbital Frame within. However, that didn't mean that Duat's Sensors could not pick up the person on the other side of things. <"You're the same pilot!"> Ascian suddenly calls out over laser-line, and actually goes as far as offering a audio-vidual communication line. If she'd open it, she'd find the bishonen pilot with his one eye covered by a bandage, sitting in a slightly red-lite Cockpit. <"I know this won't serve a purpose, but... you're better leaving this battle theater. I don't wanna hurt you."> Well, isn't that just a bit too rude of a thing to say to the /hero of the Balmarian war/!?

The pink cloud begins to disappate, and it looks like the Orbital Frame has barely moved. Its red eyes on the black hawkish 'visor' suddenly light up to a fiercesome glow, and a series of red orbs are visible behind it. Those weaponized volatile orbs of red Metatron energy that make each projectile seem like a ball of fire, excess energy seeping out like red ember feathers. And believing he gave enough warning, the frame suddenly speeds towards the Astelion and sends each orb flying from the tip of those phoenix-like feather-tails!

The beams miss, even if by narrow feet. Briefly, Lethe's eyebrow raises as she comes to quickly realize that this particular unit is a little different than the others, Gespenst or not. The purple-haired gynoid doesn't respond to Rio and glances quizzically toward her console as someone is fussing about the model of her machine, now taking the time to actually /turn/ the Flickerist itself toward the Federation unit.

The two large thrusters mounted in the black machine's back fire with muted boom through her cockpit chair, followed by a full-blown charge from the maneuvering verniers in the legs, as well as the extra set hidden under the backside of the skirting armor. While not the most agile girl at the prom, the Assault Dragoon proves to be able to /haul ass/, especially when it counts.

The plasma beam comes her way. The Flickerist twists at the waist and changes course with a few light touches of the controls, the machine narrowly avoiding a blast straight-on to the face... but instead moves on that angle, right alongside it all the way back to the source. The long, curved blade that sticks up from the elbow comes around on the fly-by, the elbow itself thrust out to catch the machine with a quick slash.

The whole machine shifts vectors, the legs flying forward to fire the verniers again. The bulky machine comes to a halt with an impressive lurch, Lethe bending forward in her seat from the inertia. The left arm swings around with a heavy-duty plasma revolver in hand, the internal components within the cylinder revving up before firing a quick double-tap of green back at Rio!

James Heller is just making a comment on the GN machines i9n general but then it proves to be much moe than he thought it was as the machine opensup on him. What the heck ws that? He's not sure about it.

"Heh, not bad lets see how you like this!"

The hit is good but even as that happen. The damage is bad and the fac this may not be a stock GN-XIII dawns on the SM.

"Humm I guess it's time for my A game then!"

Murata is fed some more data on his enemy prehaps it will lend him a hand, as for Ilyse he's got a fight oin his handshere the Sowrd BReaker powers up nd takes aim and he opens fire sending a single shot at the other machine.

"Well then I shouldn't have assumed you were just another speed bump." He actually isn't taunting from his tone.

"I didn't think I'd get a good fight to day!"

Thursters placed all along the periphery of the Astelion keep on firing in fits and starts as it whisks backwards through space at breakneck speed through the battle around the Pillar of Heaven, trying to make itself a particularly annoying fly to swat out of the air. The pilot's teeth grind together in frustration as she weaves in and out of the melting wreckage tumbling through space and--urgent phone call!

Ascian Luddite's face pops into view on Ibis' HUD and tells her to get lost, admittedly in a much nicer fashion. The American redhead (not that it really matters because that stupid A-LAWS helmet makes everything look the colour of an amber traffic signal anyway) bites back as the Astelion clings to the underside of a wrecked mobile armour for a brief moment, looking very tactical and SWAT and oorah marines yut yut.

"Appreciate the sentiment!" she barks back down the line, not entirely unpleasant but understandably a little stressed. "But I'm not leaving until this show's over!" and then has to bail immediately from her perch because a hailstorm of metatron energy slams into the spot where the Astelion previously occupied.

The big fat white Lion about-faces as it zips towards the next available spot of cover--not that there's a whole lot of that in this particular battlefield--and looses a couple of desperate countershots with the burst railgun in one hand. But what match are railgun slugs for GIANT ENERGY WEAPONS, dear reader?

When the proverbial fireworks begin, Lemon Browning remains ever the calm and patient woman, a thin smile gracing her pale face. She wears no normal suit, or even a helmet in the cockpit of her Weissaber, quite comfortable and fearless of any grim fate that may await her should her unit fail her. She's sure it won't.

"Mistress Lemon, incoming from enemy forces--" her radio announces. The Dinofaust sets its sights on the Shadow Mirror ship that had accompanied her into the assault. "Understood, I'll assis--"

Aoba manages to take care of it. A soft breath escapes Lemon's lips. "You're covered."

"Roger."

When the Weissaber turns around, there's a target lockon signal blaring in her cockpit. Tilting her head slightly, the woman's gaze settles upon the Raptor. She's seen a unit like that before...the last time she engaged in combat...

"I know these tricks. You cannot surprise me," she calmly states to the other pilot with a smile. "But please, try your best. I could always use more research data."

The missile pods open fire, while at the same time the Weissaber's do the same. The missiles meet midair, colliding with the swarm and nullifying it before several sail and strike into the Raptor. Meanwhile, the O.O. rifle is raised, aimed and fires straight for the Raptor's chest.

Scirocco's question is, meanwhile, answered by the Weissaber. "I suppose you could say I am. But I think you should concern your efforts in defending this place." Pause. "That is, if you and your men can."

Rio sees the sword come out, and draws her own to parry -- but guesses the attack angle wrong, the slash leaving a long black scorch on her armor. She turns and gives chase, the Gespenst hauling ass itself after its opponent, although not as fast... Rio draws her mega beam rifle and takes to a zig-zag pattern, evading the plasma shots ash she returns fire!

 Lethe Rusina transmits, "Please utilize caution, Mistress Lemon."

 Lemon Browning transmits, "Do not worry about me, W18. I will be fine."

 Lethe Rusina transmits, "Yes, Mistress."

The massive mega particle cannons continue to churn, blue light emanating from the tips of the prolonged barrels. Inside the cockpit, the Man from Jupiter has an odd sense of deja vu. And then he has an odd sense that he's about to be shot at, right as the warning signals go off within the Messala. Hitting the disengage on his right flight stick, the energy dissapates as he hits the accelerator, sending the mobile hybrid forward as the rounds chip off little more than paint, leaving faint dings as the angle of impact changes.

Cutting off one thruster, the Dinofaust turns on a dime, rounding to face the oncoming Moribito-02. Just when there weren't enough missiles, /there are more missiles/ flurrying out of the shoulder pods of the hybrid.

"Are you the leader here?" he inquires of the enemy unit, "Or are you just fond of following bad commands?" The smug nature of the Admiral surges ahead of the vehicle itself, as with a gush of thrust the Messala moves to meet the Moribito-02 halfway! Mid-surge, he finds a response coming from another unit, no doubt the commander. He snaps a transmission off in reply to Lemon; "Hmph. You're sorely overstretching yourself if you think one vessel and a ragtag squad is enough to take this fortress. Who are you?"

"Speed bump," Ilyse says, rolling her eyes, but she knows better than to transmit any more than that or to give in to posing. Being at least partially unknown is a good defense... even if, at least scientifically, she's hardly mysterious anymore.

Whatever shield she's using can withstand a lot of fire. The sword breaker shot hits it dead on and apparently shatters; the beam explodes into several smaller beams, none of which actually penetrate and hit Whipporwill. At least /hitting/ her is pretty easy, judging by previous success. It's just that getting through the forcefield is tricky.

Ilyse charges, the machine gliding forward as if falling. Its hand draws back as she approaches and then slams forward, surrounded with the same rippling aura she's been using to deflect shots; it hits like a cannonball, or something else much larger and more painful than a lightweight GN-XIII fist.

Lethe continues to fire at the Gespenst while it in turn continues to evade. Briefly, the attack pattern seems a little too wild, too strange to grasp, but the gynoid soon picks up on it. The bulky right arm comes up and crosses over the chest, allowing the shots to strike the Flickerist as it holds a defensive position. The excess of armor pits and cracks, shots ripple across the frame, but the heavily customized Ashsaber does not yield-- the installed defenses as well as the strength of the hull holding up amazingly well.

The arm drops back down to the Flickerist's side, and the machine ... does not move?

Instead, the Shadow Bits, those remote-controlled and modified Sword Breakers, start to blaze by Rio, one at a time. One after another, they attempt a series of cross-up strafing runs from either side, above and below, trying to keep Rio pinned between the four X-crossing beams on all sides!

Railgun Slugs are a big match against giant energy weapons, dear reader, because that's how the combat system works! The Amenthes erects its shield before itself once more, and the highly charged projectiles crash against it, shattering and splitting behind it, sending a fierce shattershot to existing debris behind it, rattling explosions and sending the Amenthes forward for a moment due to the pressure of those multiple explosions. Ascian, within that machine, was getting shook around, his eyes however set straight on that vidlink with Ibis. He bites his lower bit for a moment, before quickly glancing over through his cockpit at the machine he is fighting.

<"If you want to stay, then just stay right there!"> Ascian calls out, and the wings of the Orbital Frame suddenly open ups up a volley of attacks around her position, but not at the Astelion itself, before the machine pushes forwards again. Trying to chase the Astelion like it's some kind of game of cat-and-mouse, the Amenthes continues on, thinning in the volley of red plasma bolts that come rushing out of the right arm like a dragon's mouth spewing its fiery breath. And then suddenly, a buildup of energy. The bioluminescent lines of the frame flow from the core, gathering at the end of that rifle - a 'ball' forms for a short moment, before being spit out line a thin laserline, trying to cut into the thrusters of Ibis' unit.

"Isn't it strange how bold humans can grow when they operate under a lack of understanding?" There is the faintest glimmer of orange particles in the far distance of the battle waged at Ame-no-Mihashira. So indistinct and distant are they that they would be hard to take note of in the heat of battle, but they are assuredly there -- and rapidly growing closer. It is in that distance that a single mobile suit floats; monochromatic, its design is somewhat like an odd mixture of the GNZ line of A-LAWS mobile suits and the common principals of the classic Gundam design. In its right hand it holds a large, streamlined rifle, clenched easily within its pristine white grip. "It's that very boldness that leads them to mindlessly turning on themselves in the same, tired cycle." The rifle lifts. The barrel suddenly seperates with a soft hiss muted in space, revealing two conductor prongs and an inner barrel, glowing with ominous orange light like the center of a forge. Purple electricity arcs across the conductor prongs. GN particles are gathered at the depths of the barrel. And it is then that a voice-only line of communication opens up to Lemon Browning's Weissaber: "I wonder -- what sort of grand dreams do you think you'll realize by eating your own tail?" The trigger is pulled. And from impossible distance, a shot is fired -- a tremendous bolt of condensed orange light, trailed by purple electricity uncontrollably dancing around it like an unstable corona, puncturing through space... right for the Weissaber.

 Lethe Rusina transmits, "Mistress Lemon-!"

 Lemon Browning transmits, "I-It's okay, I'm fine."

 Ascian Luddite transmits, "Don't hesitate to ask for assistance. We're here /together/, after all."

 Lemon Browning transmits, "Thank you..."

 Ascian Luddite transmits, "James, how're you holding up?"

Divada tilts her head as the bridge crew listen to the comm chatter from the Crusader units. However, they still stay out of the battle against the smaller mobile suits. "hmmm....Seems Bushido and Murata are really pounding the hell out of each other." Divada says offhandedly. Miranda looks up and chuckles. "They both seem to be the 'all or nothing' sort, don't they?" Divada shrugs. "Let's hope they're 'all' doesn't end them, then."

"Neither!" The voice that responds back is one of a teenage girl. "I'm here to help take this place back!" The barrels of the chaingun spin, shooting down several of the incoming missiles. Moribito-02 accelerates, charging right through the rest with surprising speed. Several of them detonate harmlessly against the raised shield, and a few spiral off into the nothingness of space after deflecting away without exploding. Moribito may have guns, but Aoba prefers to fight in close... that's what the swords are for! A swift punch is thrown, missing its mark, but the Jinki continues the motion smoothly. Both arms reach up and back, and each draws a large sword... though neither of them can truly be called proper swords. One looks more like a long razor blade with a handle indented into one end, and the other is angled sharply like a giant boomerang. They're both held like swords, at least.

"You know..." Aoba pivots in her harness, lifting her right arm, and Moribito mimics her movements, slicing downward with the boomerang blade. "I don't think I've seen anything like your robot before." Another pivot, and the left arm comes across, bringing the straight razor blade horizontally. "It's pretty cool! What's it called?" Shifting slightly, both arms come up, then bring the swords down together, each crossing over diagonally. "This is Moribito-02! Though I'm not sure if you've ever seen it before..." She has to be polite and introduce her own machine if she's going to ask about his, after all.

 James Heller transmits, "I'm fine."

Because Murata's first instinct is to parry what could easily be a cockpit-crushing blow with both blades, the Guarlion's arms have been shoved aside to expose its torso by the time Susanowo finishes its follow through. With nothing between the One Man Army and Mumyou but the former's deadly hybrid blades, the only thing that saves the Armored Module from zero-gravity vivisection is its pilot stubbornly firing all thrusters to /yank/ it away from its foe before the blades can bite too deeply.

Predictably, this leaves the Guarlion with ugly, ragged lines cutting wildly across its front, but better that than the explosive alternative.

Murata bares his teeth and discontentedly growls; it isn't every day that he meets people /half/ as deadly with the sword as he is, and while he'd heard the stories of A-LAWS' One Man Army for the last year or so, he'd have been hard-pressed to believe any of them before today.

"Hm," he roughly vocalizes as he narrows his eyes on the anorexic Susanowo; soon, his eyes have slid from his main view screen to the monitor James is beaming tactical data to. By the time he's made up his mind, the katana's been sheathed again, leaving him with just the wakizashi.

"'Mister Bushido', is it? Hnnh--it's a shame you've allowed yourself to be wrapped up in the Federation's /lies/; I could /teach/ you things. Nonetheless--"

One by one, Mumyou's rear boosters ignite--and one of them actually /explodes/ as soon as it fires, as the damaged Armored Module's systems are having a difficult time limiting their output properly. The unexpected explosion hurls it a ways to the right; the /rest/ of the boosters continuing to fire means that the Armored Module quickly swings into a foolishly direct approach upon the One Man Army, but it isn't until it's passed by the Susanowo's side that it actually reaches to the sheathed Shishioh Blade to prepare itself.

"--what's done is done! Perhaps you'll be /wiser/ in your next life! Shishioh Blade!"

One sharp turn later, and Mumyou is bearing down on the Susanowo on a cloud of smoke and fire. At the very last moment before unsheathing, the booster in its right arm ignites, lending hellacious momentum to the cleaving stroke that follows. The moment the Guarlion's arm reaches its full extension, the Armored Module will come to a halt, and after casting the wakizashi aside it'll take the Shishioh Blade's hilt in both hands and try to follow that first stroke up with two--no, four, no, eight--no, dozens more.

GN Drives being what they are, it's entirely possible that Susanowo will give him the slip before slash one hits, in which case the Guarlion will be stuck trying to recover its balance for a second or two. Even in zero gravity, commitment to a failed attack can be devastating.

"Mudamudamudamudamudamudamudamudamudamudamudaaaaaaaa!" he'll exclaim as the Guarlion's arms and blade are briefly rendered blurry.

The Astelion, which is now finding itself in the middle of a bullet hell shooter boss segment, increases speed to try and deal with the threat of the oncoming storm of high-energy plasma. It's kind of silly in retrospect because there is really no chance of it /actually/ outrunning projected energy weapons, but that's another lesson for the pilot to reflect on later.

Ibis' burst railgun is hit directly in the ammunition feed by a big ol' glowing belt of high-tech hellfire and, testament to her developing reflexes as a pilot, she elects to quickly hurl the now-useless weapon as far away as she can. It tumbles end over end into some poor grunt mobile suit's head, nothing more than a molten heap of slag by the time it gets there. RIP Burst Railgun #72, you will be sorely missed. The mistake here is that Ibis then doesn't take further evasive action and the little portrait of her on the video link goes red as warning lights fill up her cockpit as a hole is punched cleanly through one of the Astelion's enormous stupid nacelles.

"Whoops." chuckles Ibis good-naturedly, who has probably actually forgotten about the video link tying her to the OPPOSING FORCE and whose adrenaline has seemingly run out. "Guess this thing's almost done for."

Maybe it is all a /dastardly trick/ because the still-functioning maneuvering thrusters on the Astelion fire in sequence along one side and send it into a wide circle as it opens up with anti-armour vulcans, trying to pin down the Amenthes for as long as it can to buy allied forces some more time to belt the crap out of their opponents. As if this sector wasn't already enough of an obstacle course /without/ machine cannon rounds littering the place up.

There's just no way Rio can dodge all this... is there? She kind of feels like she's failed a little, if she could only pilot better, surely there would be a way to avoid those remotes... But she's not out of the fight yet! Her foe has stopped running away... So the Gespenst charges in, sheathing its beam sword and brandishing the beam rifle menacingly as she lines up for a shot... and then, while Lethe is anticipating _that_ attack, she suddenly draws the M90 assault rifle and lets her have it with bullets and grenades instead!

James Heller this time is on the defence his machine pulls back and now comes even with those beams there's got to be a way through. THere has to be even if it's just plain overloading the defence systwem it's packing. As for the Ashsaber, it gets punched the hell out part head crumples in from the impact, however he's ot the Halbred shooter charging, and a second later it fires a blast prehaps point blank. Maybe just maybe he can overload that shield.

Also the things with Mister B and Murata don't look so ... good either.

"Take this place back?" the Man from Jupiter questions as the Messala Dinofaust surges towards the Moribito-02. M meets M, but not as intended; missiles are dodged, a punch is thrown, and before Scirocco knows it, an ignited beam saber is being knocked aside as a giant razorblade and a boomerang slash into the purple armor of his mobile hybrid.

Knocked back thanks to the force of the strikes -- and in addition, a stomp of his foot on the accelerator -- the Messala seeks just a momentary gap between the two units, a second beam saber igniting to ward off the enemy as the introductions transpire.

"Hmph. You must be young. This is the Dinofaust Messala Jupiter. A new variation on my prior masterpiece, the PMX-000 Messala. I call it a mobile hybrid; the best of both a mobile suit, and a mobile armor. You must also be deluded; do you intend on handing this place back to its 'rightful owners' if you prove lucky enough to win it from us, child?"

It's at about then that both beam sabers disengage -- and the claws open up, revealing row after row of grenades poised above launchers. Without further adieu, they begin firing, spiraling out towards the Jinki. Jinkies!

This time, Ilyse actually /does/ dodge; she's already moving anyway so why stop? The Whipporwill is not subject to such minor concerns as 'inertia'; it makes a hard shift to the right, moving sideways where it once was moving straight without bothering to actually turn or bank. There is a brief but significant force like a small shockwave as Ilyse flares the shield while she passes.

For all that Ilyse is making it look easy from the outside, it's damn hard for her. Whipporwill's gravity distortion system requires babysitting or it shuts down or does something it's not supposed to, and flying on top of that is actually pretty hard. She bites her lip and worries at it without even realizing she's doing it.

Whipporwill spreads its arms wide. The shield around it, a spherical bubble, abruptly becomes faintly visible; it ripples like a heat haze, radiating tiny silver sparks of light. It holds a hand forward, and another ripple emerges, less a beam and more a broad cone, a hard slam like something ramming. "Back off!"

Meiya throws the Raptor in to a lateral slide with the power of one of it's shoulder mounted engines, trying to avoid a counter attack she knows is coming. The fire daggars smash into the armor, blasting out holes.

Whats worse is the Over Oxtongue Rifle. The weapon's bullet shred clear through that shoulder mounted engine and out the other side in a blast of fire almost as large as the Raptor is tall. The explosion severs the arm directly at the shoulder and sends the Raptor spiralling away as Meiya struggles with controls to get the Raptor back into the fight.

When the Raptor stops it's flat spin to face the Weissaber again, she finds another Gundam has emerged from...somewhere and attacked it. "A Gundam?" Meiya isn't unbelieving, in fact, you can't swing a dead cat without hitting a Gundam these days.

The remaining arm of the Raptor reaches up to gras the hilt of the CIWS blade stored on it's back. "If you want research data, I'll show you the highest quality!"

The Raptor's engines tilt up and fire, accelerating it on a zig zag path through space up behind the Weissaber. The poly-carbon blade swings horizontaly, and the Raptor follows through, spinning about in a complete 360 to swing the blade at the Assault Dragoon's back a second time.

Ascian can't help but let out a little chuckle as Ibis talks to herself, so obvious of the fact that she still has that communication line open. <"Ah, sorry, sorry."> He appologizes for the laughter at her expense. What was all this now, being nice with the enemy? Well, that's how he usually does it these days, unless they piss him off, or Amenthes' 'spirit' comes out to play. But without that spirit, Ascian has to rely on Duat and his own abilities. And the fact that he is trying to be careful about his actions ends up getting him exposed to gunfire in the midst of starting up the homing beam array systems.

<"Shi...."> He cuts off his swear, pushing his fingers more firmly into the controls as the Astelion turns aboutface and works its way around the Amenthes and lashes out by pelting the machine with bullets. With the Amenthes' currently in Homing Beam startup sequence, the wings seperating further and beginning to form a vertical ring around it, the bullets have an easier time hitting it - especially as the shield cannot be brought up at that particular point in time.

<"You're not bad. I'm glad I could face off against such a skilled opponent."> The young man compliments Ibis, smiling gently towards the commlink's window, before turning his eyes up towards the Astelion - outside of his cockpit. Ibis might also heard the dim voice of Duat - the metalic-feminine sounding A.I. within the Amenthes. "Locked on." And perhaps the machinery within her unit would warn her of the same.

The 'wings' of the Amenthes, semi-flat Khopesh shaped bits, turn their tips at the Astelion, following it by swiveling and rotating towards a horizontal axis around the Amenthes, which turns about and suddenly seems to be moving at much slower capacity. Perhaps it had to do with the fact that when those machinegun bullets had fired, they had hit quite a bit of its armor. There are pockmarks all over, some of the Metatron crystals are shattered beyond recognition, and there is even a red glowing gash across the cockpit's black canopy.

Then finally, a series of red beams go flying from the array of wings. They rush around the Astelion, trying to capture it from all directions, to cut it off at the front. Hoping that the Astelion would be incapable of making the precise and well performed maneuvers to slip between the 'web' that is forming, the lasers continue to flow from the machine, rotating closer and closer around it, capturing it within a webbed sphere and sears closer and closer, trying to cut off the enemy Astelion and capture it within the cutting red beams!

The moment the Shadow Bits finish their strafing runs, Lethe's head turns, the Flickerist's attention momentarily diverted from the battle at hand. Like her gynoid spider-sense was tingling, the attack on the Weissaber by the GRM Gundam forces Lethe into a moment of honest surprise, so many priorities being shuffled around all at once.

"Mistress Lemon-!"

But she's assured that everything will be all right. W18 is still very young, and has quite a lot to learn about what things are like in this world. Proximity alarms draw her attention forward again as gunfire blazes through space, bullets striking and deflecting across the bulk of the armor, some outright missing. Fortunate for her that the Gespenst decided to charge, because, well.

So does she. "Boost Knuckle."

The Flickerist's eyes glow again, the Assault Dragoon blazing forward with the full speed made available to her. Ignoring the gunfire, the grenades that burst around and in front of her on the charge, the big black machine draws back the right hand and balls it into a fist. With a heavy swing at the Gespenst, moments before impact, the armor on the forearm splits open-- and a hidden vernier accelerates the punch to something much faster and much more punishing.

The Flickerist's knee-guards shift slightly, the feet straightening downward to allow two more of the Shadow Bits to emerge from inside their casing. Reaching full speed in short order, the Assault Dragoon twists around and aims the pistol straight on at Rio's Gespenst while more tactical data floods and feeds into the monitors that surround her. The six bits swirl around the left arm, their business ends pointed straight at the Personal Trooper.

When the Flickerist pulls the trigger, it isn't the revolver that fires, but all six of the bits, releasing a high-power torrent of purple energy straight at Rio's machine!

With a studious eye kept on the Raptor, Lemon Browning is, for the moment, distracted. This is good for the new Gundam arrival, whose potent burst suddenly pierces through the darkness of space and lands a clean shot in the Dragoon's chest. It jerks suddenly, its form going rigid as its systems momentarily go offline, seconds before its back up restores and brings it back to life.

"Dreams..?" A short pause follows, then there's a soft chuckle. "It would be a dream if I told you what they were, now would it?" The Weissaber's eyes momentarily turn to the distant Gundam. "However, if you wish to imply that my doings are self-destructive, I would like to remind you that you cannot make progress without risk. There is no reward in sitting by idly..."

Then back to the Raptor do the eyes of the Weissaber turn. "I am glad," is Lemon's response to Meiya's proclamation. "I would not want less-than impressive data for my notes. It would be an insult." Seconds later the Raptor moves swiftly, jerking through space and actually catching the Weissaber off its guard. Struck from behind, the damaged Dragoon is sent spiraling through the air, sparks flying from its torn back as it swiftly spins around and attempts to recover.

Hmphing softly to herself, Lemon notes her systems. This isn't good... but certainly she still has a chance. And even if she's sunk, there are others here who can fight on and fight hard. From the back of the Weissaber several Sword Breakers detach and move freely, splitting open and firing off an array of fire that aims for both Meiya AND Ribbons' Gundam, to unleash a barrage of rapid-fire beam attacks.

 Ascian Luddite transmits, "I am available to engage further targets."

James Heller Counter attacks with the beam machine gun as Ilyse keeps moving after him he turns he's actually seeming toi be backing of and this time he manages to score a hit. His machine is still in the fight now and he's got an idea of how his foe moves now and then he smirks as he does to evading the incomming attack.

"Sure thing and I got to tell you know what I love? Remotes without needing to be a freaking mutant! GO SWORD BREAKERS!"

The remotes detatch off his machine and form into a formation likely preprogramed but as they open fire he opens up with the beam machine gun as well.

"So you get that stuff from someone or make it yer self?!"

 James Heller transmits, "Huh this GNX is packing some non standard tech, I'm curious now. Damn she's fast!"

The two Iron Blades may be made of metal, but they seem to stand up well enough to the beam sabers. They probably aren't just iron like the name implies. "I'm sixteen!" Aoba claims proudly. She's not young at all! ...really! "Dinofaust Messala Jupiter... you designed it?" There are stars in her eyes already. "It's so cool! Does it work as well on the ground as in space?" It doesn't even occur to Aoba that she probably shouldn't be asking things like technical specifications of enemy machines, but... she can't help it. "U..um...!" Aoba bites her lip lightly. "I.. I don't know. I'm not the one who gets to decide what's done with it. I--"

Aoba cuts off, a split second before the claws open. Something bad is going to happen... it's one of those feelings she gets from time to time. Quickly crossing her arms, right over left, Aoba leans back in her harness. Moribito-02 brings its shield up, allowing the grenades to blast against it to minimize the damage. "Whoah! That... that's a great place to hide grenades!" She'll be better prepared next time!

"Can't get distracted... stop getting distracted..." Aoba shakes her head rapidly. She can admire the cool robots when they're not trying to shoot her down. "R.. right!" Her fingers run along the insides of the pilot harness, and several panels open along the backs of Moribito's legs to reveal small thrusters. The thrusters sputter several times, and then-- "PHANTOM!" There's a brief pulse of mental force and suddenly the Jinki is no longer there. It didn't teleport, but it did accelerate so quickly that it appears invisible, even to sensors... until they can catch up. Aoba has no intention on letting the sensors catch up.

Even though Moribito-02 was directly in front of the Messala just a moment ago, it's suddenly approaching from the side, left arm up and extended, hand curled into a fist. "Soryaaaa!"

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Lethe Rusina transmits, "Energy reserves at 61%. Minimal damage."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite transmits, "Miss Rusina, you can do it!"

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Lethe Rusina transmits, "Roger."

Risk? The pilot of the GNZ-001 GRM Gundam closes his eyes; his smile is placid, as if this was a response simply to be expected from the Weissaber's pilot.

"And that is why you are where you are."

The Sword Breakers detach, following pre-recorded flight patterns as they weave through three-dimensional space. The GRM's thrusters activate to shunt it forward, but it is just a second too late; beam fire lights up the space around the mobile suit like a brilliant web of fire, ricocheting off heavily-armored shoulder and chest plating and burning dark black scorches where they embrace the mech's chassis.

The force of the attack is enough to knock the GRM slightly off-course -- but not enough to stop it. Still on the move, the Gundam twists about mid-flight until it is underneath the Weissaber and facing it, GN Mega Launcher lifted upward. The mobile suit's pilot takes note of the Raptor's location for just a split second before detached, glowing-yellow eyes focus on the sight of the enemy machine. Shadow-Mirror...

"And that is why your role and your endpoint have already been long determined for you."

Another shot, another light in the darkness; the high-pitch whine of the Mega Launcher goes unheard as a charged shot, even larger than the last, spills forth from the barrel of the weapon like a deluge of churning orange fury. The beam sweeps outward -- to cut off the Weissaber's path, and punish it if it should dare stray too close to that burning light.

QUITE SOME TIME AGO, EARTH, THE GOD DAMNED OCEAN Slow-motion replay of the Astelion getting chopped to bits by a huge web made out of shiny red lasers somewhere above the ocean, cut-in of Ibis with her head on the controls punching the main viewscreen in frustration.

RIGHT NOW, SPACE, THE GOD DAMNED SPACE FORTRESS Ibis has a brief sense of deja vu as the Amenthes, slowed as it is, backs off and splays its wings in what /should/ be a sort of familiar fashion if she was only a little bit better at remembering important shit and not getting shot down! But no, not the case here. Big white dumb target that it is, the Armored Module's propensity for travelling at maximum velocity at all times means that as soon as the web goes live around it, it slams straight into it. This has an interesting effect, to say the least.

The Astelion does not go dead instantly, even though it rather amusingly goes limbless in record speed. There are still a few seconds left inbetween the lethal cage of beam emissions smashing through the armour and into the powerplant proper, a few seconds of systems uptime and communications link for Ibis to cock her head at an angle and then comically duck out of harm's way like a Looney Tunes character as the cockpit is blown open in a huge flash of red light. Thank god for spacesuits. Also for no real reason, the Astelion kind of bounces off of the lasers before going completely silent inside of it's brightly-lit grave.

Meanwhile Ibis 'crashed my sweet ride again' Douglas hunkers down in her now-spaced cockpit and prays she has enough oxygen to survive until capture or retrieval, whichever comes first.

Rio frowns, that trick usually works... And then a boost knuckle bashes a dent in her armor! Are ashsabers supposed to have those?? Rio can't remember. And then... MORE BITS. "Dammit! No!" Rio swears as her attempts to dodge are thwarted, beams melting into the Gespenst again and again! Why does this keep happening?! "I'm not going to give up! Two can play at the remote game! Slash rippers, go!" Two discs drop off the back of the Gespenst and sprout blades, one heading straight for the Flickerist, another looping around, preparing to attack from behind...

Hopefully, the trick will work this time. While the remotes divide Lethe's attention, the boosted rifle is drawn forth and fired. And then fired again and again while the remotes close in, if she's really lucky, maybe she can even hit with everything...!

Sword Breakers. Meiya has had to fight against these remote weapons before. First from Echidna Isaki, and more recently against Lethe.

She hauls back on her controls, and sends the Raptor shooting from side to side with blasts from it's swivel mounted engines, seemingly attempting to open up range from the Weissaber. Meiya strains against her harness as the G forces toss her from side to side in the Raptor's seat as it jinks and dives past blasts form the Swordbreakers, one of them is only narrowly avoided, and the beam cleaves through the close in weapon sword. "Damnit!" Meiya tosses the weapon aside. "This is far enough!"

The Raptor suddenly reverses course and ignites it's after burners, diving straight through the cloud of Sword Breakers, directly for the mother machine, Lemon's Weissaber. Leaving the drones behind and their targetting systems temporarily stymid to find a target.

The Raptor dives in, and form over it's shoudler unfolds a large gun, like a light machine gun. THe weapon is grasped by the remaiing opposite hand like a light machine gun. The barrel frosts over as it's coolant system engages, and twin electromagnetic rails accelerate ferro-magnetic bullets at hyper sonic velocities. "I certainly wouldn't want to insult an enemy!" It's hard to tell if she means that or not.

"I'd be more impressed if I didn't build them too," Ilyse says, though this is half a lie; the Feather Drones on Phoenix are extremely basic, and the Swordbreakers significantly overpower them both in energy output and in mobility.

One of them actually sneaks around where she wasn't reinforcing the shield right. Most of the shots divert around Ilyse, but the last one hits, angles slightly and still clips the Whipporwill's leg with enough energy to drill a hole. Ilyse winces. She hadn't accounted for that one.

Ilyse considers her options and rests her hand on the control system for the space distortion engine. "I built it," Ilyse admits. It's not like they don't even know. "Why, you want one? Too bad. I got you this, though."

The hand of Whipporwill is wrapped around what is nothing so much as a tangle in space. Reality bends, not just light, into a little wadded-up ball. She throws it in the accepted 'hadouken' style, matter distorting as it passes through it, leaving a trail of destruction before it violently 'untangles', exploding anything it is in the middle of passing through and sending force everywhere.

"Captain, we...can't gather anymore tactical data." The Tactical officer says to Divada, who nods. "All right. We'll just have to leave it to the forces that are there then. Maintain current position, and hope for the best...."

The bulky black Assault Dragoon seems to react well to the Slash Rippers heading it's way. Thrusters fire and the legs swing forward to provide some reverse momentum for the large machine, guarding against one while twisting away, avoiding the other. Unfortunately for Lethe, it plays her right into Rio's hands for the advent of the really goddamn big long-range sniping rifle. Plus, in space, you don't have to account for all that silly stuff like 'wind shear' and 'bullet arc.'

Still stuck in it's guarding pose, the Flickerist's armor shudders and ripples as the first shot goes wide. The second puts a hole straight through the left shoulder, the large pauldron shattering in whole sections as it passes clean through. By some miracle, the whole arm manages to retain mobility. The third shot is what does it: The slug punches straight through the abdomen, just off-center. Not quite breaking /through/ the modified Ashsaber, it causes the machine to spin off into the void, lurching around in wild circles.

The gynoid within actually grunts, trying to hold the controls steady with everything that she has. It takes some wrestling, but in the midst of that spin, both hands now produce those bulky EC71 Plasma Revolvers. Now inverted, upside-down in relation to Rio and her Gespenst, W18 starts to fire both guns back at the Personal Trooper... a lot.

Seriously. A lot.

With so much raw fury behind Susanowo's composite blade, a meeting between the two bodies could only end in explosions.

They're small, though--localized to Mumyou's right wrist; that isn't right, though, is it?

Shouldn't the Guarlion be in /pieces/?

"Agreed," Murata gravely transmits as he keeps the Shishioh Blade steady against one of the Souten's blades. Blunting /so much/ momentum with little more than a sword and an Armored Module's arms is, charitably, 'fucking stupid', but Murata is no more reasonable of a pilot than the One Man Army; it's cost him the full use of that arm, but better that than death. The lack of gravity means that Mumyou's boosters are all engaged to try pushing against Susanowo, to bring both bodies to a halt; the bearded veteran takes a moment to spit out a mouthful of blood thanks to having bitten his tongue in that first, jarring moment of impact.

"If force /alone/ were enough, your Federation would be a memory /several/ times over. No. No, no, no--force is /part/ of the picture, but not its whole."

Pretty much every one of the billion Lions that've been shat out by Earth's armies over the years have come standard with a railgun to facillitate medium-to-high powered ranged combat without relying /entirely/ on missile launchers, and despite the very particular needs of its pilot, Guarlion Mumyou is no different.

It's rare that he bothers to /use/ it, but with the Guarlion's right arm damaged and its wakizashi all the way over /there/ somewhere, there isn't much of a choice. The Armored Module unhooks the gun from its place above the wakizashi's sheath, and after taking a moment to try and make room for its barrel amongst the two(three?) swords and the tortured frame of either machine, he'll take his best shot at breaking the sword lock with a pull of the trigger.

At least he doesn't really have to /aim/.

"I haven't /fallen/ yet," he adds. "Save your requiems."

"My, you do seem easily distracted," the voice of Paptimus Scirocco chides the young enemy pilot. It's certainly not the first young girl he's had to kill; Aoba won't be the last, not by a long shot. Zipping backwards as the grenades fire out, he offers a slight chuckle at her curiosity, although the answers cease to be forthcoming for the moment.

Instead he watches as the enemy unit changes, thrusters emerging. Already the Messala seems ready, bursts of vernier fire igniting at various angles, the Man from Jupiter readying himself to react. But then the Jinki and it's pilot do something he wasn't quite anticipating. They move far faster than he'd given the unit credit for.

"What--" he begins, as the approach vector changes entirely, turning but not nearly in time to muster a true defense against the Moribito-02. His surprise turns to chagrin as he finds the side of the Dinofaust close to caving in from the force of the punch, in turn having to struggle to right his unit as it /flies/ away from the sheer depravity of such an impact.

"It seems I've misjudged you, young one! Perhaps you're not the naive flower I had thought you may be. What's your name?" the Admiral questions his assailant, as he succeeds in his struggle. The Messala flips about, thrusters on its feet bursting to halt its trajectory on the spot. Floating sideways, the top of its head facing the Jinki, the shoulder pods open up -- and the air fills with missiles, a veritable circus of them, chasing the enemy down!

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> James Heller transmits, "Halberd shooter, full charge, Sword Bits return! Let's light this fed up! Support fire welcome!"

When the cage finally comes to being, and Ibis bounces off in that cockpit, the Amenthes regathers its wings and Ascian gives a worried look. A pang of guilt overcomes him. <"Tssk... told you to leave."> He mutters, and when the Orbital Frame is finally flight ready, it slowly moves towards her location and scoops up the cockpit with its left hand. <"Get better... and one day, come and defeat me - when you are ready."> He isn't trying to make fun of her. No, quite the opposite, he is kind of cheering her on. Perhaps it had to do with her being a girl. Looking off into the distance, he finds the Ame-No-Mihashira and with Ibis in hand he blasts off towards it.

He spins the machine a few times, blasts from some mooks coming his way, until he reaches the hangar and releases the cockpit, pushing it towards the inside. <"Stay safe in there."> is the last thing he says, before giving her a kindly smile and cutting the communication feed. The Amenthes then turns about and looks at the battle that is still taking place. His gaze quickly flicks towards the Amenthes' readings. "You're not doing too well, are you?" He whispers to his own Orbital Frame. The glow of the panel indicating Duat pulses a bit, a sign that 'she' was listening.

"I will try not to take much longer. Okay?" The youth then adds, and lets the wings expand outwards again whilst he retrieves the giant sniper rifle from the vector trap once more. The ends of the wings at the same time fire homing lasers at the mooks behind him, on the side of the space fortress, to ensure he's not shot in the back. "Alright then, let's see..." A series of vidwindows spring up. Different kind of mechs all over the place. "That one!" Ascian suddenly comments, seeing James in a lot of trouble. >"Aiming"< Duat comments. A targetreticule appears over the Whipperwill. >"Adjusting for previous recorded evasive maneuvers."< Duat continues to remark. The reticule shrinks. Ascian's finger twitches. And immediately, a thick beam spams from the long ranged rifle, melting the barrel, which then gets tossed away immediately. And whilst the beam is on its way, Amenthes rushes towards Ilyse's machine.

"My end point?" A soft chuckle escapes Lemon's lips. "You are so confident, mister Gundam pilot."

The Sword Breakers fire wildly, shots fired seemingly every which way--and while their mark certainly strike Ribbons, Meiya proves swift enough to avoid being completely turned into some kind of metal swiss cheese. The speed earns the Raptor a distant smile from Lemon, but she says nothing.

Before she can properly respond to Meiya--the closest pilot to her--the GRM fires another shot, to which the Weissaber responds to by suddenly lurching aside with admirable grace and swiftness. It rolls midair before ripping its O.O. rifle out and up, setting it up to fire a quick response back. However, the Raptor's gun opens fire, striking the Weissaber hard enough to send a good piece of its shoulder flying and cause another explosion to jostle the machine harshly.

Grunting softly, Lemon clutches to the controls firmly and regains her bearing. Minimal performance now, she muses quietly. The Weissaber does not have long left.

The Halberd Shooter in the Weissaber's grasp thrusts forward and snaps open. Energy sparks and crackles to life, slowly but surely crackling up along the tongs, toward the tip.

"I am glad you fight with pride, Miss Raptor. But in the end, all is futile. Our efforts will not be stifled. This is not the end, Mister Gundam pilot. We still have a long, long way to go for our ideals to be realized. And they are, and always will be, so long as you and the rest continue your battles.

"So I thank you. Your world has given me much delight and borne new and wondrous things."

The Halberd Shooter fires hard, a potent burst of beam sent straight at the GRM's chest.

James Heller says, "Not bad then, so you are like me. Pitty I didn't bring my normal ride."

The remotes return and start to lock on to his machine and one swing down into the arm almost like before but there's an energy spike from the thing as the prong part. There's energy bouncing between each one as he locks on a target locked flashes on his heads.

"Rock on! HALBERD SHOOTER FIRE!"

The vocal command triggers the machine to fire a massive blast of energy is fired at the same time as Ascian's own attack is launched. Team work, that's how one surives, for all James bragging he'll swallow his pride when help's offered if he's in over his head. The damage from the last hit is showing there's a brach in the troso of his mecha, and thers' several exposed power lines arching electical power. One more hit may very well finish this machine off.

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite transmits, "Hope you don't mind the interuption, Heller!"

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite transmits, "It's the best I can do for getting rid of that tape."

The tremendous clash between the two machines is nothing short of startling, particularly given the curious disparity in their respective pedigrees; the custom-built Susanowo, constructed from what was once the pride of the USAF and fused with the mysterious technologies that only fell into the Federation's hands after the appearance of Celestial Being... And a Lion, however customised to its pilot's needs it may be. Really, a Lion. It would almost be embarassing, were Murata not so clearly skilled. But the worst thing is that Murata then falls back on a /gun/. It's a fairly powerful gun, the Burst Railgun's fire impacting the Susanowo's frame repeatedly, each strike blasting the black and white machine back, breaking the blade lock rather definitively. Servos and actuators groan in protest, things spark and smoke that probably oughtn't, and inside the Flag-style cockpit Bushido is rocked around in his harness, the inertial dampening system simply not up to the task of mitigating such sudden, violent impacts. But the Susanowo yet functions. "Let us see how accurate your assessment is," the One Man Army says, as the power cable from the machine's back-mounted GN condenser attaches to the double hybrid blade, an additonal particle feed bolstering the strength and sharpness of the weapon, with its particle-saturated physical blades and the actual GN Beam blades within. "Come, Crusader. Come, Guarlion! LET US SEE WHAT THE WORTH OF YOUR BLADE IS!!" Charging /again/, the Susanowo seems to lose small, and hopefully unimportant, bits even as it moves, slashing repeatedly with the double-bladed Souten, whirling the blade end over end in its gauntleted left fist as it strikes to bring either edge to bear in turn, attempting now to violently dismantle the Guarlion Mumyou.

Some red comes to Aoba's cheeks as she's called out on it. "S..sorry! It's just..!" Really, what kind of excuse can she give? 'Your robot is awesome so I had to gush over it'? That would embarrass her even more.

"Um.. Aoba! Aoba Tsuzaki!" Flexing her fingers inward, she taps a button that sends a brief signal down toward the planet. She doesn't have too much time to follow up on that, however, as a number of missiles fly her way! That... is an interesting position, and not one she really thought about, but it makes sense. If there's no up or down in space, then there's no need to think two-dimensionally. That's why the Jinki suddenly drops before jetting forward, throwing off the guidance systems of some of the missiles. Several strike along its back, but Moribito manages to close the distance to the Messala again. "What about you? It isn't fair to ask my name without telling me yours!"

Another psychic pulse rings out, but this time it isn't centered on the Jinki. There's an object flying up from the Earth, at first barely visible as a small red glint of light. As it gets closer, though, its shape can be made out... a sphere of some kind? And as it approaches closer still, patterns become visible: a soccer ball.

"Alpha Ball!" Moribito-02 lifts one arm high and 'leaps' away from the Messala, rotating as it moves. "Tachibana bicycle..." As the Jinki's foot touches the ball, it's suddenly accelerated forward, pulsing with telekinetic energy. "SHOOOOOOOT!"

Energy signatures spike on the GRM's sensors, and within the cockpit of his machine, Ribbons Almark quirks a brow in a faint, unconcerned motion.

"Oh?" It is the only thing he can breathe out before that amusement-tinged voice is drowned out by the roar of energy colliding with the GNZ-line mobile suit. High-powered particles barrage the GRM, engulf it, conceal it within the sheer magnitude of the blast. And then--

"Of course you do."

Out from the depths of that vast and terrible energy output /explodes/ the GRM, spiking itself through frictionless space with a dizzying rate of acceleration. Excess particless drool off the burnt and melted frame of the GRM, but it does not stop; electricity sparks across the side of its head, but it does not stop; thrusters ignite, bold contrails of vermillion shuddering behind the mobile suit before it is propelled forward like a shot in the darkness -- straight for the Weissaber.

There are no more words beyond that last, cryptic remark. There is only the ejection of two hilts from the GRM's shoulder plates, the ignition of sparking, sputtering sabers, and a sudden, gouging slash -- aimed to neatly and gracefully chop off the arm of the Weissaber holding that Halberd shooter, before the GRM spins around and slashes /upward/ with that second blade to do nothing less than attempt to cut Lemon's weapon neatly in half in a diagonal stroke from waist to shoulder.

Ascian's beam is interrupted by the same forcefield as Ilyse has used before. The beam splashes, spreading across a rippling shield of twisted space, a distortion similar to but subtly different than that of metatron.

And then it breaks. The beam rips through the shield, causing a minor shockwave - directed inwards, which batters Whipporwill and launches it around. With no defenses, she is a remarkably easy target for the Halberd Shooter. Nothing even attempts to interfere with its shot.

"Fuck!" Ilyse doesn't broadcast that; she just yells, inside her cockpit, at the sudden change in fortunes. She needs to get rid of /one/ of them, and decides to settle on getting rid of the known quantity.

Whipporwill slams both of its fists together, Ilyse simultaneously driving up the gain on both hands' emitters. A shockwave of distorted space radiates from the GN-XIII, a rippling attack from twisted reality itself; it radiates off in a cone, which Ilyse has aimed at James to try to knock him the rest of the way out of the fight.

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> James Heller transmits, "Systems at 6 percent."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite transmits, "Pull out of there James!"

The Railgun finds it's mark on the Weissaber. As much as Meiya is sweating to dodge the Assault Dragoon's attacks, at least she can make the enemy pilot sweat as well. The Railgun reports the firing chamber's rails have worn out past the point of firing, and with only one han the Raptor can't get the replacements in under combat conditions. "Damnit." Meiya switches off the Railgun fromt he weapons selector, and it folds back over the Raptor's shoulder. "What can I use..."

Meiya glances over her shoulder, the Raptor's head following her movement. A small smile crosses her lips.

Sword Breakers are like Funnels, or possibly Bits, but without a Psycomu to control them, their attack patterns are limited, and if they're battery powered like Funnels they have to return to their mother unit to recharge. If they're like Bits, they have reactors and are turning around right now to attack the Raptor from behind. Either way, they have to pass right by her

Sure enough, the Sword Breakers that attacked her are rushing right towards Meiya's Raptor. "Here!" The Raptor reaches out and grasps hold of a returning Sword Breaker in it's one remaining hand and turns to face Lemon's Weissaber. "Nothing is ever futile. If it was, history would not be the way it is."

The Raptor accelerates towards the Weissaber and raises the sword breaker overhead as it's thrusters pulse and fire, trying to slip from the raptor's grip."Please, remeber to take your things home with you."

And slams the remote weapon down at the Assualt Dragoon.

Shishioh and Souten clash a second time, and yet again the painfully stupid maneuver saves the Guarlion from utter destruction.

This time, however, there are no dainty explosions around its right wrist; that entire arm just disintegrates into fire and molten metal, unable to bear the strain of being attached to the Guarlion's body any longer. Mumyou captures the Shishioh Blade as soon as its right hand vanishes, and it even manages to engage its thrusters in time to pull away from Susanowo before another blow can fall.

It won't be making another pass on the One Man Army, however; it's vibrating /wildly/ as it pulls away, more armor patches popping free to fly away with every shudder. Cracks begin to spread across its cockpit window; Murata has mere seconds to make it back to the Shadow Mirror craft before depressurization occurs.

Once in its hangar, he'll wait, rather than disembarking; he's never quite comfortable with letting others work on his machines without /some/ kind of supervision, not while the Shishioh Blade is attached.

He knows from experience, after all, that it only takes a moment of non-vigilance to lose it.

"Don't you know who I am?" the reply from Paptimus is close to scornful, and he does the sensible thing; he opens the video phone, so he can let his purple gaze sink into Aoba's brain. Of course, if she doesn't immediately recognize him, he's going to scowl and have to introduce himself; "Paptimus Scirocco. Admiral Paptimus Scirocco."

Closing the gap may be simple enough for a machine like the Jinki, able to move about with such damnable speed. But it isn't as if the Messala has any intention of staying still for too long. Flipping upside down, it darts away, right in time for the bicycle kick to transpire.

Inside the cockpit, Scirocco's purple eyebrows nearly meet his purple hairline. "What--??? A psychic soccer ball?! I don't think you're taking me seriously, young miss. Forgive me, but I think I'll bring this to an end."

As he says all of that, he's busy piloting the Messala out of the psychic ball's guided trajectory; the Dinofaust spins on its horizontal axis, going upside down as it blazes away, the ball narrowly passing through the legs of the unit in what can only be called a true nutmeg.

Coming back about, the space between the Jinki and the mobile hybrid is abruptly filled with the massive burst of the undamaged mega particle cannon, the blinding, blistering blast seeking out the Moribito-02!

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> James Heller transmits, "Doing so, Ashsabers don't grow on trees."

Yes! She hit! The bad news: It didn't do as much damage as she'd hoped. The shower of return fire takes everything she has to evade, and even then the glancing hits pile up, tearing away armor. The pristine white gespenst is now covered with slag and showing exposed internals. Rio's got to end this! "You won't defeat me like this! I won't give up! TAKE THIS!"

With a little bit of mao industries inside knowledge, she's able to override the settings on the CP cannon way past the safe values. She'll only get one or two shots, and even one will make it need to be replaced, but hopefully it'll be all she needs! Energy gathers in front of the cannon's long barrel, and then out fires a steady beam of plasma, the barrel starting to glow red-hot itself!

"Hmmm...It seems the Neo-Japan II Gundam Fighter is doing pretty good for herself." "Pardon, My lady?" Miranda says as Divada says that. Divada looks back to Miranda and shrugs. "While I was at the party to celebrate the opening of Neo Japan II, Meiya Mitsurugi declared herself the fighter for Neo Japan II. I'm assuming she's here to brush up on her fighting abilities. If you could Miranda, record her progress and her suit's abilities, if you would. I'd like to keep an eye on her..." She then turns back towards the viewport. "But, My lady...she's a Federation pilot." That's right, Miranda...and that's another reason to watch her."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Lethe Rusina transmits, "Urgh..."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite transmits, "Rusina!"

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite transmits, "Tsssk..."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Divada Kirador transmits, "I'm sending out Dropships, Miss Rusina."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite transmits, "Get her home safe, miss Kirador."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Divada Kirador transmits, "I usually do, Mister Luddite. Unless they decide to walk out of sick bay."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Aoba Tsuzaki transmits, "Be carefu--"

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Aoba Tsuzaki makes a sound halfway between a squeak and a choke.

The Orbital Frame continues its hastened approach of the Whipporwill and sends a few bolts straight through the twisting reality that is coming the way of James Heller, hoping that it was simply a beam of sorts. "What the heck is that, Duat?!" Ascian demands to know, as the bolts of energy seem to have little to no effect. >"Cannot define. More data needed."< The artificial intelligence reports, turning the sensors on the anomaly ahead of itself. A few windows come up, showing 'mountain' and 'trenches' with energy readings along with them. "I can't make any sense of that..." Ascian mutters, but somehow, it /looked/ familiar.

The force hits James' Ashsaber, and Ascian immediately tells the guy to pull out. Sure, he didn't have that authority really, he wasn't a lieutenant or anything, but that didn't mean he didn't try to force some of his will on others. "At least that strange shield seems to be down. Now, while it is still down!" His eyes quickly flick left and right. The Divine Crusaders, some of them were falling. Things were starting to look bad. "I can't give up now."

The Orbital Frame's left and right arm both turn into rifles. "Raaaaaa!" The Orbital Frame Pilot isn't using any communication lines anymore. But that doesn't mean he can't scream out a battle cry. The Amenthes begins to spin around, clockwise, then counterclockwise, spaming beams of red plasma into the direction of the Whipperwill, trying to crush its armor beneath the red light of the weaponized Metatron energy.

"And it seems to me that your world is forever doomed to repeat history," she notes to Meiya, a smile evident on the woman's voice. "How futile it is to seek peace when the only answer is to keep fighting amongst yourselves. But, again, that's quite all right. You keep fighting, and I can continue to make beautiful, wonderful things... oh?"

Well, /that/ was both unexpected and impressive.

The Weissaber is struck by its own device, the Sword Breaker SLAMMED into the Dragoon's body and lodging itself deeply thick armored chassis of its shoulder. A sudden jerk to the side and the Breaker drags harshly along its arm, leaving a nasty gash where it would have likely just lodged itself into the arm completely. Gasping in surprise and mild concern as her systems go red, the Shadow Mirror scientist frowns deeply before she returns the favor in kind to Meiya, using the O.O. rifle to fire off a rapid fire burst of shots at the Raptor and counter its attack--and get it the heck away from her.

Then Ribbons' GRM finally advances.

"D-damn it..!" is Lemon's oddly emotional response before the Weissaber unleashes more of its Burning Daggers, to--if anything--provide a smoke screen and intercept his advance. Its thrusters suddenly flare up, and with a turn, the Weissaber makes its hurried flight out of combat, back to the Shadow Mirror ship waiting for her.

"They are proving to be a handful," Lemon quietly notes aloud to herself.

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite transmits, "Miss Browning, are you alright?"

James Heller isn't fast ernough this time but James has been a pilot longer than one might expect really. He manages to barely roll with the attack from the customized GNX machine. But his Ashsaber is a mess pretty much. It pauses turns and now is fleeing.

"Perhaps you're the better pilot but I'll not underestimate you next time!"

Then the Super drives the SMs are infamous for? Kick in and he's just gone. Maybe he dived under the floor pannel?!

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Aoba Tsuzaki transmits, "I... I.. I-i-i-i..!"

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Aoba Tsuzaki transmits, "I'm fighting -Paptimus Scirocco-!"

"I wouldn't ask you if I did!" When the video link opens, she blinks several times. It isn't a face she recognizes... though he looks really mean! That name, though.. when Aoba hears it, she lets out a sound somewhehere betweek a squeak and a choke. "P..paptimus Scirocco? The Man from Jupiter?" She's never met him before, but she's heard that name! "I.. I..!" He has a reputation! The strongest Newtype ever, some say! Head of the A-LAWS fleet! And he's right -here-... fighting her. She's a little nervous, a little uncertain, and a lot very frightened.

And then he has to go insult her soccer kick. "Wha--?" Aoba takes a deep breath and puffs her cheeks out in annoyance. "I am so taking this seriously! I'll have you know that would have wrecked your awesome robot if you didn't dodge it! H.. hey, there's nothing coming to an end here!" Even as the ball flies in a wide arc back toward th atmosphere, Aoba's attention is focused on the mega particles flying her way. "I.. I'm not afraid!" She doesn't even try to dodge it. No, the Cognate stands her (metaphorical) ground, lifting both arms up, with the left supporting the right. "Adjusting the angle... I'll show him who's not being serious!"

The Mega Particles strike the Jinki's shield squarely. For most machines, that might have been the end. Even a shield can't be any match for that sort of blast, can it? Except... the beam doesn't seem to have actually touched the shield. Telekinetic energies pulse around Moribito, focusing on the surface of the shield, as the mega particles coalesce into a ball of energy. Crimson and gold sparks shoot out from beneath the plasma ball, as it swirls around into a perfect sphere. "And now..."

"Full charge!" Aoba leans forward and shoves her arms out. Moribito-02 flicks its shield forward, and as soon as the metal touches the gathered ball of particles, it launches right back toward the Messala. "REBOUND FALL!"

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Lemon Browning transmits, "I'm fine, do not worry about me."

The barrel of the plasma cannon starts to glow as it's clearly charging up an attack. The Flickerist's head turns to regard the Gespenst a little closer before all of the thrusters fire-- /all/ of them-- and the machine comes roaring through space at the Gespenst like a bat out of hell. The eyes glow with another surge of yellow, faded through the visor, and the right fist draws back one more time.

"Even if I die, I will not fail to accomplish my mission."

Lethe's voice is calm and cool, if not almost monotone. The barest hints of inflection seem to have entered the gynoid's voice, her eyes narrowing behind the darkness of her sunglasses. Accelerating faster, it seems more like the purple-haired pilot has hit the afterburners, bringing the hulking black Assault Dragoon in close on the Gespenst.

The beam fires. Like a righteous, flaming sword, it skewers the Flickerist through the belly, the beam swaying through the torso due to the pilot's own maneuvering and piloting. As monitors spark and snap, as the sheer pressure and heat applied to the interior of her cockpit from the /proximity/ of the plasma beam would threaten the consciousness and life of a human, the W-number continues forward, lowering the left shoulder to /charge/.

"Mach Knuckle!"

And then the Flickerist /slams/ into the Gespenst, hitting it like a mecha-sized linebacker. She doesn't stop with one impact, either, moving the machine with controlled bursts, even while that beam continues to rip and tear through the ASK-UC90's frame, and then the right arm swings back around as hard as it can. The hidden vernier fires one more time. In space, no one can hear you scream.

But by god there might just be a sonic boom from the speed of the punch aimed at the Gespenst.



After the collision is over, the Flickerist floats in a manner much like dead weight, the arms and legs splayed wide as the glow sputters in it's eyes. Inside the cockpit, Lethe's eyes twitch before coming back into focus, the world stabilizing to proper colors. Her hands lift and grip the control sticks... the thrusters fire, and the Assault Dragoon starts to limp, proverbially speaking, back toward the Shadow Mirror ship that brought the assault team here in the first place.

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Lethe Rusina sounds calm, despite the whole 'could have just died' thing. "W18, returning."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite sounds worried, "Be more careful next time, Rusina."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ark Hammer Comms Officer transmits, "Transmitting docking coordinates, Miss Rusina. If you care to oblige for the moment.."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Lethe Rusina transmits, "I will be fine."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Lethe Rusina transmits, "I will endeavor to perform better in the future, Mistress Lemon."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Lemon Browning chuckles. "You did well, W18."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Lethe Rusina transmits, "Thank you, Mistress."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite transmits, "Agreed. You did well."

Meiya's co-opted sword breaker hits! It doesn't quiet go in as deep as she had hoped, but it does enough damage to convince the pilot to retreat. "Haa..." Meiya breathes deep. She looks down at the damaged remote weapon, and then at the retreating mech.

"This is Valkyrie-1. Recalling to the Phrike for repair and resupply." going into a fight now with an arm missing would be flat out disasterous.

Ilyse Amsel's shield does not come up immediately. Perhaps she's using the power for other things. Or maybe Ascian broke it; either one is a possibility.

Either way, the rifle blasts hit. They don't seem to crush as much as they should; Ilyse's experimental shield can manage that much, but not to protect her entirely. Alarms start to sound as the arms and torso take a beating, battered and denting from the impacts.

Ilyse's lips purse as she triggers a few more toggles. She can't take much more of this; yes, she drove one of them off, but there always seems to be another one... "Hey, you!" she demands, suddenly. "Get out of our space and maybe I won't crush that Orbital Frame!" She recognizes the design style. Some parts of it are pretty obvious.

Whipporwill reaches out one of its spindly-fingered hands toward Ascian. It looks entirely harmless until, moments later, Ilyse squeezes it into a fist; an aura of force around the Amenthes drives inward, attempting to crush it from all angles at once unless it can push through before it coalesces!

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Divada Kirador transmits, "Miranda, deploy another dropship for Mister Luddite?"

Perhaps the problem right now is that Scirocco is taking this too seriously! He pays for it, watching as that shield seems to gather the blast -- and he can tell what's coming next. "No," he mutters in his cockpit, thumbing the radio off entirely. Sure, he might just be getting a little angry at this young girl who clearly isn't taking this seriously enough.

Able to gather what's likely to happen next, he flicks the 'fire missiles' switch on his left flight stick. One of the pods opens up, spewing out a flurry of missiles, intent on knocking the Jinki off-balance before the return fire can happen.

It doesn't work. The approaching missiles are swallowed by the rebounding particles, and in turn they wash on, overwhelming the Dinofaust. One of the stubby little raptor-like arms is lost, parts explode, and one of the thruster units takes some heavy damage!

Rocked back, but not out of it just yet, the mobile hybrid is sluggish to respond to the actions of the Admiral. "Hmph, am I underestimating the pilot, as well as the unit?" he questions himself. It could just be fatigue from all the travel he's been through over the last twenty-four hours. Opening up the transmitter again, he concedes it;

"You may have gotten the best of me today, but your comrades are falling apart around you. I'd suggest you consider a tactical withdrawal along with the rest."

And to hasten that, he thumbs off another safety, firing off a thick flurry of vulcan munitions at the Moribito-02!

NOW the Ark Hammer starts deploying ships, but they're not fighters...they're dropships. One to pick up Murata's mech, and another to pick up the Amenthes. Divada, as she watches this, turns towards the Comms Officer. "Comms, open a line to Miss Mitsurugi's mech, please." "yes my lady." A few seconds later, Meiya's comm channel would beep, from an unknown frequency. If she answers, she'll hear a female voice say "Well done, Miss Mitsurugi, Gundam Fighter for Neo Japan II. We will be watching your progress in the next Gundam fight with great interest and anticipation."

<"Anomaly detected"> Whilst Ascian might not be able to tell something bad is coming, that doesn't mean that the advanced sensors on board the Amenthes could not. "What?" Is all Ascian can reply when suddenly the Amenthes gets caught in a shrinking space. The machine halts right there, though its verniers are still pushing. "What the!?" His mind goes reeling. Someone recognizing this as an Orbital Frame was no big deal. But to claim to be able to crush it from a distance?! His eyes squint. Well, his one live eye anyhow, the other still stuck behind that bandage.

"Tssk... Duat... do something." He could near the SSA of the machine creaking, a shield erecting quickly to keep itself from being crushed to death. Sparks form all across the body of the machine, and he can see how Duat is beginning to fade out. Parts of the machine's torso begin being crushed, and a foursome of the bitwings behind the machine suddenly explode under the pressure! "Damnit..." Ascian mutters. "Duat!" The A.I. flashes slower and slower... until suddenly the cockpit goes dark. Panic spreads within Ascian, suddenly feeling sweaty. "Hey, come on now, don't do that!" He whines. "We... we gonna get out of here..." Desperation. "COME ON YOU STUPID BITCH! LET'S GO!"

The cockpit suddenly springs back to life, and the entire Orbital Frame suddenly is covered in a fierce red glow. The space around it is still shrinking, its legs begin to crush, the rest of the wings explode - seperate from the unit. "MOOOOOVE!" Ascian pushes his fingers deeply into the half-orb controls. A suddenly flash of red curses across the vein-like bioluminescent lines, flowing from the core and spreading a red mist through space around it, before it suddenly... disappears!

Ilyse would sense what just happened, if she knew enough about space. The space-crush finishes around it where it once had been, before the Orbital Frame suddenly reappears again, floating almost dead in space. Sparks fly from it, and Ascian within the machine is breathing heavily. "Damn... cutting a bit close, aren't you?" He mutters, before the machine begins to limp away -- or rather, activates some emergency power and tries to blast away from the area. There was /no/ way he was combat ready anymore.

"You'd die just to capture this station?! That's crazy!" Rio shouts back, before the Gespenst is slammed into! "Ugh!" Rio is shaken pretty bad, as the Gespenst starts tumbling back, slammed into again and again... She can't keep fighting like this, but she may not have a choice, if this person will win at any cost...

There is a tense moment that seems to stretch on forever, as Rio tries to plan for a fight to the death...

...And then the Crusader flies away. Phew. Rio sighs in relief. So was that... a draw? She's got to become stronger and do better than this! "This is Rio, I took down one of them but I'm in pretty bad shape, I'm retreating... good luck!"

The gespenst never actually detached its boosterpack, and uses it now to fly back to the ship from whence it came.

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Aoba Tsuzaki transmits, "Is everyone really...?"

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Ascian Luddite transmits, "I'm sorry, miss Tsuzaki. I have to flee. Amenthes is not happy with me..."

<Radio: B - DC Tactical> Divada Kirador transmits, "Keep fighting as long as you feel the need to, Miss Tsuzaki. The Ark Hammer is here if you become disabled."

Ilyse Amsel knows more about space than 99 percent of scientists who study it.

She has been trying to get a functional teleport system without the use of metatron for years. She's close. But she can already do some tricks, and the one Ascian pulled is one of them. Her lips curl up in a grin. Yeah, she scanned that.

She also makes absolutely no attempt to follow him out or prevent his escape. In fact, Whipporwill actually discharges some of its standing charge by propelling Amenthes away faster, giving it a little boost; it's kind of an insulting push but Ilyse doesn't care. Maybe she thinks it's funny.

It's easy to underestimate Aoba. She's just a teenage girl, and a pretty scrawny one at that. She's failed all manner of Newtype and Psychodriver tests, but there's definitely -something- there to her. Moribito-02 also looks simple enough... but there's potential in it that not even Aoba knows yet. Maybe in time she'll learn everything it can do... but for now, it's strong enough to protect her and those she cares about. That's all she can ask of it.

Rebound Fall is one of those special skills that Moribito can pull off, though the results aren't always quite so impressive as this. Still, Aoba looks rather proud of her Jinki as she sees the aftermath of the blast. She's even ready to press the attack, to close the distance once more... and then the frequency opens again. "Huh? Really?" Blue eyes blink several times... and the girl gives a quick nod. "It was a good fight. And your robot is really cool! Bu--hey!" Both arms come up, and the shield absorbs most of the bullets, though a few strike the Jinki's torso. "I'm not stupid or anything!" If it was just him left, she might have tried to keep fighting. But with so much of the defending force still in fighting condition, Aoba knows better. Shifting slightly in her pilot harness, the girl leans back, and Moribito begins to float backwards away from the battlefield. It isn't until she's safely out of firing range that she turns her Jinki around and activates its thrusters.

"It seems Miss Tsuzaki is leaving the battlefield, My lady." Miranda says calmly. "Very well. Perhaps it is for the best that we do not get this warship. SOmething tells me it would be used for conquest otherwise." Divada says rather calmly. "Comms. Open a line to the opposition." "Yes, My lady." A few seconds later, all of the opposing mechs would get a comm channel open. Answering it gets them a woman's voice in their speakers. "You have fought well, A-laws. Victory is yours. Especially you, Paptimus Scirocco. You, along with Miss Mitsurugi, have fought well. We shall recover our wounded and leave. However, if you feel the need to stand guard, We will not blame you." It's quite a while before the Ark hammer's dropships return to the hangar of the Battlecruiser, and as the female voice said, they leave peacefully. Perhaps not all Divine Crusaders are insane as hell? Who knows.